Look, there are a lot of comics out there. Too many. We can never hope to have in-depth conversations about all of them. But, we sure can round up some of the more noteworthy titles we didn’t get around to from the week. Today, Patrick, Drew and Shelby discuss Red Sonja: Berzerker, Winter Soldier: Bitter March 1, Nightwing 28, Legenderry: A Steam Punk Adventure 2, and Green Lantern Corps 28. 

Patrick: Written by Nancy Collins and drawn by Fritz Casas, Red Sonja: Berzerker bears very little resemblance to the Gail Simone and Walter Geovanni series to which I subscribed. The story follows the unlikely friendship between Sonja and a polar bear that she rescued from some viking hunters. After years of living and hunting together in the woods, Sonja leaves her friend and returns to “civilized” society, only to discover that every man wants to degrade, fuck and enslave her. There’s an unnerving amount of sexual harassment and female oppression in this issue — Sonja’s always able to defend herself agains her oppressors, but every single interaction is colored by sexual threats, assumptions that she’s a prostitute and/or liberal use of the word “bitch.” And these shitty dudes keep bringing up the “if you don’t want this attention, why are you dressed like that?” argument, which mirrors the victim-blaming pervasive in our current culture. Collins seems so hell-bent on expressing this idea, which is odd as the whole point of the issue is the relationship between Sonja and this bear, which shows up in the final act to help her escape like the 10 billionth gladiatorial arena scenario Sonja’s found herself trapped in. It’s a muddled story, that tries to make too many points, many gracelessly. But hey, Casas draws a damn cute polar bear cub, so maybe it’s worth it for that. Continue reading →