Strange Girl, Volume 1: Girl Afraid

Strange Girl #1

by Rick Remender, Eric Nguyen (Artist)

Ten years after the Rapture, beautiful occultist Bethany Black and her pet runt demon Bloato embark on a road trip to the last open gateway to heaven, in hopes of befriending God and escaping hell on earth.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fantasy, Graphic Novels Comics, Post Apocalyptic, Occult

104 pages, Paperback

First published December 14, 2005

About the author

Rick Remender is an American comic book writer and artist who resides in Los Angeles, California. He is the writer/co-creator of many independent comic books like Black Science, Deadly Class, LOW, Fear Agent and Seven to Eternity. Previously, he wrote The Punisher, Uncanny X-Force, Captain America and Uncanny Avengers for Marvel Comics.

Reviews

[Ill D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Strange Girl is well a strange beast. Just as described in the Omnibus version intro by the author Mr. Remender himself, it’s hardly impossible to understand how this is definitely not a story for everyone. And its just as conversely easy to see why this series never caught on. Diminishing sales deserved? Maybe. But for those it clicked with there’s something unique, fun, and genuinely memorable to enjoy.

Which is an odd situation for this critic to find himself in. I’ll happily admit I’ve shit on just as many comics as I’ve castigated over the years. And now with a thousand read and well over half of those reviewed I’m perfectly aware that I’ll never achieve my initial dream of becoming a top reviewer here on GR. The line for comforting lies will always be longer be longer than the one for uncomfortable truths.

Yet for all to shiv here, I found much to be pleasing to the eyes and warming to the heart. Contrarian or not, there’s a plethora of youthful charm that beams its bands across a hellscape of nihilist darkness. Fuming from a particularly rapid intro the gears of narrative find themselves chugging at a breakneck speed that happily compounds its hefty doses of good and crushes the emanations of the bad. So even when the references are of uneven implementation or the usage of magick spells, blatantly ripped off of the Harry Potter series, both shear the hackneyed from the creative good, I still found plenty to praise and an equal amount enjoy.

[47Time · Rating 1 out of 5]

The artwork is all kinds of ugly in this comic. The dialogue is even worse and overly extended even when it has little to say. At one point it tries to show the dark side of the demon invasion, but the awful artwork screwed up that scene too. At another point the author has a long debate about the bad things in religion. That's one of the few enjoyable moments, though it's overextended as well. It's the humor which makes me want to stop reading. The comic tries to be funny, but fails miserably. The rest feels like a cartoon and a bad one at that.

The day of Rapture has come and young Bethany has been left behind like so many other unfaithfuls. Ten years later and Earth has become a living hell, filled to the brim with demons of all kinds. Beth has a spellcasting ability that protects her at her bartending job working for Belial, the lord of the red hordes. Bloato is Beth's demon colleague and only friend. Everyone is on edge because God is due to return soon and cleanse Earth of the faithless.

Belial is pissed at Beth and Bloato for upsetting his guests. The two decide to make a hasty exit. While revisiting her home for no apparent reason, Beth meets Tim, a boy she thought dead after the Rapture. He knows of a military installation in Arizona called Dead Western where the army is holding the demons at bay. They get away from hillbillies who wanted to rape them and from a flying demon swarm that probably wanted to eat them. It's really THAT bad...

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's always a joy to read a comic that combines great storytelling with excellent art. Strange Girl is one of those comics. Very dialogue driven, there are interesting characters that are very individual, not stereotypes or simplifications. This book deals with the aftermath of The Rapture, and I enjoyed seeing the discussions of religion and the meaning of life interplay with the action. My one complaint is that the mail protagonist uses magic. This often allows characters to defeat adversity without dealing with the limits of what magic can do and the limits of the skill and endurance of magicians. The issue if endurance has surfaced, and it has affected the flow of the story, but I'd like to see more treatment of how the limits of the protagonist's capabilities related to her limitations.

[Jennifer Bacall · Rating 1 out of 5]

I rarely say this, especially about a graphic novels, but I hated this book. The saddest aspect of that being that it had so much potential! The book starts with the reckoning and we follow Bethany Black, one of the few people left on earth which becomes a form of hell. An interesting circumstance with a ton of potential the story just crashes from this point. The book is full of cliché lines, a muddled religious and anti-religious storyline and is drawn in earth tones that don't match the tenor and thrust of the story. Bethany is strangely sexualized as a character but is not in any way sexy. Her features and figure are so misshapen that it’s difficult to look at her image on the page. I'm not sure who the target for this book was, but for me and I'd guess most readers it was way off.

[Robert Bussie · Rating 2 out of 5]

This story has an interesting premise: a girl left on earth after the rapture has to deal with life living with demons, giant bugs, and other nasty things. She decides to try to find a way to heaven's gate to plead for God's mercy. So, with her demon friend and magic powers she goes on an adventure to locate the portal to heaven. My brief overview of the story makes it sound more interesting than the actual story. The story is boring, the characters are not interesting, and worst of all are the drawings. They are terrible. At times the art work was so bad that it was hard to follow what was going on. The coloring, however, was good with sepia colors to reflect the feeling of a hellish purgatory.

I gave the book two stars based on the premise and coloring alone.

[Amélie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Actually, this is not the best from Remender...thought the story could be lots of fun, but too much religion opinion pass out of context from the story, this actually turn me off. Even if I like the subject I was not expecting this from the book, I wanted something a bit more engaging...Artwork is not that goos either, I found the lines are too much extended whcich make sometimes faces all deformed and its not sexy :(

[Rick Ray · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strange Girl was an 18-issue series released monthly by Rick Remender and Eric Nguyen. An early bit of creator-owned work from Remender with Image Comics, Strange Girl is a bit more of forgotten work from the writer who would go on to spearhead numerous more well-known works (Fear Agent, Black Science, Seven to Eternity, Deadly Class, etc.). Strange Girl follows a young girl named Beth who becomes orphaned when the Rapture takes place and her entire family save her ascend to Heaven. Beth must find a way to survive the emerging hordes of Hell that now take over the Earth, and she does so by becoming indentured to Lord Belial. Years later, a now older Beth works at a bar for Belial along with her pet demon, Bloato. During her time in service to Belial, Beth has learned magic and uses incantations to protect herself from other demons. Learning of a possible path to Heaven, Beth abandons Belial and travels with Bloato across the hellscape that is Earth to seek out this rumored gateway to Heaven.

Rough around the edges, the story is labored by some exceeding amount of campiness and edginess, though still manages to be a pretty fun ride at times. The premise is a little too simple to see how this story can drag out for 18 issues, but as far as this volume goes, the story was entertaining enough to serve as the hook. Nguyen's artwork has a bit of a caricaturized/cartoonish look to it, but it adds to the campy tone sufficiently. Despite the horror-laced aspects to the story, this first arc of Strange Girl is quite light-hearted and humorous in tone, largely in part due to Nguyen's art.

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Following the Rick Remender model of comics, Strange Girl is trashy, pulpy, irreverent comic book goodness. It curses. It's violent. The characters are just snappy enough to make you believe in them, empathize with their situations, and pull you along for the ripping, good time. The basic premise here is that the Rapture has occurred. God's chosen have left Earth, leaving Hell (literally) on Earth for the remaining. Beth Black, and her demon sidekick, Bloato, decide to go on the run from the high demon lord Belial. Road trips, action, fighting, people from Beth's past who are probably more than a little bit unhinged from ten years of Hell - basic comic book stuff, but it's done well.

Nguyen's art is, I guess, an acquired taste. I find his storytelling to be subpar, but some of the camera angles and the frenetic looseness of his line is appealing. The awkward pastel coloring does give the art a somewhat flat air, which I don't like though.

Also, the theological debates between Beth and Bloato are somewhat dry and definitely drag down the pace.

[Dee Robb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating premise (post-rapture, Hades-ruled Earth), great dialogue and interesting characters. This book is in desperate need of an editor, tho - grammar and spelling issues throughout. I find it hard to continue reading any book with editing mistakes, regardless of how good the story is....I will keep pushing forward in this series, hoping they’ve picked up an editor for volume 2.

[Hana · Rating 2 out of 5]

The idea was amazing but the execution is terrible. The art was anatomically innacurate first in action scenes where you start to wonder if you need to get your eyes checked cuz what in the hell🥵 is going on and next in scenes where the main character is sexualised she looks like a volumtious bbl baddie meanwhile shes actually built like spongebob when shes wearing jeans. Make it make sense Rick

[boat_tiger · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great artwork, though I did not care for the storyline.

[Michael Liggett · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great art and interesting story for a post-Church guy like me. I love the prospect of getting stuck during the rapture and not really wanting to go to Heaven because you think God was kind of a jerk for setting things up the way he did. The art was great...nice and choppy but not to the point where the action was lost. This was one of the few times I didn't mind all digital art in a comic!

[Rei · Rating 5 out of 5]

You just fall in love with the characters. Instantly.
If you like Saga you'll like this one. The title describes the
comic very well: strange. But in a good way. Different, funny -no,
I take that back- hilarious. I found I had to get used a bit to the
art style, but the storyline is so good it didn't take long.

[Helen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I did not really enjoy this series that much. The story felt very thin, the artwork was messy and at times hard to distinguish characters. I read the entire series because I had them from the library, very glad I had not bought them.

[Cody · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was an amazing read. I loved every second of it and can't wait to find the next installment. Demons, magic, the Rapture- these are the things that make my perfect comic.

[Dani Katt · Rating 5 out of 5]

i truly loved this graphic book. it has all the spunk and wildness that a girl who practices demon magic would have. i will cherish this comic forever. amazing read.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting story. Fun read. Memorable characters. Kind of meh ending, but overall worth the time.

[V.A. Hezaran · Rating 4 out of 5]

fun read, the art is confusing sometimes