Geek-Girl #2 - Markosia Enterprises

GEEK-GIRL No. 2, July 2018

It’s rare for a magazine to generate such a strong, mounting sense of injustice in its audience as Sam Johnson’s script for Issue Two of “Geek-Girl” arguably does in its terrible treatment of the “comic book geek with a basement stuffed with super-hero funny books”, Summer James. For whilst by her own admission, the fashion student has simply been carrying “on Geek-Girl’s work until you got better -- Just until you got back into it --”, the poor young woman’s unforgivably antagonistic reception by Ruby Kaye and her best friend’s mean-spirited parents is infuriatingly hostile, especially considering that the super-heroic stand-in only visited Little Miss Popular's residence because her supposed buddy invited her to; “Yeah, it’d be great to see you.”

This scene is tremendously well-penned by the title’s creator, and turns what was initially expected to be a joyful reunion between “the cool kids” into a somewhat uncomfortable doorstep greeting, and then later full-on verbal tirade by Janice, who immediately starts irrationally accusing the bespectacled-rookie of irresponsibly putting her daughter in a coma and almost getting her killed. This outrageous welcome to someone who has simply been trying to do their best, and placing their life on the line as a consequence, genuinely gets the blood boiling, and any liking for the original super-tech glass-wearing protagonist debatably evaporates when she subsequently further deflates Summer’s bubble by taking back Trevor Goldstein’s invention from her, even though Ruby apparently has absolutely no intention of ever wearing them again…

Happily however, this understandably depressing, dialogue-heavy sequence is interestingly interspersed by a much more humorous series of scenes focusing upon the utterly inept Terry and his unwise decision to join the League of Larcenists. Anyone foolish enough to believe a man with literally half a boar’s brain is going to produce a “rock-solid” plan for robbing Maine of half its considerable wealth is asking for trouble, so it surely wouldn’t have come as a surprise to this twenty-one page periodical’s audience that the criminal’s relationship with Pig Head and Mongo quickly degenerates in something of a farce, particularly when one of the crew reveals “he was telling me his wife made him have a vasectomy the other week” and the naïve crook’s resultantly awarded the codename “Numb Nuts”.

Quite possibly this publication’s biggest draw though is Summer’s confrontation with the mechanically-menacing Chromex. Fantastically pencilled on this comic’s variant edition cover by Carlos Granda, the heavily armour-suited villain would potentially appear a match for James even if the caped crime-fighter still actually had her powers, let alone now when she isn’t “wearing the glasses”, so his devastating destruction of Josh’s car as the student desperately attempts to save the head-miked damsel in distress sincerely shows what the robotic lawbreaker is probably planning to do to his fallen prey at the conclusion of this book.

The regular cover art of "GEEK-GIRL" No. 2 by Carlos Granda