In November, I wrote about The Spectacular Sisterhood of Superwomen. During that post, I mentioned that I had started reading several comics that were mentioned in the book.
Well, I’ve made my way through a pile of books, in addition to some comics available on the web. If anything, I’m even happier I read Hope Nicholson’s decade-by-decade list of “awesome female characters from comic book history.” I didn’t choose to read every comic mentioned in the book, and there were many I would have read, but I couldn’t get my hands on them. Of those I read, there were some characters or books that left me cold. But there were some I absolutely loved. Here’s my top ten list of characters I was introduced to through Nicholson’s book. Note that not all of them are characters she chose to feature, but I discovered these characters through her book. (Okay, that’s not completely true. I knew of Squirrel Girl. I’d just never read Squirrel Girl.)
10. Squirrel Girl (from Squirrel Girl)
Squirrel Girl is one of the silliest characters on this list, but that’s part of what makes her so wonderful. While I can and do enjoy a dark graphic novel or comic book series, sometimes it’s good to read something light. Squirrel Girl fits the bill. Considering the fact that her superpowers boil down to being a human squirrel with the power to communicate with squirrels, you wouldn’t expect her to be particularly powerful, but she is. It’s the sort of comic I’d pick for someone who was at home with a nasty cold — assuming that person was open to reading comic books!
9. Hannah Marie (from Scary Godmother)
Nicholson picked the titular character from Scary Godmother for her list. Certainly, Scary Godmother is lots of fun. She knows all of the coolest ghouls, and she’s the sort of person I’d love to sit down with for a cup of tea. But her close human friend, Hannah Marie, is ridiculously cute and so fond of Halloween that I can’t help but love her. When it looks like Halloween might not happen, Hannah Marie takes charge, working hard to do what she thinks needs to be done. She bites off more than she can chew and makes mistakes, but she is, after all, a very small and very determined child.
8. Beth Ross (from Prez)
Set in a disturbingly believable dystopian future, Prez features Beth Ross, a teen-aged president who should never have been elected. Unfortunately for the real candidates, age no longer matters, but popularity does, and Ross has recently become an Internet sensation. Completely ignorant of how to play the political game, Ross immediately starts trying to make a difference, and she makes a lot of enemies in the process. It looks like there have been no new issues of Prez after volume 1 came out in 2015. Too bad. The series had a lot of potential.
7. Sister Peaceful (from Castle Waiting)
Nicholson chose Jain from Castle Waiting, but I prefer Sister Peaceful. It’s rare to find positive depictions of faith in comics. Marvel is actually pretty good at doing this — from Nightcrawler in the X-Men to Kamala Khan in Ms. Marvel, there are a number of wonderful characters who belong to some sort of faith tradition. While Sister Peaceful belongs to a fictitious order of bearded nuns, the Solicitines, the order is clearly a Christian one, and Peaceful, mischievous as she is, is a real woman of faith. In fact, part of what I love about her is her fun-loving spirit. Peaceful is loving, not judgmental — the sort of person you’d seek out as a friend. Volume One of this series, the only one I’ve been able to get my hands on so far, includes a long section on Sister Peaceful’s backstory.
6. Beauty (from Megan Kearney’s Beauty and the Beast)
This webcomic isn’t even featured in Nicholson’s book; she just quotes the comic’s creator in her section on Annabelle from Nightmares and Fairytales. When I looked up comics that were in this book, however, I didn’t confine myself to the ones from which she drew her list of superwomen. I also searched for several that Nicholson mentioned in passing. One of those was Beauty and the Beast.
It took me several pages to really get into it, but once I did, I was hooked. Part of this was because I’ve always loved that particular fairy tale. Kearney is relatively faithful to the story, although she adds some nice touches, such as making Beauty’s sisters pleasant people instead of spoiled brats and having Beauty genuinely wrestle with her feelings about the being she sees as her jailer, albeit a kind-hearted jailer. But honestly, part of my enchantment is because Kearney writes a darned good slow-burn romance. Although I know how the story will turn out, as long as Kearney remains faithful to it, I still find myself awaiting each update to see what happens next.
5. Kamau Kogo (from Bitch Planet)
Without being the least bit like A Handmaid’s Tale, Bitch Planet is its comic book equivalent. In Bitch Planet, women are subservient to men, and the most powerful men are referred to as “father.” Non-compliant women are imprisoned on Bitch Planet. The situation seems utterly hopeless, but there are still women — and men — who are willing to fight the system. Issues of this comic tend to end with smart-alecky ads for products like Agreenex, which “doesn’t change your circumstances, but… keeps you from caring.” There are several strong female characters in the series. Nicholson featured Penny Rolle, who certainly is an awesome character, but so far my favorite is the extremely badass Kamau Kogo.
4. Martha Washington (from The Life and Times of Martha Washington in the Twenty-First Century)
Partway through Martha Washington, it occurred to me that there are probably several liberals and conservatives in its fanbase. Martha lives under a series of different governments, and all of them are deeply flawed. The conservatives are oppressive. The liberals are ineffective and corrupt. Even groups that truly mean to look out for the greater good go bad in the end. Through it all, Martha does her best to follow her conscience and fight for what she believes is right.
3. Maika Halfwolf (from Monstress)
I almost didn’t read Monstress. I knew I could expect violence and gore, and the first volume delivered just that. But it was a stunningly beautiful comic with a character who truly wrestles with an inner demon. Along with Bitch Planet and Martha Washington, this is another dark, dystopian story, but this one is set in a magical world that clearly isn’t Earth. Maika looks human, but she is really an Arcanic, part of a magical race that is at war with human beings. She’s extremely powerful, and her companions are terrified of her, but as one of them explains, “I followed you. I thought it would be safer. You’re good at killing.” Grim as this series is, I’m eagerly awaiting the next volume.
2. Patty-Jo (from Patty-Jo ‘n’ Ginger)
Nicholson picked Torchy Brown for her book. I’m glad she did, because that character led me to the biography of her creator, Jackie Ormes. The story behind the biography itself is fascinating: author Nancy Goldstein, an expert on dolls, was helping a friend research the Patty-Jo doll and became fascinated with Ormes. Ormes was the first African American woman cartoonist, but she left behind few personal papers, and it was impossible to find many of the newspapers in which her work appeared. Goldstein conducted interviews with people who’d known Ormes and dug up as much information as she could to tell Ormes’ story and reproduce samples of the four comics she created — two single-panel comics and two Torchy Brown comic strips.
Torchy Brown is a career woman and romantic heroine who appeared first in the 1930s and later in the 1950s. I can see why Nicholson might include her, but I was far more interested in the precocious little girl, Patty-Jo, from Ormes’ longest running comic, Patty-Jo ‘n’ Ginger. While Ormes did include social commentary in her other comics, Patty-Jo ‘n’ Ginger was where she really let loose with commentary on everything from racism to McCarthyism. Learning about Jackie Ormes was probably the greatest discovery I made as a result of Nicholson’s book.
1. Bandette (from Bandette)
Like Squirrel Girl, Bandette is a light-hearted comic with a heroine you can’t help but love. Bandette considers herself the greatest thief in the world, and she very well may be. But while she loves to steal, she hates villainy, and she’ll frequently aid the police in bringing down criminal masterminds. She has a weakness for chocolate, and I was very disappointed when I found that her favorite candy bar, Chocobolik, isn’t real. Her friends adore her, and even some of her enemies, such as the swashbuckling assassin Matadori, can’t help but become her friends. Every time I finish a volume, I want to visit Paris. If I manage to go, I may find myself wishing that a gravity-defying, big-hearted thief would pop out of nowhere and ask me for a chocolate bar.
Have you read The Spectacular Sisterhood of Superwomen? If so, what wonderful superwomen has Nicholson introduced you to through her book?