ThunderCats: Lost #10 // Review
Scorpius has the cats. He’s ready to spring on them. He’s not exactly in the best position, though. He’s outnumbered by the small armada of ships that are entering the planet’s atmosphere. The order is given for Captain Shiner: kill anything that moves. That includes the cats AND Scorpius. There are quite a few other dangers lurking around the planet, though anything could happen in ThunderCats: Lost #10. Writer Ed Brisson and artist Rapha Lobosco conclude the latest chapter of the current saga with a group of fantasy/sci-fi action heroes who originated on animated syndication in the 1980s.
Neko, Pumyra and Lynx-O are surrounded by Scorpius and his soldiers. They’re some of the fiercest warriors from Thundera, but they’re completely outnumbered. Scorpius is in command. He leads a squad that could easily wipe them all out, but there’s something that he doesn’t know about Captain Shiner and the full reality of the situation. Things might be complicated for Scorpius, but that doesn’t make them any less dangerous for the cats. If they’re going to survive their current predicament, there’s going to have to be some kind of miracle to save them. Of course...they wouldn’t be heroes if there wasn’t some chance for survival.
Brisson throws more than a few curves into the final chapter of the current series. There are certain things that simply aren't done with this type of franchise. And given the fact that there are as many unwritten and unspoken rules regarding toy-based cel-animated franchises, it's not really that difficult to do something. That's truly shocking with this type of series. It's not that difficult to do something. That's that surprising either. Thankfully, Brisson knows exactly how to step over all of those the sacred lines that dictate the usual formula for this sort of thing. He's not just doing so he's doing so in a way that's compelling and fascinating.
The overall pacing of the story makes it kind of difficult to frame properly for page and panel. Lobosco hammers in the shock and awe in a way that feels compelling enough. Not all of it has the kind of precision that would make for a truly brilliant execution of the final chapter in this particular series. That being said, it all reaches the page with the kind of star brutality, and wonder that makes for some really entertaining action fantasy.
There's a major shift that's revealed at the end of the issue that feels both predictable and completely unexpected at the same time. Long-running action/fantasy sagas have explored just about every kind of twist and determined imaginable over the decades. It's pretty remarkable that Brisson’s next big ThunderCats series would have the kind of surprise fusion that he manage to reveal at issue’s end. And while it’s not exactly anything new, it’s always fun to see things mix narratively that way that Brisson and company are allowing them to mix with this particular series.
