First up, the graphic novel. It’s titled Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials: The Official Graphic Novel Prelude, which doesn’t really roll off the tongue. Can you even use two colons like that? Regardless, it was promised to solve some of the franchise’s biggest mysteries; so I ordered one.
The novel includes five short stories, two of which are not new. “Run Alone,” a story about Minho’s time in the maze pre-Thomas, and “My Friend George,” the tale of Alby’s first days in the maze, were included with the blu-ray version of the first movie.
Of the three remaining stories, “The True Maze” was the coolest. <– Ice pun … you’ll get it in a minute. The story explores the second maze that was alluded to in the novels, but never detailed. This maze was populated entirely by girls, at least until the very end, who were terrorized by dragons called Shades. On top of all that, their maze is completely frozen and laid out vertically. The ‘Icers’ must escape by climbing and ice skating.
The next story is “Scorched” and introduces two new characters, Brenda and Jorge, as well as the concept of zombies. Honestly, I wasn’t that interested in this one. It was a little too zombie cliché for my tastes. One of the characters even used a leashed zombie as a guard dog via Walking Dead season 3.
The final story, “Wicked,” is the only true prequel in my eyes and by far contains the most spoilers. It starts post Flare (unknown cataclysmic event), but pre Scorch (zombie apocalypse). We’re told humanity will not survive without taking drastic measures and 30% of the world’s population needs to be eliminated. A new character, Dr. Mary Cooper, begrudgingly creates a virus. As you can imagine, releasing an airborne virus in order to commit mass genocide doesn’t end well.
In an effort to course correct, the government begins experimenting on children who are immune to the virus. Cue the maze trials. All of which culminate in a showdown between Dr. Cooper and the nefarious Ava Paige.
I can’t tell you the ending, but I will say that I looked like this.
Moving on to the next geekiest thing Maze Runner has turned out recently … a trailer reformatted entirely like a Minecraft adventure.
To be honest, I know nothing about Minecraft other than it is extremely popular with my daughter’s 2nd grade classmates. Google tells me the game is trendy with all ages, though, so this might be a brilliant move by 20th Century Fox.
Am I the only 32-year-old woman who still loves reading comic books? Do you want to see the ‘Icers’ story evolve into a movie too? Give me a shout in the comments section!
