Chicks Dig Comics: A Celebration of Comic Books by the Women Who Love Them

by Colleen Doran

  Panel Six

  1993. I’m in the staff office of the Engineering Library. I’m supposed to learn how to be an engineering librarian.

  As it turns out, I’m also supposed to learn about comics, as all my close colleagues are hardcore fans. They discuss my reading deficits like doctors trying to come up with the correct prescription for a difficult case.

  COLLEAGUE 1: “What do you think, start with the phonebooks?”

  COLLEAGUE 2: “I don’t know, the phonebooks are pretty dense.”

  COLLEAGUE 1: “Yeah, but she needs them. She definitely needs Jaka’s Story. At minimum.”

  COLLEAGUE 2: “Okay. And she’s reading Sandman already, right?”

  COLLEAGUE 1: “Of course.” [15]

  They said “the phonebooks” because that’s what the compilations of Dave Sim’s Cerebus comics were called, as they resembled phonebooks in heft and paper quality.

  Panel Seven

  1993. I’m in the living room of a small apartment, curled into a papasan chair, frowning with concentration as I read.

  Jaka’s Story was indeed dense. Paragraphs of tiny text next to panels rendered with delicate, precise linework. It was impossible to look at a page without being staggered at the amount of work that had clearly gone into it.

  There was a little girl with a looming, fearsome nurse. There was some gorgeous, fiendishly cross-hatched architecture. There was a sad, angry, lovely lady – the little girl grown up – and her feckless-looking but nonetheless handsome man. And then, suddenly, there was a cartoon animal. It had been explained to me that Cerebus was nominally an aardvark, but he was about as much like a real aardvark as Pogo was like a real possum. What was going on?

  Cerebus was the first comic I read where the artwork engaged me well before the story. I understood that it was a Big Deal, and I knew that reading it and my colleagues’ other recommended titles would be a way in to conversations with them about topics beyond the latest loon who wanted to look things up in our patent and trademark database but refused to tell us what he was looking for. [16]

  But sometimes, Cerebus felt like homework. I’d be reading along and get the vague sense that Dave Sim was slyly commenting on other creators’ work, or satirizing other elements of culture with which I was unfamiliar. [17] I knew the Oscar character was meant to evoke Oscar Wilde, and Julius was modeled on Groucho Marx, but there were a lot of nuances I was missing. It reminded me of trying to read the style of eighteenth-century English poetry that’s basically a lot of dudes slagging each other off in verse. I kept at it for some time, although I never loved it, and once Sim revealed his misogyny in all its batshit-crazy glory, [18] I stopped reading.

  I don’t regret the time I spent in Sim’s world. There’s value in making it past an intimidating surface; there’s value in reading work that isn’t to your exact taste. And Sim’s undeniably striking layouts taught me that a grid is only one way to think about a page. But I still had a lot to learn.

  My colleagues talked knowledgeably about dozens of writers, artists, and editors, regularly weighing the relative merits of different creative teams. Eventually, as I continued to read, listen, and occasionally contribute to the comics conversations in the office, I came to understand just how many contributors could be involved in making a comic, and that you could, potentially, write a comic without also being the person who drew it.

  Panel Eight

  1994. I’m still in grad school, still at the engineering library. I’ve just come from Common Language with my latest acquisition. A curious colleague asks to see it, since judging from its size and shape it is clearly a comic.

  Panel Nine

  I hand over my copy of Hothead Paisan, Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist.

  Panel Ten

  He examines it with interest.

  Panel Eleven

  He hands it back.

  COLLEAGUE: “That was not designed for me!”

  That might have been the first time I thought about how many of the other comics I’d recently been reading arguably had been.

  Designed for him, I mean.

  Panel Twelve[19]

  Various bookstores, comics shops, and conventions, 1994-1996.

  I began consciously seeking out the work of female creators of alternative and minicomics. Some, but not nearly all, of the folks I discovered: Phoebe Gloeckner, Aline Kominsky-Crumb, Dori Seda, Julie Doucet, Donna Barr, Roberta Gregory, Erika Lopez, Carla Speed McNeil, Ellen Forney, Leanne Franson, Shary Flenniken, Posy Simmonds.

  What was I getting from reading all these women’s work? I was becoming increasingly aware of how many kinds of stories could be told in comics, [20] experiencing deeply individual voices and approaches to combining words and pictures, as intimate as the self-published zines I was also reading.

  I should note that I didn’t totally swear off male creators. I kept right on with books like Sandman, Concrete, and American Splendor, and minicomics with alternative heroes like Matt Feazell’s Cynicalman and Sean Bieri’s Cool Jerk and Homo Gal. I went back in time and caught up with Pogo and Krazy Kat. I fell into Love and Rockets and have yet to re-emerge.

  I was learning what I value as a comics reader. Humor. Inventive use of language and layouts. Emotional complexity. Casts of characters who relate to each other in believable ways, even when the tone of the work is broad and exaggerated. My comics reading was less escapism than voyeurism; what I wanted was insight into other lives, worlds seen – or created, as the case may be – through other people’s sensibilities.

  Panel Thirteen

  1997. Living room of a very small apartment. Décor: publisher comps, FedEx boxes full of original art, loose stacks of minicomics and floppies, and graphic novels with cracked spines. I’m sitting on the carpet, which is not entirely free of ink.

  My tipping point as a comics creator came, perhaps unsurprisingly, when I began living with a cartoonist. Suddenly, the process was entirely demystified. Suddenly, I could just read a script and then watch the evolution from thumbnails to pencils to inks. Heck, suddenly I could stand over an artist’s shoulder and kibitz, saying, “You need to put her in a different outfit, she wouldn’t wear that.” From that point on, it was only a matter of time.

  Panel Fourteen

  1997. Living room of a somewhat larger apartment, with similar décor. I’m slumped on the couch, frowning over my overheating laptop.

  All my reading, not to mention all the other writing I’d done, wasn’t sufficient to prepare me for writing comics. First, I tried adapting one of my prose stories. There was a passage in it of which I was very fond. It was about the moon. A big yellow summer-moon, shining in the sky. I put the passage in my script, unaltered.

  Panel Fifteen

  Artist draws a circle on a blank page.

  ARTIST: “There’s the moon.”

  Panel Sixteen

  He draws some lines emanating from it.

  ARTIST: “Now it’s shining.”

  Panel Seventeen

  He looks up from the page.

  ARTIST: “Now write me something that advances the plot.”

  Panel Eighteen

  2011. Living room of a house with similar décor, but fewer FedEx boxes since mostly everyone sends art digitally now. I’m sitting in an Adirondack chair in the corner, staring into the middle distance as I contemplate a script in progress.

  I’m a comics creator because I’m a comics fan. And I mean that in the broadest sense; I am a fan of stories told by juxtaposing words and pictures in deliberate sequence, the kind of storytelling that at this time and place is known as comics. Although I love and respect the work of many, many individual creators, what I love the most is the format itself, the way a gap between panels can be a minute or a decade, the way you can destroy a planet, a plant, or a plan in the same amount of space, how the words can be lying while the pictures tell the truth, or vice versa.

  Panel Nineteen

  2012, multiple locations. Girls are sitting cross-legged, p
erched on tree branches, lying in bed, leaning against lockers. They’re looking at screens, zines, phones, small thick volumes of manga, oversized graphic novels.

  They’re all reading comics. Soon they’ll be creating them.

  [7] Dykes to Watch Out For

  [8] Love and Rockets

  [9] Hothead Paisan: Homicidal Lesbian Terrorist

  [10] Ernie Pook’s Comeek

  [11] One of many instances wherein I favored the wisecracking sidekick.

  [12] Antihero.

  [13] Heroine.

  [14] Hero.

  [15] Because it was pretty much a given that if you were an alternatively-inclined lady reading comics at that time, you were reading the work of Mr. Gaiman. See also: clove cigarettes.

  [16] In case we stole his idea.

  [17] Wikipedia would have been a godsend, but we just barely had a graphical Internet.

  [18] Issue #186. You can read about it in Wikipedia.

  [19] Really this would be a montage-y splash page, but I’m already pushing it with the conceit.

  [20] Answer: all kinds.

  I’m Batman

  Like Batman, Tammy Garrison has a dual identity. She is a digital preservation librarian by day, and a crazy cat lady, doggie foster-mom, and writer by night. She met her husband (a crazy cat man) on a Nightwing fan forum, and it’s been crazy cat-wedded bliss ever since. Her work has been published by LexisNexis and Mad Norwegian Press, and in Flashshots and Luna Station Quarterly. Her daily micro-fiction can be found at thetinytales.blogspot.com, and she can be found on Twitter and around the ‘Net via the username @spastasmagoria. She has been a Batman fan since birth, and has a strong interest in rainbows, cupcakes, those sprinkly heart things, the color purple, and pie.

  I’m Batman. Don’t let the full-figure, glasses, or breasts fool you; I am Batman.

  I can see you saying... Right. You’re Batman. But why not Batgirl? Certainly, as a librarian and bottle redhead, I have more in common with Silver Age Batgirl, Barbara Gordon, than some elitist playboy with an annoying habit of collecting children to add to his crusade. I have never so much as stood on a rooftop, much less endangered minors in my own private war. Certainly, Barbara Gordon is the safer bet, when choosing a fictional character that I connect with on a spiritual level. Right?

  Wrong.

  Barbara Gordon is awesome. She saw what she wanted in life and went after it, even when Batman didn’t want her around. She encountered adversity when the Joker shot and paralyzed her, and learned how to recreate her life and continue on. You can’t knock that. But I never wanted to be Batgirl as a kid. I never understood Batgirl the way I understand Batman.

  There are a variety of reasons I identify with Batman. Not because he is dreamy or rich or anything like that. But because he’s awesome, and he just... feels right. If I had to choose between all fictional characters in the pantheon of human literature, Batman most closely represents what I am about: punching people, awesome cars, and luring children into danger. Okay, not that part of Batman. Punching people and corrupting minors is bad, ok? (We can all agree to love awesome cars.)

  Also, I’m hardly rich, and I really don’t have the upper-body strength to hold a guy over a ledge to get him to talk. (Though it would solve a lot of problems if I could.)

  Batman is awesome and powerful. He found what he wanted to do in life and pursued it with a vengeance. He follows his instincts and his conscience, even if no one else believes in him or cares what he is doing. Batman is about perseverance, planning, and enduring. He’s had screwed-up things happen to him, and isn’t unscarred, but continues to go on. And Batman’s a big fat jerk.

  I actually had a long conversation with one of the editors of this fine book where we discussed why she hates Batman. I couldn’t disagree with any of the things she said; he’s quite horrible, really. He is emotionally stunted, and he’s incapable of telling everyone around him that they matter to him. He uses people, he treats those in his confidence like he’s unappreciative of them and their talents, he holds himself and others to unrealistic standards. He’s also got plans ready at a moment’s notice to take out the entire Justice League – which is just murder on maintaining friendships.

  The guy has issues. Dick Grayson is neurotic (a natural product of that trademarked Bat-family upbringing), and he’s still more stable and likeable than Bruce Wayne. But, I have to admit... I’m not entirely likeable either. I do things for good reasons that get misunderstood. I’m a bit crap at relating to people. I’m damned near incapable of expressing emotion in a socially acceptable manner.

  It’s not just readers who don’t like Bruce Wayne; loads of characters don’t like him either. Guy Gardner’s been nursing a grudge since Batman punched him in the face that one time. And that other time. The Justice League never really quite got over that bit where a villain stole Batman’s plans for taking out the whole Justice League and implemented it. You’d be sore, too, if your alleged friend and ally thought up plans to kill or neutralize you.

  Batman is still in the Justice League. He’s still the guy they call when they need a plan, or when they need someone to do something they consider unthinkable.

  And, hey, Batman had good reasons for having plans to take out all of his Justice League friends. Can you imagine what would happen to the world if Superman turned evil? The world needs someone like Batman who is capable of making hard decisions. Nobody wants to talk about what happens when their friend Superman goes nuts and starts laser-beaming civilians for jaywalking in Metropolis. (Because they’re all hopeful and trusting, but really.) How much egg are you going to have on your face when Superman gets taken over by alien spores and destroys half the planet Earth before you can mount any sort of counter-attack?

  It’s better to have a plan as to what you’re going to do than try to figure it out later, when you’re all dead. That’s not cuddly, but it sure is practical. However, if a bad guy steals and executes your plans for taking out all your friends, you should at least frickin’ apologize to them. At that point, you’re just a douche if you don’t. So, I try to at least own up when I’ve screwed up – even if it wasn’t entirely my fault. It keeps things polite and cordial. (And keeps your friends from kicking you out of the Justice League.) Sometimes, Batman is an example of what not to do, just as much as what to do. See, I’m learning from him all the time!

  At the end of the day, I try to get the job done, just like Batman. So often, I find myself asking the question: What Would Batman Do?

  I can’t remember a point in my childhood when I wasn’t consuming and internalizing the lessons (good and bad) of the Batman mythos. That is what they were to me, my mythology. I learned about what was important, how to be a good and contributing member of this world. (And how to punch people. Always pull your thumb back, out of the way, so you don’t break it.)

  Being a very early reader, I’d sit on the floor of the barbershop where my grandfather got his regular haircuts, reading old comics. Batman was the best of all of them, in my tender, and possibly jaded, four-year-old opinion. The Fantastic Four was just unrealistic. And Iron Man was an “obvious” Batman ripoff (I was four, and was also convinced that K9 from Doctor Who worked for the Daleks). And Iron Man drank! Like my grandparents’ neighbor, “Intoxicated Mr. Thomas.” And yes, I called him “Intoxicated Mr. Thomas.”

  But heck, everyone knew Batman never did anything bad. He never so much as hit a guy with glasses or used harsh language on the TV show I watched with my grandparents every evening at dinner time. Batman didn’t get his super powers from a lantern or a sun, he’d worked for them all. Which is what my grandparents told me you had to do to be successful: work hard. After hard work, according to my grandmother, I could be whatever I wanted when I grew up. Even Batman. (My grandparents also let me watch R-rated movies and Delta Force, so I think that explains everything you need to know about me.)

  Another lesson I internalized very early was that bad things happen to everyone. That was courtesy of li
fe itself, as opposed to Batman. But Batman taught me that it’s not the bad thing that defines you.

  I imagine most people in Gotham think Bruce Wayne is a bit of a burnout. He had potential, but now he’s just tabloid fodder. I bet they don’t even blame him, much. Who wouldn’t waste all his money on fast cars and beautiful women? Shoot, I would, given half the chance.

  But, being an only child who saw his parents murdered in front of him at a very young age? That’s got to mess someone up, right? Heck, even if he turned out to be a drug user or criminal, I’m not sure anyone would fault him. He’d just be another one of those kids that had too much thrown at him too quickly, and had the monetary resources at his disposal to be the instrument of his own demise.

  That isn’t the route he took. Sure, it’s his façade, the Scarlet Pimpernel idiot’s mask that he wears to conceal his true objectives and motives. But, for whatever reason – nature, nurture, whatever – Bruce Wayne became Batman. Other people in Gotham made other choices. Victor Freiz, when faced with the loss of his wife, became a villain – as did countless others.

  You decide who you are. You can have something horrible happen to you and become Batman, or you can become the Joker. You can get swept up in horrible circumstances and bad choices, but you don’t need to. You can exert force on your own life. You can steer your own path.

  I did try to follow that, even in those special difficult times known as primary and secondary school. No matter what peers or adults were putting me through, I didn’t need to let it make me a certain way. I didn’t have to become mean, or bitter or angry.