“Nimona. Really, really good. Funny. And itâs got what Iâve been asking for, a female-led story that isnât about womenâs suffrage or some other such boring topic.
Yeah, Iâm sorry. Itâs not that I donât think womenâs suffrage is important. But it isnât the kind of thing thatâs been well-incorporated into what I would call a comic-book-y story, which involves some ass-kicking or some jokes or a depth of emotion thatâs way beyond legislative. And this puts forth a dilemma. Do we praise the stuff that has good intentions and messages but isnât very read-able, or do we critique at the risk of sounding like fucking Sean Hannity?
This year, I made a point to read some women-helmed books, whether that be books created by women or starring women but created by men.
Nimona is a great way to end that year. Itâs funny, itâs got a decent story, and itâs totally worth your time. Itâs what I asked for with a lot of other titles, which was a comic book where a female character kicks ass and does comic book stuff.
What about the rest of the year?
Canât We Talk About Something More Pleasant by Roz Chast-
Good book, and it goes to a rough place. Chast is caring for her parents, who are dying slowly, and Chast is coming to terms with the fact that sheâll just never connect with her mother. Itâs not easy to talk about, and sheâs pretty good with material thatâs going to ring very true for some and alienate others.
Princeless: Vol.1 Save Yourself
One of my least favorites I read this year. Thereâs barely any story, and what story is there just isnât interesting at all. This book is getting a lot of cred because A) itâs very lady-positive and B) itâs written by a dude who is involved with My Little Pony, which is a big thing right now. But Princeless read, to me, like something that would have made a lot of good points or gone further enough if it had been releasedâ¦I donât know, 20 years ago. 20? I mean, jokes about the ridiculousness of Wonder Womanâs outfit and how itâs not armored are true, but they arenât all that hilarious or pointed anymore. Itâs just kind of recycling a lot of those kind of ideas. Meanwhile, this book seems to posit the theory that the only thing necessary to overcome racism and sexism is to just realize itâs a construct and not play into it. Please.
Lumberjanes vol. 1
This is what made me nervous about Nimona. I really didnât like Lumberjanes. The references didnât make sense to me, I never knew which person was where doing what, and frankly, we have a wealth of female characters who donât really have any characteristics. Just haircuts and things they know about, such as math. Yes, math. Math knowledge isnât really a characteristic. I donât think Iâd introduce any of my friends as âYou know, the one I told you about who is pretty good at math.â The difference I see is the difference between a character knowing about a thing and how they FEEL about that thing, which we just never got. I recognize that maybe the madcap nature of Lumberjanes is something that a different kind of reader would like more than me, but I still donât think this qualifies, to me, as a really good book.
Ms. Marvel vol. 1
Great. Good dialog, funny. Thereâs a little bit of suffering through âWait, what? I have powers. Like, super powers. Almost like some kind ofâ¦superâ¦heroâ thatâs made especially painful because this is a very self-aware book and the protagonist is well-versed in superheroes so itâs like, âFuck, shit, yes! Youâve got superpowers, start getting super already.â But despite that, this first volume was pretty satisfying.
Bitch Planet issue 1
Gaaah! Not good. Iâm sorry, this is not a good story, itâs not well-written, and this, to me, provides the example for a book thatâs coasting on its politics without being good comics. The whole thing reads like a rejected Twilight Zone, and the best part of the whole thing is the few paragraphs of Womenâs Studies 101 material at the end, which isnât even by the author or really related to the story contained herein. This is the hardest book I read in terms of agreeing with the politics of equality, but just finding this comic to be a clumsy, lousy handling of the issues. Itâs telling us what we want to hear (men are jerks) without adding anything interesting to the conversation or making any salient points. AND the story itself is so flawed. The twist at the end isnât even a twist! The whole story hides so much from the reader itâs the literary equivalent of that thing where someone tells you that youâre dipping your hands in a bowl of eyeballs, but really theyâre peeled grapes. And then at the end, the person says, âHa, they were just grapes! Man, I got you. You really thought there was a whole plate of eyeballs here, but nope!â And itâs like, âYes, you are controlling the entirety of the flow of information here resulted in me thinking that what you were directly telling me was the truth, but then it turned out you were just lying the entire time. Well done.â And the reveal of the grapes is just shitty. Because no one wants a bowl full of grapes a bunch of kids touched.
We Can Fix It!
I guess this is supposed to be a sexy story about time machines and bad advice. Which it is. But I didnât reallyâ¦the main character is obsessed with making out with past or future versions of herself, which didnât make a ton of sense to me. I guess one could make the argument that I would jack myself off, so why not make out. But Iâd probably also refuse to wipe my past selfâs ass, even though thatâs something I do for myself. I guess the real question is whether Iâd make out with an alternate-dimension, female version of myself. The answer is no for right now, but winter is a time of chapped lips for me, and chapped on chapped just doesnât sound like a good situation. I liked the idea of time traveling to do something stupid and frivolous, but the idea of making out with myself in the 8th grade is just so repulsive. Seriously, someone should make a list of the few people who made out with me in adolescence, because those people need to be on some kind of list where they arenât watched daily, but someone checks in every couple months or something. Just a checkin.
Drinking At The Movies by Julia Wertz
This is my favorite lady comic I read this year. Itâs excellent. If you like memoir-type comics, this is a great, great book. Itâs all about this young woman, but itâs not really about romance. Which is such a fucking relief that I canât even. Insert gif. The jokes are great, thereâs a story arc that connects the material, the art is clean and read-able, and I canât say enough about how much I liked this one.
She-Hulk vol. 1 by Charles Soule
Not awful, but I had to look back at my review to remember this thing.
Actually, I do take one part of that back. The art in the second half of the book was pretty awful.
In Real Life by Cory Doctrow
Reads like an after school special about gold farming and how workers have no fucking rights in some countries. Itâs an important issue, and this comic would have probably done well to take out some harsh language and sexual reference for the sake of getting it into the hands of WAY younger kids for whom the story would be more enlightening. Not to censor the story, but because I think the references to meeting a pervo online arenât super necessary to the story, and without them parents would be less hesitant to explore this other issue.
Ms. Marvel Vol 2.
What? What the fuck happened? This one was such a letdown after volume 1. They make Ms. Marvel powerful by making everyone else a sucky idiot. Wolverine looks like a Canadian Football League Player who had both hips replaced and took on a lot of water weight. And he sucks at fighting stuff, which is crazy because thatâs the ONLY thing Wolverine is good at. Also, it seems like Ms. Marvel can shapeshift and change her size, and she mostly does this to get big and crush stuff, make giant fists, and I think once she pretends to be a sofa. I feel like thereâs a lot of wasted potential there.
Step Aside, Pops by Kate Beaton
Always great, always funny. Iâm a huge fan of Kate Beaton, even when her Victorian references go way the fuck over my head and I laugh along just because I donât want to be the only idiotâ¦reading a book alone in my apartment.
Thor: Goddess of Thunder
Started alright, but this whole mystery about who lady Thor is really grinds the reader down. Also, the initial story was pretty good, when Thor was doing Thor stuff, but the sequence where Thor fought Titania was, again, one of those sections that lay out the politics totally naked without clothing them in any real story. And I guess itâs not totally unearned, but Iâm just not a fan of how that whole thing went down, and it felt like filler.
Hilda and the Midnight Giant
This is a great one for kids and for going to that Disney nostalgia place. Iâm not a big Disney person myself, but I think Iâm understanding Disney love when I read this book. The sort of mysteriousness and wonder of childhood, perhaps. That there are worlds within worlds and all that. Iâll read more from this series. Maybe the best I could do to describe it is like a modern, creepier Tin-Tin?
Out on the Wire by Jessica Abel
A nice look at podcasting and storytelling, lots of good advice about storytelling methods too. I wish sheâd gone a little deeper and talked to more indie podcasters, but itâs a pretty cool storytelling primer regardless of medium. And Jessica Abel always does good work. I think her art is tops, although I would have liked this book to have just a little bit of color. That was a lot of black and white, very dense pages. Handled well, but it has a weird, endless effect or something.
I Think Iâm In Friend Love With You
Short, sweet. One of those books that I like quite a bit, even though more of the enjoyment comes from thinking about it afterward simply because itâs a brief experience.
The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl
Pure fun, pure funny. I liked that this book managed to make a character that was likable and didnât feel insulting even though she was kind of a dufus. A Homer Simpson type who is female isnât something we come across a lot, and Squirrel Girl is somewhat on that road, and I dig it. Iâll be sticking with this one, for sure.
And thatâs kind of the summary of the books I read.
What about the summary of the overall experience of 2015: Year of the Lady Comic Book (which I really wanted to re-name, but fuck it, itâs December)?
Hereâs what I would extract from this:
I donât tend to enjoy lady-character-helmed books written by men. She-Hulk, Thor, Princeless. Squirrel Girl is the exception, but overall, doesnât seem to work for me. Being 100% honest, I think I found those books to be a little overcompensatory. There seemed to be a section, at the least, that made sure to point out the relevant issues that make this book IMPORTANT, which I didnât need and amounts to an issue that would be better spent reprinting a pamphlet from the League of Women Voters or something.
Graphic non-fiction written by women seemed to make me happier, in general, than fiction. Wertz, Abel, Chast. I think I was pretty interested in all the graphic non-fiction I read under this banner.
Goodreads reviews arenât very helpful when it comes to the books that are more politicized, for lack of a better term. I feel that the ratings are inflated by the being on the right side of politics as opposed to storytelling, and the more the book speaks to a specific audience, the more it will attract only that audience, and the more itâs likely to please its audience. These arenât slams on any of the books, and itâs something thatâs true in a lot of other contexts too. Cult movies have higher ratings on Rotten Tomatoes because cult movie people use Rotten Tomatoes. Evil Dead 2 is like a 98% on Rotten Tomatoes, and I love that movie, but I donât know if, even as a person whose first VHS purchases included Evil Dead 2 and Army of Darkness, I can endorse that.
You gotta ignore the people who say things like âIf you don’t love this series, you’re not a feminist.â Actual quote from a Bitch Planet review. Itâs not true. You can agree with the politics of something or the idea of feminism without enjoying the creative expression of that value in this particular instance. I know that sounds like a No Duh, but I think itâs a good message to have out there. Itâs okay to ask for more from Princeless. To put it another way, I think gay marriage is totally a right that should be fought for and protected, but you canât just tell me that a book has a stance thatâs pro-gay-marriage and assume that Iâll like it. There are plenty of books and shows and lots of media that agree with me, but I donât think that factor makes them good. Take U2. There are lots of people who love that music and donât agree with Bonoâs politics. There are lots of people who think that music stinks and agree with Bonoâs politics. In fact, if there were two books in front of me, one that was a well-reasoned argument for gay marriage, one that was a compassionate, well-argued text that points out why gay marriage is a bad idea, Iâd be far more excited to get my hands on the latter. Itâs a more interesting argument. Iâd be curious. I guess what Iâm saying is, stance doesnât denote quality when it comes to fiction.
The idea that Marvel is pandering by releasing lady-helmed comics is a little too cynical for my liking. And Iâm totally fine with women taking on the roles held by men. People tend to forget how malleable comics have been throughout history. See: Eartha Kitt as Catwoman in the 60âs Batman series. See Batmanâs MULTIPLE replacements (Dick Grayson, Jean-Paul Valley), the slew of Batgirls (Barbara Gordon, Huntress, Cassandra Cain, others), not to mention Spider-Man being a clone. There was a black Green Lantern who came after two white Green Lanterns. Jim Rhodes starting kicking ass as Iron Man in 1983 while Tony Stark was getting his shit together. The point is, this isnât a new tactic for comics, and even if itâs sales-motivated, I think fighting about that is a waste of time. Iâm personally fine with comics being a business as long as the comics are good, and itâs my opinion that comics have always been a business, and changing up characters has been and always will be a part of that business..
Reading with a goal like reading more lady comics is a situation that results in reading a couple great things that you wouldnât have otherwise read, but also a lot of things that werenât so great that you would have skipped as well. Iâd put this on any reading quest. Read this or that kind of author, read from this list, and so on. Thereâs something to be said for expanding your horizons, but I think thereâs also a lot to be said for reading books that look good and interesting as they come. In other words, rather than making it a goal to read an LGBT author next, have that idea in my mind, and when something looks interesting, let that be the factor that tips the scale as opposed to the driving force. This definitely means taking a more active role in your reading, but hell, if youâve read this far into this review, then I donât think you can be accused of not considering what you want to read. Based on this experiment, and other flirtations with book groups or recommended lists or challenges, I think the best thing to do is read. Then look back over the last year, see if there are some patterns that emerge, stuff youâre missing out on, and make your decisions there.
There you go.
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