Damsels is a Dynamite comic featuring women in fairy tales being awesome.

Seriously—whether they’re evil and plotty, amnesiac and running, or fugitive and fighting, they are awesome. The guys? Meh. One is duped. One is bedridden. Another is a lusting luxury-glutton who may or may not be in on ‘it’—whatever ‘it’ may be. (Slow unwind of evil motives). Another was transformed into a frog. 

The women are fantastic. The story is moving at an okay clip for this being issue 3. Fairy tales are woven in in fun ways (for example, a blending of the 12 Dancing Princesses and The Frog Prince).

The interior artwork is great. Detailed without being busy with good coloring.

The covers, though. Oh, ick, the covers.

The covers are all skimpy clothes, well defined T&A (even the mermaid has buttocks), erect nipples, and provocative poses. Basically, nothing at all like the stories or interior art. This is v. irritating.

Let me pull you an example. In issue #2, the girls hide out in a cave in their underthings while their clothing dries. The cover references this with the main character being shown in her underthings. Please compare that to an actual page from the comic.

See the difference? It’s subtle, I admit.

*eyeroll*

I am so looking forward to this title getting a different cover artist. The pin-up style isn’t at all a fair representation of what the comic is actually about. (Maybe I’m just still too new to comics that this bothers me…).

Anyway, covers aside, this is a fun comic with interesting worldbuilding and a growing plot. I rec it, especially if you enjoy fairy tales.

(So, Damsels is an ongoing comic by Leah Moore and John Reppion with art by Aneke. The story centers around a young woman (Rapa) with long, red dreads and little memory about her past. She has tattoos she cannot explain up and down her arms. In the first issue, Rapa’s day simply gets progressively worse. Meanwhile, a king and queen from a nearby kingdom are visiting. The two queens are clearly plotting something. The basically peaceful city shown in issue #1 becomes a battlefield by issue #3 as a result of the queens’ meddling. The queens (and their other sister(s)) are plotting. Rapa is lost, in trouble, and slowly uncovering the truth. The kingdoms are verging onto war. Even the artist are designing war machines. This is a time of change and Rapa is right in the middle of it. Good pacing. Fun world-building. Worth reading).

This is just a note for later exploration—

Sleeping Beauty pricks herself on an old spinning wheel and falls asleep.

Her entire kingdom then follows suit.

SLEEPING BEAUTY IS PATIENT ZERO. The disease needed a human in order to spread. The people who found and tended to her then caught the disease and it spread outward. This is also how her story survived, because some people escaped before they were infected.

In some versions of the story, the young king rapes Aurora, but what if his pricking of her was far more mundane? What if it was only a needle (but the story grew bawdier in the retelling)? And then her body was used to incubate the cure. This is why he leaves her behind.

Then the cure works faster than expected and she wakes alone. Or, she wakes the next time he visits and he’s bent over her (and she assumes he’s kissed her).

And the king’s ogre mother hates Sleeping Beauty because (a) she is distracting her son from statecraft with a medical mystery; and (b) she represents a new power (a ‘new’ old power) to the political game.

“I Am Not A Princess”: An exceptionally well-done spec vid done to a mix of songs off the Family Jewels by Marina & the Diamonds that encourages viewers to reject the narratives they’re given and seize the lives they want. The narratives included are Alice in Wonderland (framing), Cinderella, Snow White, Little Mermaid, Beauty & the Beast, and Sleeping Beauty. Also, this vid has good Yuletide potential. 

In winter, ice encased the tangle of vines and thorns surrounding the castle. Some inevitably thought the challenge safer when all the sharp dangers were capped off with cold, but still none ever reached the woman sleeping within. In the spring, their bodies thawed along with the branches.