Penny Century #6

The Plot: Maggie from Love and Rockets finds herself taking part in a sometimes-surreal foot race. Hilarity ensues!

I had forgotten how much I missed Maggie and Hopey. I began reading Love and Rockets when Fantagraphics released a reprint of the first, self-published effort by Los Bros. Hernandez. I immediately developed a crush on Maggie and Hopey (like just about everyone else who encountered them, I would venture to guess), but eventually drifted away from the title at a time when comics occupied very little of my attention. It's good to see the girls again, after all these years.

And my, they have changed. Maggie, especially, who has put on a few pounds, but who remains her spunky, singular self. Much like a real-life acquaintance, we see through the years of living back to the charm that won us over in the first place. Jaime tosses some truly bizarre events her way, all of which are explained at the end. It is to the enormous credit of Jaime Hernandez that this comic holds the singular distinction of being the first comic book to ever hold my wife's interest. I was nothing less than astonished to learn she read it all the way through.

My wife, y'see, just doesn't read comics. She never read them as a child, and appears to have trouble with the language of the artform. She liked this issue, though, due in no small part I'm sure to Jaime's uncanny knack for both creating and illustrating women that seem so real they could leap off the page at any moment.

And as an added bonus, it's just a plain FUN comic book. The weird happenings create an air of mystery, at the same time demonstrating Maggie's inner life, hopes (pun intended) and, dare I say it, dreams.

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