The week after DC announced their Pride anthology this year, Marvel jumped in to say that they would be launching their new “Voices” series with a pride issue as well! My feelings about this were ambivalent. I will remind you that for my first two decades of life I was a hard-core Marvel fan. I have recently sold all the comics that no longer sparked joy, but I retain two long boxes with my whole Defenders run and my Thor and key issues that I have loved for years. I wanted so much to love this issue, and I knew I would not. Why? Because Marvel feels and sounds and produces and creates like a company that is putting out stories that aren’t theirs and so, they kind of don’t get how this works, really.
Marvel definitely got top notch talent to write and draw this issue, so much love to the creators – they really put their heart into the work. Voices #1: Pride had some really terrific art, especially. But….
I know what it is…but who is it for?
Honestly, I was hoping to read a bunch of cool stories about queer characters – whether I knew them or not and by doing so, get to meet them. Instead I found myself neck deep in “explaining how it feels to be not-straight/cis 101” and “performative teen trauma 102” and “woops, this is all the intro this character’s gonna get.”
You shouldn’t need wikipedia open to enjoy a 8 page comic.
The layout is all wrong. The book begins with factoids about every one of Marvel’s breathrough first “whatever” and later, mid-book, actual issues are cited, without them being referenced in the initial discussion….in fact, there’s no continuity from the one to the other, which would have been a nice touch. “XYZ happened! Whoooo us!!!!” and no hint of “For where it happened, look on on page 18.”
My favorite story is heavily laced with irony for me, as I historically absolutely do not like the X-Men franchise on account of working at a comic shop in the mid 80s and having to tell the same guys every single week on Thursday, “No, I don’t read X-Men” as they stood there for hourssssssss trying to convince me to read X-Me on the busiest day of the week. X-Men fans in the 1980s came in 2 types – one of them was cute little fae, looking for something gayishishish to hang on to and the other kind asked me every single Thursday if I read X-Men.
Anyway, I really liked the X-Men/famous detective fanfic crossover “Grey Ladies”by Tini Howard & Samantha Dodge with Brittany Peers on colors. ^_^
And, in the end, that was why the book did not uplift me. It was all short scene-fanfic. Not a fully developed story in the lot. I know it was a lot to ask, but I would have paid twice as much for one whole story.
Ratings:
Art – 8 Outstanding in places
Story – Okay for what they were, and you kind of have to know the characters and their circumstances for it to work.
Queer – Yes, but yeah, as a comic nerd I’m not comfortable with all my heroes being cool club scene – kiss randos in the post-HIV, post-pandemic, post-Pulse, post I’m a fucking old grumpy nerd wolrd.
Service – A wholly reasonable amount of cheese and beefcake and I have no complaints, honestly.
Overall – 6 It could have been so much more. But attaboy Marvel, this is exactly the kind of self-congratulatory thing I expected. Adequately done.
If you feel that this deserves a deeper, much more abrasive dive, check out this fabulous Twitter thread in which Zoe does it better than I could ever.
…and I want to be very clear about this…Bobby Drake never “came out.” He was outed and I am still extremely pissed off about the choice by Marvel. It was not admirable.
Lastly, I bought the America Chavez cover….she’s not in the fucking book. SMDHaM
