Marvelous Women

Last year Marvel acknowledged their female readership with three titles highlighting talented female writers and artists and showcasing their roster of superheroines.

Girl Comics may have a cringe-inducing name, but the content is solid. It’s an anthology similar to Strange Tales, written and illustrated by women in comics. The result is a bit unfocused, but there are some tales including Valerie D’Orazio and Nikki Cook ‘s take on the Punisher, a fun Wolverine and Jubilee story from Marjorie Liu and Sara Pichelli, and Kitty Pryde’s 21st birthday by Carla Speed McNeil and Ronda Pattison. Pages are also dedicated to important women in Marvel’s history giving the work added depth.

Heralds is a standalone story written by Kathryn Immonen which starts with Cyclops setting up a girl’s night out for Emma Frost. The banter between her and She-Hulk, Agent Abigail Brand, Hellcat, Valkyrie, and Monica Rambeau is terrific (and can Patsy Walker: Hellcat get a series already?) and feels more like what Girl Comics should have been. In addition to fun dialogue, there’s some great action involving Johnny Storm’s ex-girlfriend and former herald of Galactus, Frankie Raye – but it’s a little continuity-heavy so feel free to lean on Wikipedia to bone up on who she is: Nova (Frankie Raye).

Marvel Her-Oes is the lightest of the three, with teenaged Janet van Dyne (The Wasp) struggling to fit in even before an accident at her father’s lab gives her superpowers. Little does she know that her best friend Jennifer Walters is hiding a big green secret of her own. A confrontation with Namora puts superpowers in the forefront, but also attracts unwanted attention from outside forces.

5 Things You Don’t Know About Wolverine

1. He’s short.
Wolverine is 5’3″ making him one of Marvel’s shorter superheroes. Based on this, former Monkee Davy Jones would be a better fit to play Wolverine instead of 6’2½” Hugh Jackman.

2. He’s heavy.
That cool unbreakable Adamantium skeleton puts Wolverine around the 300 lb. mark.

3. He was a member of the Fantastic Four.
Wolverine, Ghost Rider, Spider-Man, and the Hulk became the New Fantastic Four for a 3-issue run (FF 347-349) back in 1990. The arc is too complex to explain, but it involved Skrulls, Mole Man, and The Punisher.

4. He fought alongside Captain America in WWII.
Logan, pre-Adamantium and pre-Wolverine, teamed up with Cap to fight ninjas. It’s the first time the two heroes met and they saved the life of a very young Black Widow (UXM 268).

5. He’s met Captain Kirk and Captain Picard.
A 1996 one-shot brings the X-men to Kirk’s Enterprise (where Spock neck pinches Wolverine) and 1998′s Planet X was a novel set in the Next Generation Era (Wolverine hangs out with Worf).

We have many Wolverine and X-men graphic novels in the system. Check them out.

Covered

I’ve been following Covered for a few weeks now and while it was initially disappointing, some of the newer posts have been really impressive.

The idea behind Covered is that indie artists are covering classic comic covers. At first it was a little too faithful, but Renee French rocked Havok and Wolverine: Meltdown and Richard Sala’s take on Batman 197 made me happy that we own so many cool Richard Sala books.

One of the newer posts, is Jeffrey Brown’s version of Uncanny X-Men 211 — which reminded me that Jeffrey Brown doesn’t get enough love.

We own 2 Jeffrey Brown books. Incredible Change-Bots – which seems to parody the Transformers until you realize that it’s actually a sweet story.

We also own Bighead which is absolutely hilarious and everyone should read.

Example: