I'm sorry, I realize that is such a loaded question, because there's no one thing that you can throw out there that can answer it. Now, I liken a good story to a salad. I know that that's kind of a weird analogy but stick with me on this...
When you're making a salad you need good, fresh ingredients. You don't want wilted lettuce or mealy tomatoes, because everything you put into that salad needs to stand well enough on it's own. While at the same time, it needs to work well with everything else that it's being mixed with. Otherwise it's going to negatively affect the whole pallet and bring down everything else with it.
But for a more concise and to the point answer to that question I could just say, read Y: The Last Man.
What makes Y: The Last Man a good story? Well, I could say at it's heart, Y is the perennial coming of age story. I could also say Y is the typical heroes quest tale. However both of those answers are too broad for a book like The Last Man. So instead I present you with this, Y: The Last Man is a story about a boy and his monkey who just happen to be the last two males left alive on the planet.
When Y opens, we're introduced to Yorick Brown, a down on his luck 20-something escape artist living in New York City and his adopted helper monkey, Ampersand. As we should with all good comic books, we learn something new as Yorick talks on the phone with his transcontinental girlfriend, Beth:
Elvis had a twin brother.
Their following conversation segues into a discussion about destiny and ultimately, an event that kills every living creature with a Y-chromosome. Except of course Yorick and Ampersand.
For the next 59 issues writer Brian K. Vaughan weaves a fantastic yarn as Yorick attempts to trot the globe to reach Beth in Australia. Vaughan deftly handles drama with bits of dark comedy intermittent throughout, as the extremely likable and sadly relatable Yorick stumbles his way through a world where half the population died in an instant. I say sadly relatable of course, because any nerd worth his weight in carbonite will see flashes of themselves in the books main protagonist.
Vaughan, who really broke into the mainstream with this book after runs on DC/Vertigo's Swamp Thing and Marvel's The Hood, creates a wealth of characters who never get overshadowed by the unbelievable events that surround them. Which is no small feat, when considering that 95% of the books cast is female in a medium dominated by male creators, characters and readers.
But it's often said that behind every strong man is a stronger woman, and Yorick isn't alone on his trek across the world. He's joined by Agent 355, his bodyguard and member of the Culper Ring (a secretive US Government agency) and Dr. Allison Mann a world-renowned geneticist searching for the cause of the plague and how Yorick and Ampersand survived. Also following Yorick on his quest are his sister Hero, who has joined the Daughters of the Amazon (a dangerous group bent on eradicating every remnant of the patriarchal society that once was, including Yorick), and leader of an Israeli commando unit, Alter who is also attempting to capture Yorick. Also along the way, is a cast of memorable supporting characters, each one very different in their interactions with Yorick than the last was.
But much like Yorick being guided 355 and Allison, is Vaughan's creative partner on the book, Pia Guerra, focusing BKV on the path ahead. Juggling a huge cast of characters is no small task, and Guerra manages to give each one a distinctive look and personality while at the same time pulling off something rarely seen in comics: having the characters age. Although subtle, going back and forth through issues reveals that overtime 'Rick and crew do become more weathered for the journey, and this effect is done surprisingly well.
Together Vaughan and Guerra tell a tale that can be funny and uplifting and at other times dramatic and heart-breaking. But more importantly they tell a story that has something to draw in everybody, and that each reader can connect to differently. It's the book that reads like a salad.
And at the very least you're presented with a fun question to ask people, did you know Elvis had a twin brother?
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