Snotgirl #2

Written by Bryan Lee O'Malley
Art by Leslie Hung
Published by Image Comics

The first issue of Bryan Lee O’Malley and Leslie Hung’s Snotgirl took a surprising turn when a character slipped and brained herself on a night club’s dank bathroom floor. The story began innocently enough with a clique of self-centered and shallow fashion bloggers and ended with a bizarre death scene that has left our neurotic main character tailspinning into possible psychosis.
 

Snotgirl #2 starts straying away from Devil Wears Prada and veers into American Psycho’s lane as Lottie confusedly mistakes reality for fiction and vice versa. She knows that her new friend Caroline (or “Coolgirl” as she’s been dubbed because Lottie doesn’t care enough to call her friends by name) slipped on Lottie’s round allergy pills and killed herself. Lottie left Caroline to bleed to death, but isn’t sure exactly what happened and can’t find a report of the death online.
 

It’s not entirely clear if Caroline is dead or not because Lottie is nucking futs, but the police have taken an interest in the case.  Detective John Cho investigates and like everyone else in this story, he loves fashion. Being intimately familiar with the fashion scene in LA will surely mean trouble for Lottie. That is...if Lottie is actually wanted for something.
 

The characters continue their theatrical whining. So far, their wretched and inhuman reactions to their surroundings have been amusing to observe at arm’s length, but it makes me wonder when they’ll become insufferable. For some readers, they probably already are. Lottie narrates the events of her life like she’s talking to her followers online… and she kind of hates her followers. She’s narrating to herself and treats herself just like she treats her followers. She idolizes the fictionalized personality she’s fabricated. She’s Lottie’s biggest fan. However, she hates herself just like she hates all of Lottie’s sycophants. She needs stronger prescriptions..
 

I had never heard of Leslie Hung before this comic, but her art continues to stand out. Hung has mastered so many storytelling techniques, it’s hard to keep track of what she’s doing. In every panel it’s easy to follow what’s happening and it’s easy to understand the difference in tone from one scene to the next. Hung throws so many nuanced techniques at the reader, they may not realize just how efficiently they’re being manipulated.
 

In one sequence, Lottie realizes she’s being followed by her boring ex-intern, whose drab features are always shown in a brown palette in the background, slightly behind objects or characters’ limbs and hair. The ex-intern wears no makeup. She doesn’t have a distinct jawline or sharp upturned nose. She’s just so boring when compared to the bright haired fashion bloggers who surround themselves in jovial color palettes.
 

This isn’t a comic book that can continue forever. The events set in motion at the end of issue #1 almost guarantee it will end. That’s a good thing. I can’t imaging following around Lottie and her “haters” for year, but a brief series should continue to be enjoyable.