Bitch Planet #1

Otherworldly. 

Writer: Kelly Sue DeConnick 
Artist: Valentine De Landro
Publisher: Image

 If you removed Bitch Planet from its timely release amidst current trends towards feminist ideals and standards (all of which I love, applaud and support by the way) it would be a good comic with an important message. When you view it in our current social context however, Bitch Planet becomes more than just a good comic. It’s a screaming, throat slashing, ball-busting charge into women’s rights viewed through a comic lens. A charge that I welcome gladly but that if you didn’t welcome, would still mow you over without a care in the world.

Kelly Sue DeConnick writes with a certain ferocity. These women kill, maim, riot and swear and rightfully so, given their situation as prisoners of a world that sees them so “non-compliant” that it ships them off-planet to punish them. The writing of these women, characters, heroes and villains has the tension and energy of bottled lightning. It’s a concise meditation on the failings of our modern patriarchal societies. When Marvel willingly publishes a Spider Woman cover that garners the disgust of women and forward thinking men in this massive community and industry, Kelly Sue DeConnick gives you a strong black woman who is handier with a shiv than most marines could ever hope to be in response. The idea is original, the dialogue is believable and the pacing is exquisite. This issue doesn’t tell you a lot about where we’re going but it does give you an unwavering look at a world and characters that have stories to tell.

De Landro is the visual interpreter of those stories and handles them with exquisite care and theatricality. The art successfully brings to life a multitude of characters and places. From large, powerful and terrifying women to cunning and mischievous digital wardens, Bitch Planet is a living, breathing and beating machine. The action is fluid and taut while remaining full-bodied and punishing. These are strong, vicious women and bastardly, conniving men brought to life in an exquisite way without being overly cartoonish or obvious. Real people like these seem to be demand realistic art and De Landro delivers.

Go buy it already because DeConnick and De Landro have something to say and you better be listening.