Preacher, You Have a Smutty Mind
Originally posted at Uncreated Conscience.
And so do I. I’ve Twittered before about my newfound love for Chester 5000 XYV but failed to follow up with an actual blog post about it. (Warning for the kiddos-not that I think anyone younger than 18 follows my blog: Chester 5000 XYV is porn.)
I love graphic novels and comic books but was never allowed to read them as a child because my mother deemed them “not girly.” (Also on the list of verboten reads included such series as THE BABYSITTERS’ CLUB by Ann M. Martin and GOOSEBUMPS by R. L. Stine.) I dislike the gender bias of graphic novels, not because somethings aren’t inherently “boy” books or “girl” books, but because it’s less an issue of gendered books so much as how one perceives information. I am a visual person. I relate to the world with images as much as words and I certainly express my thoughts visually as well as verbally.
Chester 5000 XYV by Jess Fink
Chester 5000 XYV by Jess Fink
Chester 5000 XYV is a charming erotic graphic web comic (yes, I mean each and every one of those adjectives) about a repressed housewife and her love affair with a robot. Priscilla married a scientist, but quickly discovered that his first love was his work, not his wife. To compensate for the lack of, er, passion in their bedroom, he created for her a sex robot (yes, I know, I know) to keep her occupied. He didn’t quite expect Chester to develop feelings for Priscilla, nor did he expect her to reciprocate, leaving him with a bit of a dilemma on his hands.
This is one of the cutest (for the lack of a better word) web comics I’ve read in a while. There is no dialogue; the entire story is told in pictures. Since my favourite device in films is silence (barring score and sound effects), I really, really enjoyed what Ms. Fink has of Chester 5000 XYV. I find that 85% of communication is non-verbal and the comic more than amply supplies the words for you despite the fact there is no speech. It is also hilarious. Because there is no way you can read a webcomic with robot boners without laughing (sproing!). Because Ms. Fink doesn’t take herself too seriously (unlike Alan Moore and LOST GIRLS-which I loved), the sentimental scenes are unexpectedly poignant and earnest.
Girls Next Door by Pika-La-Cynique
Girls Next Door by Pika-La-Cynique
Those people who follow me on Twitter know that I will Tweet whenever a new episode of Girls Next Door is uploaded. I freaking love this comic. My friend Katranna is actually the one to have introduced me to this particular artist, citing that she is the only one she knows who portrays Door of Magical Uncle’s NEVERWHERE correctly. Girls Next Door is actually a spin-off of the fan comic Roomates in which Jareth from the movie Labyrinth and Erik from LE FANTÔME DE L’OPERA/the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical are roommates. Included in this metafictional apartment building are assorted fictional characters like Javert from LES MISERABLES, Commodore Norrington from Pirates of the Caribbean, Legolas from THE LORD OF THE RINGS, Sweeney Todd from Sweeney Todd and many others. Girls Next Door is actually about Sarah from Labyrinth and Christine, who apparently live in the apartment above them.
Words really can’t describe how adorable/cute/funny/metafictional this entire strip is. My favourite episode, “Fortune Cookie” I think pretty aptly sums up everything I love about it. The real stars of this strip are Jareth and Sarah, who exist in a post-Labyrinth storyline and have an ongoing flirtation that is too freaking cute. In particular I love the artist’s style, which seems effortless (even if it isn’t-I loved the same thing about Naoko Takeuchi’s art).
There you have it! I also like that these are comics drawn by women and in some ways for women. Not that I don’t love DC and Marvel and other indie graphic novel publishers, but I think these two prove that the comic medium is not just for boys. My friend Jess works at St. Mark’s Comics and we had a discussion about the demographics of the customers purchasing at the store.
(I will be cruel here.)
Marvel, it seems, appeals to young men who are either 1) your classic, stereotypical nerd, or 2) people from disadvantaged backgrounds. DC comics appeal more to girls and young men from middle class upbringing. Why? I think it often has to do with the characters and the stories each brand chooses to tell. Marvel, I have said, doesn’t have too many individual heroes I find interesting: the iconic Marvel superhero (for me) is Spiderman. Spiderman is your classic underdog champion: he is a dorky science kid from Queens who not only saves the world, but gets the hottest girl too. On the other hand, the iconic DC hero is Batman, a vigilante who takes the law into his own hands.
Marvel does the better hero groups: The X-Men, The Fantastic Four, The Avengers, just to name a few. It goes in with the stories they seem to tell: underdogs banding together. The X-Men to me sums up every theme of Marvel’s brand: the disenfranchised banding together to save those who are prejudiced against them. One can see why socially challenged boys and economically disadvantaged groups would love them. This is a story they can relate to: they aren’t the dregs of society; they have superpowers and soon the world will come to know how respected/talented/useful they are.
DC has a different ethos, one to which privileged children like myself can relate. Understand that I am spoiled rotten and know it; I know that my childhood has been painless and loving and sickeningly perfect in ways that others will never know. My life has been one of many opportunities because of some trick of fate that allowed me to be born to parents with means. As a result, I (and many others like me including the children I went to prep school with) have been told since I was little that I can “do anything [I] want.” The implication being “the rules do not apply to [me].” Batman is a classic example for whom the rules do not apply. DC heroes are frequently individualistic and use people rather than develop meaningful relationships with them. Most of the DC superheroes stand alone: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern (♥!) etc. except when they work together in groups like The Justice League or Teen Titans, in which case it seems to be too many pastry chefs ruining the cake.
I think the reason DC over Marvel appeals to women is because of the Vertigo imprint (which has published SANDMAN, PREACHER, FABLES, Y THE LAST MAN, and V FOR VENDETTA), which was founded by a woman, Karen Berger. Despite the plethora of sex and violence, the stories appeal to a lot of girls I know, especially SANDMAN and FABLES. FABLES, of course, features fairytale characters while SANDMAN features several dreamlike, mythological stories and many of them feature romance. Vertigo, it seems, focuses more on how characters relate to each other, which is more interesting to girls than saving the world. (Well, for this girl, at least.)
I could be wrong, of course. But Jess and I seem to share this opinion. Female readership of graphic novels is growing and I hope that trend continues in the future.
Also, according to the Humane Society emails I get every morning, The EU has banned seal products from the Canadian commercial seal trade. White-Harp is pleased that her cousins won’t be clubbed to death.