
The Last Days of an Immortal
Written by Fabien Vehlmann. Art by Gwen de Bonneval.
In a future of extended life, a mediator confronts the limits of understanding other minds.
Overview
Fabien Vehlmann wrote and Gwen de Bonneval drew Les Derniers Jours d'un immortel, published by Futuropolis in 2010. Its imagined society includes long-lived people and a discipline concerned with the psychology of nonhuman species.
The story follows encounters across profound differences in experience. Immortality expands the time available for a life without making empathy or judgment simple.
Why It Matters
The book favors philosophical investigation over action-driven spectacle. Its future is interesting because ordinary social concepts become unstable when lifespans and forms of consciousness differ.
It treats communication as a demanding ethical task. Knowing more about another being can still leave the question of how to live alongside it unresolved.
The Science Fiction
Extended life changes the scale of memory and attachment. A mind that has lived for centuries may face loss, conflict, and responsibility differently from a short-lived one.
The study of alien or nonhuman psychology extends this inquiry beyond humanity. The comic asks whether shared moral rules can survive radically different perceptions of time.
Art & Visual Identity
De Bonneval's clear figures and measured pages give abstract conversations room to breathe. The restraint fits a story driven by thought rather than hardware.
The visual calm can make unfamiliar beings and settings more unsettling. Difference emerges through composition and interaction rather than spectacle alone.
Read This If You Like
- Philosophical science fiction
- Immortality and memory
- Alien psychology
- Quiet European graphic novels