Women are my favorite guy: Birds of Prey #1 Review *
* abridged
A trap I keep falling into with superhero comics is thinking to myself, “I haven’t read enough with this character to read this new comic.” It’s not a far cry from the “comics are too hard to get into” argument that I continue to explore as part of No Context Comics. Even after nearly a year of writing about comics without prior knowledge, I keep retreating to that line of thought. I know that superhero books don’t require you to read everything! Not the good ones, anyway (And this is a good one). Maybe it’s just an excuse to justify not spending the time or money in getting into a new book.
All this preamble is to say that I’m not super familiar with most of the characters starring in Birds of Prey by Kelly Thompson, Leonardo Romero, Jordie Bellaire, and Clayton Cowles. But the creative team has a solid track record and I really love Romero’s work in particular. Despite that, my general ignorance of these characters (at least their specific comics history–I have a working knowledge of most of Their Deal) made me hesitant to give the book a shot. I was worried when they started talking about Sin–a character I didn’t even know. But Thompson slowly and naturally explains who she is with more detail as the issue goes on. After writing a bunch of No Context Comics and analyzing how people handle communicating information in a serialized story, I am impressed by how naturally Thompson manages to do it. There’s no single moment where a character stands and explains the plot or stakes. The explanations come throughout in fragments, as part of the structure of th estory and to further the way newly introduced characters relate. Each needs different pieces of information, or different characters reflect back different perspectives. By the time the issue ends, even people completely unfamiliar with Black Canary know a lot about her and her sister, Sin.
A team book is only as good as the relationships between members. The characters in this issue are all distinct and play off one another, and the creators depict those distinctions through a variety of choices in art and script. Take, for example, Batgirl, the standout for me in this issue. Cassandra Cain does not speak much–her movement is her language. She is unlike anyone else in comics. She was trained as an assassin from childhood and never taught how to speak until she met Barbara Gordon in her teens. Her word balloons are small, never more than a few words at a time. It is usually only 1 or 2. When she speaks for longer, they are short and direct sentences. Her dialogue stands out on the page. Her movement is fast, fluid, and beautiful. When Black Canary and Batgirl first meet in this issue, Leonardo Romero’ utilizes the De Luca effect across a double-page spread that shows the two characters in motion across the page, instantly adapting to one another’s fighting styles to work in concert. Batgirl can relate to Black Canary immediately through combat, and when Cassandra agrees to help Dinah without hesitation, it doesn’t come as a surprise.
On the other hand, when Batgirl goes to recruit Big Barda (who is fighting a pack of vampires, naturally), the two could not be more different either in speech or fighting style. Barda is boastful and speaks in Jack Kirby soliloquy. She fights with intensity, relying on overpowering others with her raw strength. She doesn’t need acrobatics or speed. When Batgirl and Barda fight together, we see Batgirl’s acrobatics and swift motion to quickly take out her enemies juxtaposed against Barda’s direct assault…
…The general beats here are familiar. It’s a classic assembling the team of unconventional heroes story in the vein of Seven Samurai. But it excels at everything it tries to do. Each of the characters is fully defined in image and dialogue. It is stylish and confident and in your face, and one of the best first issues I’ve read in a long time.
Read the full review—including more in-depth analysis of Romero’s and Bellaire’s art and how it reflects and contrasts the characters and attitude of the series—on Patreon.
DCAU Rewatch
In case you missed it, I announced a new Patreon-exclusive series where I’ll be providing commentary on every episode of the DCAU. You’ll get a preview of each week’s post here on the newsletter, but for the full thing you’ll have to join the growing Patreon community! Read more about it here.
At the highest tier, you can even request a specific issue or story. Look for the first Patreon-suggested article soon—about FORMERLY KNOWN AS THE JUSTICE LEAGUE.
No Context Comics
This week, I loved Shazam, and read Boom’s Once Upon a Time at the End of the World, and the adventures of Lobot and Lando in Star Wars.
Back next week with more stuff—including more DCAU.
Tim