Saga #51

Previously in Saga #50

I knew things were too good to be true in the last issue, and predicted something terrible would happen in this issue. Unfortunately, I was right.

Saga never shies away from reminding us that there are many casualties in war. Sometimes that means losing a beloved charter and sometimes it means watching a child’s innocence slip away. This issue, we got both.

Squire is having nightmares about… well, everything. He wants to go home to pay respects at his mother’s tomb, but Prince Robot IV explains that even with their new identities, they won’t be welcome in the Robot Kingdom. This poor kid hasn’t had an opportunity to know his old life — his family, his roots, etc. — and now he’s being asked to don a new. It’s too much for him to process and he still secretly makes plans to run away.

As Upsher secures the deal to move Petrichor, Prince Robot IV, and Squire into protection, Doff spends time at the beach with Hazel and Ghüs. He makes the fateful decision to go off alone with the hopes of getting a photograph of a rare creature. Instead he runs into Ianthe and her prisoner, The Will. The latter of which makes it clear that whether or not Doff tells her what she wants to know — the location of Marko and family — Ianthe will kill him. Doff makes the decision to go out fighting.

So many people have died trying to protect Hazel and her parents, but this one truly hurts. Doff and Upsher have journalistic integrity that is currently sorely lacking in the real world. They were also another representation of an LGBTQ relationship in comic books, something lacking in mainstream entertainment still.

The only positive to come out of this encounter is that The Will escaped; although, that may not be good news for Prince Robot IV should the two cross paths.