Comic book reviews for The Old Guard #4 and The Old Guard #5 by Greg Rucka and Leandro Fernandez
Average rating: 4/5 stars
The Old Guard #4 by Greg Rucka
Art: Leandro Fernandez
I’m a little disappointed in myself that I didn’t figure out Booker was working with Copley and Merrick. I liked how Nile worked it out. I like Andy, but I’m never sure how I feel about people who use age as an excuse about technology. You can learn it.
I’ve greatly enjoyed Nile’s integration into this book. She’s certainly supposed to be the stand-in for the reader, but she’s also just lighter than the other characters. Nile seems to be the one that Rucka knows the best.
Daniela Miwa’s colors were fantastic and pushed forward this issue a lot for me.
Nile’s surprise at Andy’s “collections” were pretty great. Andy’s story about Achilles was wonderful. It gives us more flavor to who she is. More context about how she does try or has tried to have human connections. In her lifetime, her relationship with Achilles was recent.
Merrick certainly seems like a mix of everything that the entire group worries about when it comes to medical and science experiments being done on them.
The Old Guard #5 by Greg Rucka
Art: Leandro Fernandez
This book wraps up with more heart than it started off. It’s not that I doubted Rucka would make a compelling story, but I’m trying to be more deliberate about my time (especially as I get older) and I’m not in for those recommendations of “but the show gets really great 10 episodes in!”
Eventually, all our characters have a lot of heart. Well, Booker may be a little astray in his, or too desperate to die. Andy has someone young to train (and to train her). Nicky and Joe still have each other. Booker gets isolated from the group. A harrowing punishment for someone whose lack of connection with life led him on his path of betrayal.
I love how Andy claims she doesn’t remember how old she is, except that she actually knows her exact age. That’s a kind of precision I love in a character.
Nile does seem a little too comfortable with the major change in her life existence. While this book doesn’t have much time to sort out how she’s actually going to interact (or not interact) with her family or anything beyond showing her that she cannot let anyone know about her immortality. Lesson learned.
Also, Nile’s not embedded enough with them to make a decision about what to do with Booker.
As this ended stronger than it started, if there are more stories here, I may be more inclined to read it. We’ll see what happens.