Sheena Queen of the Jungle #6

Written by: Marguerite Bennett and Christina Trujillo

Art by: Maria Sanapo

Color by: Ceci De La Cruz

Published by: Dynamite

With the end of the first arc, I expressed some hope for this series going forward. What Bennett and Trujillo are crafting in this new Sheena comic seems like it can be fun but it is starting to feel like they are falling back on every jungle character story trope there is.

Why do I say this? The first arc dealt with the invasion of the outsider looking to profit from Sheena’s tribe’s land. Now in the second arc, the antagonist, from what I can tell, is a jungle witch that may or may not be mystical attacking Sheena’s tribe for reasons that are not yet clear.

One saving grace in this series is that Bennett and Trujillo have begun to expand Sheena’s cast of characters and making it so that it isn’t just “insert prototypical tribesperson” into the story. We get to meet two such characters in this issue: the chieftainess and the healer.

We learn, quite abruptly I might add, that even the title is about Sheena, she is far from the leader of this tribe and in actuality is but a simple warrior for it. We learn this by the introduction of the chieftainess who arrives back to the tribe after having helped a neighbouring tribe involved in a conflict. We get a sense from the moment we meet her that she is a no-nonsense type of leader who expects quite a bit of Sheena.

The second character, that of the healer, is introduced as a potential love interest, from my understanding, who is keen to follow Sheena anywhere she goes. I’ll reserve my judgement on this character for now, as I’m hoping she isn’t simply a plot device.

The other saving grace is the introduction of Maria Sanapo on art. After being let-down that Moritat seemed to only have been hired for a few issues, they finally replaced him with someone who’s art jumps off the page. It’s by no means perfect, but it does add to the story more so than it did before.