"I am neither bad not good. I am simply legal"
This book is good. Really good. It put a smile on my face. I told non-comic fans about it and they are now intrigued!
Fifth time may be the charm for our Jennifer Walters. This is her strongest first issue and an amazing start to a new series.
I was a young boy attending Head Start in glamorous Cleveland, OH when I first heard my mother reading about She-Hulk in the daily paper. With my young mind being curious, she took me to the library where I got to "borrow" some of her issues. I don't know which ones, and I use the term "borrow" because the comics barely made it back to the library before we moved to Window Rock, AZ.
I started collecting comics when I was ten. I still remember being the toast of my class because I had the She-Hulk graphic novel (future review to come). I bought her 1989 series and stuck around even after John Byrne left! I loved her Dan Slott series and shared parts of it with anyone who would listen, lived under my roof, or couldn't run away! I'm such a fan I even noticed when her trade-mark between-the-eyes bangs disappeared and were replaced with a Bettie Page cut. Blessedly the bangs are back on the cover!
So what about the story?
Well Jennifer learns the hard way that great work isn't always what people want, and friends quickly become enemies when legal matters get involved. You can go somewhere else if you really need spoilers and a full synopses, but what you should do is grab $2.99 and head to your closest comic store. This is truly a great comic!
Charles Soule is a lawyer and a comic writer, and being someone who has played both sides of the law he knows his stuff. Half the fun of this issue are the legal hoops Jen has to jump through just to solve a simple case. I pride myself on knowing the law and it's malleability; my last company sicced three lawyers on me. I chewed them up, spit them out and easily won my case. I highly doubt I want to face Charles on the other side of the bench.
The art by Javier Pulido may be too Allred-esk for Robert's taste (Thanks for letting me write for your blog) but we both agree it fits the tone of the book.
All is not perfect: The 18th floor is hard to figure out perceptive wise and I had to look up Jonas Harrow on my own because the narrative didn't tell me who he was. (Actually caring who he is doesn't matter to the context of the story.) Apparently Eddie Finch was created as a throw away name. (Any help would be great. I don't know my Iron Man history)
This book could have gone wrong in so many ways, but thankfully it didn't. It could have been gamma Ally McBeal, but Jennifer Walters is too self-aware to ever jump down that rabbit hole. She isn't cocky, but confident in her intelligence and her skills as a lawyer. She is nowhere near perfect, losing her temper at least TWICE in the book, but she feels justified in her actions.
As far as first issues go, this one does it right. We learn who Jennifer Walters/She-Hulk is. We learn the direction of the series. We experience a great She-Hulk story. This story would NOT work for Daredevil or any other super-hero lawyer. This is all about Shulkie!
Will I be back for more? You betcha! Normally I would wait for the trade or a sale, but I'll pick up the monthlies and probably but the trade too. To loan out.
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