{"id":1349,"date":"2024-06-26T15:00:00","date_gmt":"2024-06-26T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/?p=1349"},"modified":"2024-06-26T23:11:47","modified_gmt":"2024-06-26T23:11:47","slug":"the-first-american-girl-comic-book-julie-and-the-blue-guitar-is-a-worthy-installment-in-the-franchise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/2024\/06\/26\/the-first-american-girl-comic-book-julie-and-the-blue-guitar-is-a-worthy-installment-in-the-franchise\/","title":{"rendered":"The first American Girl comic book, Julie and the Blue Guitar, is a worthy installment in the franchise"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n \"Julie
Image: Felia Hanakata\/IDW Publishing<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But it raises questions about the diversity of the dolls themselves<\/p>\n

My memories of American Girl literature are strong. The chapter books painted backstories for my favorite dolls, giving me a taste for historical fiction and nonfiction that I still have today, and books like Hair: Styling Tips and Tricks for Girls<\/em><\/a> and The Care and Keeping of You: The Body Book for Girls<\/em><\/a> offered a gender-affirming look at girlhood in an otherwise fraught moment for representations of women in media: the mid-2000s. <\/p>\n

\n
\n \"Julie
\n Image: Felia Hanakata\/IDW Publishing<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

So, when IDW Publishing and Mattel announced they were partnering for a set of American Girl graphic novels for the kids of the 2020s, I got really<\/em> excited. Polygon got the chance to read the first, Julie and the Blue Guitar<\/em>, written by Casey Gilly and drawn by Felia Hanakata, before it was released to readers this week. Blue Guitar<\/em> continues the American Girl tradition of telling fascinating historic stories through a hopeful lens, but it also brings forth a failure inherent in the dolls themselves: their singularity.<\/p>\n

Gilly and Hanakata are not new to transforming iconic franchises into comic books \u2014 between them, they\u2019ve worked on well-received tales in the canon of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Dragon Prince<\/em>, My Little Pony, and Dungeons & Dragons, to name a few \u2014 so it\u2019s no surprise that Julie and the Blue Guitar <\/em>is compelling and inventive. <\/p>\n

The creators build on the history of Julie Albright, a \u201970s-era doll introduced in 2007, bringing her story into the 21st century via her diary, which is discovered by the book\u2019s present-day lead, Emma Dhillon, while moving into her new home in San Francisco. This kicks off two parallel tales \u2014 one in which Emma makes a documentary about her journey to figure out who Julie is, and Julie and her friends try to solve the mystery of a stolen blue guitar in 1977.<\/p>\n

\n
\n \"A
\n Image: Casey Gilly and Felia Hanakata\/IDW Publishing<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

To keep the stories straight, Hanakata borders Emma\u2019s sequences in blue and Julie\u2019s in yellow, but I\u2019ll admit I was confused by the premise at first. A panel of Emma and Julie shouting simultaneously while facing each other had me thinking we were time traveling for a moment \u2014 but once I settled into the parallel narratives (and the color coding), I didn\u2019t put the book down until I finished it.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t just the American Girl nostalgia that kept me turning the page. In fact, it\u2019s almost the opposite. Hanakata\u2019s thick-lined, brightly pigmented representation of Julie is refreshingly modern compared to the photorealistic imagery of her on the American Girl website<\/a>. The pages designed to look like the inside of Julie\u2019s journal make me excited for kids who get to create imaginary worlds for their Julie dolls based on what they learn about her in this book.<\/p>\n

Julie\u2019s story also centers on her motivation to raise money to benefit the San Francisco Bay oil spill cleanup, which is based on the real-life spill that happened in 1971. In true American Girl form, the last few pages of the book contain information about several real-life historical events that inspired elements of the story.<\/p>\n

\n
\n \"A
\n Image: Casey Gilly and Felia Hanakata\/IDW Publishing<\/cite>
\n <\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

It\u2019s not only accurate in the historic sense. Gilly and Hanakata aren\u2019t shy about incorporating modern technology and vernacular, which feels like a great way to keep young readers interested. Emma films her documentary on her smartphone, illustrated to look like the UI of a real phone, down to the puppy filter that pops up on Emma\u2019s face in a few scenes. Gilly strikes a nice balance of modernity, sending Emma\u2019s character to the library to look through local yearbooks that don\u2019t exist in digital form, just like Julie\u2019s diary. <\/p>\n

However, this book throws one of my biggest reservations about American Girl as a now-adult feminist into stark relief. Hanakata\u2019s Emma is short with dark hair that fades to pink at the ends, framing her round face and complementing her relatively chubby build. Julie is consistent with other American Girl artwork of the doll: She\u2019s thin and willowy, with long, blonde hair. <\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n \"The
\n Image: American Girl via Polygon<\/cite>
The Julie American Girl doll comes with a copy of her journal.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n \"A
\n Image: American Girl via Polygon<\/cite>
This is the closest I could get to a doll that resembles Emma using AmericanGirl.com\u2019s doll creation tool.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

But though you can buy a Julie doll, you can\u2019t buy an Emma doll. I tried to create a custom Emma doll on the American Girl website, but I couldn\u2019t find a hairstyle or color to match, nor could I customize her shorter height and thicker body shape. No matter what, every American Girl doll is predestined to be 18 inches tall with a soft, flat belly and legs that don\u2019t touch. <\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t that the dolls are particularly harmful in their representation \u2014 compared to the wide world of big-brand dolls, they\u2019re not overly skinny, and you can select from a range of skin colors and hair types. But their homogeneity in body type means that, in media like this comic, the dolls are all represented similarly, too. <\/p>\n

In short: There hasn\u2019t been a fat American Girl doll yet, and it\u2019s past due. For one reason or another, Gilly and Hanakata chose to represent Julie and the Blue Guitar<\/em>\u2019s main character as having a body dissimilar from Julie\u2019s, and that begs the question: If American Girl\u2019s new graphic novel line can build compelling stories with body diversity, when will American Girl reflect that in its main business?<\/p>\n

The book cashes in on body diversity in a good way \u2014 I\u2019m glad young readers will see a smart, intriguing character that might look more like them in American Girl media \u2014 but Mattel fails to back it with dolls that purport that value, too. It\u2019s a shame that kids would have to get creative with their dolls to create narratives that match the body diversity in Julie and the Blue Guitar<\/em>, because the choice to make Emma different makes for a better graphic novel. Why can\u2019t those varying shapes and sizes exist for the dolls, too? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Image: Felia Hanakata\/IDW Publishing But it raises questions about the diversity of the dolls themselves My memories of American Girl literature are strong. The chapter books painted backstories for my favorite dolls, giving me a taste for historical fiction and nonfiction that I still have today, and books like Hair: Styling Tips and Tricks for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1351,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1349"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1349"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1349\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1358,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1349\/revisions\/1358"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/littlesturgisrally.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}