Hailey’s Comic – Week Three
What do girls want to see in their comic books? 11-year old “Haileyscomic” is a girl who has recently started getting into comics and is helping us answer that question. This summer, HC is updating Pink Raygun on what she’s buying, what she likes and what she doesn’t like. This week HC picked up an issue of A Boy and His Shadow and an issue of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
A Boy and His Shadow Part 3
A shadow is just something that is there, there is no use for it. Really, shadows are something we could all live without. Well, this comic book has taken that and twisted it backwards. In fact, if it weren’t for shadows, A Boy and his Shadow would be downright. . . boring.
This comic book is completely original. Instead of being about someone with weird supernatural-powers, its about a boy who’s shadow gets him into trouble. The art style of this series communicates well without any dark or confusing colors to back that up. The plot left me wanting more – it was mysterious and unexplained, but not so much that it was impossible to know what was going on.
Buffy the Vampire Slayer: The Long Way Home Part IV #4 June 2007
I could tell that ‘Buffy’ was based on a TV show because it was written in the style of many action/adventure movies. I mean that it would get to an exciting part and then switch to something new and then there would another exciting thing and it would switch again. This is something that I like in some movies, but in comic books it can be pretty confusing.
One thing that I’ve never liked in comic books is that even when a girl is doing something that people find unusual (like slaying a vampire) they are still all prissy and showy. I think this series captures that feature, too.
About Haileyscomic: I am a girl but I’m not obsessed with how I look or what’s in style or anything like that. I am also not trying to be just like a boy. I like action-adventure, but not fantasy and magic.
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Hailey’s Comic – Week One
Hailey’s Comic – Week Two
It’s SO funny that you say that, Hailey! Because I talk about that same thing – the difference between techniques for TV and comics, and how the TV stuff might not always work in comic form, and how that made issue #4 of the Buffy comic weak – in my upcoming review of the whole “Long Way Home” story arc.
So, you are obviously a very astute reviewer!
Did you ever watch the Buffy TV show?
I must say, you are very perceptive reader. However, your reviews would carry a little more weight if you would go back a few issues and catch up with the story instead of just jumping in the middle of a story you know nothing about.
For example, I’m very disappointed that you did not take the time to go back and read Buffy 1-3 before reviewing #4. Issue 4 was the completion of a story arc that had been running since issue 1.
I notice that the only comic you really liked was Electric Girl, and you read several issues of that one. Maybe you would have liked some of the others a bit more if you’d given them the same chance.
“Fray” is a one-shot that you may like, although it does contain “someone trying to save the world,” which doesn’t seem to be your cup of tea. Anyway, it’s about a strong woman who isn’t prissy. Yes, it is by the same writer as Buffy, and it is about a slayer, but the whole story is in one graphic novel. I’d like to see what you have to say about Joss Whedon’s work after reading an entire story of his, not just bits and pieces.
LadyMink – For years, the standard for comic books was that “Every issue is somebody’s first.” It doesn’t matter if someone discovers a title at issue 1, 4, 20, or 100 – it should remain accessible enough that the new reader doesn’t get lost. However, if you re-read Hailey’s review, she in no way suggests that she was lost or confused about what was going on in this issue. You criticize Hailey on things she didn’t even mention.
What Hailey criticized was the excessive use of quick-cuts in the story – the structure like a TV show rather than what she expected in a book or comic book was enough for her to notice. As soon as a reader notices the writing, they’ve been pulled out of the story, which means that the fiction has failed.
Admin – Jumping to the rescue a little quick around here, aren’t we?
Anyway, Hailey mentions in her reviews of Ghost Rider, Supergirl and the Legion of the Super Heroes, and Buffy that the storyline jumps around or uses quick cuts. Even though she doesn’t come right out and say it, after reading all of her reviews, it appears to the reader that the jumps and cuts are confusing to her.
As far as “every issue is somebody’s first” – sure. What other way is there to attract new readers? However, readers should expect that they’re missing out on something. I don’t expect to pick up a book, comic or manga in the middle of the series and get everything.
I’m just saying, as a reviewer, Hailey could do a bit more homework to make her reviews a little more robust. If this is truly an effort to review comics carte blanche, without knowing anything about them, then maybe a review of more than 5 sentences would have a better impact.
Is the problem with the reviewer, or is the problem with an industry that has forgotten how to write for new readers?
How many 11 year olds do you know that have a spare ten dollars/week to spend at a comic shop, and of those 11 year olds, how many do you think might actually come back week after week to spend their money on comics that fail them in some way or another?
Before comic book shops, kids picked up comics with no hope of ever reading what came before. Therefore, each issue had to be able to stand alone, and capture the reader enough to bring them back the next month. This is no longer the case – comics are written with the trade collection in mind, or part of some over-arching, super-convoluted storyline that requires WELL above $10.00/week to read.
The first issue of BTVS Season 8 goes for $5.00 plus shipping through Amazon. I don’t know about the availability at cover price through local comic shops. Would an average kid spend their entire weekly budget hunting down back issues that have been hiked up in price, just so they can understand the new comic in their hand at cover price?
But that’s part of the experiment we’re doing with Haileyscomic this summer. We have, in Hailey, a girl who’s interested enough in comics to take part in this. Will she still be interested enough at the end of August to keep on buying with her own money? Or will she just give up in frustration?
We’ll see.
“I’m just saying, as a reviewer, Hailey could do a bit more homework to make her reviews a little more robust.”
HC is picking up issues that catch her eye. A reader shouldn’t have to read an entire series or arc or do research to decide whether he or she likes a comic. If a reader has to do that, the writer and artist failed.
“If this is truly an effort to review comics carte blanche, without knowing anything about them, then maybe a review of more than 5 sentences would have a better impact.”
It’s an effort to learn what a girl likes and dislikes about the comics she picks up. We could speculate as much as we want about that, like many others on the internets, but felt it would be more efficient and accurate to ask an actual girl.
“Admin – Jumping to the rescue a little quick around here, aren’t we?”
We’re online all day and felt you deserved a swift response. HC is 11 years old, on summer vacation and doesn’t have an umbilical cord connecting her to the computer like we do. I’m a little jealous of her because of that.
Buffy 4ever!!!!
Hello everyone.
)
First: I’m from Germany, and i haven’t read the Buffy comics yet. I’d like to, but my english is not so good and i’m still hoping that the comics will be translated.
And second: I’m a big Buffy Fan (the tv series) and i don’t think that Buffy Summers is prissy or showy. No, not at all! You don’t have to like strong girls/women who save the world. But i do! and yes, i’m repeating myself: I don’t think Buffy’s prissy at all. But okay…
I suppose you haven’t watched the tv series, maybe because you were too young. But you should. It’s really great!
Greets from Munich,
(i hope you could understand my english – i’m better in french
Christine
Christine,
Je parle un peu de francais. J’adore Buffy! Vraiment, elle n’est pas chichiteuse! Bandes dessinées n’ayez pas beaucoup des fort elles. Nous avons besoin de plus de héroďnes comme Buffy.
Excusez mon français faible. J’ai dű compter sur l’Internet pour un certain vocabulaire.
I think you guys are missing the point: “strong girls saving the world” is just fine, infact it’s something that I enjoy, but I don’t see why they always have to be worried about looks as well.
So you don’t like “strong girls saving the world” and at the same time still beeing a girl who does girly stuff?? Is that the point?
i think that’s normal because girls are girls and boys are boys. And they keep behaving like girls/boys. That’s why they do the girly stuff.
@LadyMink: je pense que tu parle bien le francais! J’ai tout compris.
^^ I think the last few comments are drifting into a whole ‘nother bag of trouble with everyone’s personal idea what “girly” behaviour is or isn’t.
I’m just going to take your view of what you like in a girl’s behaviour as stated (as it’s your view and we weren’t invited to read your column with the set-up that you have to be a girl-cliché yourself) and enjoy your impressions of something I’ve been reading since I was 13 or 14 myself 25 years ago.
It’s just not how I read comics these days (then again I basically only read manga now) and especially interesting and different because of that.
I hope you’re enjoying your experience!
I have never watched the buffy t.v. series before but this morning I was flipping trough channels and I saw that it was on so I watched mabye 20 minutes of it, and what I saw of it I liked better than the comic book. like I said it works for movies and shows, but not for comic books.