Y: The Last Man
Vaughan and Guerra's Eisner-winning post-apocalyptic epic about Yorick Brown, the last man on Earth after a plague kills every male mammal on the planet.
đź“– Vertigo / DC Comics • Started 2002
Every man, every boy, every male mammal on Earth drops dead at the same moment — except one: Yorick Brown, an aspiring escape artist, and his capuchin monkey Ampersand.
Y: The Last Man is the sixty-issue post-apocalyptic landmark by Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra, published by Vertigo from 2002 to 2008. It’s a mystery, a road movie, and a meditation on gender and power all at once — the story of a world without men, and the last one left trying to find his girlfriend.
The Last Man on Earth
The premise is pure high-concept: an unexplained “gendercide” kills every mammal with a Y chromosome on the planet, from humans to zoo animals. Only Yorick — who was hiding in a bank vault practicing his escape-artist act at the exact moment of the plague — survives, along with his monkey. Agent 355 of the Culper Ring, an elite secret society, and Dr. Allison Mann, the geneticist who may hold the key to saving humanity, escort him across a shattered America toward a possible cure. What follows is a sprawling quest through a world remade by grief, where grief-stricken widows, new governments, and old conspiracies all have their own plans for the last man alive.
A Masterpiece With Teeth
Vaughan and Guerra built something that transcended its gimmick: a series equally comfortable with gut-punch tragedy, razor-sharp comedy, and genuinely shocking reveals. Guerra’s expressive, empathetic artwork — inked by Jose Marzan Jr. — made a cast of dozens feel lived-in, from secret agents to Amazon pirates to the President’s daughter. The series won three Eisner Awards, including Best Continuing Series in 2008, and was adapted into a live-action series for FX on Hulu in 2021.
Six decades of comics, one unforgettable premise, and an ending that still gets argued about in comic shops today. Pick up the Y: The Last Man Omnibus and see why this remains one of the definitive achievements of 2000s comics — the book that made Brian K. Vaughan and Pia Guerra household names.
