“Ultimate Fangirl Part 1”
Creative Staff:
Story: Amy Chu
Art: Maria Laura Sanapo
Colors: Wendy Broome
Letterer: Pat Brosseau
What They Say:
Katie, a spirited 98-year-old woman has escaped her nursing home. As her caregivers track her down, Katie recounts her World War II adventures with Wonder Woman.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The variety of Wonder Woman stories so far has been good as we get a pretty solid range of types, times, and styles for it all. With this storyline, Amy Chu gets to work on the character again though she’s a bit more in the abstract for this opening installment that feels familiar. What I’m more excited about is that Maria Laura Sanapo is on board for the artwork. She’s one of my favorite artists in general but one of my top artists when it comes to work on DC books and in particular with the digital series that she’s involved with. She gets to step into some WWII material here, which reminds me of the Bombshells series and puts in some great classic Wonder Woman material that just delights.
The premise for this is interesting as we’re introduced to Katie, a woman in an elder care facility who has managed three times in the past month to get out of the facility and take a stroll around. That frustrates everyone because they can’t figure out how she’s able to do it but also because she’s putting the place and people at risk not just with reputation but legal issues as well. Katie, for her part, just wants to be out among people and the open sky instead of being cooped up and watched over closely. It’s a familiar issue for people within this age group as they’ve been independent for so long and bristle at all the fuss over things that they’re still quite capable of doing. What katie ends up doing while out, however, is meeting a kid playing soccer and ends up getting him to listen to her tell a story.
Which isn’t hard since she’s wearing a golden Wonder Woman-style tiara on her forehead. What we learn is that Katie was a photojournalist during World War II and was in Belgium as the Nazis invaded and spent time with others hoping the American’s would arrive as things got dire. She’s got the full-on interactive thing going on here with her job and is holding up well amid the chaos. But this is also a key moment as it’s when Wonder Woman arrives on the scene and draws enemy fire upon her to protect everyone. Tales of those who have seen Wonder Woman in action are always fun and Katie telling this young kid what happened has him hooked and wanting to know more, especially since he thinks she might be Wonder Woman by having the tiara herself.
In Summary:
While this story feels familiar and I can’t pin down where I think I read it before, it’s one that I like as Katie makes herself an interesting character in past and present. Amy Chu keeps the story moving well so that we get both angles of what’s going on and want to know more from both. Maria Laura Sanapo is a great artist and I really like her WWII era material as she captures the Diana of then in a great way while also giving Katie a kind of vibrancy in the present that’s wholly on brand for the character the moment we meet her. It’ll be interesting to see what kind o solution they can come up with to please everybody by the end of this but mostly you just want to see good stuff for Katie.
Grade: B
Age Rating: 12+
Released By: DC Comics via ComiXology
Release Date: March 3rd, 2021
MSRP: $0.99
