She-Hulk #12 // Review
Jen isn’t feeling good. Someone just knocked her out of a very tall window, and she’s kind of upset about it. Her boyfriend isn’t feeling well, and work is difficult, to say the least. Now, Reed isn’t allowing her to help capture the guy who knocked her out the window. She won’t let that stop her in She-Hulk #12. Writer Rainbow Rowell continues a cleverly modulated issue with Jen featuring artwork by Andrés Genolet and Joe Quinones. Dee Cunniffe and Bryan Valenza handle the colors. It’s another issue that manages to balance action with drama and a little bit of every different angle of Jen’s life for another month.
So Jen calls up Ben. (Ben works with Reed.) Ben has no trouble letting Jen in on the stakeout they’ve put together to capture the guy who knocked Jen out of the very tall building. They know that he’s going to try to steal something. Naturally, the gentleman in question runs into Jen on the way out of the facility. Jen’s going to try her hardest to catch a guy who didn’t seem to have all that much difficulty the last time they encountered each other. Jen’s frustrated, but that frustration could work to her advantage.
The ratio that Rowell is working with is really, really appealing. The first three pages are personal life stuff. Then Rowell switches gears for four pages of Jen’s professional life before switching to her life as the big jade superhero for much of the rest of the issue. It’s a well-balanced day-and-night in the life of Jen that makes for an intimate issue’s walk with one of Marvel’s most appealing characters. The central action involves a normal-looking guy who just happens to have no difficulty at all with Jen. The mystery of the guy (who is a thief) rests very much at the heart of a very satisfying issue.
Genolet and Quinones have a wit about their art that goes a long way toward maintaining and endearing a world for She-Hulk to inhabit. It’s a great deal of fun to see it all come together the way that it does between the aggression, action, and nuanced drama. The action might not have quite the impact that it could, but Jen’s emotional side is vividly etched into every panel of the issue. Dramatic moments shift articulately across the page with an impressive range of expression. Cunniffe and Valenza cast action and drama alike in a cool and breezy atmosphere.
There is SOME sense of overlap between issues #12 and #11, but Rowell’s approach to the serial of Jen’s life keeps the events from being annoyingly repetitious. The series is as evenly-balanced as Jen’s life, making repetition seem tantalizingly natural. Rowell makes Jen...and She-Hulk feel deeply relatable in spite of all that she’s been through and all that she’s capable of. Rowell’s writing remains remarkably impressive in light of this.
