Ms Marvel: No Normal, G. Willow Wilson, Adrian Alphona
I’m going to pretend I haven’t seen/read the comments and reviews that basically boil down to “a Muslim American can’t be a superhero, and because this story is about a Muslim American teen, it’s not really a superhero book”. Despite the fact that in many ways, this is Spider-man: family issues, school issues, identity issues, except it happens to be a female character who also happens to be a person of colour and a Muslim. There is nothing in the set of issues here that wouldn’t be right at home wearing a different mask in Spider-man. He spends just as much time building up to getting the costume, just as much time or more actually becoming a superhero.
I did find that this TPB stopped just where I wanted things to really begin for Kamala. It’s a little too short, not giving me enough to really hold onto. I like Kamala, I like her family, I like the quirks of the art and what we’ve seen so far — I just haven’t seen enough yet to know how much I’m going to like it. This TPB is really just an origin story, and we have yet to see Kamala meet the wider world.
It’s great as an origin story, but I’m not hooked yet.
And before you ask, Spidey took me a while too.
Rating: 4/5
My son, the superhero fanatic, tells me Ms Marvel will be starring in one of the many superhero movies scheduled for release in the next 4 years. So you have a jump start on her origins where most of us haven’t even heard of her.
Ah, not quite! The film is going to be Captain Marvel, with the main character Carol Danvers — this is Ms Marvel, with main character Kamala Khan. But Carol used to be Ms Marvel, so you’re not far wrong, heh. I’ve read almost everything since Carol became Captain Marvel, but I haven’t gone back to read about her origins in the original Ms Marvel.