Paper Girls, Vol. 1 by Brian K. Vaughan, Cliff Chiang
My rating: 3/5 cats
three stars cats with room to grow.
while impatiently waiting for more installments of saga to come out, i decided to check out this other brian k. vaughan book, because i liked the cover, the synopsis promised me plucky girls, 80’s references, and this right here is how you get my attention:
Suburban drama and supernatural mysteries collide in this smash-hit series about nostalgia, first jobs, and the last days of childhood.
all my sweet spots = accounted for.
because, yes – plucky girls:
80’s references:
nostalgia (for me, anyway – this picture made my heart soften):
and there are also some pretty funny 80’s-flavored dream sequences:
i’m just not hooked yet. it’s no saga, that’s for sure. but in a more positive light, it’s actually what i thought Lumberjanes, Vol. 1: Beware the Kitten Holy was going to be, before realizing that series was for a much younger reading age. this one has all the girl-power and female bonding and general badassery-adventure setup as Lumberjanes, but with significantly more guns, cussin’ and good-natured pal-ribbin’, pterodactyls, and actual danger, and it is far less p.c. because it was the 80’s, my friends, and twelve-year-old internetless kids from the suburbs didn’t always have access to the rich spectrum of life and they sometimes said “faggot.” but if time travelers can forgive a kid for their squeamishness:
so can we. and for being set in midwestern 80’s suburbia, there’s some decent diversity in the characters here – there’s a jewish girl and a vietnamese(?) girl and an adopted girl of indeterminate race and everyone’s favorite stereotype: a chain-smoking irish-american lass, tough and redheaded and on her way to becoming a criminal just like the rest of her family! but apart from her homophobia and the cliché of her, she’s pretty rad – willing to step up and throw down for her equally-fierce pack of paper girls against the most unexpected foes.
i didn’t always understand what was going on, but i’m confident it will all become clearer in future volumes. i’m intrigued enough to continue with the series – i’m not in love with it, but it’s got potential and i’ll check back in next volume to see if it’s getting there yet, if only to enjoy more 80’s background details.
