REVIEW: Ninjettes No.1

Out of all the prestige works that came out this week, surprisingly all it took was a spin-off from Jennifer Blood (of all the franchises) to be able to fully capture my attention. I won’t lie, most comic books I utilize easily to drown out the background noise as I make my way from point A to B on my many commutes. So there is an innate fascination I have for a book like “Ninjettes” that was able to transport me into the world that Van Lente built just by reading word bubbles and observing Cooper’s mini canvases that are not built to move.

The simple “Lord Of The Flies” inspired story is the true ninja work here : the art of misdirection.
Not once does the cover giveaway that the inner pages are about a group of girl’s from seemingly privileged backgrounds being forced onto a remote island with one another and having to compete to survive after they get directions on an unplugged T.V. monitor from some chibli version of Jigsaw.
Fusing those two known storylines from pop culture history with added details in Joseph Cooper’s art is what makes this recipe come out hot off the presses baked to perfection. The U.S. Olympic & Texas A&M jersey’s ground this story in a reality that reader’s would love to escape from.

Setting up the Alphabet Boy kidnappings in an Atlanta terminal was a nice touch as well too. Given how much human trafficking occurs in the Deep South, and the looks of horrified (but otherwise non-action oriented) faces on the background characters that filled up that particular panel, makes myself as a reader wonder how many trafficked people I have ran into or conversed with on my many journeys throughout the Continental U.S.
The true horror being that I would be just as inspired to interact for the freedom of such victims as much as the background people in this book, should I knowingly run into a human being trafficked in real time, since I know that I would normalize the occurrence by victim blaming and chalk up the transport to the (most likely) woman having engaged in some form of ultra-promiscuity to have landed herself in the situation of a captive.

This and the statements on fascism and capitalism turns Ninjettes into a think piece, even though it has it’s airs and underlying themes of promiscuity. Granted that the cover looks like a bunch of Go-Gos will be running around the pages, the women (thus far) are fully clothed throughout the duration of the read, it’s warming to discover that’s not the only main draw for this new series.

As in the spirit of the main title (Jennifer Blood) the main character(s) may be attractive – but the focus of this snuff book, is equal parts beauty of the female anatomy and beauty of death; and no this isn’t a lookbook featuring Kirby Howell Baptiste. From the opening of a gunshot to the head of some aristocrat to the final pages with a girl, kitana in hand while being strangled from behind, “Ninjettes” is a marvelous mori.

A book published by both Dynamite and Atlas, it’s only natural that “Ninjettes” plays off both with perverted displays of violence and sensuality, but Van Lente’s pop culture nods and socially conscious asides, coupled with Kelly’s colors that make “Ninjette’s”appear harmlessly pulpy while Cooper’s dark shades reveal the true tone of this book is what forms indie-comics’ latest mech that is in the same breath both mindful and mindless.

Score : 5/5

(W) Fred Van Lente (A) Joseph Cooper (CA) Leirix