By Gabe Gonzalez — Look, I’ve been a fan of writer David Pepose’s work since the first issue of his Calvin and Hobbes homage, Spencer and Locke, hit the shelves of my local comic shop. I buy and read every comic that Pepose and his collaborators make, appreciating as I do his uncanny knack for telling stories that take familiar concepts and get to the heart of what makes them personal. His newest book is Scout’s Honor #1, out this week from Aftershock Comics, and I’m happy to report that it feels like a welcome extension of his work to date.

Scout’s Honor #1 follows a post-apocalyptic world, wherein boys and men are fighting to survive a radioactive wastelands with the help of a guide, a beacon amid the chaos that is guiding them after they’ve spent generations in bunkers under the ground — an old Ranger Scout manual. Yes, the rules that guide the Boy Scouts of America are now the rules that give shape to society. The manual has essentially become a Bible, a foundation for survival within a world of cartoonishly-large mutant pigs and masked gangs lurking in the crevices of a destroyed world.

Beware SPOILERS here, but the lens through which we experience all of this is by following a young woman named Kit, who uses a chest binder to appear as a boy, thereby avoiding being put into the stereotypical gender roles for women that the Ranger Scout ethos has embraced. Within the world-building required to both destroy the earth and establish the scout manual as a framework, Scout’s Honor #1 is filled with action and mayhem, with scout’s fighting gamma-infused boars as they earn accolades ranging from Tactical driving Merit Badges to Explosive Merit Badges. Our hero Kit performs feats associated with those names, like hot-wiring or using grenades.

Making it all more complex is the presence of Doctor Jefferson Hancock, looming over it all through a statue of himself holding Scout Laws in a pose that evokes Moses holding the twin stone tablets bearing the Ten Commandments. This all contributes to a very intriguing conflict: Kit is fighting to prove herself and her worth among men and brainwashed boys who think that the women should, “keep the torch of civilization burning at home.”

The art and lettering in the book are by Luca Casalanguida, Matt Milla, and Carlos M. Mangual, and their work is fantastic. Scout’s Honor #1 comes to life well, depicting the sickly lime-green eyes of a radioactive boar or the costumed gangs in the Colorado Badlands. This is an apocalyptic world, yet it’s also one that brims with color rather than dull greys, blacks, or harsh browns. The action here feels frantic, the worry and fear real. The characters are also not your standard action-hero fare but rather their own people with visual character choices that feel effective and intentional. The creative team crafts a fantastic and memorable world through strong design and solid character dynamics. Mangual’s lettering is fantastic, too, laying down scratchy lettering as characters talk through gas masks and onomatopoeias that sometimes look like they’re flying off the page.

As this book relates, it’s impossible to tell what the future may hold, but if the future of this book is as strong as this first issue, this will continue to be a season the requires readers to be prepared.

Overall: A fantastic creative team brings to life an interesting and rich vision for a post-apocalypse guided by an old Ranger Scout manual — for better or worse. It’s a first issue that will get its hooks in readers, inspiring them to add it to their pull. 9.8/10

REVIEW: Scout’s Honor #1

Scout’s Honor #1
Writer: David Pepose
Artist: Luca Casalanguida
Colorist: Matt Milla
Letterer: Carlos M. Mangual
Publisher: Aftershock Comics
Years after a nuclear apocalypse, a new society has risen from the ashes...and their bible is an old Ranger Scout manual. A young Ranger Scout named Kit has endured the harsh survivalist upbringing needed to con-quer the irradiated Colorado Badlands. But after discovering a terrible secret once lost to histo-ry, Kit must risk everything on a dangerous quest to uncover the truth behind the Ranger Scouts' doctrine.
Price: $4.99
Release Date: January 6, 2021
Read It Digitally: Scout’s Honor #1

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Gabe Gonzalez