Eszter Szép

… in Hungarian. The literary journal “Alföld” kindly commissioned comics reviews for its May issue (link). The plan was to sync these with the International Comics Festival Budapest. The festival was cancelled, and the journal ran out of funding so it only publishes online instead of print and cannot pay the authors for an indefinite amount of time.

Culture is in a terrible position in Hungary, it is a noble hobby and the frustration caused by the lack of money slowly kills you inside. But I am an optimist today (my position on the optimist-let’s die now axis changes every day), and I am happy that I could write a review of these two comics in Hungarian.

Why are these comics important?

1. Hungary has a limited comics market: the majority of the titles is interesting for a male readership in their 30s and 40s. I can understand this: they are the ones who buy comics, and the publishers want to sell. Plus publishers belong to that age group. (Naturally, as every trend, this one exists among other trends and is not absoulute.)
2. When the guys mentioned above were children, there were no comics that could have addressed a girl readership, so they are missing now.
3. Some publishers realized that it is vitally important to address young readers today — they are the comics readers of the future!
4. Some publishers realized that it is vitally important to bring in comics that are not about superheroes and white males.

Because of points 3 and 4 in the above list, the publication of Nimona and Women in Battle is very important: they address a new reader group, that of teenage girls. I hope their audience finds them.

(I analyze the comics scene in Hungary from a gender point of view in the 2019/4 issue of Csillagszálló. It will soon be published online at Dot &Line.)

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