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A review by helpfulsnowman
Lady Killer by Jamie Rich
3.0
The art is good, especially the mock vintage pieces, but here and there the colors and lines get a little busy for me.
The story here is mostly the premise. As far as a tale being told, if you asked someone to summarize this for you, chances are they’d tell you the setup, but the story in this volume is pretty bare.
The story/premise is where I lose interest. I think the concept of a perfect housewife on the surface, stone killer underneath, is fine, but...it doesn't feel like it's new or more interesting than the other "sympathetic hitman" stories we've seen before.
It's kinda weird because I think there's the push/pull of being a housewife in the era of Stepford wives and ALSO being a killer, but it plays a little inconsistently. The killer's husband is pretty much the most empowering dude you could remotely expect for the era, totally good with his wife taking long trips by herself, seemingly unconcerned when it comes to her working/volunteering, even bringing their two young daughters to see her working at the World's Fair because it'd be good for them. I'm not saying this is an ideal relationship in every way, I'm saying that the dichotomy isn't really there.
There's a parallel here about a woman moving into the world of "work" and having to choose between family and workplace, but I have my issues with that as well. Not because our hitwoman is a woman, but because I think there's a natural bad fit between killing people for money and raising kids. Call me uptight. I'm not really sympathetic to the plight of a woman penned in by society's view of women when the way in which she's penned in is a man telling her "We can't have you being a part-time mom and a part-time murderer."
I also feel like it's reasonable to ask your hitperson to work evenings. As much as anything involved with this sort of work is "reasonable."
So yeah, I think there's something going on here, but I don't get past the fact that she's killing people for money, so I don't really think her workplace should have childcare, don't feel a ton of sympathy in the case of her particular glass ceiling. I think the parallel to modern society and the plight of our mothers/grandmothers is diluted because my grandma's dream gig wasn't stabbing fuckers.
But my big thing with this, I just don't know that I want to read, watch, or hear another fictional hitman story. They're just...they go the same places without fail.
+Weird Quirk: In this case, she doesn't like guns. I mean, c'mon. She's not Batman. She's killing people for money and not using the best tool for the job? That'd be like being a professional driver and refusing to get on the highway.
+Side Characters in the Dark: I'd be a lot happier to see a story like this where the husband knew EXACTLY what was going on and was fine with it. Just me? Isn't that better than the constant needing to make excuses? I'd much rather see husband and wife working together to keep mother in law in the dark.
+Family: There's often family, and I think that's supposed to be a shortcut to sympathy. Look, I'm not a judgmental person, but on this one I'll judge: if you're gonna kill people, for money or for fun, go ahead and skip having kids.
+Sympathetic: The killer is usually supposed to be sympathetic. I generally don't care about them on an emotional level. You gotta give me a reason to care about this particular person, and being a killbot with children isn't gonna do it for me. It's tough to get me to feel like a person who kills other people professionally doesn't deserve what's coming. I think I need another reason to be invested, whether it's a plot reason, an action thing. But having sympathy for the main character on an emotional "she doesn't deserve to have someone trying to kill her!" probably isn't going to work.
The story here is mostly the premise. As far as a tale being told, if you asked someone to summarize this for you, chances are they’d tell you the setup, but the story in this volume is pretty bare.
The story/premise is where I lose interest. I think the concept of a perfect housewife on the surface, stone killer underneath, is fine, but...it doesn't feel like it's new or more interesting than the other "sympathetic hitman" stories we've seen before.
It's kinda weird because I think there's the push/pull of being a housewife in the era of Stepford wives and ALSO being a killer, but it plays a little inconsistently. The killer's husband is pretty much the most empowering dude you could remotely expect for the era, totally good with his wife taking long trips by herself, seemingly unconcerned when it comes to her working/volunteering, even bringing their two young daughters to see her working at the World's Fair because it'd be good for them. I'm not saying this is an ideal relationship in every way, I'm saying that the dichotomy isn't really there.
There's a parallel here about a woman moving into the world of "work" and having to choose between family and workplace, but I have my issues with that as well. Not because our hitwoman is a woman, but because I think there's a natural bad fit between killing people for money and raising kids. Call me uptight. I'm not really sympathetic to the plight of a woman penned in by society's view of women when the way in which she's penned in is a man telling her "We can't have you being a part-time mom and a part-time murderer."
I also feel like it's reasonable to ask your hitperson to work evenings. As much as anything involved with this sort of work is "reasonable."
So yeah, I think there's something going on here, but I don't get past the fact that she's killing people for money, so I don't really think her workplace should have childcare, don't feel a ton of sympathy in the case of her particular glass ceiling. I think the parallel to modern society and the plight of our mothers/grandmothers is diluted because my grandma's dream gig wasn't stabbing fuckers.
But my big thing with this, I just don't know that I want to read, watch, or hear another fictional hitman story. They're just...they go the same places without fail.
+Weird Quirk: In this case, she doesn't like guns. I mean, c'mon. She's not Batman. She's killing people for money and not using the best tool for the job? That'd be like being a professional driver and refusing to get on the highway.
+Side Characters in the Dark: I'd be a lot happier to see a story like this where the husband knew EXACTLY what was going on and was fine with it. Just me? Isn't that better than the constant needing to make excuses? I'd much rather see husband and wife working together to keep mother in law in the dark.
+Family: There's often family, and I think that's supposed to be a shortcut to sympathy. Look, I'm not a judgmental person, but on this one I'll judge: if you're gonna kill people, for money or for fun, go ahead and skip having kids.
+Sympathetic: The killer is usually supposed to be sympathetic. I generally don't care about them on an emotional level. You gotta give me a reason to care about this particular person, and being a killbot with children isn't gonna do it for me. It's tough to get me to feel like a person who kills other people professionally doesn't deserve what's coming. I think I need another reason to be invested, whether it's a plot reason, an action thing. But having sympathy for the main character on an emotional "she doesn't deserve to have someone trying to kill her!" probably isn't going to work.