Rainbow Rowell and Kris Anka’s beloved Runaways series ended recently and it’s now available in the trade paperback format. Collected in Come Away With Me is Runaways #32-38 with the extra-sized finale, plenty of resolutions, surprise superhero sightings, and young adulthood on full display. It’s a collection that reads like Rowell knew the story would come to a close and yet manages to make every interaction genuine and real.
The first issue in this collection was released nearly a year ago after suffering delays due to the pandemic. Utilizing a smash cut, Rowell reveals how things have changed and you can practically hear the record scratch preceding the “you’re probably wondering how we got here” narration. Natacha Bustos draws the issue to perfection with long stretches with no dialogue at all. Just vibes. The team is going through some tough times and even Gib makes a major change.
Things go from bad to worse when Wolverine and Pixie show up seemingly to kidnap Molly, only it turns out they were led to believe Molly wanted to be shuttled to Krakoa. This leads to a team-up that’s fun, filled with monsters, and well-drawn by Andres Genolet. Along the way, characters are forced to come to grips with their powers, their identity and who they love.
Some relationships seem to meet a natural place by the end.
Credit: Marvel
Genolet is joined by Adrian Alphona and Kris Anka on the final issue, which features a heavy dose of time travel, a few twists and turns, and some empowering moments of characters letting go. It all ends with some tasty cliffhangers, but this final issue still feels rather final. These characters feel a bit more grown-up than when we started with them and there’s some hard thinking for some before the next big adventure.
The time travel elements do end up acting as a quick bandaid being torn clean off quickly to resolve things, but it certainly gets the job done. Rowell gets to close the door so to speak on these characters’ journeys and current state while leaving the door ajar for future tales.
The book may suffer a bit from coming to a kind of conclusion with so many characters and so many character dynamics in play, but Rowell and her collaborators do well enough to make this feel like a finale. Given the delays this story arc has suffered, it does what it needs to in order to say goodbye.
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