Our heroes are almost at the end of the dungeon but there are still some bosses to overcome. Find out if the players can survive in Die #19 by Image Comics!

DIE #19

Writer: Kieron Gillen
Artist: Stephanie Hans
Colorist: Stephanie Hans
Letterer: Clayton Cowles
Editor: Chrissy Williams
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: August 25th, 2021 

Previously in Die:  A group of teenagers were stuck in a tabletop game for two years. As adults they have been forced to return. Dealing with their own trauma, they head to the center of Die to try and save Earth. But each person has their own hurdles to go through. Matt needs to overcome his grief and anger, Angela has to manage her own daughter being a living corpse, and Ash must find herself.

OUT OF THE WARDROBE

Die #19 places the party against their next obstacle in this dungeon: a manifestation of Ash’s repression. Matt’s first instinct is to attack but he is quickly overpowered and loses his anger weapon. Izzy has to make a deal to heal Matt and in return she can’t make any more deals for the rest of this quest. Ash comes to terms with her repression, that sometimes in reality she wants to be a woman and playing this game allows her to be something that the world doesn’t see. Izzy mentions this as genderfluidity and Ash confronts her repression and both her and the monster fall to their demise.

The rest of the group continues forward, and Angela uses her last fey coin to summon a tracker dog. But she doesn’t have the coin to pay for the tracking feat. Chuck deceives the party and kills Molly, Angela’s undead daughter, to get a fey coin from the body. Molly will resurrect over time, but Angela is still upset. The party continues and Matt learns from his sword that Ash is still alive and rushes to help. The party, reunited, head to fight the final boss.

ACCEPTING ONESELF

It took me until Die #19 to realize that there is a theme of acceptance in the series. Every character loathes themselves in one way or another. When Ash had to approach her repression on her gender, when it came about it was like a breath of fresh air. Despite not focusing on this theme, it felt earned and you begin to realize how much Kieron set this up from the very beginning of this series. Normally when things like this happen, I feel a bit blindsided. Die earned this reveal and shed a light on a difficult topic with skill and finesse. Great work here.

Die is ending next issue, and I am unsure what will happen. Very few books have been able to keep me engaged this long. (Especially considering the publication schedules during Covid-19) But I applaud the artistry of Stephanie Hans skillfully bringing these characters to life and Kieron for telling a unique story. I love tabletop games and I picked this comic up because of that love. I stayed because it is an amazing comic book that I am going to remember for years to come.

BOTTOM LINE: MUST READ

Die is a must-read comic. It shows complex characters overcoming difficult things and tells a magnificent story. When you play a tabletop game, you want to shine a line of the player characters as they overcome the villain and I am excited to see how this concludes in the next issue. Die #19 is a 5 out of 5 from me.

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Die #19

100%

100%

Must-Read

Die #19 tells a story with a difficult theme with a skillful and respectful hand.

• Writing

  10
• Art

  10
• Coloring

  10
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