The Boys # 4; Heroes for Hire 1 and 3; Supergirl Power

The Boys #4
Garth Ennis Darick Robertson
We come right to the cusp of having something happen in The Boys in issue four. Think about this, The Boys is like...20 pages, right? So 4 issues in, is 80 pages of book. And we're 80 pages in and we're still just building anticipation to seeing the Boys work. And we still know next to nothing about 80 percent of the group. So that's the downside. But again, it's Garth Ennis, he's said this is going to be a long run, so we begrudge him that.

The upside is there is lots and lots of disgusting disgusting sex. Orgies, rape, violence--and jokes about all of it. Nothing as ghastly as the worst of the preacher, but still lots of "I can't believe they let them put that in bookshelves" moments. With probably the most disgusting for me being the whore house for superheroes, where The Butcher is talking about how the prostitutes have trouble keeping up with the superpowered fuck jobs. Ennis is doing a good job of painting a dark disgusting world in need of a bit of a cleaning off.

But seriously. I'm waiting for the redeeming moment, and it's not happening. I mean, if say Ennis has lost his touch, or isn't as committed to this book as he said...this could be a disaster.

Also the dialouge seems disjointed for Ennis. I feel like I'm caught between accents a lot of times in this book. But that's to be expected with a book that has such a mix of white people from diffrent places.

Honestly after reading The Boys, I needed a book like Heroes for Hire.

Heroes for Hire
Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti--Francis Portela and Billy Tucci

Heroes for Hire is a women dominated, women led, group of b-listers, operating in the seems of Civil War. I missed issue two, so it will take more issues to get a real feel of the book, but honestly I sort of like what I've read by Palmiotti and Gray. My main concern with this book is it falling into a kind of Charlie's Angels type of situation. So far all of the women characters in the book are being presented pretty strongly, which is good. But I'm still not sure what kind of book this is going to turn into.

I kind of want more humor. There's some nice bits in the first issue, that are kind of gone by the third. There is also a problem that many of the female characters seem to sound kind of alike. They seem like the same character drawn with diffrent colors, and so I'll be looking for greater differentiation there.

On the whole though it's not a must must read yet. I'm going to keep reading it just because it is a nice little change of pace, even though it is within the tight wearing community.

Oh yeah this book also kind of shows how poor the pool is for female characters in the comic book world. I honestly think DC does a little better job with female characters, but not by much. Though that's to be expected from the genre. It is very testerone driven. It just seems like there's a lot of duplication and confusion of ideas of what to do with female characters. And obviously I'm not the first person to say it.

That said. I am a SuperGirl fan. I'm going to be catching up on her next, so hopefully that goes well. I saw part of that movie with Helen Slater when I was a kid, and I know now it is basically a bad movie, but when I saw it as a kid, I was like damn she's cool(the part I have burned into my brain is when she kicks the trucker guy's ass in the parking lot). She's been impossible to follow in comics though, so I'm really only now revisting her. But honestly I probably like her even more than Wonder Woman. Someone should make a new Supergirl movie.

Supergirl Power
Jeph Loeb and Ian Churchhill

YES! This is what I'm talking about. Supergirl. Happy dance time. Jeph Loeb hits it out of the ballpark. The book is self-deprecating and campy in all the right spots. It's aware of the poor history of female comic book characters(Actually thinking more on this, X-Men has always had strong female characters) and it uses that awareness with great precision.

The story is basically about Kara Zor-El the new Supergirl figuring out who she is and basically going from place to place in the DCU getting attacked. The first person narrative is a lot of fun, though not flawless, it is enjoyable. Moments like when she and Stargirl watch the JSA fight while having a casual discussion are just plain sublime. This is just a character I really love, and I feel like Jeph Loeb does as well.

I think part of the reason why Supergirl works and Superman doesn't is because Supergirl isn't perfect, she has a temper, she does make mistakes, she's more human than Superman.

On an unrelated note, I don't like Power Girl. Never have. Never will.

Anyways. Back on topic.

Supergirl: Neato.