Comic Girl: Not Just “Girl Books”

So we’re going through this awesome time where girls are becoming more prevalent in the comic world, and not mostly as weak damsels in distress. There are plenty of awesome books out there with strong women as the title character, and it’s really great to see. The comic book world in general just seems to be a more welcoming place for females now, when before it was easy to sort of feel shut out of it.

But just because there are a lot of really awesome female characters out there doesn’t mean you need to stick to their title books only. There are plenty of books centered around male leads that are really good reads, and that don’t include women who are just there for either sex appeal or to represent weakness.

There’s Marvel’s current Punisher series, which has been awesome. I honestly never thought I could enjoy a Punisher book so much – it’s easy to think of the character as a cheesy tough guy you can’t really take seriously. But this series (issue eighteen came out in early May) has been worth reading. It centers around society and people, sort of, as the weaknesses, which is much better than a damsel in distress, don’t you think? There have actually been a couple of women involved in the story, and they’ve been totally badass – there was even a crossover with the Black Widow series that I talked about before, which was a really good read, of course.

Marvel’s Magneto series has been a great read too (okay, so I read a lot of Marvel). The most recent issue came out in mid-May. It’s another series that has sort of focused on other people – well, and mutants – as the ones needing help. That’s kind of another awesome trend that has come into play along with the increase of tougher female characters – without them as the weak ones, someone has to be, right? Magneto has featured some badass females as well, which seems to make everything better! And, of course, the art is fantastic, which makes it even more worth the read.

Rocket Raccoon has had some really enjoyable issues as well. I mean, he’s a raccoon who quotes Gilmore Girls constantly – what’s not enjoyable about that? If you ask me, that just speaks to women on a much deeper level, am I right?

There are tons of others, of course. Try broadening your horizons and see what’s out there! Maybe give Afterlife With Archie a try, because who doesn’t love a zombie book? Or while we’re on the subject, Night of the Living Deadpool was a really entertaining read, which is always a good thing. Really, there are a huge amount of good books out there that don’t involve weak “save me” women and that don’t necessarily have them as a lead either. When it boils down to it, the thing that makes a good book a “good book” is the story and the art. And hey, by all means, don’t stick to the “big two” either, there are plenty of good books from other publishers. I know I’ve really just talked about Marvel books, but that’s what I’ve been reading a lot of. I guess I’m going through a bit of a phase (I did the same with DC books at one point). I do have a lot of other books queued up to read next, so I’m sure I’ll be able to talk about something else at some point.