Revisitor is a regular column in which I look back on personal favorites from comic history, whether they’re a single issue, graphic novel, comic strip, webcomic or basically any form of sequential art you can think of. When I do this, my hope is to include perspective from the people who made these comics. That may not always happen. The good news is, it did this time.

Y the Last Man holds a special place in my heart, and for a good, perhaps unexpected reason. While this Vertigo title’s quality is undeniable, with writer Brian K. Vaughan, artist Pia Guerra, inker Jose Marzan Jr., colorist Zylonol Studios, and letterer Clem Robins crafting a classic over its 60 issue run, my connection to it is a personal one.

Back when I was in high school, I had stopped reading comics completely. I had no intent to ever return, either. This lasted for several years, until a summer break from college when my mom told me something that proved to be rather consequential. She said that of all the things I had ever done, the only thing she felt ashamed about was that I stopped reading comics. She believed I truly loved comics, and that I gave up on them because I was worried about what others might think. With that in mind, she made me an offer: she’d take me to Bosco’s — my local comic book shop — and would buy me a comic to see if I still enjoyed them. I agreed, of course.

When we went there, I told a clerk my story. In response, he asked what my favorite comic was. That was easy. Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s Preacher, and I told him all the things I enjoyed about it. The clerk thought to himself for a second, and then asked me another question.

“Have you ever heard of Y the Last Man?”

That moment set me on the path to where I am now. I bought 14 the recently released first trade paperback of that series, and in the process of reading it, I realized that my mom was in fact correct: I loved comics.

To some degree, you can figure out what happened next. I was all in once again. I’m a pretty big fan of comics these days, and a rather enthusiastic reader of them. But one thing is certain. I wouldn’t be writing this, or anything on SKTCHD, without Y the Last Man.

While the series was an incredible one loaded with unforgettable characters, whether you’re talking series lead Yorick Brown, the unimpeachably great Agent 355, geneticist Dr. Allison Mann, or any number of others, my favorite is undoubtedly Ampersand. My guy Amp was Yorick’s pet Capuchin monkey, 15 but that’s understating it. They were best friends, a pair whose bond was forged by their inexplicable survival during the sudden devastation of every living mammal on Earth with a Y chromosome — besides them.

Throughout the series, you know Yorick would do anything for Ampersand, his brother in survival. We know this, both through his actions and his words. We get a lot of Yorick’s perspective. To be honest, the guy loves to talk. It’s quite clear where he stands. But for Amp, it’s a bit more difficult. A mammal that lacks the ability to communicate is rarely the best at sharing their true thoughts and feelings.

That’s what makes Y the Last Man #42 so special. This issue is called “1,000 Typewriters,” a nod in the direction of Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and its own reference of the Infinite Monkey Theorem, which suggests that an infinite number of monkeys typing randomly on a similarly infinite number of typewriters will eventually write out the complete works of William Shakespeare. 16 You can call it that, but I often simply describe it as “The Ampersand Issue.” After all, it’s the one that tells Ampersand’s story, walking us through his time before he made it to Yorick, the journey so far, and what he’s been up to since he was abducted by Toyota, a Japanese assassin, 11 issues previous.

It is maybe the most unique issue of the entire run, and one I never expected to get as a reader. More than that, it is one of my favorite single issues ever. Its singular focus on Ampersand is at the core of why both of those things are true.

An issue centered on a non-verbal 17 animal is a challenging idea, both for creatives and readers. That brings up something else unique about it. Y the Last Man #42 finds artist Goran Sudžuka providing pencils rather than Guerra. Sudžuka was the most common fill-in artist in the series, working on 12 of its 60 issues, typically in two to four issue chunks. While having Marzan Jr. and Zylonol as constants ensured the artist meshed well with what preceded him, Sudžuka told me he believed he was chosen as a fill-in for Guerra “because our artistic approaches (were) already similar enough.” At no point was he asked to “adapt or change” his style, because he was a naturally snug fit for Y. That’s something Vaughan agreed with. The writer emphasized that Sudžuka always impressed because he “contains multitudes,” something that jived well with the book and this issue in specific.

“(Goran’s) very funny, but also extremely dark; has a huge imagination, but still knows how to make a story feel grounded and real; is a master of quiet character work, but also of explosive violence,” Vaughan told me. “I was always excited to experiment during our collaborations, and that Ampersand issue was definitely a bit of a flyer. Expanding the audience’s understanding of a monkey — without overly anthropomorphizing or otherwise betraying the tone of the book — was a challenge, but Goran obviously knocked it out of the park.” 18