Review by C.J. Bunce
French illustrator, painter, and comics creator Jean-Marc Rochette is best known internationally for illustrating Snowpiercer, the dystopic adventure merging theories from Plato with the impact of climate change. Best his best work has only just arrived. The Last Queen available now here at Amazon from Self Made Hero, is a landmark work for the comics medium. How many graphic novels have you read that are truly impactful, truly life changing? Part historical novel about the horrors of war (and even worse horrors of humanity that come in its wake), about life and spirit and survival beyond the temporal plain, the rare people one experiences who actually change the world for the better, and the unfortunate imbalance between the evils of man and nature, Rochette has created a story that sticks, populated with some of his best use of color, symbolism, and detail.
In short, The Last Queen is a must for next year’s Eisner Awards, and the kind of story that should merit humanitarian awards at all levels. There is a reason French art stands out in fine art, pop art, and cinema. You can see it in the works of Moebius, Catel Muller, Guilhem, Jean-Claude Forest, Claude Mézières, writers like Pierre Boileau and Thomas Narcejac, a tradition of filmmakers from Georges Méliès to Luc Besson, and in the works of fine artists Rodin, Monet, and Renoir. In his story Rochette makes the reader reflect, stand in judgment of himself or herself. But in his visual storytelling he entrances us all, pulling us into dark places as he seeks out the barest of snippets of beauty in humanity.
The story is a work of fiction, but in 240 pages you will believe it all happened. Rochette follows Édouard Roux, a veteran of World War I whose face is left massively disfigured in the war. He hails from a village that has protected majestic bears going back to ancient times, through the Middle Ages and beyond, history we learn through the writer-artist’s swift and seamless insertions of backstory. Despondent and nearly at his end, this brave soldier left discarded by society learns of a woman named Jeanne Sauvage, a unique artist known for creating new faces for men like Roux, using the latest tools and methods. She indeed works her artistry and the two fall in love. Their love is deeper than their contemporaries. Their characters well beyond their banal contemporaries.
This work is a stack of struggles built on the backs of loss and hopelessness. Which makes the glimmer Rochette shares that much more poignant and necessary. The preview images from the publisher don’t do the book justice.
Roux is heroic and sympathetic. Sauvage is inspiring and wonderful.
The Last Queen is an achievement in sequential storytelling. If you’ve only considered American comics, make a change and take a look at this master work. Pick up The Last Queen from publisher Self Made Hero now at Elite Comics, your local comic shop, or here at Amazon.
