Forever Barbie_ The Unauthorized Biography of a Real Doll - Lord [71]
In December 1990, however, Marvel Comics rescued Barbie by providing an alternative to her sordid board-game identity. It began Barbie and Barbie Fashion comic books, which, written by Lisa Trusiani and Barbara Slate, and edited by Hildy Mesnik, are sharp, sly, and very much in the tradition of Maybee's and Lawrence's novels. Even Diana Huss Green, the fierce Massachusetts-based watchdog of children's culture, gave them her blessing: In 1992, Parent's Choice, the organization she founded in 1978, singled the books out as reading material of quality.
Perhaps the most redeeming thing about the comic books is that they are hand-drawn. Although brand recognition may be one of their by-products, they do not exist to promote specific dolls. The constraining effect of photographs on children's imaginations has been overcome. Barbie exists as an open-ended construct, not a patented plastic one.
The uninitiated might dismiss Barbie Fashion as a pretext for Barbie to change clothes. But as conceived by Barbara Slate, the comics have dealt with such sophisticated concepts as divorce, homelessness, euthanasia of a dying pet, and the philosophy underlying pop art. Slate's comic "We Girls Can Do Anything," from June 1991, actually conveys the message of its title. While out driving, Barbie and Skipper pass a group of construction workers, one of whom is female; they watch two female police officers ticket a speeding motorist; and, when they get a flat tire, they actually fix it themselves. Nor is Barbie's comic-book persona so addicted to work that she treats people shabbily. In "Aunt Rose Comes First" (June 1992), Barbie's modeling agent, Eileen Plymouth (a crafty wordplay on Eileen Ford), gets Barbie a modeling job in Tahiti. When Barbie, who has a commitment to visit her aunt, won't go, Plymouth snarls: "This is business and business always comes first." But Barbie doesn't see it that way—and Barbie's contrarian vision is vindicated at the end.
In "The Volunteers" (February 1993), Skipper spends a winter holiday serving dinner at a homeless shelter. (To avoid pigeonholing the characters by religion, the holiday is unspecific.) Her experience has a sanitized quality; she encounters no unregenerate crack smokers or teenage mothers of six. But the idea of making homelessness visible—not erasing it through omission—is noteworthy. Skipper and Barbie interact not just with fashion dolls of color, but with people.
Given Barbie's universality—she can live anywhere or have any job— you'd think that writing for her would be a cinch. But there is one drawback: Mattel insists that she be infallible. Fortunately, Skipper and Ken are permitted to make mistakes, so at least someone's problems can be solved over the course of a story. "I have Ken being a feminist—being very considerate," Slate told me, "and I like to have him traveling, being the man-about-town. Because there's a reason why this guy is going out with the most fantastic girl in the world—he can't be stupid."
Slate's own background as a comic artist has always been controversial and, she says, feminist. She gained recognition in the seventies with a character called Ms. Liz, a wisecracking "liberated" woman who appeared in greeting cards, Cosmopolitan, and spots on the Today show. Ms. Liz flaunted her sexual emancipation and lampooned men whose sense of self derived from "supporting" the women in their lives. "Darling, of course I can live on your salary," Ms. Liz says on one greeting card, "but what will you live on?"
By 1986 Slate had a new female character—Angel Love, a young woman whose dealings with "drugs, sex and rock 'n' roll" were not G-rated. Nor were they morally simple. Featured in an eponymous DC comic book for twelve- to fourteen-year-old girls, Angel had a boyfriend who was doing "blow," a father who