Click Here For Comics - Girls With Slingshots

Here we are again with another issue of Click Here for Comics, where I find a webcomic and give you my thoughts on it. This issue, I am going to review the one and only Girls with Slingshots.

Girls With Slingshots  www.gwscomic.com

Written and Drawn by Danielle Corsetto

Updates Monday - Friday

Girls with Slingshots centers around the lives of several 20 something year old women doing what women do. You know, drinking, dating, yelling at their talking cacti, the normal stuff. Hazel, a sarcastic red head who has gone from journalist to...well not being a journalist any more, and Jamie, a sweet brunette who works in a florist shop, are the two main characters in this parade of personalities. And the moral of the story seems to always be that there isn't anything that can't be cured by alcohol.

What I like about this comic

Let me start about by saying that I am so happy to find a comic that is written by a female that isn't so overly girly and pink that I am choking on glitter and fairy wings. But the comic isn't so overly sexual that I'm not sure if I should if I should feel dirty or light a cigarette. Girls with Slingshots is the perfect balance of acknowledging the female perspective, but not running it into the extremist pitfalls that female characters in comics seem to find themselves in.

Danielle Corsetto does a wonderful job of bringing the female voice into the world of comics. These characters are women who we see everyday. They act like most women act, think like most women think, and talk like most women talk. I can't tell you the numerous times I have looked over a female character and thought, "Is this person serious?" or "No self-respecting women would ever say something like that." So thank you Ms. Corsetto for creating a comic with a cast of believable female personas.

Girls with Slingshots has a quirky wit about it that makes it a fun read. From Jamie's bubbly demeanor to Maureen's painfully shy nature to Hazel's biting sarcasm and everyone in between, there is a character for everyone to enjoy and identify with. The characters are smartly written and therefore have very interesting solutions to the situations they find themselves in. And Corsetto is not above going for the low brow joke every once in a while. I mean, let's face it, who isn't going to laugh when someone gets a dildo thrown at them?

The strip did a lot of changing as the story line progressed. The art changed, the personalities of some of the characters changed. Going through the archives, you can see the progression and development that has been going on through the years that the strip has created. Corsetto has definitely found her place as a writer and artist and I, for one, like the place she is in.

What I dislike about this comic

There were a few story arcs where the topics weren't much to my liking. Usually the topics were sexual in nature. While Corsetto does a good job of keeping it tasteful, I personally would rather have not read it at all. Also, in these arcs, Corsetto takes stances on some issues that tend to divide readership. Personally, I think the comic would have been just as good if these issues weren't brought up at all. However, I do give Corsetto points for the way she did it. It was very "this is the way I feel about this, you don't have to agree with me". And that is something I can respect.

All in all, I like Girls with Slingshots. It is a humorous read, with just enough storyline and drama to keep my interest. While most strips are pretty benign, there is a lot of innuendo, use of alcohol and sometimes, just good ol' sexy times to be had by all. This comic is definitely geared toward an older audience.

Internet Extras!

You can follow Danielle Corsetto on Twitter @dcorsetto. Every once in a while, Danielle will Ustream her work. She is one of the people who do their work in traditional media, scans it in to be fixed in Photoshop and then posts it to the web. Since her Ustreams are very sporadic, the only way to catch one is when she announces it via Twitter.