Comic Review:
The Gamma Gals #1
Story, Art & Created By: Stefano Terry
Published By: Fanbase Press
Brightstone City. Home to Brightstone City Park, Downtown Brightstone, Brightstone City High School, and thanks to a gamma irradiated storm, it’s also home to 16 year old Harriet Henderson, and 15 year olds Kira Walton, & Sue Kwan, D & D playing friends and classmates also known as The Gamma Gals!
All writer and artist Stefano Terry needed was a one page primer to set the stage for us in the new all ages comic from publisher Fanbase Press. Our titular characters are playing Dungeons & Dragons in Brightstone Park when a loud BOOM alerts them to a problem downtown. Arriving in costume and prepared to defend their city, the Gals encounter one who appears to be affected by the same storm they were. However, this new threat is unable to control his changes, and instead lashes out; giving us our first action showdown only a few pages in. A showdown that gives us a chance to see all of our Gamma Gals in action, see their different powers, and a sense of them working as a team.
In a comic centered on teenagers, you’d expect a decent amount of time to be spent in school, and The Gamma Gals is no exception. It’s in these school scenes and pages that we get to see characters that are, instead of common archetypes we’ve seen multitudes of times to ones that are more fleshed out and developed. That’s not to say that they are out of the realm of ‘normalcy’, they’re not; but they are out of the realm of normalcy for a comic book. Where normally, the colored page delivers a common cast of characters that look and feel somewhat similar, the cast in Gamma Gals is not only diverse, but diverse in a way that reflects actual reality instead of a narrow view of one. Race, disability, body sizes and types exist in this world not as a trope, but simply as a fact of being; and that’s refreshing to see.
The story at hand is thoughtful, engaging, and involves a cast of characters you not only enjoy, but hope to see more of, and more of their world at home and school. The art in Gamma Gals is fun, bright, and kinetic. The layouts change slightly throughout the book keeping variety in the pages, but Terry could take 1 or 2 pages to really have the opportunity & showcase off the fun. (Though I could be projecting on a potential print to buy for my daughter who absolutely loved this title) The colors are inked nicely, and the sketch lines that are left with the colors really add to the overall look and feel. I do wish we got a little more of them playing in the D&D world, as it gives a chance to go off the wall without sacrificing the narrative being told.
The Gamma Gals #1 is not only a win for creator Stefano Terry & publisher Fanbase Press, but is a huge win for its readers.
Available digitally at comixology for only .99 an issue
