Astro City Returns to Reflect on Its History... and Hint at Its Future
In the new special one-shot issue Astro City: That Was Then..., writer Kurt Busiek and artist Brent Eric Anderson return to the world of Astro City to explore the series' past and look forward to what lies ahead. With the last issue being published in 2018, this marks a new beginning for the long-running series that has previously won multiple Eisner and Harvey awards. Having started at Image Comics in 1995, Astro City was then published by Homage Comics, Wildstorm, Vertigo, and is now finally back with Image Comics.
Astro City is an anthology series that explores not only the lives of superheroes in the titular city, but also how their exploits impact regular people on the ground. It is famous for playing with and subverting common tropes from superhero stories. This new story takes a step back into the past, following a group of sidekicks that have decided to set out on a road trip across the United States to try and figure out how to progress beyond their childhoods. The trip follows the death of a team of other young heroes known as the Jayhawks, prompting the surviving ones to reevaluate how they live their lives. Concerns about college, the commitment to superheroics, and simply getting older hound their thoughts as they sit around the campfire.
Related: Astro City Asks, What if Superman Never Stopped Helping?
The plight of the protagonists is shared by Astro City itself, as it leaves behind the death of its former publisher, Vertigo. Under Image Comics, the series is set to continue with new stories. In the back pages of the issue, Busiek mentions work on a new graphic novel as well as new collected editions of previous issues such as the first Astro City MetroBook, a collection of the first 19 issues that is
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