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In honor of Bonnie and Lola and THE GIRL WHO WOULD BE KING we continue our 30 Days of Superheroines!
July is Cass Cain* aka Batgirl’s 13 year anniversary…so what better day for her to be Superheroine of the Day than Day 13?!
*I went with any version of Cass I could find that I liked!
By Shono
By Jenzee
Tags: Bonnie Braverman, comics!, Lola LeFever, The Girl Who Would Be King
“Bryan Q. Miller delivers in “Batgirl” #24 a powerful, inspiring, and emotionally satisfying ending to his little series that could, cut short before its time…”
Read the rest of my 4.5/5.0 star CBR Review of Batgirl #24 here.
As always, likes and retweets are much appreciated and you can read all of my CBR reviews thus far here.
Tags: comics!
I love it when comics make me chuckle. Batgirl #18 was full of good chuckles this week. And one of them (I think) translates well enough in a single panel to work for panel of the week. Despite really liking a few comics this week, and really hating a few others, I had trouble sussing out a single exceptional panel…but fun chuckles win the day.
Batgirl #18 was excellent this week. It was by far the best single issue in the 18 month run – the art by Dustin Nguyen was superb, the colors by by Guy Major (and Nguyen – because I’m guessing the watercolors were his…?) are exceptional and the writing by Bryan Q. Miller was hilarious. All of which makes my decision to drop all current Bat-books (Batman Inc, Batman & Robin, Red Robin, Batgirl, Batman: Streets of Gotham, and Batman) from my pull list in protest of the continued mis-handling (and lately seemingly joyful mis-handling) of the Cass Cain issue pretty sad. For the uninitiated the “Cass Cain issue” is essentially that the character continues to be horribly mis-treated and ignored. It’s a particularly grievous offence considering that the Bat family and brand is – and has been for months – in a process of massive re-expansion and reunion as Bruce has returned from the dead while his daughter remains painfully, obviously, ridiculously and stupidly absent from all of it.
It’s often said in comics that there’s only one way to protest things you don’t like and that way is to vote with your dollars. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen any hard evidence of such a thing actively working…and as someone that writes about comics and comics related things that is often hard for me to do, as I feel compelled to be in the loop and know what’s going on…but I feel it’s important here – and despite Batman being my favorite character of all time – to finally make a stand on this issue beyond railing about it on blogs, signing petitions, writing letters, and rambling about it on podcasts – so I did it.
With regret I picked up my last Bat-books this week and updated my pull list at the comic shop. I’ve kept Batwoman on the list as it’s one of the only forthcoming superhero books I’ve been excited about for…well…more than a year now…and because I find that with effort I can rationalize that book as it seems to be rather removed from the issue of Cass and perhaps a bit from the Bat-books in general, but it’s with disappointment (after this issue especially) that I find I can’t do the same for Batgirl.
But I must say it’s a huge compliment to Mr. Miller that I tried so hard to rationalize keeping Batgirl on…I never thought in a million years I’d be sad to drop a book starring Stephanie Brown, so I genuinely offer you congrats on some damn fine work over the last year and a half sir. And thank for this last great Panel Of The Week!
Tags: comics!, Panel Of The Week
So my love of Cassandra Cain is well documented…check here and here if you need reminding or convincing.
And I’d like nothing more than to see her back in comics doing her thing on the regular again. I’d personally like an ongoing, though I’d settle for a really great mini-series that rooted her back into our universe (and the minds of her ENTIRE FAMILY) and then some ongoing supporting roles in other books (Batman, Batman Inc., Red Robin, Birds of Prey, Batgirl…all of these are books with room – or room that could be made – for Cass Cain). Ideally I’d like Cass to be a Bat for the new enterprise that is Batman Inc., or alternatively for her to take up the Nightwing mantle or to come up with her own alternative persona as her brothers Dick, Tim, and Jason have and have her own book…but again, I’d settle for any path that began the effort to bring her back.
Regardless, if you want her back…go here now and sign the petition. Let’s get a crazy insane number of signatures!
Tags: comics!, things made of awesome
I tried people, I really did.
I’ve never liked Steph much and I’ve made no secret of it, and I dislike her in the Batgirl uniform for a variety of reasons (up to and including the fact that her actual costume is ugly as sin with its thigh pouch and hideous purple) but I have bought every single damn issue of that series and I have tried my best to have an open mind and I have supported it with my dollars and even talked positively about it on this blog – about how even though I don’t like Steph much, that I think Bryan Q. Miller has done a great job with her voice on the series and that overall it’s a really positive book for young women and girls – the kind of book we need more of. That it’s an important book because of the niche it fills and the audience it respectfully reaches out to. I was even excited because Dustin Nguyen was coming on board.
And this bullshit is the thanks I get?! It may be adorable, but it’s horseshit. Check it out…a “tiny adorable history which Cass has been COMPLETELY EDITED OUT OF!” And worst of all, the bit seems to imply that this is STEPHANIE’S VERSION OF EVENTS…which makes her seem like a bitch that edits out her best friend when convenient. Oh screw it, I’ll just post it – from The Source.
Honestly DC…just because you know how fucked up your handling of Cass has been for um…YEARS…does not mean you can have Nguyen draw an adorable little revision and we’ll just swallow it up. And I really don’t know what your goal is here, because you’re DEFINITELY going to piss off the Cass fans (like me) but most of the Steph fans are ALSO fans of Cass because the two characters were best friends…so just who are you thinking is going to love this…? Why do it? Do you really think the book is such a crazy irreplaceable success that people will just read this and be all “oh, yeah, that’s totally how it was. Cass who?” Unlikely. And I notice Steph has conveniently left out her time as Robin as well…which she would never do…so this all just smacks of you guys trying to gloss over everything you’re not so proud of regarding your female characters in four cute cartoon-y pages. Epic fail.
Regardless, you just lost a reader and a reviewer. I HAD been working on a post for CBR’s Comics Should Be Good about how despite my Steph dislike, the book had become quite good, and more importantly, IMPORTANT. Guess where that article is now? That’s right – the fucking round file – where it belongs.
Congrats DC. You pretty successfully rehabbed a character, so that even people like me that dislike Steph were buying your book…but now, with that little “Cass apparently never existed stunt” you lost a reader. And we’re at it, the realization of Batgirl/Oracle is pretty tasteless as well.
So, Batgirl can come off my pull list…what other DC books on my list are TOTALLY UNNECESSARY.
Time to do some culling.
I cheated this week and picked a couple…but I have really good reasons, I swear.
First of all, this…from Batman & Robin #14:
And am I wrong? No, I’m not. It’s crazy f’ed up panels like this that make The Joker one of the greatest villains of all time. Also, look at Damian all trussed up and painted like a clown…hilarious and also horrifying. Awesome stuff.
And this, also from Batman & Robin #14:
It’s panels like this that make Batman the single greatest superhero of all time. Look at the that silhouette! A-MAZING. And I don’t deny that Bats is my favorite and thus I’m totally biased…but aren’t all we comics geeks unreasonably crazy for certain characters?
But this, from Batgirl #14, which is a double (triple?) cheat, because it’s a page, not a panel, also deserves mention. I’m a fairly vocal non-fan of Stephanie Brown as Batgirl, and I don’t love the book, but I continue buying it because I think it’s an important book to have out there for girls and women – and in the hopes that I will manage to fall in love…eventually. I also think Bryan Q. Miller IS actually doing a pretty great job finding Steph’s voice. Case in point, this page, which is executed perfectly. I’m not always crazy for Garbett’s art but I think he nails Steph in panel 3.
Tags: Panel Of The Week
Batgirl #2. Brian Q. Miller. Comics/Graphic Novels.
So in all honesty I was feeling all “blah” about this before I even picked it up to read. And I previously said I was not going to read anymore once it was revealed that Stephanie Brown was the new Batgirl, but I picked it up anyway, I’m not sure why…half out of being bored…half out of curiosity I guess.
But here’s the problem, even if the issue was brilliant -which it isn’t – the issue itself is not particularly well written, it seems heavy handed, a bit whiny, and just incredibly dull. This is the story arc for issue number two of a major relaunch? YAWN.
However, the real problem is, I just don’t like Stephanie Brown.
I find her whiny and annoying, and really really blonde and really really white (which judging by this, DC has got WAY too much of going on right now). I also find her to be just totally unexceptional, which, when we come to The Bat Family, is something I expect…not only expect…but NEED in order to buy the suspension of disbelief that Bruce would sign off on letting teens and pre-teens suit up and fight crime beside him. You need to be exceptional in order to do that. The only thing exceptional about Stephanie to me is her unwillingness to go away, which unfortunately comes off to me as obnoxiousness rather than something endearing.
Also, the fact that Dick and Barbara are allowing this to go on (Barbara may be giving her a hard time, but that’s hardly stopping her) is disrespectful to Bruce. Bruce didn’t want her in that uniform. He shut it down. Have some respect for the man and Shut. It. Down.
Stephanie has no respect for the costume, for the symbol. Or for those who wore it before her (Cass possibly excepted since they were friends). Though she desperately wants to be part of the crowd, her wants are selfish and childish. She gets a high off of fighting crime and she does it almost casually. She’s not tormented by anything driving her to it, she’s just a really attractive blonde white girl going to college and putting on a costume at night for fun.
There is nothing interesting to me in this. That was my last issue.
I miss Cass 
Last week’s DC Nation page featured a Wonder Woman renumbering controversy that fans of Wonder Woman hold dear to their heart – the issue is this – Why the hell is the preeminent female superhero of the DC Universe currently on issue #45 while Superman and Batman are edging towards #700?
Wonder Woman, like her Justice League teammates has actually had just short of 600 issues, however her title has been relaunched so many times that she’s now “technically” only on issue #45 of her latest relaunch. And there’s been a campaign going on to get her the recognition she’s earned. Well the fan cries have been heard because last week Editor-In-Chief Dan Didio addressed the issue in DC Nation and gave fans an opportunity to actually make a difference: send in a postcard in favor of Wonder Woman getting renumbered to #600 and if they receive 600 postcards, it will be done.
Now, I hate blogging about Wonder Woman because I always feel a bit like a wolf in sheep’s clothing as I’m really not a true fan. I keep trying…I WANT to love her so badly. But no writer has been able to make it happen for me yet. So why should I bother blogging about this issue? Three reasons.
1. I think it’s great when DC (or any corporation) actively wants to listen to their fans – and truly gives them an opportunity to voice opposition or approval and affect change, as Dan Didio is doing with this postcard pledge.
2. I’m not a big fan of revamping and “relaunching” books in general, so I see this as a way to right those wrongs. Not that books don’t sometimes need an update, or when they’ve gone horribly wrong, don’t deserve (or yearn for) a fresh start, but I’m pretty against starting off with an “ALL NEW FIRST ISSUE!” every time things get tough. I understand that it gets people excited and likely sales briefly spike, I get it, but as a long time reader I’m not a fan. It makes being a reader (and a collector) a huge pain.
“You’re talking about issue #3 right? Oh, wait, which issue #3…would that be volume 1, volume 2, the super secret alternative arc volume 8? ARGH!”
And I do believe it’s some of that madness that freaks other “normal” people (i.e. non comics fans) out and away from comics. Comics are DAMN complicated. And they don’t have to be. Sure, relaunch a title with a new creative team…but you don’t have to call it “ALL NEW WONDER WOMAN ISSUE #1” and undo the last 200 or however many issues.
There are of course cases where relaunching a book with an all new #1 has worked and been a huge benefit, not just in sales but in content and direction, but in general I’m not a fan, especially when the character isn’t changing. For example, though I’m personally not a fan of the ALL NEW Batgirl #1 relaunch, it makes sense for that to be a new series in a way, because it’s a new character. Sure it’s still Batgirl, but it’s no longer Cass Cain (much to my chagrin) so I find that more palatable. But Wonder Woman, in all her incantations over the years, is still Diana. And she earned the hell out of that #600.
3. I’m a feminist. Whether Wondy and I have come to love each other or not, she still deserves the same recognition as her teammates. And I think it’s only fair to acknowledge that as a female superhero, she’s actually had a much harder time becoming a success than Superman and Batman, and yet she has prevailed and stood the test of time. She deserves the recognition of each one of those issues she struggled for.
Didio made a decent point in his argument that he thinks the #45 is less off putting to possible new fans than the #600, but I just don’t think it’s really that much less off putting. 45 issues is still nearly four years of issues – so it’s not like it’s issue #3 or something and you can just jump on board with zero drama.
Anyway, if you agree with me, or if you have your own reasons. Send a postcard in to Dan Didio at DC proclaiming that you want Wonder Woman to start renumbering at #600. My postcard is in the mail. See?
Well, they revealed Batgirl’s identity in the first issue, which is good. And I have to take back my bitching and moaning about the idea of trying to drag it out. Officially, thank you DC for not dragging it out. Unfortunately…
SPOILER
thanks to pasrimonia for the awesome ‘batgirl for batgirl’ poster image.
All signs point to the new Batgirl not being Cass. And the most recent hints suggest it is either Steph (The Spoiler) or a combination of two or three women (possibilities that seem to include : Cass, Steph, Babs, or Misfit) taking up the cowl together…which is an interesting idea, but I admit I’m not really on board, mostly because I just don’t understand why it’s not Cass straight up and with no ‘battle for the cowl’ bullshit.
I feel like the fans really love her and have long embraced her, but DC just somehow never has, and I don’t know why.
I guess the only thing I’m truly glad about is that it doesn’t LOOK like the plan is for it to be Barbara – which I would hate. There’s speculation that because of dropped hints that they wanted to bring her back as Batgirl and changed their minds. I would love if this was true, because it suggests that they do listen to fans (everyone loves Barbara, but almost nobody wants her back in the Batgirl uniform) or at least to themselves when they realize something isn’t right. The bottom line is that Barbara has so evolved beyond being just Batgirl. Barbara is so much more as Oracle and she can’t go backwards in time…which is what it would be for her to put on the Batgirl uniform again.
Anyway, let’s be all scientific like and look at the hints:
There were the three images released as Batgirl teasters, and each of them are basically different costumes, and thus suggests different women…which I guess is where we’re all getting idea that it will either be a team up of multiple women donning the cowl, or at least a battle to be the one and only.
The first (and my favorite of course) is pure Cass (although a bit heavy om the boobage).
