Wondrous Girls and White Weddings: The DC Solicits Are Up!

I’ve been a Very Busy Girl, Gentle Reader, but as things are beginning to calm down a bit, I’ve been able to ease back into my pop cultures. I spent the majority of my free time the last few evenings reading through a vicious backlog of comics, watching through the dozens of hours of recorded TV on the DVR with Mr. Reads, and trying to get my Feet Back Under Me Again. That is to say, My Academic Article has been submitted to An Academic Journal (huzzah!), The Dissertation Chapter Revision is almost done (double huzzah!), and my class is going swimmingly (triple huzzah!).

Now that some of those things are off of my plate (and salad plate, and sorbet bowl, and coffee cup-and-saucer), I can get back to enjoying my free time instead of sacrificing it to the Sometimes Unforgiving and Always Demanding Graduate School Gods. And that means, of course, catching up on Comic Book News, and, well, Comic Books In General.

The name of the game in Comic Book Catch-Up is JSA/JLA Crossover, and really, Friends, I must ask: why did no one insist more, well, insistently, that I read JSA? Mr. Reads has been Quite Vocal about this, of course, but One doesn’t always listen to One’s Spouse, no? I’ve a post In The Works about the marvelous Liberty Belle, Cyclone, Stargirl, and, of course, the Ever-Fabulous Power Girl, but that needs a bit more time.

The *solicits*, however, need No Time At All, because I am ready to Shout from the Rooftops my complete happiness over a Wonder Girl mini-series. I *adore* Cassie, and have since she first arrived on the scene. I find her character development to be everything *a teen girl’s character development should be*. That is, no skeletal presentations for her! Angst, certainly, and confusion, and despair, as any teenager would experience, particularly with 1) the after-school job Cassie has, and 2) the sacrifice her boyfriend made to save the world. But moreover, Cassie is *complex*. She’s interesting, well-developed, and smart, in All of the Books in which she appears. That kind of kid-sidekick-complexity, Gentle Reader, seems only, to this point, at least, Bat-Enabled.

Other Interests include Infinity Inc., the Booster Gold run, the fantastic new direction for Supergirl (she looks like a real girl now!), the Black Canary/Green Arrow Wedding (and the fact that Superman, it seems, is the only man invited to the Bachelorette Party), and the hint that—can it really be true, Gentle Reader?—my beloved Wally West is coming back.

There are some puzzlements, as well, including the question of why The Flash is being attacked by *ahem* A Rather Large Piece Of Symbolism, why Black Canary’s costume, in black, doesn’t look nearly as naughty as it does in white, and why you, yes, You, DC Comics, will not give me a Big Barda Title.

More free time Looms Near, Gentle Reader, and that means playing more Catch-Up, with New Avengers, with the Batman titles (Detective and Batman and Confidential, oh my!), and with a Rather Large Backlog of The Authority and Hellblazer checked out from the Library. And, of course, finally composing my thoughts on JSA and the recent Action Comics.