Lights, Camera, ACTION!

I've gotta be kidding, right? I mean, everybody knows that the Femforce is just a T and A comic book. It's not a REAL superhero comic book just an excuse for guys to look at 2 dimensional fantasy women. You just have to read the name of the title to know that's the case. The FEMFORCE. Who's AC trying to fool. Just go on any newsgroup and some comic book fan will be happy to tell you all about the Femforce title. They'll say: "It's just a bunch of posed pictures of impossibly proportioned women;" or, "There's no plot or characterization, everybody just stands around looking pretty;" or, "It's an adult book, full of sex and nudity."

You know what? That's baloney! Ask those same commenters the basis for their opinion and they'll tell you they never actually read the title, or they picked up an issue at the beginning of the run and don't remember liking it very much. So much for an informed judgement! Well, I've been reading the title since it first appeared on the racks and, yeah, the "drawrings" of the featured female superheroines are "purty." I got some news for you, the male superheroes are drawn as pretty handsome guys themselves. Last time I checked, the superheroes and superheroines over at Marvel and DC were looking pretty good also. It's part of the genre.

The unrealistic proportions stuff gets me steamed, but what gets my dander up almost as much is the unfair accusation that the art is just a collection of pin-up poses. That's when you really know you're dealing with an ignoramus. You know what the Femforce artists have always done very well? Action! The Femforce is full of action! Slugfests? They've got 'em. The heroine coming to save the day? Got that as well, and it's not blood and guts. Nope. We're talking old-fashioned comic book action. Just a collection of posed pin-up panels? I think not! Unlike the uninformed sources willing to offer their opinions of books they've never read, however, I'm going to provide proof. Evidence that some of the best action sequences you'll ever see occurred on the pages of the Femforce. Starting right at the beginning.

	Here's a single page from the first issue. I post this one because I still remember getting a kick out of it the first time I saw it 15 years ago. It's not the first action sequence in that issue, but the image of a startled Tara instinctively going for her knife only to be grabbed and tossed through the trees was memorable. It's not often that the heroine's defeat is treated as comic relief. You probably can't read the words being uttered by She-Cat. She's saying, "Say, Tara really can move fast through the jungle!"
In Issue 2, there was this great scene where Tara moves around this prehistoric jungle and breaks into a clearing just in time to see Rita Farrar being carried away by a pterodactyl. Mark Heike's art conveys both the humidity of the age and Tara's shock at the unbelievability of what she's seeing.
On the next page, the Jungle Girl's instincts take over and she whips out a knife and unerringly sends it aloft to down the flying creature in a lake. She dives in, rescues Rita and swims to the surface. Notice that Heike doesn't have blood flying everywhere. Notice also how easily the scene moves from one panel to the next. There's enough detail to give the sense of place but not so much that the page gets cluttered. Visually, the reader doesn't get lost. We'll come back to Tara later for my favorite action sequence ever in a comic book, but first I want to show you a knock-down, drag-out, slugfest between two powerhouses, Ms. Victory and Valkyra.
	There are a lot of good fight scenes spread throughout the Femforce's run, but this one in Issue 72 is one of the best and goes on for the longest time. It's so long, in fact, that I'm not even going to try and show you all of it. It starts with Ms. Victory trying to restrain the villain, Valkyra, from behind. She gets an elbow to the gut for her trouble and before she can fully recover Valkyra brings a knee up into her stomach, clobbers her, and then sends her flying head over heels with a two-fisted uppercut. Of course, this can't really be considered an action scene because nobody's guts are getting ripped out by adamantium claws (Yes, Virginia, that was sarcasm)! Notice how this page is just a collection of pin-up images with no sense that the characters are actually in motion (uhmm, sarcasm again!).
	Moving on a little further in the scene, I'm still waiting for pin-up poses but what I'm pretty sure of is that there is a fight going on. Once again, Ms. Victory is sent flying! Notice that the artist depicts the blows as being so powerful that they lift the heroine off her feet, but different angles are utilized in different panels so that it doesn't seem to be all one note.
Ms. Victory is a true heroine so she fights back and delivers a telling blow of her own, but the punishment she has taken has left her injured and she doubles over in pain unable to act upon her advantage.
	Not the kind to show mercy to an injured foe, Valkyra pounds Ms. Victory repeatedly to her injured ribs. You can almost feel the air escaping the heroine's lips with each punch to the gut.
Ms. Victory has been pounded into the ground but luck is on her side as help comes to the rescue and Valkyra is forced to flee to escape capture before she can finish the heroine off. Now, I want to show you a really cool action scene pencilled by Brad Gorby featuring Tara. This is from Issue 90. If you don't have it, get it. It's a really fun read.
As you can see, we're joining the story part way through. An explosive has just gone off, knocking Tara off her feet as we join the action. Jumping to her feet, she tries to avoid getting blown up as a group of hunters prepare to track her as prey.	Without any weapons, she has to incapacitate the men chasing her. Check out the panel with her swinging down from the tree limb and knocking the guy of his ATV with a two-booted assault.
	When the terrain and weapons fire cause her to lose control of the vehicle she has appropriated, she turns on her pursuer and in a cool move takes him right off his vehicle. Notice that Gorby doesn't even use motion lines, the angles he chooses and the positions of the bodies are enough to convey what's happening.
	How can you have a classic action scene without somebody chasing a rider on horseback?

Well folks, I rest my case. The evidence proves that the Femforce isn't just a bunch of pin-up poses strung together with no sense of movement. On the contrary, the Femforce are action heroines!