Women of Marvel

The Premise: Three (technically 4, cause there's a one page story) stories that tell about Invisible Woman, Songbird, and Shanna the She-Devil.
The Good: The Songbird story seems to be the best of the bunch.  With good artwork and solid narrative, it offers a feel good story.  It gives a good sense of her character in a nutshell.  Compared to the other stories, this is the most quality you will get in this book.
The Bad: The other two stories are flops.  The Invisible Woman's fairy tale just came off as too cutesy for my tastes.  It seems like a story made specifically for a much younger audience, which felt out of place when the book has a T+ rating.  It was basically Cinderella with a bit too much sugar added to it.  Also, what was that subtext about teachers as a profession?   Again, the story felt very shallow.  The artwork was fine for the subject, but had flaws.
Then we get to the Shanna the She-Devil story.  This one was...weird.  Essentially, three people crash in the Savage Land and Shanna "helps" them.  Really, this story was flat out bizarre with clunky dialogue and weird ideas thrown out now and then.  For lack of a better description, it's like on of those political cartoons you would find in an 1900's newspaper spread out over 10 so pages.  Besides ending the book on a real downer (who screams "The Horror, The Horror," when someone dies?!) the last story left me quite perplex.  The art here was alright, but baffling story overlooks it.
Finally, there's the Greg Land cover.  I think that speaks for itself as being embarrassing.
Overall: Though there's a one page about the Savage She-Hulk, this anthology is really a step down.  Only one of these stories was what I would consider likable, and the other two I just have to say what were the writers thinking?!  Really, I kinda wish that Marvel put the Songbird story in place of the Black Cat story in Women of Marvel 1, getting all the mediocre and bad stories in this one.
Besides just one good story, this book is not worth it.  Maybe during the trade that includes all the previous one-shots of females released this year, the good will outweigh the bad.  But in the end, way to end the "Year of Women" with a whimper.

   
2010 is the year of the Women of Marvel, and this issue is a good example why! We have four short stories about the vaious women of marvel. 
 
The first story focuses on the invisible Woman, and parodies Cinderella with a few twists. It's a straight up Cinderella story except Sue Storm replaces Cinderella, and Medusa and Malice act as the stepmother and stepsister. it's by Dame Darcy and Robin Ha, neither of which I'm familiar with, but I enjoyed it . It was cute, fun, and the art was very cartoonish. It was nice, but i really like the colorist of this story, Rachelle Rosenberg.  
 
Songbird is the focus in the next story by two of my personal favorite creators, Jim McCann and Michael Ryan(colored by the great Sonia Oback!). Basically, Songbird's been really stressed out lately, and just when she wants to start her life over, she runs into her old bos(I assume), Screaming Mimi. There's a nice action scene, which really shows Ryan's talent, and eventually she puts her back in jail. The story itself was pretty simple, but I enjoyed Songbird's inner monologue, and witty banter. I adore Michael Ryan, and there's not much to say about the art, exccept that it was incredible! 
 
The next story was Shanna the she devil. In the jungle, Shanna runs into a hunter, and the two flirt a bit. The hunter helps Shanna, and she helps him in return by saving some of his friends. He can't understand the life she lives, and she can't understand what his life his about.. I had a bit of a hard time understanding the story. It's written by Mary HK Choi, another writer who I'm unfamiliar with. The dialogue was good, but Shanna's monologue seemed a bit like it was an actual novel. i like books when they're written like that, but there was a bit too much of that in this story. The art was by Nuno Plati, again another whom I don't know. The action scenes look good, and the art is really soft, and a biut sketchy at times. I can't say I loved it, but it was good. 
 
The last one as my personal favorite, about Lyra, the Savage She Hulk, by Audrey Loeb and Emily Warren. Lyra's mom takers her to the mall to try on a dress for the prom, which she doesn't want to do. To make the dress fir, she has to transform into She hulk. It's cute, whimsical, I really liked it! I also enjoyed the art too. Emily Warren is normally a colorist(one of my personal favorite, but she proves herself as a capablle penciler as well.  
 
The cover is by Greg Land and Justin Ponser, and I really like that too. Although I'm not too crazy about greg Land's marvel work on XMen and such(i liked him on Sojourn), but this looks good! 
 
I'd recommend this issue to anyone, because there's something for everyone in here!