I don’t care that you can fly, if you have a chance to ride a dragon you need acrophobia to not do so. Like me.
Molly Danger/Princeless FCBD 2013
Action Lab Comics (May, 2013)
Molly Danger
WRITER/PENCILER: Jamal Igle
INKER: Juan Castro
COLORIST: Romulo Fajardo, Jr
LETTERER: Frank Cvetkovic
EDITOR: Adam P. Knave
Princeless: “Girls Who Fight Boys”
WRITER: Jeremy Whitley
ARTIST: Emily C. Martin
COLORIST: Soojin Paek
LETTERER: Dave Dwonch
The villain Medula has a brain in a jar attached to a robotic body, a “gift” he would spread to everyone else if not for the superpowered teen Molly Danger. She’s having trouble getting back into the fight. Lucky for her she finds a helicopter pilot as crazy (and potentially also doesn’t know what “collateral damage” means or how to avoid it) as she is to get her there. This was just a fun story and now I want to check out the full comic. Win for this preview and it’s a full tale, which I wish more Free Comic Book Day comics are.
Our second tale is also a full story. A princess (sort of) named Raven is locked in a tower. Princess (for real) Adrienne Ashe knows what that’s like but had to rescue herself, the plot of the series along with rescuing her sisters, because she was tired of waiting for escue. Her and her really strong friend Bedelia must rescue the tower maiden and deal with a chauvinist prince who is so strawman you have to ask “if princes are supposed to rescue princesses from towers what the #$%# are you doing standing there preaching ‘the way things are supposed to be’ instead of rescuing her, you jackass?” who tries to stop them because they’re both women. There’s some kind of girl power message that would work if the antagonist wasn’t so obvious and ridiculous, the dialog is modern but the story is set in a medieval fantasy world and thus confusing, the dragon (probably also female) doesn’t really get to do anything when that would be awesome, and the girl being the daughter of a pirate king (that’s where the “sort of” comes in) and how he won’t be happy she’s out of the tower is obvious story set up. I don’t hate it but it could use another pass to iron out some minor issues. Really like the art style though, and Adrienne isn’t automatically awesome at everything since she didn’t have Raven’s weapons training, Bedelia is pretty cool, and Raven would be my favorite if she didn’t stand out so much from the time period with her dialog. It is hinted why she’s a good archer and girl of action, being the daughter of a pirate king, so her assisting in her own rescue makes sense and she might be a good addition to the team. At least the strawman deserves his punishment. Still, not really as drawn to this one.
Overall both stories are enjoyable, the first more so, and it’s a good preview of two interesting series. It’s free on ComiXology so it’s worth a look to see if you might be interested in either series.
BW Media Spotlight 