That One Issue: Silk #1
In recent years, Marvel has been doing a fantastic job creating female led solo titles and the spider women have been killing it. My favourite out of the bunch would have to be Silk #1 which got me to instantly fall in love with a character that I didn’t know existed until her book was announced last year.
Within the first few pages, Silk #1 establishes that Cindy Moon aka Silk is not Peter Parker. Beyond the obvious costume differences, we watch how being isolated from the world for a decade can affect how Silk approaches being a superhero. She has difficulty coming up with quips and when she does make them, they come out either dated and/or self conscious. Later on in the issue, Silk’s intent to give Dragonclaw a light uppercut to the face is translated into a punch that sends him flying across the page in this long horizontal panel. She hasn’t gotten a hang of her powers just yet.
This issue gave me a superhero who messes up. She’s awkward. She doesn’t know what she’s doing in a world she doesn’t recognize or understand anymore. In her non-superhero life at Fact Channel, her isolation has stripped her of the social dance that we’ve all learned the steps to but for her, it becomes an asset whether it’s getting two friends to go out or getting someone like J. Jonah Jameson to notice you. Robbie Thompson does a fantastic job in one issue conveying who Cindy is, her goals and her fears. Stacey Lee’s art is both beautiful and playful while Ian Herring’s colouring adds a vibrancy to it (Ian Herring also did the gorgeous colours for Hacktivist so check that out).
Staving off isolation is one of the things I do frequently as an introvert. I’d rather stay at home reading books and comics than go out and I write and engage with people a lot online. This means I need to actively reintegrate myself in the physical world through monthly book club brunches and saying yes to as many invites as possible. So I get it when Cindy ultimately goes back to the bunker. It’s a place that offers quiet to the barrage of sounds and images of life but most importantly, it’s comfortable. Comfort is nice but you can only grow so much without pushing yourself beyond it. After hanging out with someone in a flesh and blood setting, I find myself rejuvenated. I feel alive. As Peter says, it’s called balance and I hope that as the series progresses, Cindy will step out of her comfort zone in the same way that I try to everyday.
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