Still appreciate what this series is aiming for, and there are some good bits in here, but the plot still takes leaps I can’t follow, and my nagging concerns still nag.

So, this still doesn’t sit totally right with me. The sleaze as art choice is still not my style, and I’m not sure which side of the “artistic vs. objectifying” it falls on, though the former is clearly the goal. I also think that plot and character “development” sometimes move too quickly to really land.

If I’m more generous toward this volume, though, it’s because it’s more clear what the creators are trying to do here. The characters are more compelling, with backstories and relationships that make them interesting. The plot twists add genuine drama. It feels like they are trying to prove that comics can be a serious, “adult” (in not just one sense of the term) medium, and I think they mostly succeed? It feels like a comics equivalent of all those blockbuster TV shows I don’t watch, and I can give it credit for that even if there are reasons I tend not to watch those shows.

I keep expecting to like Matt Fraction stuff to be better than I do because I’ve heard so much good stuff about him. There’s something interesting in here, but it also seems sleazy and grimy as an intentional style decision, and I don’t know if that’s my kind of fiction. I’ll probably keep reading this, and it was helpful to read the cast pages at the end so I could remember who everyone was, but I don’t know if I’ll like it any more.

I am by nature pretty prudish, and even though I’ve been successfully dialing that down recently, I still feel weird about having read this and even weirder about acknowledging that on a public website. That said, I’ve always felt like I should give this a try since it’s well regarded in comics, and after a few failed attempts in earlier, more prudish years, I powered my way through this complete edition over the past few days.

I never would have picked this comic up on my own, but I discovered it through TVTropes, read it over two days, and really enjoyed i!

Fraction’s take on writing it is similar to Ryan North’s take on Squirrel Girl, with a lot of humor, very little taking oneself seriously, and plenty of story to keep the whole thing together.

The comic leans into the silliness of Olsen as a character and embraces a lot of the Silver Age approach to comics. It homages that era in a way that acknowledges its silliness, and that self-aware approach is —surprisingly!—better than any attempt to reimagine or grittify the character.