i've currently finished with book 5 of 8 of robert kirkman's "the walking dead." i look forward to finishing the series as soon as this financial crisis blows over (or i might just have to sell all of my other books).
today i wandered into the local comic shop looking for some interesting material for f.g.g.. much to my dismay, there aren't a huge amount of feminist comic writers/illustrators as were so popular in the 70's; or so said the girl behind the counter. she did, however, point me in the direction of a few girl-empowered graphic novels. many of them i found to be written and illustrated by men: cool. what i found was rather disingenous. a new "tank girl," by Ashley Wood: don't get me wrong; Wood is a great artist, but, i wouldn't say that he's much of a feminist. picture after picture displayed a scantily clad tank girl with her panties exposed. i proceeded to look at several other works by Wood, most of them featuring nude or nearly nude females.
i spent the better half of an hour scouring the comic shop in search of some sort of feminist comic or graphic novel. i was lead to female-written biographical comics and subtle if not borderline feminist works such as a league of extraordinary gentleman, y, the last man and persepolis but again, two-thirds male driven, and none containing that certain je ne sais quoi that i was looking for.
i think perhaps my search, though without spelling it out in exact words to the proprietor, was for a contemporary work of art that deals with todays women in everyday instances. i didn't want to find a girl with huge tits strutting around a war torn city with a gun, donning a cape... well the war torn part might be cool if it might have had some sort of participation on the part of the undead, but, ultimately i wanted something with real women perspective that wasn't outlandishly superheroish. i was, after some time, able to find a few cool items that i will have to return for. by no means is this meant to come off as some tirade against CH comics either: i respect the couple that own the shop and wish them well beyond their wildest dreams. what i would like to see is more women writing and illustrating novels based on everyday trials, or the very least, better characters in realistic, if slightly outlandish or apocalyptic settings.
one of the wonderfully fruitful things i received from my visit was the tip that led me here to girl-wonder.org. it was there that i found out about fem-oreiented zombie apparel, and nothing, as anyone who knows anything about anything, is cooler than zombies and zombie-related topics. although i'm not sure how exactly their fashion line actually has anything to do with zombies, they do have some cool designs and so i'll name drop them on an undead-premise (if not just for the fact that they hail from Stow, OH., which is a paltry 35 minutes from my hometown.) i was sort of hoping that there might be some zombie themed fabrics; maybe a silk-screened t-shirt or skirt that had "bub" or at least a few blood spatters, but, the dresses and other adornments were bereft of any noticeable gore, albeit, the models did look a mildly less-than-lively (goth?) before moving on i did browse through several of ZA's previous fashion shows taking notice of just a few disturbing things:
1st - the bald creep who repeatedly looks odd and pervish in the background. what's he hiding under those folded arms??
seen again here with an alarming countenance on his face. is he leaning over the invisible front row to get a better glimpse of shoes or a thigh? i'm thinking the latter
2nd - the men's line: who the fuck is wearing this other than this guy? for him, i feel sorry, and slightly ashamed.
again: who the hell is wearing this? what genre/crowd/style of people is this? pearl necklace clad grandma meets scottish-goth and has a sex-change, falls in love with the drop kick murphy's and buys a rainslicker so she doesn't have to cart a goddamn umbrella everywhere she goes.
No comments:
Post a Comment