Read a small pile of romance comics yesterday:


YOUNG LUST was one of the more successful of the original underground comix and ran 6 issues in its heyday, from 1970-1980, with a couple of late additions to the series in 1990 (#7) and 1993 (#8). It was the creation of Bill Griffith (of ZIPPY fame) and Jay Kinney, with the contributions of various other UG artists. This first issue was published while the traditional romance comics genre was still in full swing, and its success can probably be attributed to the fact that they captured the exaggerated emotional angst and relationship-difficulty tropes of the romance genre while applying that style of story to adult themes. Mine was a later reprinting from 1982 with a $1.50 cover price. These should all be reprinted in a trade paperback some day. The art's a little awkward by today's standards, but these original UG comix were a huge step in breaking the mold (and stranglehold) of traditional comics publishers, and this is definitely one of the better ones.

Here's another unique alternative romance comic that I was completely unaware existed until I discovered 4 issues in the 50-cent boxes:

These first two issues of EMPTY LOVE STORIES were first published in 1994 (#1) and 1996 (#2), by B&W/alternative publisher Slave Labor Graphics. Steve Darnall is the creator/writer, along with various artists (many of whom are recognizable, like Colleen Doran). Issue #1 has a cover by Darnall's friend and comics superstar Alex Ross, and #2's cover is drawn by then up-and-coming indy comics supertalent Mike Allred (of MADMAN, BATMAN '66, and SILVER SURFER). Both issues received nominations for the Eisner Awards (for Best Single Issue, and Best New Series), and these comics are outrageously funny. I can't believe Steve Darnall didn't become better-known in the industry and go on to more successful and higher-paying gigs, because it's obvious he's got gobs of talent. Today he's mainly known (if at all) for scripting the 2-issue Vertigo prestige miniseries U.S. (a.k.a. Uncle Sam) with artwork by Alex Ross.

The EMPTY LOVE STORIES "SPECIAL" (quotation marks verbatim) from 1998 has a cover by Canadian cartoonist Ty Templeton. EMPTY LOVE STORIES 1999 has a cover by Jeff Smith (of BONE). For these next two issues of the series, Darnall set himself up in self-publishing. Inexplicably (other than the fact that, as a self-publisher, he could do whatever he felt like), when Darnell reprinted SLG's #1 and #2 under his own Funny Valentine Press imprint, the reprint of #2 contained a 7-page(!) text-and-photos article about the cult TV show Mystery Science Theater 3000. I'm a big fan of the show myself, but the straightforward article seems oddly out-of-place in this otherwise devastating satire of the romance comics genre. The pastiche lovelorn advice-column letter pages in these issues are particularly hilarious.


Lastly, we come to HEART THROBS #1, a 1999 Vertigo revamp of an older DC title (inherited from Quality Comics actually, when that publisher went out of business in 1956), HEART THROBS was part of a whole series of re-imaginings of old discontinued DC titles like STRANGE ADVENTURES (sci-fi), WEIRD WESTERN TALES, WEIRD WAR TALES, and THE WITCHING HOUR -- all of which had been cancelled by the mid-1980s, but were revived with late-90s spin by Vertigo.

I didn't actually find any other issues than #1, but after reading it you can bet I'll be keeping my eyes peeled. I just love the covers, though. This flew entirely under my radar when it was first published, but again (as with EMPTY LOVE STORIES), all of these stories are great, with top-flight creators. #1 leads off with a great Bruce Timm cover and opens with artist Brian Bolland's spin on the old fairytale classic "The Frog Prince", and is totally funny -- Who even knew Bolland could write? As awesome an illustrator as he is, he should do it more often. The other stories are distinctly modern, but skewer the old comics genre properly. Again, no trade paperback collection (or any follow-up) on this 4-issue mini, which is a darned shame. It should be better-known, and the caliber of all the creators is tops.

Quote from: Shuester on March 05, 2017, 08:44:07 AM


I don't know what year this comes from, but Archie's Funhouse only got started a couple of years ago [...]  I know which comic I'd rather buy.

Archie's Funhouse #20 is from July 2016. Jughead & Archie #22 is from October 2016. Both covers were drawn by Fernando Ruiz some time ago. He turned in his final work for ACP over a year ago, so in all likelihood he'd gotten far ahead on covers for these two particular digest titles, and they had been drawn and sitting awaiting publication for some time. This is because as 2015 began, both of those particular titles were being published at the frequency of 10 times per year. Sometime around the Fall of 2015, both of them were reduced in frequency from the former 10 issues per year to only 6 issues per year, which accounts for Fernando's work still appearing on those digest covers long after he'd received his last paying work from ACP.

As I mentioned before, it seems very likely that the digest editor decided that it might be a good idea for covers to become less specific and more generic. If you look carefully at some of the collected 1000 Page and Giant Comics digests, you'll see that those are now mostly all Dan Parent covers as well, recycled from images used on previous covers. If it's a joke cover, it can't be used this way again, because readers will remember the joke and realize that they had seen the same cover before. Worse still, they might not buy it if it looks familiar, thinking that they already own or have read it because of that. They're just trying to save money, and are probably building up a big file of seasonal and themed images that can be recycled (once they have enough of them) over and over for years.

On the left, from November 2016. On the right, from February 2015. Recycled (or re-scooter'ed) after only 20 months.

Quote from: SAGG on March 05, 2017, 09:14:19 AM
I wonder in the Archie 279 if that's Valerie?

Yes. It's a Dan Parent cover. It was Dan's idea to play matchmaker for Archie & Valerie, and he wrote the original story where the two songwriters gazed deeply into each others' eyes and were bitten by the love bug.

Quote from: Shuester on March 05, 2017, 04:27:29 AM
May seems to have a really good selection of comics.

Something I've been noticing over the past few years is that the Digest covers never really seem to have jokes anymore. Usually it's just images of the main cast looking extremely cartoony and Barbie-like, frolicking in the snow or the leaves or the water or the flowers. Everyone always has a massive, slightly unsettling smile on their face. The covers used to attract me because of the jokes, and the ones that do still have jokes are always my first pick over these extremely happy ones. Has anyone else noticed this?

Somebody had mentioned the same thing about a year or so ago -- in actuality, I think the last word balloon gag cover was back in October 2016:



But you're right -- these used to represent the majority of covers, and now they're in the distinct minority. More often than not, when it's a gag it's simply a visual gag, with no verbal commentary by the characters.

I don't know if it's because Dan Parent (now that he's the sole cover artist left) just has a preference to just do iconic character images, but I suspect it's more likely an editorial directive so that ACP can build up a stockpile of infinitely REusable cover images.

Quote from: steveinthecity on March 04, 2017, 07:41:42 PM

Quote from: irishmoxie on March 04, 2017, 09:03:07 AM

Quote from: steveinthecity on March 04, 2017, 05:27:38 AM

Quote from: carrotz on March 02, 2017, 05:57:24 AM

It was no one's fault the old forum died, but losing eleven years of threads makes the new forum feel second best. It is 2006 all over again, except without the unity, innocence and optimism.

I'm fairly certain some fault can be found.  We lost a great amount of info, plus contributing members like Frank, Forsythe, Captain Hero, Chuck, and Greg who are still involved in the hobby.

Yeah where did all these Archie historians go? Are they still interested in Archie? Are they posting somewhere else? Or is there just nothing to say now that ACP puts out so little Classic Archie.

Forsythe still contributes to the reprints and is credited. Greg is a head guy at GCD, Chuck is doing his thing(plus a blog), Captain Hero still reads, and Frank is still in comics, but I haven't communicated with him in nearly a year.

Where would I find Forsythe's name credited, Steve? Surely not in the digests (or their bigger brothers, the Giant Comics and 1000 Page Comics digest re-reprints), but is it mentioned somewhere in the small type on the indicia page of TP and HC collections? What actual name (I assume it's not actually Forsythe...) would I look for?

What actual service is he contributing to ACP? (Credits, story selection suggestions, guidance for where to find original stories, etc.) Does he get paid for this, or is he just volunteering his help?

Quote from: BettyReggie on March 04, 2017, 05:44:32 AM
At Lot Less, I bought 12 boxes of Betty & Veronica bank cards that has their pictures on them . And you can color them, I use them as thank you cards because you can write anything in them. I even sent some to Dan & Fernando & Gisele & Thomas Pitilli & Gabbie Gross. I want to some to Sandy Jarell if he does my commission.

Oooo... pictures, please. I have some but I wonder if yours are the same. 

Is original art really "merchandise", though? I never thought of it that way. The way I figure it, merchandise is something manufactured to sell. Custom-made things aren't really merchandise, even though you might have paid for them, and original artwork is "custom made".

Have you taken photos of all your original art and posted them in your gallery? You should.

Quote from: JonInIowaCity on March 03, 2017, 10:44:39 AM
Let's talk about the comics and digests then. What comic book did you last enjoy from Archie Comics?

B&V Friends Comics Annual #253. I subscribe to all the digests. I still really enjoy all the issues of B&V Friends and Betty and Veronica digests (my top two, respectively), and most issues of Jughead & Archie are still worth the money to me. Recently I haven't been enjoying the Archie and World of Archie digests as much, so I'm letting those subscriptions lapse and will only buy them FNO when there's a new story (or reprint) of special interest. Maybe it's just too much Archie for me - it's overkill. I'm kind of on the fence about Archie's Funhouse (it tends to vary from one issue to another, as does World of Archie), but I've still got a number of issues left in my subscription before having to decide whether to keep it or not.

I'm sort of partial to keeping on with Archie's Funhouse as I've got a nearly complete set of those (still missing one), and it's only six times a year anyway. I tend to enjoy the reprinted stories featuring Reggie, Dilton, Ethel, Nancy or Chuck more than just straight Archie stories, and most of those are in either Funhouse or WoA (it varies), but I feel shortchanged when they stick in 15 pages of Little Archie (this happens in Jughead & Archie with regularity too, but it's more than counterbalanced with enough good Jughead stories by Samm Schwartz, Fernando Ruiz, or Boldman & Lindsey in each issue).

I do wish they'd reprint more older stories (Silver/Bronze Age) and more obscure characters like Bingo Wilkin, the Madhouse Glads, etc., just for some variety. One of the reasons I like the two B&V digests so much is that they've reliably got either Sabrina or Josie reprints, and frequently Cheryl Blossom reprints as well. What about some reprints of Katy Keene stories from the 1980s? I don't think I've ever seen any in the digests so far.

I wish they could double the number of pages of new stories in the digests. Some more interesting stories could be done with the characters, but they'd require more than 5 pages, or they could even let some of the non-star players get a 5-page solo story every so often. I feel like there are all these great unused supporting characters out there just going to waste because there really isn't enough room in 5 page story that has to feature the main characters every issue. I'd love to see Veronica's cousins Harper or Marcy, or some of the New Kids get meatier parts in the stories -- but as it stands right now, there just isn't enough room or enough pages a year to squeeze them in on a regular basis. In a few years, none of these characters will even be remembered by digest readers, if they aren't forgotten already. What am I saying? With only 240 pages a year of new material being generated by Dan Parent right now, they won't have any stories to fill the digests of five years in the future. Or maybe they'll be down to only a couple of bimonthly digest titles by then.

JUGHEAD is the only other comic that they're putting out right now that I'm getting anything out of, but I don't expect that situation will last much longer, since they've already announced that they're replacing Ryan North on the writing. Derek Charm comes the closest of all the artists on New Riverdale comics to actually being a cartoonist. The opening pages of the issue where the gang were all playing the racing videogame almost fooled me that Charm was slowly adjusting his style more towards the cartoony side, but then he had to spoil it by going back to more of a realistic style - it was just for the characters as they appeared inside the game. I liked Ian Flynn's writing on Mega Man and I liked him on New Crusaders, but can he write a funny JUGHEAD story? I suspect he'll be doing most of the work because his page rate is cheaper than Mark Waid's -- I think Waid is just there to ride herd on the continuity and his name is being used to attract the readers who already like his writing on ARCHIE.

My posting has actually gone down just since RIVERDALE aired.

Hate to say it, but it's beginning to feel like just another board for TV show discussions. 

In Adam Hughes' B&V #2, I believe it was (going on memory here because I don't actually own the comic) there was a subtle reference to Chip Zdarksy's first story arc in JUGHEAD. In fact, so subtle that most readers probably didn't catch it, and subtle enough that there's an ambiguity there about whether the reference represents 'continuity' per se, or some kind of in-joke.

Having said that, I am now pausing to reflect on the recent announcement that the current JUGHEAD writer, Ryan North, is slated to be replaced by the team of Mark Waid and Ian Flynn. I wonder if this isn't a response both to lagging sales on JUGHEAD, and confusion among readers as to whether the New Riverdale titles are all part of some sort of Archie Universe. It occurs to me that Adam Hughes' BETTY AND VERONICA arc is slated only to run through the 3rd issue, and I wonder if the next announcement from ACP might not be that B&V will be co-written by Mark Waid and another (cheap to hire) writer following Hughes' departure in issue #3. ACP may have decided that the New Riverdale titles as a group could benefit from being continuity-wrangled by Waid, hoping that some of ARCHIE's readers might get onboard with the other New Riverdale titles if they were perceived as being all in-continuity.

In Adam Hughes' B&V, he jumps right into a Betty VERSUS Veronica story, which is implying we should be shocked at this as if they have a long-established history as BFFs. Sure doesn't seem like the same characters who are appearing in ARCHIE.

Quote from: irishmoxie on March 01, 2017, 08:50:44 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on March 01, 2017, 07:06:55 AM
BEDTIME STORIES FOR IMPRESSIONABLE CHILDREN #1

I read this too but was disappointed in it. I liked Spook House better.

Me too. I won't be getting further issues of BSFIC, but I continue to get Spook House. If you like Spook House, you should try HILLBILLY, also from creator Eric Powell.

LONG HOT SUMMER TP
B & V FRIENDS COMICS ANNUAL #253
THE DEATH OF HAWKMAN #6 (of 6)
THE FALL & RISE OF CAPTAIN ATOM #3 (of 6)
MOON KNIGHT #12
RICK AND MORTY #23
SAVAGE DRAGON #221
SUPER POWERS #5 (of 6)
STREET FIGHTER VS. DARKSTALKERS #0
CRYPT OF SCREAMS #1
BEDTIME STORIES FOR IMPRESSIONABLE CHILDREN #1
ANIMAL NOIR #1
BLACK HARVEST TP
CADET ANDERSON: PSI DIVISION - TEENAGE KYX TP
THRILL-POWER OVERLOAD: 2000AD - THE FIRST 40 YEARS HC

Quote from: irishmoxie on February 26, 2017, 07:21:08 PM

Quote from: DeCarlo Rules on February 26, 2017, 04:42:54 PM
FRANKEN FRAN by Katsuhisa Kigitsu. Seven Seas published this in 4 large omnibus volumes (originally the series ran 8 tankobon volumes published by Akita Shoten in Japan), totaling about 1600 pages. I spent the better part of 5 days reading the whole thing. Not what I was originally expecting. The covers sort of make it look like part of the 'sexy monster girl' subgenre of manga, but it was nothing of the kind (in fact, there's no fanservice here at all, and Fran never appears other than modestly clothed). It was more of a horror/black comedy thing, and it was excellent. A bit gory and grotesque (particularly the earlier stories), but what would you expect from Franken-anything? The earliest stories in the first volume weren't as good as later ones, and I didn't always quite comprehend what the endings were about. It gets quite a bit better as it progresses though, especially after the author begins to include a fair amount of real bio-science as the basis of the stories (I think I may actually have learned a few things about biology here, as explained by Fran). That aspect of it reminded me a lot of Osamu Tezuka's stories of the rogue surgeon BLACK JACK, which always included a fair amount of medical science to make the stories feel convincing (since Tezuka did have a medical doctorate). That made me wonder whether Kigitsu had studied biology and/or medicine as well, as he has included a lot of factual background explanations. The emphasis on the grotesque and disturbing here is of the human fear of biological processes and body morphology horror, similar to Junji Ito's TOMIE. The stories for the most part seem to have those black comedy twist endings based on irony or karmic turnabout of the same type favored in the classic E.C. Comics, although sometimes they varied by being of the open-ended "... The End?" type where the reader is left to wonder what sort of consequences (surely bad) would result. Kigitsu managed to cover quite a few genres or tropes as satires, too. Actually I'd say that there's quite a bit more than just horror and comedy here, as the stories become more varied as they go along. Each 24 page chapter is a complete story (although many of the stories are subsequently revisited by sequels in chapters later on), with 16 stories per omnibus volume (plus a couple of 6-page bonus stories, 2 one-page gags, and 2 pages of the author's notes on the stories), making up about 400 pages for each of the four omnibus volumes.

Fran Madaraki is a patchwork girl who resembles a very thin teenager with long straight blonde hair (her character design reminded me somewhat of Tim Burton's THE CORPSE BRIDE), if you ignore the fact (and almost everyone seems to) that she has two giant electrodes (the heads of which are the approximate size of tuna cans) protruding from the temples of her skull and her body is covered with stitched-up seams. She is considered the daughter of the famous (and now long-missing) Professor Madaraki, whose cutting edge work for the government of Japan in bio-engineering had begun back in World War II (so if still alive somewhere, and it's implied that he is, he'd be quite ancient). In reality, she's his greatest creation and his greatest pupil (in later stories, when Fran speaks of the Professor, it's clear that her love for him is more than that of a daughter for her father). She seems to be quite famous herself, and no one in the stories ever displays any shock or alarm at her stitches or electrodes. Whenever she's walking along the artist has drawn little "wobble, wobble" and "totter, totter" SFX to indicate that her gait or balance is somewhat unsteady or shaky, but in the operating room Fran's a positive dynamo of energy (and she usually preps for the surgery by upgrading herself with a pair or two of extra arms beforehand), announcing with great enthusiasm, "BEGIN THE OPERATION!!" or something similar. She's most commonly seen in a pensive mood sitting at her computer or at a desk with pen and notepad, pondering a biomedical challenge with a thoughtful look and a finger on her chin. Fran's personality is what really stitches all the stories together, as she sometimes plays a minor role (in terms of panel time), with the bulk of the story being given over to the patient or subject of her experimentation. Fran really does have the highest respect for saving (or restoring) a life, but she's perhaps a little less fussy about exactly what form that life might take, so you might say her morality is a little more flexible than the average person's, and she has no natural revulsion for the gruesome biological details, or prejudices regarding other forms of life than human. Her experimental surgery frequently leads to unforeseen results, and her patients should always think carefully before they engage her services. Then too, sometimes her best intentions have a way of going awry -- and at other times, her desire to prove an experimental theory seems to have overwhelmed her better judgment in considering the potential negative consequences. Or maybe her lack of a childhood and social upbringing leaves her somewhat clueless when it comes to understanding how normal humans view things. She charges exorbitant fees for clients that can afford them, yet she can be moved to tears by a luckless patient's story of true love lost, and waive her fees to grant their wishes. For a mad scientist, her optimism and good intentions are actually pretty charming.

Too bad this isn't available digitally. The covers are a bit too...not readable in public. Her look reminds me of Princess Leia.

That surprises and puzzles me. Certainly I would think the people at Seven Seas are aware that the market for manga in digital format is much more significant than that for mainstream American collected edition titles, relative to the total readership for the comic as a whole -- or, to put it another way, it seems to me that manga readers would be more likely to be digital-format adopters because they have less of the traditional collector-mentality than American comic book readers. I guess the other thing to take into account here is that (as I am aware from various online comments I've read elsewhere) these same stories had been previously available online as digital fan-made scanslations, so maybe they felt that a large percent of the potential digital market was significantly eroded already? (Although the scanslations have mostly now been removed from those sites, since being legitimately licensed for American translation by Seven Seas.)

Even though the covers used on Seven Seas' print omnibus collections are the same as the ones appearing on the original Akita Shoten tankobon volumes as drawn by original creator Kasuhisa Kigitsu (both tankoban covers for the volumes collected in Seven Seas' omnibuses appear as color inserts inside), they represent a more glamorous 'sexy pin-up' re-interpretation of the characters like you'd find on Deviant Art, and are completely non-representational of the style of artwork and characters as they appear in the actual stories. I sort of preferred the interior cover page images (unfortunately only printed in black and white in Seven Seas' paperbacks), which are more like homages to movie posters or old-school paperback book cover art. The "cover" images I display here would have appeared as color insert pages in select issues of CHAMPION RED, the seinin manga magazine where Kigitsu's Franken Fran series first appeared.

I realize this info does nothing to ameliorate any potential embarrassment you might experience if seen reading FRANKEN FRAN, but I guess the only solution would be to go literally old-school and make your own book cover out of a plain brown paper bag. While various protective vinyl covers for paperbacks are sold at bookstores, few of them would fit these otherwise-standard-MMPB-dimensions Seven Seas manga omnibuses due to the 400-page thickness.

FRANKEN FRAN by Katsuhisa Kigitsu. Seven Seas published this in 4 large omnibus volumes (originally the series ran 8 tankobon volumes published by Akita Shoten in Japan), totaling about 1600 pages. I spent the better part of 5 days reading the whole thing. Not what I was originally expecting. The covers sort of make it look like part of the 'sexy monster girl' subgenre of manga, but it was nothing of the kind (in fact, there's no fanservice here at all, and Fran never appears other than modestly clothed). It was more of a horror/black comedy thing, and it was excellent. A bit gory and grotesque (particularly the earlier stories), but what would you expect from Franken-anything? The earliest stories in the first volume weren't as good as later ones, and I didn't always quite comprehend what the endings were about. It gets quite a bit better as it progresses though, especially after the author begins to include a fair amount of real bio-science as the basis of the stories (I think I may actually have learned a few things about biology here, as explained by Fran). That aspect of it reminded me a lot of Osamu Tezuka's stories of the rogue surgeon BLACK JACK, which always included a fair amount of medical science to make the stories feel convincing (since Tezuka did have a medical doctorate). That made me wonder whether Kigitsu had studied biology and/or medicine as well, as he has included a lot of factual background explanations. The emphasis on the grotesque and disturbing here is of the human fear of biological processes and body morphology horror, similar to Junji Ito's TOMIE. The stories for the most part seem to have those black comedy twist endings based on irony or karmic turnabout of the same type favored in the classic E.C. Comics, although sometimes they varied by being of the open-ended "... The End?" type where the reader is left to wonder what sort of consequences (surely bad) would result. Kigitsu managed to cover quite a few genres or tropes as satires, too. Actually I'd say that there's quite a bit more than just horror and comedy here, as the stories become more varied as they go along. Each 24 page chapter is a complete story (although many of the stories are subsequently revisited by sequels in chapters later on), with 16 stories per omnibus volume (plus a couple of 6-page bonus stories, 2 one-page gags, and 2 pages of the author's notes on the stories), making up about 400 pages for each of the four omnibus volumes.

Fran Madaraki is a patchwork girl who resembles a very thin teenager with long straight blonde hair (her character design reminded me somewhat of Tim Burton's THE CORPSE BRIDE), if you ignore the fact (and almost everyone seems to) that she has two giant electrodes (the heads of which are the approximate size of tuna cans) protruding from the temples of her skull and her body is covered with stitched-up seams. She is considered the daughter of the famous (and now long-missing) Professor Madaraki, whose cutting edge work for the government of Japan in bio-engineering had begun back in World War II (so if still alive somewhere, and it's implied that he is, he'd be quite ancient). In reality, she's his greatest creation and his greatest pupil (in later stories, when Fran speaks of the Professor, it's clear that her love for him is more than that of a daughter for her father). She seems to be quite famous herself, and no one in the stories ever displays any shock or alarm at her stitches or electrodes. Whenever she's walking along the artist has drawn little "wobble, wobble" and "totter, totter" SFX to indicate that her gait or balance is somewhat unsteady or shaky, but in the operating room Fran's a positive dynamo of energy (and she usually preps for the surgery by upgrading herself with a pair or two of extra arms beforehand), announcing with great enthusiasm, "BEGIN THE OPERATION!!" or something similar. She's most commonly seen in a pensive mood sitting at her computer or at a desk with pen and notepad, pondering a biomedical challenge with a thoughtful look and a finger on her chin. Fran's personality is what really stitches all the stories together, as she sometimes plays a minor role (in terms of panel time), with the bulk of the story being given over to the patient or subject of her experimentation. Fran really does have the highest respect for saving (or restoring) a life, but she's perhaps a little less fussy about exactly what form that life might take, so you might say her morality is a little more flexible than the average person's, and she has no natural revulsion for the gruesome biological details, or prejudices regarding other forms of life than human. Her experimental surgery frequently leads to unforeseen results, and her patients should always think carefully before they engage her services. Then too, sometimes her best intentions have a way of going awry -- and at other times, her desire to prove an experimental theory seems to have overwhelmed her better judgment in considering the potential negative consequences. Or maybe her lack of a childhood and social upbringing leaves her somewhat clueless when it comes to understanding how normal humans view things. She charges exorbitant fees for clients that can afford them, yet she can be moved to tears by a luckless patient's story of true love lost, and waive her fees to grant their wishes. For a mad scientist, her optimism and good intentions are actually pretty charming.