"The End" Week: Astro City #52!

I thought this issue was older, but it was only a year and a half ago: from 2018, Astro City #52, "And, In the End" Written by Kurt Busiek, art by Brent Anderson, cover by Alex Ross.

The last three issues of this volume of Astro City tied back to one of its best, and best-known, stories, "The Nearness of You," from Astro City #1/2. (Free to read on Comixology if you haven't already.) Michael Tenicek is being driven mad by recurring dreams of a woman he seemingly knows but can't remember. Nearing his limits, he receives help from an unexpected source: mystic hero-slash-mysterious force of nature, the Hanged Man. (Think a gloomier, more cryptic Spectre.) The Hanged Man tells Michael he's dreaming of his wife, Miranda; who was lost in a Crisis-like event. The timeline was altered just enough that her parents never met, and she was never born. But Michael still remembers. The Hanged Man offers to take his memory of her, but Michael declines.

Twenty years later, Michael still lived in Astro City, maintaining a survivors' group for superhuman incidents, and serving as a volunteer emergency responder. When the nature of his loss comes forward, some feel like it doesn't count: they lost spouses, friends, children; while Michael lost someone who was never there. But she was real to him. Michael also notices he hasn't had any bills for a few years--they've been getting paid somehow--and realizes he may not have moved on as much as he might have. Should he move on?

It might not look it, but this falls strongly in the hero-considers-quitting vein: must there be a Batman, or a Spider-Man, or a Michael Tenicek? Well, yes. It's a bit sad to realize full-on happiness is far out of Michael's reach, but there's still something, and sometimes that's the best you can hope for. The issue ends with a bit of a teaser for an upcoming graphic novel featuring the N-Forcer, an armored hero that I don't recall getting a lot of focus in the series before. It looks like a bit of a spin on an Iron Man-type, something Busiek had experience with; but it hasn't shown up on the schedule yet. Hopefully soon!