Miss Fury Visits Planet Rusty

Well folks it’s that time again…………………….

Hopefully you had a great Free Comic Book Day at your local shop. I know I did!!

Getting your hands on reprints of old Buck Rogers and some Walking Dead and The Tick? Nothing but pure awesome! The other highlight for me was seeing the young kids getting their hands on some books and seeing their little eyes light up. Just makes me feel good to know that this day is going to bring in some new little readers.

The only down side to FCBD? Seeing folks you know aren’t into comics show up and grabbing up books just cause, “they’re free,” and “this might be worth some money one day!” Any other day that type is chuckling at you and calling you some name if you let word of your hobby slip, and I see a few pop up every year regardless of what shop I go to for the day. But you know? Seeing the little kids who get excited over what is offered up that year more than evens out watching the vultures circle around the table of free goodies.

Enough of that and let’s look at a book up for review this week! I’ve decided to see what is up with the slew of old pulp characters that Dynamite has seen fit to dust off and roll out for a new generation, and with that I’ve decided to start at ground zero with Miss Fury. I figured seeing as how this series is just starting and I know nothing about this character it’s a good way to start. Let’s backtrack to issue one so we can talk about issue two that just hit, okay? Okay! Miss Fury is a wealthy socialite (aren’t they all?) named Marla Drake in the year 1942 who moonlights (after a kind of confusing origin story) as a masked vigilante/antihero. Yes, she likes beating up the bad guys, but she also has a case of the sticky fingers. Through a turn of events, Marla is warped forward in time to the present day where she’s smack dab in the middle of a Nazi takeover of America, or is just something that’s all in her head?

Jumping to our latest issue, our Miss Marla is in present day government custody confusing the bejezzus out of Agent Harmon with her talk of the past, but sees a use for her in taking out what he claims are Nazis infiltrating America. But Marla is hallucinating an old man Nazi no one else can see and in her mind she seems to jump between 1942 and 2013, showing her intimate relations with the horribly burned Captain Chandler.

Let me just say this right off the bat, Miss Fury ain’t for the younger crowd. Between the language that gets a little salty and various states of undress Marla is shown in, and her sexual conquests, best to have that birds and the bees talk with the young’uns before you let them have a go at this. With that being said, Miss Fury is off to a good, but shaky start after two issues. To me, it feels like Dynamite is molding the character into a different version of Catwoman, given her attitude and outfit, which isn’t a bad thing in a way. But seeing as how we were treated to an origin story that leaves you wondering if she really has powers or is just a loon, and an immediate jump to make a mystery woman a secret government operative……..Well, hopefully this all figures into what is really going on in Marla’s head at they end of this story arc, or this is taking “comic book logic” to a far off place that leaves plot holes a Mack truck can be driven through.

The action that we’ve had so far and the curiosity of where the character of Marla is taken has me along for the ride for now, but if more confusion and odd plot jumps keep happening I’m afraid it’ll wind up being just another book with scantily clad women (but Jack Herbert has some great art in there!). So please, editorial staff at Dynamite, please keep writer Rob Williams on the straight and narrow path that, yes, I do see in this book. Yes, a character can have a little sex appeal, nothing wrong with that, but lots of T&A and flimsy plot makes a comic into an old episode of Baywatch pretty quick.

Oh wow! I got on a little bit of a soapbox there didn’t I? Seeing as how I just got myself all wound up now might be a good time for me to sign off, otherwise I may start ranting like Andy Rooney, and no one wants that.