Wonder Woman #13 (from The Batmom October 2012)

Covergirl: Before New York Comic Con, I adored Cliff Chiang and felt a little disappointed every time Tony Akins’ name appeared on the cover.

After New York Comic Con, after hearing Tony Akins talk about his art, after hearing him reference wide-ranging influences that include Victorian funereal photographry and British footballer Wayne Rooney, I was psyched to see his name on this week’s cover.

(P-S-Y-C-H-E-D! Let’s! Get! Psyched! My pom-pom shaking days ended decades ago, but that little bit of perkitude is forever etched in my brain.)

That said, the cover didn’t blow me away, though I did find the use of space (i.e. the sand stretching in front of Diana) interesting and effective. Nice break from the Covers of Much Action.

We don’t always need a boot in the face. Though I love to say MOTHERFUCKER, and when you get a boot in the face, you get to say MOTHERFUCKER.

Ramble: Another great read. Let’s get my one hesitation with the book out of the way first, then dive into the happy.

My One Hesitation with the Book

The bit about the scientists seemed out of another book; Supergirl, maybe.

Diving into the Happy

I particularly enjoyed the family dramedy; both the poolside scene at Apollo’s re-imagined Olympus, which looks like a newly minted movie star’s first multimillion-dollar estate, and the Hera-Zola smackdown in Diana’s London apartment.

Also enjoyed the Siracca reveal, especially the final dramatic shot and the initial interaction between the demi-god and Diana, her half-sister.

Siracca appears first in the form of a child, which allows us for a brief moment to envision a maternal Diana. She’s fresh off a display of her superhero chops. The juxtaposition of that ass-kickery with her taking care of a small, scared child succinctly reminds of us Diana’s gender duality.

Do you like that phrase, gender duality? I learned it in graduate school. $30,000 bucks buys you some swell jargon.

 

NY Comic Con (from The Batmom October 2012)

New York Comic Con is in the merch bag. Happily weary and Salem bound, brain not up to the task of spinning a coherent narrative. Instead I shoot bullets.

Pow Chicka Pow Pow.

• Everyone goes to comic con. The stereotypes spoofed on screen attend en masse, and so does your grandma, your babysitter, your dog-sitter, your dentist. All ages, all colors, all walks of life. And yes, people wear some crazy-ass costumes, a number of them scanty.

• Everyone comes off smart: the longtime Wonder Woman reader who patiently placed my concept of Wonder Woman in historical perspective, the 20-something guy who attended any panel that might help him grow as a writer, and the many comic creators (writers, artists, letterers, colorists, editors) who presented at panels.

These creators’ brains are cultural catalogues, and the compendiums astound. Wonder Woman artists Cliff Chiang and Tony Akins discussed character creation during a Friday panel. I jotted down every cultural reference they made. Check it out:

British footballer Wayne "Wazza" Rooney • Bruce Lee • the leviathans portrayed on antique maps • Victorian funereal photography • Hellboy artist Mike Mignola • Palestinian girls’ clothing from the 1920s and ‘30s • Father Christmas • Japanese hipsters • foxes in Dionysian tradition • Jack Kirby’s Orion • 1990s-era Superboy • Italian motocross racers • swimmers • old Thor comics • Through the Looking Glass •Google Maps • Kurosawa

Impressed? I was.

• Famous people are charming. Or convincingly fake it.

I attended a Q&A with Sean Astin (The Goonies, Rudy, and in LOTR as my favorite Samwise Gamgee). In the manner of a kind and scruffy history professor, Astin spoke lovingly about Tolkein’s language, which first drew him to the LOTR script. He explained how certain words grab him as an actor, then repeated the word “home” several times, and in such a manner that it became a poem. Home. Home. Home.

(Astonishingly and amusingly, he had never heard of Lord of the Rings before getting the script, and in fact had The Hobbit confused with The Phantom Tollbooth. Starring Elijah Wood as a guy who talks to a dog. Or is that Wilfred?)

Other writers and actors charmed and amused me, including Fables creator Bill Willingham and actress Jewel Staite (Firefly, The L.A. Complex), but only one made me swoon: Nathan Fillion (Firefly, Dr. Horrible, Castle). He showed up unannounced during a Firefly event. (If you haven’t seen Firefly, go rent it. Joss Whedon created the show, a sci-fi/Western hybrid bleeding clever and, accordingly, cancelled after one season.)

When Fillion walked in, my friend Rene and I screamed like 1960s teenagers at a Beatles’ concert. Rather, Rene screamed while I, laryngitis-riddled, aped The Scream. I know roguish charm is Fillion’s thing, and to some extent he’s playing a role, but his Firefly co-stars spoke repeatedly of Fillion’s kindness to everyone on-set, from bottom to top.

Fillion also impressed me by answering crowd questions creatively, rather than offering up glazed perfunctory quips; and by playing the kind of clown that everyone loves but no one fears — he’s not going to make the class laugh by poking fun at you.

• Marketers are brilliant and probably evil. A lot of this conference aimed to get we the people (who paid to get in) to promote stuff. We gathered loads of branded swag (including a Rubik’s Cube and a crown!) and were constantly being asked to tap into social media and share our pop culture happiness with the universe. (This ploy might have worked better had any of us been able to access the Internet during the conference.)

I’m 41 and while I love my twitter, I’m also old enough to take what I want from a marketing frenzy and leave the rest. Some of the marketing was fun fun fun: Rene starred as the heroine in a mini-movie, and we got to bust out of the cover of a comic book.

Had I been a gamer, good lord. There must have been hundreds of gaming stations set up on the show floor offerings conventioneers first-shots at updates and new games. I wasn’t inspired to start playing, but I am inspired to rewatch Felicia Day’s funny funny gaming-centric web series The Guild.

• Speaking of brilliant, New York. I lived in Manhattan long ago, for a mostly unhappy year, but had forgotten how every last block offers up something if you’re willing to look: patterened blue and white tiling; golden art deco detailing; a thick, simply handsome wooden door.

• Let’s just keep running with brilliant: my friends.

I spent most of my time with Rene of StrangerInAFamiliarLand. We laughed a lot, especially when she yelled “areola” on a crowded bus, and enabled one another’s comic book-buying excesses.

We had dinner with three college friends; though my memory’s double-glazed with red wine and Benadryl, I think one asked not to be mentioned online, so I won’t. But I will suggest you go buy “Salvage,” and note the evening was such that I now miss all three of them.

Yesterday, I trotted uptown to walk a lovely dog with a lovely friend in October-lovely Central Park. Best of all, my lovely friend sent me home with a new read: Lilian Ross’s Here But Not Here.

Now I’m on the train home, staring at New England out my window and anticipating the sweet faces of my kids, who are still young enough to thrill at my return before asking “Whadja get me?”

I’ll play Santa with a swag bag and then get back to it.

Home. Home. Home.

* P.S. @frogandcode rocks.

* P.P.S. For the real nerds, I heard speak or grabbed signatures from (among others): Tony Akins, Raphael Albuquerque, Brian Azzarello, Greg Capullo, Bernard Chang, Cliff Chiang, Joshua Fialkov, Franco, Aaron Kuder, Scott Snyder, Bill Willingham. I didn’t buy a lot, but I picked up a few recommends from a helpful guy at Midtown Comics – Rising Stars, Saga, Locke & Key - and have a list from random folks who recommended mid-con.

 

Pippilotta Delicatessa Windowshade Mackrelmint Ephraim's Daughter Longstocking

Daughter and I spent the long weekend in Jackson, NH, currently painted the orange, yellow, and pine green of mountain fall. Driving homeward down Route 16, we listened to Astrid Lindgren's “Pippi Longstocking” on audio book. I loved the book and the movie when young, but didn’t remember much.

Should I continue to listen all the way through and/or Google extensively, I'm sure I will discover that this childhood favorite is rife with racist commentary, sexist language, or features Pippi wearing long johns made of the furs of 10 slain Iberian lynx.

(I’m still rattled from a summertime revisit of animal-gabber Dr. Dolittle, who had me flashbacking to the Optic White section of “Invisible Man.”)

But up through the point where Pippi takes out a crew of snot-nosed bullies using only her two scrawny fists, this girl’s proving a superheroine for the ages.

First off, she’s an orphan. Mama soars with the angels and papa is either king of the cannibals or sleeping with the fishes.

Secondly, her garb sets her apart. While Pippi’s roof-hopping shenanigans might be better served by Batwoman’s aerodynamic latex and shit kickers, Pippi’s a sartorial stand-alone with her motley get-up and clod-hoppers.

More importantly, Pippi lives according to her own code. When a pair of policemen attempts to chase her down and ship her off to an orphanage, she gives them merry chase, all the while keeping up friendly chatter and pointing out the many foibles of the polite society into which they’re trying to force her.

Finally, Pippi possesses superhuman strength. When she cows the aforementioned bullies, she does so by tossing each into a tree.

Pippi engages me, unlike Supergirl. Unlike Catwoman, she’s not trying to show me her cleavage. Looking for a heroine? You could do worse than Pippilotta Longstocking.

 

Baking for Tammy (from The Batmom October 2012)

Talented Tammy, creative cook and clever writer, former co-worker, current GLOW, and creator/author/chef-in-residence at FoodOnTheFood.com, just wrote a cookbook.

Really just; she sent off the final flour-dusted pages this week, breathing a sigh of relief but leaving the rest of us holding our breaths for an entire year, when Wintersweet hits the shelves.

Oddly, she entrusted me to test a recipe, a straightforward recipe for killer chocolate chip cheesecake cookies. (Killer delicious, not snack-time assassins.)

And this is how the testing went:

Before shopping, I triple-checked my list. Before baking I triple-checked my ingredients.

I’m not a triple-checker. Nothing I cook contains every called-for ingredient. I read the list too quickly, or forget an item at the grocery store, or leave a bag in my car for three days whereupon everything spoils. All of these things happen monthly, and so a recipe in my hands becomes a research project and a game, involving creative guesswork and a constant consulting of the “substitutions” section of my "Joy of Cooking."

However, testing a recipe for a cookbook requires use of exact ingredients, and so I applied uncharacteristic vigor to the entire procurement process. Except I didn’t read the chocolate chip package, and so at 9:30 p.m. last Tuesday, after the PTO meeting and after putting my kids to bed and 12 hours before my report was due to Tammy, I discovered I had purchased Chips Of Unusual Size.

I said a bad word then texted Beth, she of the well-stocked pantry. She had Chips Of Usual Size, and with them in hand, I returned to my bowl-ing.

Whenever I bake, I think about my grandmother and her popovers and her hermits. I remember her when I level flour with a knife, as she taught me; and I remember her as I ignore her instructions to crack eggs into a separate bowl, in case they’re bloody. On Recipe Test Night, I could actually hear her laughing from the Kitchen in the Sky as a vile, red egg slipped out of its shell and onto a pile of carefully measured sugar.

I cleaned out the whole damn bowl and started from scratch, for the first time in my life heeding my grandmother’s egg advice.

After the bloody egg, all progressed simply, enjoyably. (After the bloody egg, I poured myself a glass of wine.) The recipe proved not only delicious but foolproof, I playing the fool. Beth tested blintzes and Danielle tested rum raisin cheesecake bars, and we all met up to pig out.

Everyone declared Tammy a triple killer success: writer, instructor, baker. (Killer amazing, not toque-wearing assassin.) Put Wintersweet on your 2013 list of must-haves. Until then try her other recipes (and enjoy her killer ha ha sense of humor) at her blog, FoodOnTheFood.com.

Wonder Woman #0 (from The Batmom October 2012)

Ramble: Great read! More interesting twistiness uncovered in Wonder Woman's history. She was already a girl alone among the Amazons, what with being a holy bastard and the only one of her race not to toss baby boys off the island.

In this flashback issue, Ares, Diana’s uncle and god of war, takes his 13-year-old niece and makes of her a warrior. She grows strong and swift, but when she shows the Minotaur mercy, Uncle War fwooms fire and declares her a loner for life.

From a gender perspective, this new bit mixes things up even more than past issues.

Traditionally, Diana is raised and trained by a race of brave women who stand man-less and proud on their island. Brian Azzarello (writer) and Cliff Chiang (artist) angered not a few readers in issue #7 by turning the Amazons into heartless floozies, but that twist certainly served to heighten Diana’s feelings of isolation – from her family and her gender.

In issue #0 she’s being trained by a male god who rules a traditionally male arena – battle – and she’s triumphing on her own terms, which once again separates her from her family, here male.

I’m a new reader, but even I didn’t like the nasty turn the Amazons took in #7. I do like the point at which Diana’s arrived. She embodies the strength and skill of her teachers, male and female, and uses them to employ her unique brand of justice, which she metes out with a healthy dose of compassion.

The issue looks great, too. The creators present the book as if it was pulled out of DC’s archives; the art and the writing reflect this. Behold Diana’s first thought: “My prize is nearly in my grasp. Though my arms do ache as Atlas’ must, I shan’t give up my quest.”

Shan’t. Ha! Pitch-perfect, start to finish. On to issue #12.

- 

Batwoman #0 (from The Batmom September 2012)

Ramble: I know most of you don’t read comic books, and aren’t going to start. But if you’d like, just once, a taste of what I’m having, go buy Batwoman #0.

A perfect book.

First off, the cover. All of the covers for the issue 0 books feature their superhero busting through a greyscale comic book page. My other superheroes strike typically heroic poses, but Batwoman is all FU Kung Fu. This is the pose I plan to adopt next time I walk into Market Basket. Out of my way, motherfuckers. I need some motherfucking organic skim milk NOW.

The thing I love about J.H. Williams – his art is smart art. He also writes Batwoman, with W. Haden Blackman, and his art speaks to me like writing speaks to me, which is saying something. I’m all words. I think in words and when I view art at a museum, I almost always need verbiage to bridge the gap between my alphabet-filled mind and the abstraction at which I’m looking.

Comics have been, on the visual front, a challenge. As I’ve written before, my instinct with a comic book is to jump from word blurb to word blurb, like a frog navigating a lily-pad covered pond. Earlier in my comic book journey, I had to force myself to slow down, to tear my eyes from the text they adore and consume the pictures, too.

For once, I listened to my wiser self and now I crave the art in both Batwoman and Wonder Woman (Cliff Chiang). Thank god, because all comic book artists are saying something with their pictures, and the best comic book artists brilliantly succeed.

The 0 issues DC released this month feature backstory on each superhero. A typical Batwoman book features genius, unique framing and her signature black-grey + red-orange palette. The narrative hip-hops around, sometimes too quickly for my liking, but always in engaging and original fashion.

For Batwoman #0, Williams created a very linear format that, at comic book’s start, is employed to present a very linear narrative: Kate Kane and her twin Beth share a special bond, Beth protects Kate from her darkest self even as a child, Beth and Mom are killed, Kate attends West Point and then leaves for refusing to hide her sexuality.

Pushed by her father, who is no doubt tormented by the same demons fighting for his daughter’s soul, Kate dives into darker and darker territory, growing stronger and more alone. As she transforms into Batwoman, the paler, lighter colors of the early pages are replaced with the darker fire-punched palette we associate with this book.

The second-to-last page takes the simple format Williams employs for much of the book (six rectangular panels per page) and busts it wide open, shoving Batwoman and deranged Beth into the linear format that no longer fits their violently heroic and violently villainous selves. They literally spill out of an ordered world that no longer holds space for them.

Sandwiching the story are two typically Batwoman, typically beautiful Williams pages featuring the Batwoman we’ve come to know – as much as she will ever be known – and, in my case, to love.

This book is triumph. Go buy it.

Shoveling Skunk (from The Batmom September 2012)

Shoveling skunk should be the phrase kids use for eating vile school cafeteria food, or the lingo 2012 election watchers employ when discussing lying liars lying. But it’s not.

I shoveled a skunk into a trash bag just before 10 p.m. last night.

I performed poorly, but the road kill skunk did worse, flopping about all bloody and smelly.

My friend Miz A, who fearlessly led our mission, suggested I grow a pair. I have many a pair, but none of them are testicles. Switching gender appeal, Miz A reminded me I had birthed two babies, surely a more strenuous and overwhelming experience than shoveling skunk.

I explained that while birthing, I took drugs and I did not look until my children were out.

(Would you like to look in the mirror, asked the doctor? No you *@$)**@, I would not like to look in the mirror. My vagina is not taking a powder break, it is birthing a baby.)

Drug-less and open-eyed, I grabbed hold the shovel handle while Miz A pushed Mr. Floppy aboard, onto the shovel. Then we dumped him into the trash bag. Rather, she dumped him into the trash bag and I unhelpfully flapped the edges of the trash bag and said “Eeee-ew!” a bunch of times.

I suggested we taxidermy him, dress him in a t-shirt that says “Salem: A Bewitchingly Good Time,” and mail him to The Bloggess, but Miz A put him in her garbage can and pushed it out of sight.

This is a gross blog post, the bit about the dead skunk and that disturbing digression in which I discuss my vagina looking in the mirror.

But you know, I’m a mom and I’m afraid Mr. Floppy was too. Just the other day, I saw the tail end of a baby skunk scurrying behind a neighbor’s recycling bin. I am now fretting about the baby skunk, about who will butter her toast and pack her lunchbox and put not nearly enough money in her 529. About who will love her.

Because once you’re a mother, after the pushing and the swearing and the drugs, and in spite of the laundry and the dishes and the noise, you would throw yourself in front of a car for your babies. And maybe Mr. Floppy did, just moments before Miz A and I came upon his gag-awful smelly carcass.

While every mother I know would throw herself under a car, we also fear death more than we ever did before kids. (I’ve had 98 diseases since 2005. Blame my kids. And Google.)

We fear death because we’re the mothers; no one does toast and lunch and insufficient 529s like we do.

We fear death because we love our stinky little skunks, even when they crawl into our beds at 2 a.m. and kick our heads and steal our covers and siphon our intelligence; our sanity, even.

We fear death because we want to see our children grow up, we want to help them grow up, and we want a lifetime of chances to make up for the many ways we’ve screwed up.

I could go on, but I’m going to go kiss my sleeping kids instead. And if I see any little skunks trash-diving around the neighborhood, I’m going to shut my eyes and walk on by.

 

When I Have Nothing to Write I Listen (from The Batmom September 2012)

(One 30-minute writing sprint.)

6:31 AM

The Cat pushes a small metal dish across pine floorboards.

My refrigerator hums a near-om, letting me know she’s working. The frozen waffles are frozen and the coffee creamer’s cold. Ommmm. Namaste. Waffles.

A bird slowly chirps, too lethargically for sunshine at 6:41. His buddy squawks, sounding ugly and small.

(How is it only 6:41? I have to write until 7:01. I will kill this minute. 6:41 6:41 6:41 6:41 6:42! Continue.)

A car accelerates. GO FAST GET FINED the sign says, though I can’t hear it.

One guy utters three words. The words I can’t distinguish, but I hear their Bahstan loud and clee-ah.

Chirpity chirpity chirpity chirp. Coffee kicking in, bird perking up.

Something I don’t hear: Bird’s squawking buddy. Drinking coffee? Snagged by calico?

(The Cat will wish himself the perpetrator. I will be happy he’s not, he having a fondness for delivering dead mice to my bed.)

(Fact my son knows: Mice can squeeze through holes the size of a penny. A dime? A nickel? My son will remember. I don’t.)

A plane lowering to Logan.

(My daughter says all planes are going to Florida. Florida's a better place to land than grey East Boston, though grey East Boston’s got a racetrack and AT-AT-Walkers and a shrine, which I will someday visit because it’s there, Mary looming large.)

A huffing jogger. Huff sneaker sneaker. Huff sneaker sneaker.

A trash truck. Not our day. Callooh! Callay!

A train. We are just far away enough from the tracks. I love the mechanical thrum, big cousin to my fridge’s Ommmming. When we try to sell the condo, the listing must include the words, “antique,” “charming,” and “mechanical thrum.”

Beep beep. Not a honker, that car.

7:02 AM

One me whooping, so softly, as to not awaken the troops.

 

- See more at: http://www.thebatmom.com/2012/09/when-i-have-nothing-to-write-i-listen.html#sthash.6nWo9quc.dpuf

The Grey Doesn't Know What She's Missing (from The Batmom August 2012)

I failed at Women Read Comics in Public Day Tuesday.

I forgot the “in Public” part and spent 25 minutes taking photos of myself reading comics in my empty house. Which I will save for Women Read Comics in Front of Living Room Mirrors Day.

To make up for my failure, I named today Cats Read Comics in Bunk Beds Day.

And failed again.

The Cat is a hybrid animal; part cat, part dog, part human, part superbeing. His sister, The Grey, is all feline.

The Cat will come running from five rooms away when called.

When called from two feet away, The Grey stays hidden in the closet, refusing the reveal. 

The Cat is the American mayor of our house, glad-handing everyone who walks through our door. 

The Grey is the British patriarch, making only the well-chosen appearance and, even then, remaining aloof if non-familiars are present.

Like her human counterpart Elizabeth, The Grey offers unwavering loyalty to a chosen few, namely me.

Today was to be The Grey’s day to shine. With the TV dulling my children’s intellects, I grabbed my camera and searched the house. I found her snoozing in a bunk bed. Thankfully today isn’t Cats Reading Comics in a Laundry Basket Day, or I would have been screwed.

I slipped Marceline in next to her.

 Marceline, as Adventure Time fans well know, is both ancient and teenager, a vampire wandering the Land of Ooo pulling pranks and ever-seeking red. Not blood. Red. Unlike her forebears, Marceline needs only suck red items. Any red items. The red from summer raspberries. The red from a stop sign. The red from the ugly plastic trashcan I keep in my fireplace for recycling paper.

Marceline rocks. So much so that kaboom! studios has given her a 6-issue series, “Marceline and the Scream Queens,” during which she and her rock band travel around Ooo seeking fame, fortune, and red.

Adventure Time and Marceline’s spinoff offer much to love. They’re funny, they’re weird, they have robots (BMO) and bad guys (the Ice King) and rock-and-roll vampires and people called Blooobians and stories called “Grumpy Butt” AND they have the best princess ever.

Daughter loves her because she’s pink and her name is Princess Bubblegum. I love her because she’s an inventor and band manager and totally devoted to her princess duties in an overly earnest, extremely funny way.

 Quote: “I love being a scientist and managing a rock band, but I would never let music or science distract me from my princess duties. Because being a princess and ruling the Candy Kingdom is my job!”

It’s hard not to love Princess Bubblegum. It’s hard not to adore Marceline and The Scream Queens.

Unless you’re The Grey, who found it easy to disdain. As soon as Marceline hit the allergen-proof mattress cover on which The Grey was sleeping, The Grey turned up her nose. 

Whether she was turned off by Marceline’s deviance from traditional vampire lore or just hoping from some god-damned peace and quiet, The Grey was having none of the comic book or the comic book photo session. Finally, as I heard the insipid closing theme song of Strawberry Shortcake, I snapped the above photo.

It does justice to neither The Grey nor Marceline, but it will have to do.

Happy Cats Read Comics in Bunk Beds Day, everyone!


Batwoman #12 (from The Batmom August 2012)

COVERGIRL: My dad is old school, preferring to riff on the Lord’s name when angry, instead of employing more vulgar and, in my opinion, satisfactory cusses. In deference to him, and in response to the Batwoman-Wonder Woman combo promised by this cover, I say a hearty, “GOD DAMN!”

INSIDE STORY: Batwoman seeks Sune and her gaggle of horrific urban legends brought to life. Employing the help of werewolf Kyle Abbot, she find Bloody Mary, whose myth little Gotham girls recite at slumber parties to engender the chills.

Batwoman employs the children’s chant: “Bloody Mary show yourself. Bloody Mary show yourself! BLOODY MARY SHOW YOURSELF!”

Instead of collapsing into giggles like Gotham’s tweens, Batwoman summons the demon spirit. Mary informs Batwoman that Medusa isn’t an organization, but rather the Queen Monster, snake-tressed Gorgon of old.

Gotham’s superheroes face a variety of evils, but Greek gods are the stuff of someone else's legend: Wonder Woman’s. Batwoman tells DEO boss Bones it’s time to bring in the Amazon.

Though Kate Kane doesn’t reach out to Diana until book’s end, Wonder Woman’s current status is woven (gorgeously) throughout the book. She’s battling a serpentine crew, and vows to destroy them all. Serpentine. Medusa. Do I have to spell it out?

Also, Gotham parents grieving for their kidnapped children berate poor hard-working Maggie Sawyer. Kate’s not up to the task of comforting. She’s off to Paradise Island.

Also, Bette Kane/Flamebird is out of the hospital and living with Uncle Jake.

RAMBLE: Have I said, "God Damn?" Yippee! Though as overstuffed as usual, super duper double whooper issue.

Gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous. I’m always blathering on about the art in this book, so I won’t. But really. Gorgeous.

The juxtaposition of Wonder Woman’s story and Batwoman’s, which can’t help but be awesome for the awesomeness of the awesome women, is the more brilliant for the writing.

I never noticed how distinct Batwoman’s voice is, probably because I was so busy drooling over the art. (Have I mentioned gorgeous?) She’s of Gotham, matter-of-fact and about the facts; closer to Batman-speak than quippy Batgirl’s intelligent chatter.

Wonder Woman, who in her own book remains fairly silent, the better to shine in the midst of her garrulous family’s mad bickering, here speaks like a grandiloquent stereotype of herself. Alone she might sound ridiculous, but when her godly speech runs alongside Batwoman’s straight prose … genius!

I had been excited for September, for all the #0 backstorying, but now I just want to skip ahead to October and see what happens next. Perhaps Harrison’s will let me set up a tent.

Wonder Woman #12 (from The Batmom August 2012)

COVERGIRL: Like: darker palette, bright moon, and Apollo’s glowy accoutrements. Love: Wonder Woman grabbing Apollo and delivering a smackeroo.

All superheroes are loners, but Wonder Woman is an Other among superheroes, defying standards and refusing to be a This or a That.

On cover #12, she’s subverting a familiar romantic stance (e.g. Life's 1945 kissing sailor photo) and seizing the male position. Apollo, a sleek and manly god as painted by Cliff Chiang’s brush, is here emasculated.

I’m not saying Wonder Woman consciously wars in the name of woman; she’s just who she is. She defies expectations, stereotypes, and genres. She’s not grabbing Apollo because she is woman, hear her roar. She’s grabbing Apollo because he needs his shiny ass kicked. That she is woman, and occasionally roars, is not a point she is making but the point is made nonetheless.

Wonder Woman walks the walks and leaves the talking to others.

INSIDE STORY: Apollo raises a new Olympus, replete with skyscrapers as flashy as he.

Wonder Woman removes her cuffs and undergoes an astounding transformation: her eyes glow, her power surges.

Zola’s water breaks.

Hera, cast out of the realm of the gods by Apollo, becomes mortal and auditions for the newest Real Housewives.

She also chucks Zola off a ledge; Wonder Woman gains flight and saves her.

Has Diana sprouted wings? Nope. Her dear friend Hermes, the kind and brave messenger we’ve grown to adore over 12 issues, zings a feather at her, temporarily granting her flight. How typical of him, acting the friend and savior. Too bad he STEALS ZOLA’S BABY TWO SECONDS LATER, BETRAYING DIANA.

RAMBLE: YOL. That’s Yelping Out Loud. Start using it.

I have never been so surprised by a comic. I opened the book to take a peek while my son was brushing his teeth. He finished brushing but I couldn’t stop reading. Though he was puffing impatiently and waving Green Lantern #5 in my face, I could not put the book down

When I reached the betrayal, I YOLed. I shouted, “What?” I whispered, “et tu, Hermes?”

I felt betrayed. I’m not even lying. And I was so happy I felt betrayed, I yelped again. Because this is how much I love this book. To feel a visceral response to a work of art, this is one of the great joys of reading. To render a character and tell a story with such skill that your readers respond like I did, must be one of the great joys of creating.

All hail Chiang and Azzarello. And Hermes be damned.