Ah, the school dance. After grade eight, I don't think I attended a single dance. Oh, I remember agonising over asking a girl to go with me to a few of them, but I never worked up the nerve and certainly never attended. Not even prom. Don't really regret any of that since the dances I attended in elementary school weren't that great (although I did get a few of those awkward slow dances in). But, let's be honest, those dances happened in the middle of the day and everyone went, so they're much closer to the dance we get in this issue.The dance itself comes about when Destra goes to the administration and demands one--and she gets it because her daddy is some big muck-a-muck and drawn all shadowy on the other end of the speaker phone. Maybe something to do with that Devonshire company that makes the crappy cafeteria food? Hmm???
What's interesting is how there's a conflict here--this is a high school for superheroes and yet the idea of a dance raises eyebrows. An argument has to be made that these are teenagers and should have some of the normal activities of their non-powered peers. For all the progressive talk about evolution and advancement common sense gets temporarily misplaced. Also, this reads as a subtle jab at something like Grant Morrison's New X-Men where such an emphasis is placed on the mutatation/superpower, that somehow that one little change negates all sense of identity as a human (species politics aside, being raised as a human makes you human, especially emotionally)--that one part of who you are suddenly dominates your entire identity. This idea will come up again and again throughout the series.
This issue pairs up Empty Vee and Sykes in an odd way, because it's there, but it's not. Casey doesn't seem exactly sure what he's doing with it--and never seems sure. In the halls, Duke and Punchy are acting like idiots and the panels highlight Sykes with the last one showing Vee becoming visible behind him. Later in the issue, it seems that Sykes and Vee are dancing since Sykes is dancing alone, making others think Vee is invisible when, really, she's off making out with the bass player from the Weirdness, the band playing the dance. When I first read the issue, I thought that maybe Sykes was using his powers to control the bassist, but later issues invalidate that (maybe). Although, Sykes's null field takes the shape of Vee's head in those panels and his body language is similar to what we see of the bassist while making out with Vee... There's an obvious "invisible" connection between the two, but was Casey shooting for more?
Casey also furthers the pairing of Duke and Destra as she asks him to dance. Later, she'll go to him for a "team-up" over the summer... does this explain her hash reaction to him coming over to her on behalf of Punchy last issue?
Some of my favourite infoscroll items:
* "NO MORE TRADES? NO MORE STORY? NO MORE MONEY..."
* "STATISTICS SHOW THAT ONE OUT OF EVERY TEN TEENAGE SUPERHEROES GROWS UP TO BE AN ADULT SUPERVILLAIN..."
* "PROPOSED THEMES OF THE INAUGURAL SEMINARY SCHOOL DANCE: 'INDIVIDUALITY,' 'WE'RE ALL SPECIAL' AND 'CRISIS ON MULTIPLE DANCE FLOORS'..."
* "WHO HAS THE CURIOSITY TO READ THESE INFO SCROLLS?... WHO HAS THE PATIENCE TO WRITE THEM?..."
* "TEENAGERS AREN'T REQUIRED TO MAKE SENSE WITH THEIR ACTIONS..."
* "VEGAS ODDS ON NUMBER OF ISSUES THIS SERIES WILL LAST: NOT AVAILABLE..."
Next issue: a very special after-school special issue.
