Empowered, Vol. 8, by Adam Warren (Dark Horse Books) | review

Sistah Spooky is still devastated by the loss of her lover, and it’s made all the worse by her having kept their relationship secret during their time together. Emp is feeling terrible about it too, wondering if she could have done something different on the Superhomeys’ space station D10. So the two of them do something really stupid that involves using forbidden alien weaponry (forbidden because six years ago it created a new volcano in San Antonio) to batter at the gates of hell. We’ll learn lots more about Sistah Spooky and even a bit about Emp’s unfortunate tendency to get tied up by supervillains. This book keeps up the high standards of the series. From an unpromising beginning Emp has grown into one of the bravest, most admirable and most determined superheroes in comics. I may have only bought the whole series because it was on sale at Dark Horse Digital (it was Father’s Day and I deserved a treat!), but it’s now a solid favourite of mine. The stories take a while to bloom, but when they do you care because the roots go so deep. Stephen Theaker ****

Empowered, Deluxe Edition, Volume I – reviewed by Stephen Theaker

Empowered, Deluxe Edition, Volume I (Dark Horse, hb, 712pp), written and drawn by Adam Warren, collects three previously released paperbacks together with a selection of bonus materials. Empowered—or Emp for short—is a novice hero whose tendency to get captured by villains—and tied up, usually with a ball gag in her mouth—has made her a laughing stock in the superhero community. Not to mention the subject of many, many embarrassing photos and internet videos. She’s not completely useless, it’s just that her figure-clinging suit’s power declines sharply as it gets damaged, and it is a very, very delicate suit. Early strips have little more than that to them, but Emp soon makes two good friends and one good enemy who improve the book immensely. Thugboy is a professional henchman with a dangerous history of ripping off super-villains—he falls for Emp and vice versa while he’s tying her up. Ninjette is a sexy bad girl with her name on the bum of her shorts. The fourth member of their little gang is the funniest, Emp’s one great conquest, the Caged Demonwolf, captured in an alien bondage belt and now given to issuing dire threats from the coffee table, frustrated by the reluctance of the dirty mammals to let him watch their filthy coupling. While the addition of these characters doesn’t lessen the saucy elements of the book, it does create a much nicer vibe and introduces some slow-burning plots. One of the book’s sweetest moments is when Thugboy says to Emp, following one of her many humiliations, that she’s the bravest of superheroes, because she goes out to fight despite knowing how vulnerable she is.