Review by Andy Williams

In a barren wasteland adjacent to a big city, lives Empress – a small child reduced to scrounging for scraps to survive. It’s a harsh environment where the threat of violence, both physical and sexual, is a daily occurrence. Apart from Empress no other characters are named, though some are known by titles such as “The Man” and “Soldier”. A few seem to want to protect her, others want to do her harm, but their underlying motives are mostly unclear. Empress manages to escape to the nearby city, but even as an adult, can’t emotionally connect with other people. Isolated and haunted by her abusive past, Empress seems destined to accept her fate.

Writer and artist Gilbert Hernandez has a clear but expressive cartoon style that often belies the morally ambiguous characters and serious situations that he depicts. Although his storytelling is strong, the characterisation is sparse and the art lacks detail in places. Hernandez always excels in creating a visually distinctive cast and never shies away from depicting varied ethnicities.

This is a disturbing parallel for a modern society where life is cheap and disposable. Empress embodies the dispossessed who struggle to rise above their traumatic experiences to live a peaceful existence. She remains stoic throughout, a mostly blank slate that, except for a single violent outburst, shows little to no emotion. The anonymous characters that Empress encounters are little more than cyphers; just as she fails to relate to them, the reader finds nothing to empathise with. Featuring disturbing episodes of child abuse, extreme violence and harrowing in places, this is a short but challenging read.