Choosing The Right World In Life Is Strange #4
by Josh Davison
[*Mild Spoilers Ahead!]
Max Caulfield finds herself in some sort of in-between realm where she sees glimpses of various worlds with herself and Chloe. Max eventually returns to the world she knows, and she tells Chloe about what she experienced before the two young women have a heart-to-heart about all of this. Max finally decides that she and Chloe need to do something fun, but Chloe knows that this means Max is planning on doing something drastic. Finally, the day of Nathan Prescott’s memorial comes, and the future of Max and Chloe is decided.
Life is Strange #4 brings the first arc of the series to an end. Max learns the possible source of her recent problems with her powers, and she takes a drastic step in the hopes that she can fix things for good.
Like much of the first season of the game, much of the conflict of this issue revolves around whether Max can stay with Chloe and if she even should.
It also leans heavily into the “butterfly effect” aspect of the story, like many story-based videogames of this sort (see also Until Dawn), and it also dips into multiverse theory–so I choose to believe that Life is Strange is a part of the DC Expanded Universe.
Joking aside, Life is Strange #4 is another very emotional issue, and the comic is a wonderful finale to this first arc. The story’s notoriously sad emotional gut-punch moments has you expecting the worst, and you know full well this could all end in heartbreak.
Claudia Leonardi finishes the arc on a visual strong note too. The depiction of what Max calls the “Transect” is interesting and unique. The characters are expressive and look exactly as Max and Chloe should. Andrea Izzo’s color work is vibrant and pops off the page well.
Life is Strange #4 is a wonderful and emotionally resonant finale to the first comic book arc of this series. Max and Chloe are as compelling and touching as ever, and Leonardi and Izzo make sure that the comic looks as beautiful as it reads. This one gets a recommendation. Give it a read.
Life is Strange #4 comes to us from writer Emma Vieceli, artist and cover artist Claudia Leonardi, color artist Andrea Izzo, letterers Richard Starkings and Comicraft’s Jimmy Betancourt, and variant cover artist AJ.
