Peter Bagge's weird comic genius appears regularly in the pages of Reason magazine. He's also written a serialized comic (Apocalypse Nerd), and now a graphic novel that falls under the wide tent of science fiction. Reset deals with a Guy Krause, failed former TV personality, now in the throes of middle age looking back on what went wrong with his life. When offered a chance to relive some of his past failures and try to make amends, he reluctantly signs onto what he thinks will reset his life.

Both Apocalypse Nerd and Reset feature anti-heroes wallowing in self-misery. They appear powerless and emasculated when faced with reality and other people. They are sad sacks who cry out for some sympathy, yet at the same time make the kind of mistakes that render them at the same time less sympathetic. Krause, mired in his failures, accepts a job as a lab experiment: reliving past failures. However, he tries to alter some of the requirements when he finds portions disagreeable. As he negotiates and subtly alters some of the terms with the two people working the experiment, it becomes obvious that something else is going on behind the scenes. Krause must experience parts of his life over and over again, many of them shifted towards the most negative, humiliating, and depressing moments of his life. Krause thinks he is given a reset button, but each decision he makes seems to have the opposite effect. Rather than atoning for his sins, he must experience them all over again. This leads him to rebel; he decides to push more and more to control his past experiences, rather than be forced to live them again.

The effects lead Krause to re-examine his current life. Perhaps he cannot reset his past, but he might be able to reset his future. He even discovers things in real life may not have happened the way he thought. When the people behind the experiment discover this, they push harder, and we learn some of the reasons behind merely using Krause as a way for them to learn a more effective way to control people.

While Reset isn't explicitly libertarian, the story includes many important ideas, such as self-control, responsibility, and ability to learn and change. Bagge sketches many long libertarian comics in Reason. Perhaps one day he will create a book with more positive characters, ones you really want to root for, not reluctantly stick with for the sake of the story.