Today, Spencer and Shelby are discussing Rat Queens 6, originally released May 7th, 2014.

Spencer: If you asked me to describe the members of Rat Queens, I’d probably start by calling them “young punk rock Golden Girls as D&D characters,” and while there’s certainly an element of humor to that, I think there’s also more than a little truth. How many of you have actually watched Golden Girls? The four leads were the best of friends, close as family, but they didn’t meet until they were all in their 50s or 60s, meaning that they were constantly hearing stories or meeting people from each other’s pasts that they had never heard of before. I was reminded of this while reading Kurtis J. Wiebe and Roc Upchurch’s Rat Queens 6; it’s obvious how close our adventurers are and how much they care about each other, but it’s just as clear that they know absolutely nothing about each other’s pasts.

It’s been a night of partying and hook-ups for the Rat Queens (besides Dee), and Hannah’s attempts to hide her tryst with her on-again, off-again, on-again, off-again flame Sawyer is a complete non-starter. Even after the Mayor unexpectedly praises them for saving the town and gives them a new mission slaying mushroom people, they still can’t stop hassling Hannah, so she wanders off. Meanwhile, the rest of the Queens are in for the surprise of their life as they come across a man who turns out to be Dee’s husband!

Dee’s long been the series’ most elusive character, so while I was certainly shocked to meet her husband, I wasn’t really surprised that she had kept such a significant fact hidden from both her friends and the audience. What interests me — and what I’m sure we’ll see explored more next month — is what their relationship is like, and why Dee and her husband are no longer together.

There’s already a rather strange dynamic between these two — Dee is uncharacteristically docile around Mezikiah, almost apologetic, in fact. After seeing them meet, I immediately thought back to a panel from earlier in the issue:

The proceeding panels showed the other Queens with partners, but poor Dee just looks so lonely here; Upchurch creates a sense of melancholy, loneliness, and longing in this panel that’s absolutely devastating, but the reveal of Dee’s husband also adds some extra meaning to the image that’s much harder to discern. Does Dee miss her husband, or just miss having a man around in general? Was she forced to marry Mezikiah and ran away, or did she change her mind after marrying him, or does she actually love him and was forced to leave?

The only thing that seems certain is that, just like the rest of her fellow Rat Queens, Dee is running from her past. What’s also certain is that the Rat Queens don’t care, and have embraced her as family, ready to fight for her; twice Violet steps in to “protect” Dee from Mezikiah. They’re just as familial with Hannah, albeit in a more “nagging parent” way, as they meddle in her relationship with Sawyer Mary Worth-style. Hannah’s attempt to hide her and Sawyer’s latest hook-up is ill-fated and largely perfunctory, and Wiebe makes it clear that much of Hannah’s attitude is bluster, just a futile attempt to avoid getting too close to her friends.

Here Hannah alludes to some sort of tragedy in her past that the other Queens seem to be unaware of, a piece of her past she just can’t escape. The implication seems to be that, as the daughter of Necromancers, the past has an especially strong hold on her, and I find this to be an ingenious concept. A Necromancer is someone who brings the dead back to life, who drags a long forgotten piece of the past back to the here-and-now, and that seems to apply to ideas and memories just as plainly as it does corpses; Hannah literally keeps bringing her past back to life.

This revelation certainly does wonders in fleshing out her relationship with Sawyer. The other Queens suggest that there’s something deeper between Hannah and Sawyer, and they might be right, but it’s just as possible that Hannah can’t let go of Sawyer, that every time she tries the memory of their relationship takes hold of her again. Either way, I can certainly see why Hannah might be running from her past.

Speaking of Sawyer, though, he’s up to his ears in trouble himself. He finds a note that he thinks is from an assassin of the Black Khali, who he apparently has dealt with before, but instead the note is a trap set by a man named Gerrig who seems to believe that Sawyer has wronged him. He unleashes a mutated Bernadette into the town, but not before treating Sawyer to the nastiest looking sushi I’ve ever seen:

I have to give major credit to Upchurch here; this panel really puts the “horror” in “eldritch horror.” I think it’s the contrast between the slightly more realistic depiction of Sawyer and the almost cartoony otherness of the tentacle that gets me the most; either way, it’s disgusting and horrifying and I really hope it’s not the last we see of Sawyer, because not only am I interested in the two different secrets of his past introduced in this issue, but I plain just like his relationship with Hannah, and would hate to see it end like this.

I feel strange calling this issue — which features a statue with a broken penis, among other amusing oddities — somber, but somehow it comes across that way. Rat Queens’ typical crude sense of humor still shines through strong as ever, but Wiebe also seems to be putting added emphasis on the darker side of these characters. I’m down for that; as always, I’m impressed by the amount of depth and nuance Wiebe has imbued the Rat Queens with. Shelby, are you as happy with these new developments as I am? And how rad is that cover, anyway? I’d buy their album; I’d help crowdsource it even!

Shelby: Man, do I ever love this book. Seriously, I think Hannah is my spirit animal; I adore her crusty, rockabilly “fuck all y’all” attitude, and I have zero doubts that she only acts that way because she is hugely sensitive and is just trying to protect herself. I, too, love her and Sawyer’s relationship, because it is so real-world fucked up. I know I’ve had those relationships, where you know it’s bad for you in the long term, but it makes you feel so good in the short term you convince yourself you don’t care. Or you do like Hannah is doing, and try to convince yourself you’re less invested than you actually are. It’s a really hard thing to extract yourself from; I completely understand why Hannah is having trouble, just like I completely understand why she puts on the tough guy show for her friends.

Ultimately, that’s why I love this title so much; I see a lot of me and my friends and our problems in it. Granted, we don’t have to worry about mushroom people, evil necromantic fits, and the dread Cthulhu climbing out of our fuck-buddy’s mouth, but other than that it’s exactly the same. Spencer, you asked if I was happy with the darker tone this arc is taking, and I absolutely am. With that darker tone, I think we’re beginning to take a deeper look at the girls themselves, which I think is important for this book’s longevity. As fun as the madcap booze, drugs, fighting, and fucking was in the first arc, we need something a little sturdier upon which to build this universe.

The first few issues gave us glimpses of the ladies, enough to know who they were and what they were banding together against, and now it’s time to dig into that further. We knew Hannah was a hardcore rock n’ roller, but now we’re starting to see the chinks in her emotional armor. We knew Dee left her family out of a crisis of faith, and now we’re seeing that crisis, like so many crises before it, is a lot more complicated than we originally thought.

Wiebe took a risk, focusing the first arc more on establishing the tone of the series, and now going back to backfill with character development. It was a risk that totally paid off, in my opinion. The irreverent and zany tone of the book was what drew me in in the first place, and now I’m being rewarded with a more compelling look at these characters who’ve become pretty important to me.

For a complete list of what we’re reading, head on over to our Pull List page.  Whenever possible, buy your comics from your local mom and pop comic bookstore.  If you want to rock digital copies, head on over to Comixology and download issues there.  There’s no need to pirate, right?