The angst, ennui, and malaise of the queer apocalypse sublimated to the equally ravishing graphic novel.
A gay couple flees the city from the impending apocalypse. They meet another artist on the way. Their clashing relationships, emotions, ideologies, hopes, and plans all transform unpredictably at the twilight of the human race. Jaakko Pallasvuo tells the convoluted and beautiful drama in the face of oblivion with stunning colors and visual and literal innovations in the way that are only possible in contemporary comics.
Jaakko Pallasvuo has a gift for rendering the anxiety of contemporary life with complicated sincerity. He blends art-world satire and queer tragedy with a cosmic sensibility that can ruminate on ecological deep time and crack absurdist jokes on the same page. Retreat is his most accomplished comic to date: an ambitious, fully-realized post-apocalypse narrative in lush, impressionistic watercolour. Like everything he makes, I adore it. — Saelan Twerdy
