Lesbians write comics? Black lesbians? WHAT?

So I was reading my handy-dandy email newsletter from NEC about the new releases this week. Now, NEC is my "neighborhood" shop and I appreciate them for their ability to Not Suck, despite mostly employing white dudes. Every week they send out the new releases to people on the email list, including their top picks.

This week, along with a bunch of Marvel stuff I wasn't interested in (Emma Frost finally comes clean? For what?) one Marvel thing I'm curious about (Spider-Woman), and a very thin list of my usual DC titles, was a top pick that I was totally surprised by (since I clearly do not keep up on solicits, thankyouverymuch).

Who the Hell is the Web? I have no idea. Who is the Hangman? Also no idea. But I know who Angela Robinson is. Oh yes.

Angela Robinson gave us Jordana Brewster doing a hilarious music montage to an Erasure song. That's right. An Erasure song. Jordana Brewster. Is there a better montage in the last decade of movies? No. There is not, my friends. D.E.B.S. is a satirical spy movie about a group of young college-age women that are superspies, and the one Perfect Score who falls in love with the bad guy (Lucy Diamond. Yeah. Like in the sky.) It's lowish budget but adorable and witty, and has a great cast. The original short it was based on also has a great cast, and I think it still may be up on PopcornQ somewhere.

Or Youtube. Okay then.



(I guess that's only the first two minutes. You used to be able to see the whole thing streaming on the internet, but apparently since they stuck it on a DVD with 9 other shorts you may not een want to see, that's no longer possible. Right. Ohoh, here you go, a slightly censored version.)

Angela Robinson isn't just responsible for superspies and the evil lesbian supervillains that love them. She also did Herbie: Fully Loaded (yeah, with Lindsey Lohan) and this great, unfinished webseries called GirlTrash, which was a female-driven modern noir.

She's also directed some of the best episodes of The L Word, including that one with that awesome phone tree. You know the one. If you've ever watched The L Word, which you're required to if you're a lesbian or bisexual woman, or you get kicked out of the club.

Speaking of the club, I know who Angela Robinson is because D.E.B.S. has become a part of the Lesbian Required Viewing List. What list? Oh tsk tsk. You know, the one with Desert Hearts, Personal Best, Go Fish, and more recently Imagine Me & You, Lost and Delirious, The Cave (just kidding!), Saving Face, those episodes of Once and Again where Evan Rachel Wood's character realizes she has feelings for Mischa Barton's character, the first three seasons of Bad Girls, anything adapted from a Sarah Waters novel, and the entire run of Xena: Warrior Princess. Among other things.

Where was I?

Comics!

Angela Robinson is writing a comic for DC Comics. Cool. I'm still not sure how cool this Web dude's going to be (and The Hangman looks a lot like Hooded Justice...) but I'll put it on my pull list, and I'll probably do a write up on that this week.

Don't want to get kicked out of the club, after all.

Redo!

Fantastic Fangirls' most recent Q&A asked:

What comics story do you want reimagined or covered, and by whom?

I'm reprinting my answer here, possibly with a few more details, definitely with some pictures, because... it's my blog and I'll do what I want to. You would cry to if it - oh, wait.

Just a small music tangent: Lesley Gore's iconic songs, "It's My Party" and "You Don't Own Me" were given an extra layer of interestingness (flickr invented that word, don't blame me) when she came out as a lesbian in 2005, and said she'd been gay since her late teens. Seriously, go check out those lyrics.

Anyway, my answer!


I'd like to see someone redo Camelot 3000. I really enjoy the idea of the story, but the 80s' idea of the future is... laughable now. I didn't read it until about six months ago, and the art and story both seem dated. I feel like a modern writer/artist team could give it a spin that just feels more correct and holds up better with time. I love retro-future ideas, but most of the ones from that decade just don't hold as well as the ones written in the 50s and 60s. I liked the struggle of the knights to find themselves in the 40th century, but I didn't feel like the 40th century reflected well enough on the 20th century that the writers were coming from.

As for that writer/artist team. Hm. I'm currently enamored with Greg Rucka and Gail Simone. I think Rucka does really interesting things with mythological constructs (I'm basing this on the Crime Bible stuff) and I just like the way Gail Simone thinks about and writes comics (there's a great interview with her on AfterEllen that really piqued my interest in her writing) and I think between them they could put out a good story with interesting characters and a good adapted mythos. I will absolutely admit to mainly wanting to see the Tristan/Isolde story retold by a modern writer, but the rest of it would be great, too. Also, maybe we could ignore the tired old Arthur/Guinevere/Lancelot thing. Granted, the resolution in the original was fairly cutting edge, but I think by the 40th century they could just all get together and be happy.

Another tangent: David Franzoni's/Anton Fuqua's weird-but-enjoyable (Sarmatians? Really?) take on Arthur, the one that finally had a Celtic warrior woman (who needed a sandwich, but still), did a good modern twist on that triangle, making it Arthur and Lancelot who were the unrequieted tragic lovers. Not, like, on screen (because Heaven forfend men be in love in an action movie), but the undercurrents were pretty clear. To me. And even if they weren't, Lancelot was very obviously more interested in Arthur than Guinevere.

And artists, hmmmmm. I know less about artists. I really enjoy the more realistic style of Stuart Immomen, whom I recently discovered, and I think it would work well for that kind of story. Also a cover or two by Alex Ross would be iconic and amazing.

That art as it is is... well. Dark and strange. With odd detailing and accents. I'm sure it was very good for its time, but it's definitely not a style I enjoy. It reminds me of Heavy Metal and Ralph Bakshi settings. I don't like Ralph Bakshi settings, because they do the dark-and-bright-at-the-same-time thing in a strangely surreal way that removes me from the story. Seriously, have you seen War Wizards? WTF. I guess it has its place in fantasy (and I certainly like surreal artists like Peter Chung, so maybe it's more that I prefer surreality in science fiction over fantasy) but I'd rather see Camelot 3000 done with a more realistic, modern bent.

Besides Stuart Immomen, I also enjoy the artist doing Batwoman on Detectice Comics right now, JH Williams. Like I said before, I like his noir style. And while Kate Kane may be a bit vampiric, he's certainly capable of adding pigment to people, so I think that'd be fine. A neo-noir Arthurian story would be sort of cool, really. Like Blade Runner meets Sin City meets, well. King Arthur.

So that's my personal answer. I was an Arthurian geek before I was ever a comic geek.

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