What I Bought 8/9/2017 - Part 2

My downstairs neighbor left a note on my door last week, a full page front and back, complaining how I kept her up all night with loud music and banging noises. Except I went to be bed at 10:30 on the night in question. I think she means the people in the apartment behind mine, but I can't be bothered to find out. But it did put me in a sour mood that day, especially since the note informed me she had told management about my (nonexistent) transgression. I haven't heard anything from them,
so I presume they're taking it even less seriously than I did. I have the impression she complains to them about everyone around her a lot.

Ms. Marvel #21, by G. Willow Wilson (writer), Marco Failla (artist), Ian Herring (color artist), Joe Caramagna (letterer) - Nice use of the lightning bolt symbol there, especially in contrast to the electricity crackling off the bad guy's gauntlet.

Kamala, her brother, and the other people set to be booted out of town fight back and try to find safety in the local mosque. HYDRA Lite barges in, the fight continues, Kamala ends up in the bathroom with the masked bad guy who turns out to be that blond jock, Josh. Who has turned his feelings of inadequacy into violence against others. Brilliant.

Kamala and Josh stopping to have a heart-to-heart in a bathroom while there's a huge fight between hate mongers and a bunch of innocent people going on outside seems like a curious decision. Yes, Kamala wants to understand why he's doing this, and she's worn out, but maybe deal with understanding after the innocent people are out of danger? It's a little hard for me to see Josh recognizing the error of his ways and switching sides in the twelfth hour. I did like how, in the flashback, Lockdown tells Josh she knows he isn't bad, he just had a bad idea, and he's really a leader, when she had been the one insisting he had to be locked up because he might cause an explosion at the school. Josh, you gullible asshole.

Failla draws Kamala a little taller in this issue, even on the page where she briefly surrenders. Possibly because she was in fight mode most of the issue, so she was always making herself a little larger. Or maybe he's drawing her a little skinnier than usual, which makes her look more stretched out. It's less noticeable as the issue progresses, because she's getting worn down, and can't keep up the pace, and a lot less noticeable once she and Josh are sitting and talking, what with her being out of fight mode entirely.

Yellow is the color Herring seems to use for when Kamala's going to fight. The panels get a prominent yellow tint when she takes heart from her brother and decides to keep resisting. It's not the first time, it's been pretty consistent across both volumes, yellow is the color for moments when she puts her doubts aside and stands up. Which feels a little strange to me, since yellow gets associated with cowardice, having a yellow streak and all that. But yellow's also a bright color, associated with light and life, which are things she'd be protecting. And her lightning bolt's yellow as well, of course.

Unbeatable Squirrel Girl #23, by Ryan North (writer), Erica Henderson (artist), Rico Renzi (color artist), Travis Lanham (letterer) - I feel like Henderson's emulating something with these covers, but I don't know what. Covers of old pulp adventure novels. The coloring is just making it look odd to me.

The equipment that sustains the Savage Land is failing, and the problem is believed to be some programming issue with the alien robots that maintain it. Thus bringing in clever programming students to try and figure out the problem. But, as watching character do programming stuff is really boring, the issue instead focuses on Nancy and Stefan's tentative relationship. Their differing opinions on Doom are causing some issues, but may not be insurmountable. Romance subplot done for now, the story returns to hot programming action, now with Dinosaur Ultron. Which is an outstanding addition, and something I didn't know I wanted to see until now. I hadn't even thought of him taking a form like that, but it's outstanding. Much better than that time Frank Cho drew Ultron as looking like the Wasp because . . . well, because it was Frank Cho drawing it I assume.

So that was a pretty good reveal for the final two pages (not counting the actual final page, Kraven's continuing struggle with the Poachmaster General). The two-page spread of Doreen helping Nancy through her doubts about the possible relationship covered some important character work, but didn't take up so much space we were denied Dinosaur Ultron. Also, I like the touch of having Doreen write her name as "DOREEN!" on her name tag, while Nancy opted for "Nancy Whitehead".

However, I must take issue with something. The Squirrel Girl Bathroom Update about Doreen trying to return the baby pterosaur to its parents clearly states Doreen's shirt got torn at the shoulder, and yet there was no battle damage when she returned to the dinner table, having unfortunately missed out on exciting relationship developments. Not Doomesque, dude. I demand continuity be maintained between the main story and the jokes at the bottom of the page!

Lotta good jokes in this issue, too. Latverian slang, the bit about programming montages being boring, the menu jokes, Squire Pete as the (nonexistent) character find of 2017. Unless Squire Pete is going to show up to help in this story arc. Still funny, though. Although knightly armor would have to be unpleasant in a tropical jungle. Chafing issues galore. Nothing funny about that.

As usual, Squirrel Girl's a highly enjoyable book.