Tomb Radier: Sacred Artifacts #4 is written by Casey Gilly and published by Dark Horse. Artwork is by Antonio Di Caprio, colours by Eren Angiolini and letters by Andworld Design. Main cover art (left) is by Di Caprio.
Tomb Raider: Sacred Artifacts #4 is available from today, in comic book stores and on digital platforms where all good comic books are sold. Grab your physical copy from Forbidden Planet or digitally from Amazon Comixology UK.
Synopsis
It’s the final showdown! Lara and Anna have stumbled right into the Postulant’s monstrous hands. Outgunned and outmanned, Lara may have finally met her match! Connections to the past are revealed and myth becomes manifest in the thrilling finale to Tomb Raider: Sacred Artifacts!
Review
It’s hard to believe but today is finale day for Casey Gilly’s fun Tomb Raider: Sacred Artifacts adventure. After leaving Lara in the belly of the beast at the conclusion of last month’s issue, it’s time for bluffs and double bluffs as Gilly navigates the series to a rewarding conclusion. Will Lara get away from The Postulant in time to save the day? Will find out pretty quickly actually!
Now I’ve had my suspicions for most of the last four months about “Anna”. Some of them have certainly made their way into my previous reviews. But as Sacred Artifacts has hurtled onwards each month I’ve yo-yoed back and forth on my feelings towards her potential double-cross of Lara. So it wasn’t at all surprising to me that on page one of this month’s finale we see Anna pulling a gun. For a brief moment Gilly had me fooled this was the final twist. I should have known better…
The stroke of genius here is that Gilly paints Anna the classic Tomb Raider double-cross. She’s the perfect candidate for a friend to Lara, particularly for having arrived as Lara struggles with her identity as a Croft. Anna presented the perfect antithesis to how Lara was feeling. So to have her then turn out to be the villain fits perfectly in the mould of classic characters from the games. This final issue makes plenty of room for Anna to monologue her villainous history, tying the character back to the events of Tomb Raider 2 which have informed so much of Sacred Artifact’s story. It’s genius. But it’s also not Gilly’s master plan.
For the first half of this final issue we’re entirely under Gilly’s spell, following Anna’s evil machinations towards what seems like a bleak outcome for our hero. Again all of the classic Tomb Raider tropes are presented to us one after the other. Anna has ties to The Postulant, there’s supernatural elements which find one of the minions turning into a giant two-headed wolf creature. The stakes just continue to escalate until it feels like there’s no turning back. But this is when things take a turn, the truths are revealed and finally we understand that all is not what it seems. What we thought was the huge drop on the rollercoaster was in fact but the tip of its final peak. When Gilly drops us at full speed Sacred Artifacts really hurtles into its including moments.
I wouldn’t have argued with adding a couple of extra pages to the runtime of this finale to allow for a little more wrap up. But I sincerely hope the fact Sacred Artifacts doesn’t fully bring Lara’s lack of belonging to a close is a sign that there’s more to come. Gilly and Di Caprio work in a brilliant visual nod to the fanbase in the closing pages which has to be sowing the seeds for future storytelling. It nods towards Lara perhaps finding her people whilst visually showing us she’s begun taking those steps. But there is room for so much more.
Verdict
Tomb Raider: Sacred Artifacts has been a consistent hit for me each month and this finale cements that. It plays with franchise tropes, lulling us into a false sense of security before breaking with convention. Gilly wraps up Lara’s adventure neatly, giving enough time to touch on some of the book’s wider themes whilst leaving plenty of room to come back for more… hopefully… please Dark Horse!
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