We here at Lady Geek Girl and Friends are big fans of the feminist re-do, in which a creator takes a formerly problematic trope, character, or plot, and twists it in some way to make it subversive and progressive. It makes sense, then, that I absolutely adored the new comic Bitch Planet.
Bitch Planet is a feminist re-do of exploitation films set in women’s prisons: rather than we as an audience taking delight in watching these so-called non-compliant women’s humiliation, the story is framed so that we want each and every one of them to fuck someone up. Set in a dystopian sci-fi future where society is (still) ruled by patriarchal values, women who stand up are hammered right back down—and sent to the Auxiliary Compliance Outpost, an off-world prison world known colloquially as Bitch Planet. The first issue follows two storylines: that of the women who have just arrived on Bitch Planet, and that of one woman’s husband, who’s doing all he can to manipulate his wife’s place in the prison system.
Spoilers for the first issue below.
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