Bomb Queen: Trump Card #4 // Review
It's the last days of the Trump administration. Still refusing to concede, Trump is living in a parallel dimension in which he'll be continuing on into a second term. Image Comics' nightmare vision of him running for a third term makes its way to print this week in Bomb Queen: Trump Card #4. Writer/artist Jimmie Robinson makes his closing arguments in a weird, little political satire that fails to be crude enough to make much of an impact and doesn't really manage a hell of a lot of sophistication either. The pleasantly strange little experiment that is Bomb Queen continues to draw itself into its own strange, little world at the end of another series.
Bomb Queen is all set for a presidential debate with Donald Trump. Her running mate, the White Knight, isn't exactly confident in her chances. She hasn't prepared at all...at least not with respect to an actual debate or anything. She HAS, however, moved into Trump's presence for one last, little meeting before the debate: she's taken the place of his prostitute for the evening. He was expecting a black sex worker. He's getting a supervillain. She's going to seduce the sleazy septuagenarian con artist, but to what end? And if she DOES have a plan, will it be worth having sex with a corpulent, old egotist?
Robinson's script clings to the surface of a very simple plot. Given that her name is on the top of the cover and the series is light and crass, there's little question that Bomb Queen will come out on top. It's kind of fun to watch her climb her way through to victory, but without a deeper satirical perspective, it's a very superficial victory. A sexy, megalomaniacal supervillain squaring-off against a cheap, ugly, wannabe dictator should be a lot more fun than this. To be more fun, it needs to have a more sophisticated political perspective.
Robinson's art is pleasantly crude. He's got a kind of a brilliant eye for visual framing and composition. (The cover is gorgeous, brutal, and minimalistic.) The actual flow of action across the page feels a bit awkward, though. Trump makes his (likely) final appearance in Bomb Queen's world in a suitably ugly light. The grizzled beastliness of a human monster just out of the shower in a white bathrobe contrasts against the sleek beauty of Bomb Queen. Then there's the debate...and then things get pleasantly disgusting.
If the action's narrative flow was as gorgeous as the cover, it could have been beautifully revolting. Instead, it just feels crude. Bomb Queen is an appealing premise. Once again, Robinson fails to completely live up to the character's true potential. Look carefully into her eyes in any given panel. There is the definite feeling that Bomb Queen knows that she knows something Robinson doesn't. She seems to be aware that she's doing so much more with so much more grace than anything Robinson seems to be able to articulate. Maybe she's waiting for the right moment to come along into something that lives up to her true power. Or perhaps she doesn't care.
