Starlight #5 (Image)

writer: Mark Millar
artist: Goran Parlov

via Image Comics

The penultimate issue of the series already?  I guess I'd allowed myself to believe it was going to be a longer journey, probably because it reminds me so much of Saga, and that's a series that's going to be hitting twenty-five issues when it comes back from hiatus early next year.  I fell pretty heavy for Starlight early in the year.  Its release schedule hasn't been strictly monthly, which is why far more than six months passed from the first to sixth issues.  

Mark Millar has reached a point where, I guess, it's assumed fans will find his work on their own.  He gets to do pretty much what he wants and he's guaranteed to get attention, although he's no longer quite at the vanguard like he was during the height of Kick-Ass's success.  That's allowed Starlight to fall through the cracks, and subsequently difficult for my local comics shop to stay on top of it like it should.  (Smallish sales means questionable availability.)  This issue was released in August but I didn't catch it until October, which is the same month the final issue was released, and I haven't seen that yet, which means the lag time Comics Reader always has even when I've actually read something is more real than usual.  

Duke McQueen by this point is fully committed to being the hero once again, and at the end of the issue is about to reach the moment his supporters have been waiting for, even though it's come at their own expense.  It's the story beat where the bad guys seem to have won, all the supporting good guys look like they've all but bought the farm, and the lead has had to overcome one last obstacle before he can accomplish his ultimate goal.

While there's some emotional heft to watching Space-Boy's parents, in flashback, buy the farm, with the increasing disconnect between Duke's Earth-bound past that served as my personal hook for the series, it's the adventure itself that needed to carry the weight for the issue.  Hopefully the final installment brings everything full circle, because that's still my favorite element of the story, the one that Millar most needs to nail in order to call this one a full success.