Once More With Patsy Walker: Hellcat

Fine, so the title is probably inaccurate. After all, this is just ideas I had after reading the final issue, without having the previous four around to check things against, so I'm sure there's a post like that somewhere in the future. Maybe.

The thing I think I hit on with Patsy Walker: Hellcat #5 is, for all the speechifying about portents and heirs, and souls being stolen and everything else, it really boils down to a story about teens conflicting with their parents. Ssangyong wants to be an artist, has creativity in her heart*, but her mothers (all seven of them) want her to follow in their footsteps, be a shaman, that kind of thing. All the stuff they gave Patsy about how they got out into the area around their home, map it out, and then return, is just a metaphor for how people settle into routines, get less adventurous as they get older. They won't just hop in the car and drive wherever, they have to have a specific destination, and a map to make sure they get there**. When they tell patsy that they can't find their heir, that all their maps just lead in circles, it represents how different generations have difficulty understanding one another because they come from different places. Ssangyong wants different things from her life than they did, and they can't understand that, so they can't "find" her, where that represents being able to really communicate with her.

The stuff about how Patsy must rescue their heir from the Windigo, before it devours her soul is "parents don't like your new boyfriend" problems. The only way he's going to steal Ssangyong's soul is by encouraging her to go do what she wants, rather than listening to her parents. That's the problem with him as far as the kooky shamans are concerned. After all, he's magic, they should love that their daughter is hanging out with a magic creature, rather than a doctor, or law student or something. But he's a sign of her growing independence, so she must be rescued from him.

The shamans believe ravens are significant when it come to Ssangyong because one flew overhead when she was born, so any ravens are a portent that must be heeded. Seems like the overprotective parent syndrome, where the kid scrapes their knee once when they fall off their bike and after that it's much too dangerous to let them go outside. Or a raven did something bad to them when they were younger, and so they're sure it will do something bad to Ssangyong as well. The father being turned into the map that looks like a "calendar"? He's a map because he comes from the world Ssangyong wants to be part of, he can talk with her in a way all those shaman/moms can't, so he's the one that can guide the way to some sort of peaceful resolution. The fact that he looks like what Patsy believes is a calendar represents all the years he spent in that form rather than step up and be a parent. If he had accepted responsibilities as her father, he could have served as a buffer or mediator between daughter and mothers. Sure the shamans changed him that way initially, but they tried to change him back, and he didn't want to be changed back, so it didn't work. So he represents time, time lost, time wasted on pointless arguing where the principals involved just talk past each other.

With all that said, and me feeling pretty pleased with myself, it's time to raise the questions I still don't understand, namely, what all this had to do with Patsy herself? I still think it has something to do with her relationship with the mother that made her a multimedia superstar from childhood on, and Patsy getting sick of the control her mom was trying to exert on her through that. I still don't understand what was the deal with the fellow who took her on the tour on the snowmobile, but also was driving the SUV when Patsy received this mission. How does he figure into all this? He never appeared again, but he's the only character that Patsy sees in both worlds. That has to mean something. Ssangyong pointed out that Patsy was supposed to have seven helpers with her, but at the time she reached the ship, she was a little short***. She had her wolf, the bear, the rabbits (which only count as one). I'm guessing the map/father counted, and Patsy mentioned she had a snow lemming for a time. That's five. My guess is that Pete and Ssangyong are the last two. Patsy's weird reflection in #3 said that the helpers would not always ask nicely, and Ssangyong certainly wasn't being nice. But she kept them from falling into the really cold ocean, and Pete swallowed all the ravens his girlfriend unleashed in her angry, keeping everyone from getting their eyes eaten and being left gasping****. Also, I'm still concerned by what it means that Patsy was so cavalier about letting the wolf and the Bear with Antlers fall into the ocean. That was pretty cold of her, even if she insists they'll be fine.

* And thus is horrified that her parents were so terribly uncreative as to name her after an SUV. And it just occurred to me, that is the vehicle Patsy is driving isn't it? A Ssangyong Rexton. I'm so terribly slow it kills me sometimes.

** Sadly, this describes me as well. I don't really drive without having a specific destination anymore. Alex and I used to just cruise around wherever the road took us for hours. Then gas got more expensive, and golly gee, my vehicles mileage started to get up there a ways, and I just kind of stopped. I'm too young to be acting so old.

*** I find it amusing that Ssangyong apparently hates the life of magic she grew up in so much, but not only did she end up dating a Yeti with magic powers (though I imagine the options were limited), she certainly doesn't mind spouting off about mystical requirements when it suits her. or using magic to unleash a horde of ravens when she gets pissed. I guess that shows the ability of teenagers to be so busy being angry at the world, that they miss their own hypocrisy.

**** That's a nice curse. I need to remember to use that sometime.