The Only Thing in the Closet is Spandex
By Martin Eden
Titan Books, $19.95, 96 pages
Martin Edin’s Spandex: Fast and Hard collects the first three issues of this UK comic series. The titular super-team runs the gamut of the LGBT community while trying to walk the fine line between loving send-up, fleshed-out characters, and stock stereotypes.
While the comic does feature battles with a fifty-foot lesbian and pink ninjas, the superhero scenes aren’t where it shines. After the fights is where things get interesting. Issue 3 side-steps the main story established in one and two, where a diminished team fights an alien creating depression-zombies in an out-of-continuity side plot that’s the strongest of the book.
The art style doesn’t lend itself to action sequences, and some of the jokes feel forced. The comic leans heavily on beef/cheesecake, puns, and sexuality. Some choices may baffle (the mixed-race twins) and others annoy (the flighty Frenchwoman and the handling of language in issue 2), but reader mileage may vary. That said, Spandex is a lovingly written start to what has the potential to develop into a truly groundbreaking comic series. Perfect for the good-humored gay, straight, or allied superhero in you.
Reviewed by Hollie Allen
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