Response to the announcement of the summer 2016 publication of DC Super Hero Girls: Finals Crisis, the first graphic novel in the DC Super Hero Girls line of books and merchandise for teenage girls, has been so strong the publisher is adding a second volume. DC now plans to publish book two, DC Super Hero Girls: Hits and Myths, by the same creative team of writer Shea Fontana and artist Yancey Labat, in November.
First announced in early 2015, DC Super Hero Girls is a multipronged franchise of books, animated media, apparel, toys and other merchandise produced by DC, its parent Warner Bros., and partners at Random House, Mattel, and Lego. Focused on girls aged 6-12, the line is an indication how much the demographics of American super hero fandom and comic book readership—which historically have been dominated by teenage boys and older male fans—have changed in recent years. Indeed a new generation of teenage girls are demanding super heroes, too—female super heroes.
In an exclusive interview, writer Shea Fontana, who is writing both the DC Super Hero Girls graphic novel series as well as a series of web-based short animations, said, “The fans have been so supportive and are totally digging the webisode shorts that have been released so far,” Fontana said. “Lots of moms and dads have told me how excited they are to share DC Super Hero Girls with their daughters and how they wished something like this existed when they were kids.”
DC Super Hero Girls is based on teenage versions of seven multi-ethnic female heroes in the DC Comics universe (Wonder Woman, Batgirl, Supergirl, Katana, Bumblebee, Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn) while they attend Super Hero High School in Metropolis.
The teen girl super heroes, their personalities (and the usual teen social status hijinks) will be laid out in the first book, Finals Crisis—the title is a reference to Final Crisis, a famous DC super hero comics series. “We get a chapter from the point of view of each of the main characters which allows us to really get to know them and their unique personalities,” Fontana said.
“Even though she's a teen, Wonder Woman is the same strong, empowered leader that we've admired for the past 75 years,” Fontana said. The series depicts villainous characters like Poison Ivy and Harley Quinn, before they go bad. “Harley is still the wisecracking jokester and Ivy is still a genius biologist, but as teenagers, they're just discovering how they want to use their powers in the world.”
Book Two, Hits and Myths, she said, will build on the relationships established in the first book, and “introduce new characters and go to a place that the DC Super Hero Girls have never explored before.”
