Rant about 'My So-called secret Identity'

So, last week a new web-comic was launched. Creator/writer Will Brooker seemingly -at some point- walked into a comic store, and after seeing all the comic covers with boobs and women with their clothes falling off (his words) he understood instantly why girls would never set foot in a comic store (again his words). So he decided to do something about it. He started writing a comic targeted especially at young women, starring "Cat", our 'strong female lead'. Sounds really noble right.

They put up 22 pages, and already they have gotten a huge amount of attention. They've got a big fat list of loving reviews (like.. really really loving), after being live for about a week or so now. It must be good then. Right? Right.

I've read their first issue.. and to be fair, it wasn't terrible. I enjoyed it ok enough, but it certainly wasn't "[..]really, really goddamn good.", "Impressive!" and "The one we've been waiting for! It's so good I want to weep.", as the website would like us to believe (really these quotes and reviews are all over the place). The art is solid (kinda liked that) but the writing was a little cheesy and there where some weird phasing problems. I found the characters a little boring and forgettable so far.

So what's going on here? Why is this a thing? Well. Mr Brooker is cleverly marketing his comic as "the only comic for girls" and making a huge deal out of it. It's a bit as if he thinks he reinvented the wheel. As if he truly believes there is nothing out there for us (although maybe I'm a bit to old to be his target audience, but hell I've read books for teenagers and appreciated them). The website describes him as an " international academic expert on media and popular narrative" , but I really wonder if any of his knowledge actually extends into the comic scene. Or, if it does, I wonder why he chooses to ignore a large part of the industries.

My guess is that he noticed that there is in-fact a large female audience out there, who think the whole over-sexualization is a bit of a (sad-gotten out of hand kind of) joke (with things like the hawk-eye initiative getting massive exposure) and he's simply using our "anger" about this for marketing purpose.

The irritating thing is, what he writes is exactly the opposite of what the answer to the problem is. Sure, I appreciate his effort to create a story about a smart girl (she calls her intelligence is a 'super power' btw.. because you know, normally we girls don't have intelligence - ok that one was cheap.. sorry XD). But with his whole "comics, now also available for women" project he's promoting -further segregation-, instead of proving to the whole audience that female characters in "normal comics" can also be interesting characters. And everybody seems to be cheering about it...

(ps, I'm not including the link to the comic because they are getting more then enough free exposure of their agenda, but if you insist on reading it, just google for the title in this journal.)
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And now, to restore balance in the world after my 'negative-nancy' rant, have a funny:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmPmpU…