In March of 2010, Marvel released a three-part anthology series called Girl Comics, with stories completely written and drawn by women. In addition to original short comic stories, each issue spotlights influential women in the industry, such as Flo Steinberg, who worked as secretary to Spider-Man creator Stan Lee in the early 1960s before going on to publish her own comic, Big Apple Comix, in 1975. “A lot of the criticism I’ve heard leveled against doing something like Girl Comics is, you know, why do we have to separate it, can’t we all just get along,” says editor Jeanine Schaefer. “And yes, we can. But if we just stop talking about it, it goes back to the way it was instead of continuing the discourse and trying to move forward.”
Marvel Comics
DC’s Birds of Prey series gathers female caped crusaders from across several titles into a new, ragtag collection of badass heroines headed up by Barbara “Babs” Gordon, formerly known at Batman’s sidekick Batgirl. “ Birds of Prey is a notorious gateway drug for getting women and girls hooked on comics,” says series writer Gail Simone. “It isn’t mired in endless continuity, and the women are both incredibly kick-ass and very human. I adore them—they’re funny and imperfect and fascinating to me.”
DC Comics
After his hit show Buffy the Vampire Slayer bowed after seven seasons in 2003, creator Joss Whedon decided to continue the Slayer’s story in comic book form with a new series from Dark Horse Press, who had had a successful run of tie-in comics while the show was still on the air. “Dark Horse knew they had an opportunity to bring in not just female readers, but younger readers as well,” says Sierra Hahn, an associate editor at Dark Horse. “We’re getting more female readers into comic book stores who didn’t even know what a comic book store was until Buffy launched. They go in there, and I think even the retailers get enthusiastic, and they’re like ‘Oh, this person came in and bought Buffy, what else would they like, what are other things that women are reading?’ And so they’re kind of hand-selling books more frequently to a new audience.”
Dark Horse Comics
DC’s Wonder Woman debuted in 1941. The superpowered Amazon uses her Lasso of Truth and indestructible bracelets to fight baddies. Despite the recent glut of comic-based hit movies like The Dark Knight and Iron Man, the big screen adaptation of Wonder Woman has been stuck in development hell since 2001.
DC Comics
Mary Jane made her first full appearance in 1966’s The Amazing Spider-Man #42. Progressing from Spider-Man alter ego Peter Parker’s best friend, to girlfriend, to wife, Mary Jane was portrayed in the big screen trilogy by Kirsten Dunst.
Marvel Comics
Comic book superstars Frank Miller ( Sin City, 300 ) and Dave Gibbons ( Watchmen ) teamed up in 1990 to create a four-issue series for Dark Horse. The series follow Martha Washington, a young woman who rises from the projects to become a war hero in a dystopian future.
Dark Horse Comics
Artist Rebekah Isaacs teams up with Brian Wood for a limited eight-issue series of DV8, which is published by DC imprint WildStorm. The series revolves around a group of black ops superheroes, a mixture of male and female characters. “I’ve actually been making a point to turn down a female-character book for my next book,” says Isaacs, “because there’s this idea that women will only be interested not only in reading but in drawing a book that centers around a female character, and I know growing up my favorite characters were always male.”
DC Comics
Iron Man’s Girl Friday/love interest Pepper Potts gets an upgrade in “Rescue,” a one-shot comic that hits stores in May. When Tony Stark needed to save Pepper’s life, he did the only thing he could think of, and gave her a repulsor chest implant and a suit of armor all her own, turning her into superheroine Rescue. “She doesn't have to be support staff anymore, not a plot device, not tied to the train tracks, not doing her part to make exposition less obvious. She's stepping into position not only as a heroine, but as a protagonist,” writer Kelly Sue DeConnick recently told Marvel.
DC’s Secret Six puts B-list baddies on the main stage with a group of mercenaries existing in that delightful gray area between anti-hero and villain. Gail Simone currently heads up the series alongside “a brilliant female artist named Nicola Scott, and we simply delighted in the fact that it was DC’s ballsiest superhero book, put out monthly by two unshockable chick creators,” Simone says.
DC Comics
G. Willow Wilson created Air for DC Comics in October of 2008. The series revolves around Blythe, a flight attendant with (irony alert!) a wicked fear of heights, who gets entangled with a shady organization called the Etesian Front. “Having been to a few conventions now since Air has been out on the stands, I can say it has a pretty good following of women,” Wilson says. “It’s encouraging to be able to appeal to both sides of the gender divide. I’ve been very lucky, I’ve worked with women editors on almost all of my comics. My experience has been very positive with regard to being able to interact with other women in the industry and feeling like there’s a female authority who understands these issues and who I can go to and work with.”
DC Comics
Angelica “Angel” Jones—otherwise known as Firestar—lives up to her name, manipulating microwave radiation in order to fly and generate flames. The character was introduced in the animated series Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends in 1981.
Marvel Comics
Catwoman, also known as Selina Kyle, has been a staple of the DC universe since 1940 when she was introduced as a foil for Batman. Over the years, the saucy cat burglar has evolved from supervillain to anti-hero, and from Batman’s adversary to his one true love.
DC Comics
In 2001, Joss Whedon launched an eight-issue miniseries spinning his Buffy the Vampire Slayer mythology into the far future with Melaka Fray, a Slayer from the slums of New York City—or what’s left of it, anyway. The crossover between television and comics was not one-way; Fray’s trademark scythe, created for the comic, popped up in the television series finale as the lynchpin to the final end-of-the-world throwdown.
Dark Horse Comics
Marvel’s X-23, a female clone of Wolverine, was first created for the X-Men: Evolution animated television series in 2003, appearing as a young girl who was raised in captivity and trained to be a weapon. After accidentally killing her mother, she reappeared in New York City in NYX #3 in 2004, working as a prostitute employed by a pimp named Zebra Daddy.
Marvel Comics
Actress and girl geek extraordinaire Felicia Day ( Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog) brings her hit webseries The Guild, a sitcom about an online gaming guild, to comics, in a perfect burst of subject matter/delivery synergy.
Dark Horse Comics
