In this review of Blade Runner Black Lotus: Las Vegas #1, the hunt for the Black Lotus is on as Wallace Corps recruits one Officer Davis to help track her. Meanwhile, their target is intent on 1) not getting caught and 2) finding some answers.
Blade Runner Black Lotus: Las Vegas #1
Writer: Nancy A. Collins
Artist: Jesus Hervas
Main Cover: KAEL NGU
Variant Covers: DANNY EARLS, JESUS HERVAS, ANDY BELANGER, KIT WALLIS, KAEL NGU
Page Count: 32pages
Release Date: September 17, 2025
This review contains spoilers
Blade Runner Black Lotus: Las Vegas #1 begins with a brief overview of Elle’s story so far, we’re brought to the Wallace Corps HQ. Wallace is still after the girl. Menzes hasn’t found her, himself, and so he’s assigned to a Doll Squad and tasked with recuriting one Officer Davis, the only known human survivor of a fight with the Black Lotus.
Davis, meanwhile, has been having a nightmare/flashback about that encounter. She and her wife are visited by Menzes, who has a tempting offer: join the Doll Squad to help retrieve the target and Davis will be able to walk again and she and her wife can move to whatever off-world colony they’d like (seen as an impossibility due to her wife’s lupus).
We catch up to Elle as she continues her flight through the desert. She’s heading for the Death Valley Spa, wanting to learn more about her past and the memory fragments that’ve been plaguing her. She has a run-in with a group of pirates that’d been robbing a train, only for a group from Brekker Solutions to fire at them (which gives Elle an opening to make a break for it).
The Doll Squad is introduced to Davis and vice versa, Davis having been released from surgery faster than recommended. Each has some connection to their target (two are Replicants, one was the head of security at a fractory said target had blown up, one’s brother was killed by her…).
They show up at the scene where the Brekker group has rounded up the pirates that’d attacked one of their trains. Asked if there was a young girl among the group, the Doll Squad learns that they’d just missed her. They figure she’s heading to Las Vegas, and stop at the spa for supplies. And the Brekker group finds out about the generous bounty on Elle and want that, themselves.
In Vegas, Elle arrives, soon encountering Cleopatra, who claims to have the answers she’s looking for…
Analysis
So, Blade Runner Black Lotus: Las Vegas #1 was an instance wherein I came into it with just a very baseline knowledge of the Blade Runner universe itself. That page of backstory at the beginning was helpful in terms of understanding the stakes. At the same time, the various fragments of prior events are making me curious about checking out as much of the source franchise as possible. But we’re mainly here for this specific installment.
Story-wise, I think it’s an intriguing setup, with a girl on the hunt for her past and (by the end of the issue) two groups on the hunt for her. So far, everyone’s got pretty clear motivations: Elle’s looking for answers about her past. The Wallace Corp? Control. Davis is here for the ability to walk again and to get a better life for herself and her wife. The Brekker group’s mainly in it for the money.
The scene with the pirates around the campfire does a nice job of setting up the thought of going to the ruins of Las Vegas in the first place. They’re talking about the radiation still hanging around (and why they haven’t tried cleaning out the casinos), and there’s a little bit of background on why it’s a ruins and not the thriving tourist locale it’d been before then.
The artwork has a very slightly stylized quality, I think. It’s not super-realistic, but still enough to fit the seriousness of the story itself. I appreciate the use of dot halftones for some of the shading, as well. I just always sort of like how that looks, really.
The color palette overall in Blade Runner Black Lotus: Las Vegas #1 is fairly de-saturated. It doesn’t fully approach monochrome status (save for flashbacks), but the brightest hues seem to come up during sequences of gunfire, or with the night sky (which provides a lovely contrast with the pirates’ campfire), or when Cleopatra is introduced on the last page. .
I will say that I didn’t have a strong connection to anyone just yet, but I’m still fairly new to this series as a whole and that’s likely to change as I read on. It probably hits rather differently for those that’d followed each iteration of the franchise.
Final Thoughts
Maybe not the greatest jumping-on point for newcomers, but Blade Runner Black Lotus: Las Vegas #1 is interesting enough to make one curious about playing catch-up.
