lispylibrarian's review
5.0
With all of the excitement behind Marvel's Avenger's Infinity War coming out in May, I have been diving in to the Marvel universe to learn as much as I can. That led me to finally getting around to reading Ms. Marvel! I'm so glad that I did, too, because she is definitely my new favorite superhero! Kamala Khan (Ms. Marvel's secret identity) is a wonderful display of not only a teenage girl on a path to discovering who SHE truly is, but a great story on how to accept who you are and love yourself exactly the way that you are.
Kamala struggles with being a Muslim american girl with crazy strict parents who want her to be "perfect" and get straight A's, go to med school, etc. But Kamala is just trying to get by and figure out who she is and her place in the world. When she is given super powers that she uses to help people a super villain harvesting teenager's energies are added to her list of problems. She does a great job of showing the struggles that every teenager goes through when trying to figure out their place in the world as well as a young superhero trying to learn their powers. Kamala has to learn to depend on her friends and know when to ask for help as well.
I LOVED IT! I'll definitely be recommending her (and probably cosplaying her ;) ) in the future.
Kamala struggles with being a Muslim american girl with crazy strict parents who want her to be "perfect" and get straight A's, go to med school, etc. But Kamala is just trying to get by and figure out who she is and her place in the world. When she is given super powers that she uses to help people a super villain harvesting teenager's energies are added to her list of problems. She does a great job of showing the struggles that every teenager goes through when trying to figure out their place in the world as well as a young superhero trying to learn their powers. Kamala has to learn to depend on her friends and know when to ask for help as well.
I LOVED IT! I'll definitely be recommending her (and probably cosplaying her ;) ) in the future.
jmhobson's review
4.0
So, so fun. I want every girl and kid I know to read it. Great first read for the New Year!
audjmo91's review
3.0
This is more like a 3.5 than a 3.
There was a lot to like about Ms. Marvel's debut, and Kamala is great. I liked her supporting cast of Bruno, Nakia, Lockjaw, her family, and (briefly) Wolverine, and her exploration of her powers and their origin. (Small shout out to Agents of SHIELD for thoroughly explaining the Terrigen Mist to me.) Her efforts to balance all the clashing parts of her life with ingenuity and charm makes this a very fun read.
I think the weaknesses come in the villain, The Inventor, whose motives I more or less understand, but whose strategy felt missing. How did he find and convince all of those kids to be a part of his plot? Were there rousing speeches posted onto YouTube? A reddit post around that TIME article on millennials that The Inventor took over with his ideas? Were they just kidnapping runaways who already had low-self esteem? Maybe it's my lack of Marvel background showing, but I felt like he could have been more well-rounded.
All in all, definitely looking forward to more. I hear the next hardcover copy is out and I'll be picking it up for sure.
There was a lot to like about Ms. Marvel's debut, and Kamala is great. I liked her supporting cast of Bruno, Nakia, Lockjaw, her family, and (briefly) Wolverine, and her exploration of her powers and their origin. (Small shout out to Agents of SHIELD for thoroughly explaining the Terrigen Mist to me.) Her efforts to balance all the clashing parts of her life with ingenuity and charm makes this a very fun read.
I think the weaknesses come in the villain, The Inventor, whose motives I more or less understand, but whose strategy felt missing. How did he find and convince all of those kids to be a part of his plot? Were there rousing speeches posted onto YouTube? A reddit post around that TIME article on millennials that The Inventor took over with his ideas? Were they just kidnapping runaways who already had low-self esteem? Maybe it's my lack of Marvel background showing, but I felt like he could have been more well-rounded.
Spoiler
It's clear when the original inventor is captured, this is not the last we have heard of from him.All in all, definitely looking forward to more. I hear the next hardcover copy is out and I'll be picking it up for sure.
kaycee_k's review
3.0
Ms. Marvel Vol. 1 is a comic that I’ve been waiting to read, once I heard about it. But once I started I didn’t feel as pulled in as I was hoping. I did like it but I’m not during to read the next one, I could wait a while and not feel the need to want to read it. I think it was the lead character girl, I felt she was to up and down for being a short comic. I did enjoy Kamala friends, who brought personally to these pages. I wasn’t a fan of Kamala parents either. But other than that I liked it.
calamitymane's review
2.0
If nothing else, this book made me come to a realisation: I do not like super hero comics.
There is a lot to like about this book - it’s about a female superhero; that female superhero just happens to be Pakistani-American (how I hate that convention); and a teenager. It’s sort of a coming of age tale within a coming of age tale (she must come to terms with who she is now ::cough:: superhero, while coming to terms with who she is full stop). It’s a female point of view, written from a female point of view. This is a great book for geek girls of colour who would like to see themselves reflected in the pages of a genre that they love. Especially those who have immigrated or whose parents have immigrated.
My problems with the graphic novel? It’s YA, for one, and that just isn’t my wheelhouse. Two, the disjointed narrative that is inherent to telling a story in superhero comic form. Three, the disjointed narrative that IS telling a superhero story, especially in comic book form.
None of those things appeal to me. I don’t like struggling to follow the storyline, particularly when it’s not because I don’t understand the storyline, but because I can’t find the next bloody sentence. I dislike the quasi-science that I am always forced to make excuses for, just so that it fits the story.
In this tale of growing up as the child of immigrant parents in America, neither Wilson (the author) nor Kamala Kahn (the protagonist) sheds any new light on what it means to be brown and a teenage girl and living near New York (especially after 9/11 and the “reports” of the Muslim community on 9/11). I feel that Wilson missed an opportunity to tell an interesting tale here and chose to fall back on familiar territory instead.
The most compelling character in the book was Kamala’s older brother. I wanted to know more about him and felt that the story would have been better served if *he* had been the one to suddenly have superpowers. That’s not good in a novel about another protagonist. The surrounding story isn’t enough to make me continue with the series to find out what happens to him.
There is a lot to like about this book - it’s about a female superhero; that female superhero just happens to be Pakistani-American (how I hate that convention); and a teenager. It’s sort of a coming of age tale within a coming of age tale (she must come to terms with who she is now ::cough:: superhero, while coming to terms with who she is full stop). It’s a female point of view, written from a female point of view. This is a great book for geek girls of colour who would like to see themselves reflected in the pages of a genre that they love. Especially those who have immigrated or whose parents have immigrated.
My problems with the graphic novel? It’s YA, for one, and that just isn’t my wheelhouse. Two, the disjointed narrative that is inherent to telling a story in superhero comic form. Three, the disjointed narrative that IS telling a superhero story, especially in comic book form.
None of those things appeal to me. I don’t like struggling to follow the storyline, particularly when it’s not because I don’t understand the storyline, but because I can’t find the next bloody sentence. I dislike the quasi-science that I am always forced to make excuses for, just so that it fits the story.
In this tale of growing up as the child of immigrant parents in America, neither Wilson (the author) nor Kamala Kahn (the protagonist) sheds any new light on what it means to be brown and a teenage girl and living near New York (especially after 9/11 and the “reports” of the Muslim community on 9/11). I feel that Wilson missed an opportunity to tell an interesting tale here and chose to fall back on familiar territory instead.
The most compelling character in the book was Kamala’s older brother. I wanted to know more about him and felt that the story would have been better served if *he* had been the one to suddenly have superpowers. That’s not good in a novel about another protagonist. The surrounding story isn’t enough to make me continue with the series to find out what happens to him.
katrinky's review
5.0
already love this. subtle humor in the circle q door- "hours: all of them."
"gm-o's cereal: trust your gut, not the lawsuits!"
"such athletic. very claws. so amaze. wow."
"hello, my name is Lockjaw, I like hugs."
"gm-o's cereal: trust your gut, not the lawsuits!"
"such athletic. very claws. so amaze. wow."
"hello, my name is Lockjaw, I like hugs."
jules1278's review
4.0
4.5 stars, so much love. It took a little bit to get going at the beginning in the first issue, but then I was fully invested. Kamala Kahn is a wonderful hero. <3