I would like an extra seven hours in every day and some sort of additional appendage, please. And a pony. Made of gold.
This is by way of an apology, insofar as I make them, for my utter slackitude over the last several weeks of this column. Many things have happened I turned 27! The Secret Six title started again! The Runaways and Young Avengers began another crossover! Several commenters on scans_daily and stupid_free were utterly appalled at the way Genius (my review/interview) hints that possibly police in L.A. are not always kind and gentle neighbours to people of colour in low-income neighbourhoods and there might be some complex and interesting dynamics worth exploring in a comic*! but I have not written about them, because I have been writing about other things, and, not incidentally, giving myself some really spectacular muscle cramps. Also, baking. Go me!
During this period of GRC neglect, many wonderful things have been happening in the magical land of Girl-Wonder.org! Here are but a few:
- Planet Karen is back, with its eponymous author! This is news that’s definitely worth a celebratory glass or ten.
- The Feminist Friendly Comic Book Store Map has been well and truly debugged. It is freaking awesome. Visit and review your favourite stores, to the delight and convenience of your peers, and the honour of your LCS.
- Spoiler Space is looking for submissions (ignore that date). Share your feminist and intersectional activism thoughts on comics and the comics community, enter the caption contest, or scribble up a comic submission. Reprints of material you’ve already published elsewhere are welcome.
- Girl-Wonder.org is partnering with Cerise, the online feminist gaming magazine, for a special October issue on the overlap of gaming and comics! Cerise is looking for submissions details are here! Topics can cover any intersection of comics and gaming, from creative to fannish. What can the industries learn from each other? What are the best game-based comics or best comic-inspired games?
- As part of this joint venture, keep an eye out for Cerise bloggers stopping by Girl-Wonder.org in October, and your chance to win combined prize packs. (Also, Cerise-editor-and-my-best-friend Robyn Fleming and I will probably interview each other again. Fun with accents, and maybe that story about how we scarred Justin Pierce of Wonderella fame with our wild party girl ways. [Speaking of Wonderella, did you know that you can now buy it in book form?])
- Rachel Edidin has stepped down from her Board of Directors position. We are sad to see her go, but she’ll still be blogging at Inside, Out and fulfilling her position as one of the Mod Squad!
- As a result of Rachel’s reluctant resignation, we have a Board seat free. We’re holding a by-election all Girl-Wonder.org volunteers are eligible to run and vote, so get your nominations in to me at [email protected] by September 21st. Self-nominations are welcome!
- A heads-up our big yearly fundraiser, the Art Et Cetera Auction, fast approaches. It’s running October 6 12, and the donated items are freaking awesome. Keep an eye on the frontpage newsfeed as we start highlighting donations on the run up to the auction opening!
And that is all for now. I hope to resume this column’s regular-ish schedule in the very near future. For one thing, Misfit keeps bouncing in and wondering very loudly if perhaps I would like to drink straight spirits from the bottle, and the last time I ignored her hints I eventually woke up with a concussion. I rather like my brains unbruised. - I highly recommend Naamen’s take on the Genius uproar, here he also includes a links round-up to other commentators. For my own part, I wish to observe that the people who complain that Genius has a Mary Sue for a main character and is poorly written compared to the other Pilot Season offerings are perfectly entitled to their opinions, even when one of the other offerings stars a famous novelist who dreams perfect translations of ancient tablets found on Mars and who wields Excalibur. The novelist a professional writer then earnestly narrates the caption, ‘Mankind was notched down a peg or two on the food chain,’ which is my favourite line in a comic for months.
