Hanna Is Not a Boy’s Name (But Is a Zombie Friendly Comic)
Posted By John Sears on August 23, 2010
The ZRC was recently asked for its take on a particular webcomic via twitter, immediately before the bombs fell/credit card theft and some other personal nightmares came up. Fortunately, we still had time to review the comic in question, Hanna Is Not a Boy’s Name, created and published by artist/author Tessa Stone, because it brought joy to our hearts and another great artistic property to our recommended list.
Now, for the actual review:
Hanna Is Not a Boy’s Name (Hanna hereafter for brevity’s sake) is a visually striking, semi-infinite canvas sort of comic about the world around a paranormal investigator, the eponymous Hanna Falk, relating how he attempts to solve cases relating to vampires, poltergeists, werewolves and more (but usually succeeds only in complicating his own already messy existence). The ZRC’s interest, aside from the gorgeously moody and colorful artwork, comes from the unnamed narrator of the story, Hanna’s constant companion and stalwart partner in the business, an Undead individual the author refers to as {…}.
{…} is referred to thusly not out of some Prince-like need to eschew normal names, but because he doesn’t know his own or care to adopt a false one in the meantime. His friend and employer Hanna takes the interesting tack of using a new and unique name to refer to him in each and every conversation; how Hanna avoids accidentally re-using an old one is as yet an unrevealed mystery. Is {…}, strictly speaking, a Zombie? Impossible to say for certain, though he’s sufficiently Zombie-like that most observers conclude him to be one. {…} died roughly ten years before the comic begins, and wandered the world in a semi-amnesiac fog before turning up on Hanna’s doorstep, looking for a job. Like most Zombies, {…} proved too dedicated and selfless to wallow in his own problems, and once they had proven intractable, and his identity impossible for himself to retrieve, he turned to the communal good and public service.
This handily illustrates one of the noblest traits of the Zombie that the ZRC often has to explain to confused members of the public who have been spoonfed too much Romero propaganda. Zombies aren’t a brainless, shambling mob; they work together with complete harmony in large groups to achieve their goals, even in those hateful films that slanderously state their goal is simply to eat people. However, going back to the earliest days of American Zombie lore this same subconscious admission of Intra-Zombie harmony can be found, in the toiling groups of Voodoo Zombies, in your Zombie rebellions and uprisings and what have you. Traditionally a witch doctor like Baron Mardi would create a Zombie, not as a weapon of terror, but as a trusted servant. Now, I ask you: who would want an employee who is always after their brain, or fighting with coworkers?
(Yes, I know, most Zombies raised in this manner were intended for use as slave labor, but the example of enlightened modern witch doctors like Mardi shows us that practitioners of the mystic arts can move beyond the need for uncompensated laborers. I wonder what kind of benefits package Mardi gives his Zombies…)
Anyway, Hanna and {…} work with other denizens of the weird and supernatural world to solve crimes and better lives, often at great personal cost, and along the way even work to combat Anti-Zombie prejudice by positive example. This isn’t just a comic we can recommend, it’s a comic that communicates our message to the masses! Outstanding!
At the core, Hanna’s message for the human world about Zombies is simple enough that we frequently put it on our picket signs: Zombies Are People Too. Being green, or grey, or blue-tinted, lacking a heartbeat or respiration, that doesn’t diminish in any way your essential humanity.
A question we found ourselves asking while writing this review, however, adds a tiny troubling note to the overall conversation: was this intentional? Does this comic reflect the heart-felt views of its author, , or is this a case where the truths illuminated by art transcend the intention of the artist themselves?
The ZRC wonders. Unfortunately, judging by the way the author characterizes Zombies outside the canon of her colorful world, it may be the latter, and some outreach could still be done for the author herself:
Not much is known about him, even so much as what he is. Though he is frequently referred to as ‘zombie’ for those who aren’t creative enough [or weird enough] to come up with a new name for him each time, he lacks the desire to feast upon any brains, and while his visible emotions may seem to range from indifferent to mildly concerned, it seems fairly obvious that { … } has a good range of feelings. He falls apart, stitches back together, is dry of blood, and has a small aversion to anything very wet. He’s also told that the white shocks of hair on his head resemble angel wings, but he assures you he is anything but. So in short, he simply just is with no real explanation.
As you can see, dear reader, Ms. Stone is unfortunately still under the sway of some of these negative stereotypes about Zombies, even as she exceeds their vicious limitations with her sympathetic and nuanced portrayal of a Zombie of her own. The ZRC still has work to do here, even as it stands in awe of the product of her imagination and its potential to advance the Zombie Rights dialogue.
We’re happy to help, as always. For now, we will leave it at this: Hanna Is Not a Boy’s Name is highly recommended, and heartily endorsed, by The Zombie Rights Campaign.
