Ralph Azham, Vol. 4: The Dying Flame by Lewis Trondheim

This is the end: the concluding three albums of the "Ralph Azham" series, the final quarter of the story. It's just as knotty and complicated as the first nine, set in the same world of "blueys" who have specific magical talents themselves and a bewildering array of artifacts that also have very particular powers - individually, and in particular configurations, and when used by a bluey with the right powers.

Lewis Trondheim has always been a creator who delights in complication. I wonder if he has a notebook, or a chart on some wall, with all sixteen of those artifacts and how they interact, listing the powers of all of the blueys he's introduced, with scrawled notes at the bottom about the even greater complications he didn't quite get to. Or maybe he just all keeps it in his head.

The Dying Flame is the fourth omnibus of Ralph's adventures. It completes the story that ran through Black Are the Stars and The Land of the Blue Demons and You Can't Stop a River. Ralph started off as a teen, with an magical gift uncomfortable to his fellow villagers, deep in the hinterlands of the fantasy kingdom of Astolia. Now he's the Superintendent, right-hand to the King - after once leading an attempt to assassinate that ancient bluey king, and maybe not having completely given up on that aim - and also the official Chosen One.

There have been a lot of Chosen Ones. Every bluey is Chosen - and there seem to be at least dozens of blueys, each with a couple of quirky, potentially deadly, possibly destabilizing powers. There's a few more every year, after another conjunction of the moons. Blueys also develop additional powers over time - they're not stable. The old regime, when Ralph was young, used to carefully take the young blueys away and kill them - and as blueys now proliferate and squabble, some of those around Ralph can see the cruel wisdom in that. 

Ralph Azham is a story essentially about power, both political and personal. About how you can grab it, and kill for it - and go to great lengths to do things you believe are absolutely justified and right - and still not be happy, or secure, since there's someone else just as justified and committed to getting rid of you.

Ralph has wanted off that wheel for a while; it came up a lot in the third omnibus, and it's dominant here. He's cranky, unhappy, and it comes out every time he talks. He takes crazy risks - maybe because he hopes something will kill him, maybe just to feel that thrill of pure action and clear direction. We think he has good intentions. In a world of murderous factions and cutthroat politics, he's hugely more willing to not kill his enemies than is standard...or maybe wise.

This is the end. This is how it finally gets resolved, how Ralph gets a chance to get away - if he can just set everything else right, as far as he sees "right" - solve his and the kingdom's problems, and grab a moment to get away. But he has to solve those problems, face those enemies, and learn the last secrets of his world first.

This is a great fantasy series in comics form: it has most of the strengths of the Dungeon books Trondheim does with Joann Sfar plus the power of being a single, consistent, coherent story, planned from the beginning to have a real ending. And this is that ending.