One Last Song

(Brain Scan, 2007)
™ and © 2007 CJ Hurtt and Shawn Richter

Brain Scan Studios’ One Last Song takes place in a dystopic America some 40 years in the future, where the War on Terror has never really ended despite a seeming lack of actual threats. In this America, all media outlets must obtain a “performance card” from the Department of Homeland Security in order to have a public voice, be they social institutions like a newspaper, or mere coffeehouse musicians. The latter gives this book its star in Amanda Casey, who, thanks to inside information from her ex-DHS friend Brian, writes subversive love songs that threaten to expose to government and its corrupt ways. Unbeknownst to Amanda, though, the government is actually on to her, and intends instead for her songs to keep people under control, as all good government-sanctioned entertainers should.

The future One Last Song paints is bleak, though perhaps not completely unrealistic given the current political climate of the United States, and the interesting artistic choices by creators CJ Hurtt and Shawn Richter, especially in the way of panel layout and scene juxtaposition (they like to cross-cut a lot), really sell the paranoia and general unease that make this book compelling.

— Eric Garneau

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Notes

Writer

Artist

#1

Cover Price: $2.95
5 copies available from $2.95

C.J. Hurtt

Shawn Richter