Episode 277: But the Men are Idealized Too
Sorry for the wait, readers! Progress on this story line has been slow, but steady. Don’t worry, our intrepid heroine will step in soon, before “Alpha Man” here wreaks too much more havoc with the power of his gaze. Just stay tuned…
In the meantime, leave your praise of his awesomely badass new costume in the comments below.
And don’t forget to like Gyno-Star’s facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/gynostar1
Not enough pouches.
Does he have a utility headband? GENIUS!
Can we get one off eBay?
What exactly is he carrying in those pouches? I thought it might be ammunition but he’s not carrying a gun. Maybe they’re where he keeps his makeup… XD
Web fluid. He’ll never run out again.
Man-sized tissues. Bigger, tougher and stronger, for when he realises that, despite his ability to force people to fawn over him, nobody likes him and bursts into macho, manly tears.
Joshua Daniel: There are more pouches you can’t see. Off panel.
That’s acceptable then.
I started reading this comic from the beginning, and the first thing I see is lumping all us stay at home moms in with the Palin supporting anti-Muslim hate-mongers.
I haz a sad.
But at least she also said all you stay-at-home moms are genius engineers.
Maybe I need to go back and read through it all again, but the message I got from The Happy Homemaker wasn’t that being a stay at home mum was a bad thing, but that trying to force every other woman to be a stay at home mum is. If HH just stayed at home, being a mother, I doubt she would’ve been a villain in the story.
I’m a nerdy white male, so I see some of myself in the current villain… but it’s not his being nerdy, white and male that makes him a villain, it’s the whole hyper-masculine power fantasy thing, and the denial of other people’s free will that’s doing it. Assuming I didn’t misread the HH storylines, I’m seeing a pattern emerging – it’s not about the choices that people make for themselves that make them bad in this strip, it’s their assumption that they have the right to make other people’s choices for them.
If Alpha Man had just turned himself into a muscle-bound hulk and dressed in a Halloween costume, there would have been no problem, because he has the right to make himself look stupid. It’s his use of his new powers against others and his insistence that he’s the one who’s been wronged, despite having knocked a guy out just for laughing at the ludicrous clown suit, that cause the problem.
The Happy Homemaker doesn’t represent all stay at home moms just because she is one.
And making her one is a statement. I’m also a homemaker. Stereotyping women isn’t helping, IMO. I found it off-putting. I’m sure many won’t, and I won’t hang around making noise on your page. I’d appreciate it if you thought about it some. If you disagree, there’s not much further I can say about it.
As a feminist and comics fan, I will not be reading your work.
Stereotyping men isn’t helping either but I rarely look to webcomics for help. Bye!
Yes, these comics aren’t helping my grasp on reality at all. Where are the comics of the TRUE feminists? The ones who pick apart others works of creative fiction and offer nothing in return? Why aren’t you writing non fiction based on that? SHAME on you!
I suspect some of those pouches have pouches in them as well.
I know he’s supposed to be a villain and all, but that outfit really IS an improvement, pouches and all. Good job!
I think anything would seem like an improvement compared to what he had on before.
I’m not sure it is an improvement. Lets say they are roughly equally ridiculous. I love the art design, BTW, your characters are often very memorable for their visual style alone.
I dunno. Going from a ludicrous Liefeld parody to a sincere Liefeld tribute loses points, in my book.
I think this is still a Liefeld parody. But to be fair the guy is obviously under the effects of Young Blood Disease, the symptoms of which include being a jerk, bad fashion sense, a loss of pupils, and a need wield giant impractical guns.
Of course it’s a statement. It’s a statement about how certain conservatives (claim to) prize traditional gender roles. It’s also a joke about anti-feminists trying to force women to return to those traditional roles. Rather than interpreting the character as representative of all women who stay at home, why would you not interpret her as representative of all people who want to force women to stay at home? As well as being a joke about how our culture distills feminism into a dichotomy between working women and housewives? Well… rest assured, I’ve thought about it some. Sorry you don’t like it.
I’m not a woman, so I can’t really speak for them. I found the Happy Homemaker story arc the best one to date. She was my favourite villain, the plot was the most interesting, and it made me laugh several times. I am perfectly able to understand the satire behind it. I don’t see the problem with bringing up controversial topics in an obviously over-the-top format such as Gyno-Star. It’s unfortunate that someone always takes offence to humour. Maybe the Happy Homemaker will come up with some new evil plot sometime in the next few years.
Amen.
I’m a woman, so I feel entirely free to comment. Thing is, in Feminism, no woman can speak for women; that’s the whole point. Feminism is about equality and being free to be yourself. If that means being a stay-at-home mom, fantastic — but only if it’s your own free choice (when it’s necessity, that’s an indication of how far our society has yet to progress). I don’t have any problem with the story arc in question.
Liefeld-man lives! Liefeld-man Unbound!
Okay, wich Comicbook Supers did he rip off this time?
That left arm looks familiar, but I cannot remmeber from where.
That shirt could be a hulk reference.
the arm looks like that guy from the X-man movie, one of the older kids at the school, he looks normal, but can surround himself with metal armour head to toe. I can’t remember his name. Something simple, maybe Juggernaut?
You’re thinking of Collosus, bro.
It’s spelled “Colossus” and you’re right. This suit IS kind of an improvement, if only because the midriff is now covered. For a while, it looked like he was wearing a sports bra.
Interesting that he hasn’t changed his bespectacled friend into a clingy, vapid, thigh clutcher. It was made painfully clear earlier in the story that he simply doesn’t see her that way and I guess that hasn’t changed. However, I’m hoping that she escapes him if only to alert Gyno-Star about the new menace on the block.
Yes, but the single metal arm plus pouches is a pretty clear reference to Liefeld creation Cable, introduced back in the last days of the New Mutants comic.
He’s not the Juggernaut, bitch!
Umm….. that’s not meant as a misogynistic thing… it’s a thing… it’s funny… because… uh… I’ll let him explain it himself – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75cVj4m2x0Q
Dude looks mostly like Cable, IMHO.
i need to see his feet!
He’s Liefeld-Man, he has no feet, only chicken-wings glued to his ankle-stumps! Thus why he must always hide them behind increasingly-improbably scenery!
Somehow I missed the male gaze reference in the last few strips. That’s such a great idea for a superpower.
Well, at least he’s now got an original costume instead of a mash-up that would make all his nerd friends pick on him.
Actually, as superhero/super-villain costumes go, that’s a cool one.
So if the gaze can be reflected by glass/mirrors…wouldn’t that mean Gyno could take him out with a compact?
Wait…if easy on the eyes up there tried to blast Gyno and got his gaze thrown back at him would it make him ‘manlier’ or would he get hit full force by whatever he was trying to do to Gyno?
And finally, in my head, the penny drops: ‘the male gaze.’
I seldom so enjoy feeling that I am kind of dumb. 🙂
My evil brain briefly imagined what his gaze would inflict on our heroes. It wimpered in terror. Human spines just aren’t meant to bend that way. It’s like Batman vs. Bane…
Ah, excellent page to end on archive binge on: Strike a POSE!
I just realized after viewing this comic about a half dozen times, I just noticed that he gave himself a bigger penis and/or testicles. Look at the size of the bulge in panel 2 and panel 4.
So either his power should also allow him to change women’s endowments, or his costume is padded.
I think you were possessed by Rob Liefeld when you designed that new costume. Brava Cohen! Brava!
I spotted a continuity error with the brown-haired wench clutching his left leg. In the previous strip the strap was on her left shoulder. Here, it’s on her right. Oops!
There’s a giant mirror in the scene, so maybe we’re really looking at her reflection. Or he might have zapped her a second time off-panel and changed her outfit again.
But we’re not looking into a mirror (it’s actually a glass window from the comics store, I believe). Even if it is a reflective surface, we’re seeing this image from Glasses Girl’s POV and she’s not staring into a mirror. Also, if he did zap the brown-haired girl again, wouldn’t he change her outfit completely? Except for switching the strap to the other shoulder, it doesn’t look any different from the previous comic strip.
They say Rob Liefeld once created a character so disproportionate that it had to open its pouches with its tiny feet, as its fingers were too large and inarticulate to do so.
Too bad he’s calling himself Alpha Man, just thought of a better joke, maybe you could use it for another character? Gynostar should have an opponent called The Male Factor, and when she meets him, she would naturally “mispronounce” it as malefactor. It would highlight how he doesn’t think of himself as a villain (nobody does, in their own mind…)
Then, with your considerable talent. perhaps you could make it clear that your work is aimed at those who want to force women into traditional roles, and not at mothers themselves.
I guess I thought disguising her as Sarah Palin, having her lead the Tea Party, and having her wear a “Palin 2012” t-shirt would be clear enough.
Why does his green eye-smoke from his left eye always waft in a different direction than the green eye-smoke from his right eye? I suspect it is just another deviation from reality for the sake of art. A trouble is that too much deviation and people will have difficulty relating.
Because it would be a crime to hide those good looks.
Does it have to cross his face? Couldn’t the eye smoke just rise straight up like from a campfire on a still summer’s morn? Or drift back as a light breeze caresses his face?
Last panel: Where did the babes go? o.O
Perhaps they’re kissing his feet?
Are you dead? When will you update?
Just chiming in to make sure you are alright also.
Hi folks! I’m not dead. Thank you for asking!
I’m really sorry about this unplanned/unannounced hiatus. I’ve been pretty busy lately and had to make the comic a low priority for a while.
But rest assured, I’ve been working on some new comics, and I’m trying to arrange things so that, when I start updating again, I can keep updating regularly and consistently for a long time!
So, stay tuned. New comics are coming. I swear!
Thank you.
Sadly we’ve grown accustom to the instant gratification of a twitter feed.
I often feel like this is a foreboding echo of the twitchy nervousness or outright fainting that occurred on ST:TNG when a Borg got disconnected from The Collective
Thanks for checking in. Those of who read a lot of webcomics are use to this sort of thing. All we ask is that you pop in so we know the webcomic still exists.
Glad to know you haven’t been banished to the dungeon dimension… I bumped into a sad when I saw there’d only been a handful of updates since my last visit (I had my own temporary banishment to deal with, it wasn’t a lack of interest in clicking the link.) but have discovered a glad upon hearing that things are not beyond all hope.
I hope there’s nothing terrible going on, and eagerly await episode the next!
No, I don’t know why I’m writing like that either…
Looking forward to seeing them.
I hope the strip will continue soonish. I wanna see what happens when GS meets this guy.
Unfortunately it is now February 8, 2014. Are you busy now and can’t put any more for us? If So I am glad you have paying work.
Shame this comic, hasn’t had an update in bloody ages, i really did quite like it’s style
Has the comic endet or is there a new place they are uploadet?
The one above is the most recent comic I posted, but don’t worry: New comics are coming starting in a few days. Check back here on Tuesday.
Woo, patience pays off!
Btw, I’ve been loving your Vitamin W strips.
Aww, thank you!
🙂
Oh god, HE’S GONE LIEFIELD!
Great art!
Looks like he managed to fit a bit of the winter soldier in there, eh?