The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl Book 2: Squirrel You Know It's True (#5-8)

"Oh my God.  I'm gonna be the one who brings bluetooth to Asgard!" - Nancy

Whew, well it's been a dark old month on this blog, we've had post-apocalyptic raping and pillaging, World War 2 vampires, depression, a reflection in the what it feels to fight the wrong wars and dead mothers. So lets see January out with some more upbeat stuff and what could be more so than the continuing adventures of the endearing superhero, Doreen Green aka Squirrel Girl.  She's a hero with super strength and agility, the ability to talk to squirrels and summon a great number to help her, a bushy tail and a massively positive attitude to life.  In the previous volume she started college studying computing and she and her squirrel companion "Tippy-Toe" moved in with Nancy Whitehead and her pet cat Mew.  Nancy discovered Squirrel Girl's superhero identity and has quickly become a trusted friend.  Squirrel Girl also met and rather clumsily flirted with another student called Tomas before saving the Earth from Galactus by finding him a planet covered in delicious nuts and no sentient life.  Now in this second (and last of this Marvel NOW run) volume we get to meet The Avengers and see her take on an ancient Asgardian villain while getting some help from an unexpected source.  So without further ado lets carry on.

Nancy is trapped in the top of the statue of liberty while Squirrel Girl and a whole bunch of other heroes fighting invading dinosaurs.  She has company and as they sit and wait for rescue conversation turns to favourite superheroes and who might save them.  Nancy says Squirrel will, and one of the group, an old woman says she has a story about Squirrel Girl from when she was a young girl.  Nancy protests that Squirrel Girl isn't old enough but the old lady continues and we get a Kirbyesque looking story.

Zoinks!

Squirrel Girl saves Captain America from the nefarious mind control waves sent out by a Red Skull bot turning Captain America into a Hydra ally.  Preposterous, that could never really happen. Ahem.  Anyway, the Skull bot is disguised as "Bass Lass" and Squirrel Girl stops the mind control waves and unmasks Bass Lass saving the good Captain in the process.  Huzzah, democracy is safe.  The end.

Nancy is somewhat disbelieving of this story and then a younger man says he has a real story about her, that involved clones.  Someone stole her blood and made a clone of her.  The clone took a Red Squirrel theme versus Squirrel Girls grey and they sometimes teamed up and sometimes they fought.  Oh and also Squirrel acquired a costume that was an alien symbiote.  One of the others says to him, "dude, I think you're thinking of Spider-Man" and the man says oh yes, he totally was.

Nancy looks pained as says people don't have to make up stories about her.  But another pipes up saying he has done legit research on her.  He describes the Squirrel Girl Nancy knows well, but then says she's from the future. "What." says Nancy flatly.  He tells an exciting tale of how she came back in time and teamed up with Nick Fury to take down an army of Doom-bots. Squirrel Girl says Doom's weakness is his ego and his Doom-bots will be built to share them.  She uses her robot to search it's database for a way to get to him and finds "a fear of squirrels and the ability to be easily vexed by squirrels."

Many Squirrel Girls appear!

She uses super-telepathy to summon squirrels to attack them, then gets her robot to call in all the Squirrel Girls from other timelines.  Epic battle commences, but Nancy puts an end to the story. She says Squirrel Girl is real, not something she invented so they could pass the time making up stories about her.  The boy says he did research on the internet about her.

Nancy: "I swear, the internet is like 5% true facts, 85% misinformation and 10% local moms with one weird trick that doesn't even friggin' work".

After another couple of interjections, one in the style of Peanuts (which includes a "totally nuts" pun) and the other of The Dark Knight Returns, Nancy has had enough.   She gives a speech about the real Squirrel Girl pointing out the incongruities in their stories.  One of them asks what makes her so sure, "are you, like her roomate or something?"

Nancy denies it then Squirrel Girl pops her head through the window having sorted the dinosaurs out with the other heroes.  "Oh hey Nancy!  How the heck have you been?" she says to a surprised Nancy. Later with the group safely out, Nancy says she hopes being taken hostage isn't going to be a regular thing now she's friends with Squirrel Girl.   Squirrel Girl says she was just in the wrong place in the wrong time. 

Poor Nancy.

As they walk off together, Nancy tells her about the stories going around about her. Squirrel Girl says "it sounds totally nuts!".  The man who first made the pun is delighted, while the others debate whether she is a robot duplicate and the fact you can't see her abs in her "stupid costume".  And that brings the first chapter to a close.

We start the next chapter with Nancy wearing the "suit" of squirrels again.  She says she doesn't think they are helping her fight and when she punches the squirrels move out of the way.  Disappointed Squirrel Girl has this confirmed by Tippy-Toe.  She said she could have told her before as she had the idea to farm out Squirrel Suits to make Nancy "the general of an unstoppable army of Squirrel Scouts??"

They are standing outside the bank that got robbed in volume one.  The suddenly a humanoid hippo appears and he plans to rob it.   In a flurry of terrible hippo puns another hero arrives to help Squirrel Girl defeat "Hippo the Hippo"  Another man jumps in to help as well.  As the newcomer fights Hippo, the first one introduces himself to Squirrel Girl as "Chipmunk Hunk".   She is super pleased when she realises he is another hero who can talk to animals.

Chipmunk Hunk and Koi Boi take on Hippo The Hippo.

Incredibly annoyed by the fun they are poking at him Hippo says he never asked to be changed from a hippo in the zoo who was changed into a quasi-human.  He says he has zero education and has to rob banks to pay rent on a place to live that will accomodate his size.  Squirrel Girl agrees with him that it is unfair that he woke up one morning with a bunch of human responsibilities.  Hippo calms down say no one has ever listened to him before, but he is still going to rob the bank.

Squirrel Girl says she can't let him do that, but with his size and strength he should be working for a demolitions company, knocking down buildings for a job.  She tells him to search the internet and he should find something.  Mollified, Hippo leaves, saying he'll give it a go but if it fails he's going to come back and rob the bank.  And he is gone, once again Squirrel Girl solves a problem with her power of helpfulness.

The other hero introduces himself as "Koi Boi" friend to Chipmunk Hunk and similar "protector of the scales of justice".  Nancy almost sighs, and says to Squirrel Girl who she calls Doreen that the two men are only wearing domino masks and takes Chipmunk Hunk's off to reveal Tomas Lara-Perez, from their class.  She says she doesn't know Koi Boi's real name but she's seen him with Tomas in their databases 101 class.  Koi Boi says his name is Ken Shiga, "can we please go somewhere less public to talk about this?"

Nancy is not fooled by the usual disguises.

They go inside and discuss their powers, Ken can talk to fish.  After they leave Nancy grumbles that everyone has superpowers except her.  Squirrel Girl says maybe she does, maybe she can talk to an animal but not know it.  The very next day they will go to the zoo. "And you Nancy Whitehead, are going to chat up every animal there".  Nancy says no chance, but next day they are indeed at the zoo and an embarrassed Nancy, egged on by Squirrel Girl starts shouting at the monkeys, but gets hushed by the monkey keeper. 

Squirrel Girl says they'll try some more animals and as they work their way round the zoo in the lion house their keeper has a heart attack and they escape through the open zoo.  Before Squirrel Girl can spring into action, a humanoid squirrel appears and picks up the lions and tosses them back in their pen.  Later Nancy and Squirrel Girl see a news headline online that "Girl Squirrel" saved the zoo.

"Girl Squirrel" saves the day.

Squirrel Girl tells Nancy she has talked to all the squirrels and none of them know who Girl Squirrel is.  She doesn't trust her, even though Nancy thinks she is just being jealous. "She's up to something" insists Squirrel Girl and she's right.  That night Girl Squirrel starts creeping into peoples bedrooms and speaking into their ears in Squirrel language.  The omniscient narrator translates for us and gets freaked out by the awful things Girl Squirrel is saying to the sleeping people.

In fact they get so upset they quit the comic.  This chapter ends with Girl Squirrel trying to whisper into Nancy's ear but Mew growls at her and sends her packing.  Nancy wakes up just missing her and says to Mew she wishes she could talk, "I gotta met someone named 'Cat Brat'" and kissed her head, bringing chapter two to a close.

The next day Squirrel Girl and Nancy arrive late to their databases class because they broke up several fights on the way there.  The teacher asks her to tell the class what durability is and she answers correctlt much to his annoyance. Then the teacher starts ranting angrily about the sloppiness of students today and one of the students accuses him of selling grades for cash.  A brawl starts up which she, Tomas and Ken try to break up.

Wikipedia knows all.

Later they sit and try and figure out what's going on.  Nancy believes she knows what has happened.  Girl Squirrel is in fact "Ratatoskr"  a being from Norse mythology who provokes people with slanderous gossip according to Wikipedia. 

Squirrel Girl: "Can I just say that it's really satisfying to find out that someone you didn't like for kinda no reason might've been evil all along??"
They debate how they might stop her and Squirrel Girl says to Nancy that they should ask the person who Nancy writes fanfiction about a feline version of - "Cat Thor".  Tomas queries the idea that they are going to walk into Avengers tower just like that.   But off they go, and Squirrel Girl rings the doorbell and is let in.

Inside she introduces them to the Avengers, but Ratotoskr has gotten to them as well.    Squirrel Girl tries to tell them what has happened but gets mocked and ends up knocking them all out.  Thor isn't there, but they phone him up on Captain America's phone.  A quick note, Thor at the moment is in fact a woman because male Thor was judged unworthy of Mjolinir.  He is still fighting with her, but at the moment, she is Thor and he is "Odinson".

Thor and Odinson in the breakfast battle.

Anyway Odinson and Thor are caught up in mass riot at a restaurant between people who like pancakes and those who prefer waffles.  When Squirrel Girl tells him she thinks Ratatoskr is responsible we get a quick history lesson about her.   She was supposed to have been imprisoned because her influence had nearly ended Midgard before. 

Odinson: "This is no mere smack-talking squirrel.  Heed my warning well: Ratatoskr's arsenal includes god-teir smack talking and she wields it readily".

She is the ultimate troll and will ruin humanity and Squirrel Girl alone must stop her. "I kinda thought you might help??" responds Squirrel Girl.  He says that another bears the title of Thor, he doesn't know much about her except the fact, "she kisses well".

Squirrel Girl and the others travel to his and Thor's location where they have finally calmed things by tieing everyone up. Thor says they must go to Asgard and restore the barriers which are supposed to hold Ratatoskr.   They decide to split up, Nancy and Tippy-Toe will go to Asgard with Thor and Odinson to fill them in on what Ratatoskr is like now and Squirrel Girl, Tomas and Ken will stay on Earth to fight Ratatoskr. And off Nancy goes.

Later Squirrel Girl, Tomas and Ken find Ratatoskr.  Ratatoskr denies being Ratatoskr asking them what she has supposed to have done, "do I visit their homes in a single night like some demented Santa Claus, using my special talents to inject messages in their brains, messages that I'm sustaining still, even as we speak?"  Squirrel Girl says she is saying that sarcastically but actually that sounds exactly like what's been going on.

Ratatoskr's true form.

So Ratatoskr drops the innocent act and transforms into a sinister and vicious looking black Squirrel.   Squirrel Girl and Chipmunk Hunk order the squirrels and chipmunks to attack. But Ratatoskr is able to stop them with her evil words much to Squirrel Girl's anger, "Ratatoskr, you are a vile, vile Squirrel".  Ratatoskr says she is just ending the world to make room for something better and knocks Squirrel Girl and the others down with a swipe of her hand.

The next chapter starts with a page of Nancy's pencil drawn comic showing Cat-Thor versus the Frost Giant Schnauzers.  Then we join her, Tippy-Toe, Thor and Odinson arrving in Asgard.   Nancy shows them "the great seer Wikipedia" and its information on Rataoskr.  Thor reads it and says that it says if they donated now his fundraiser would be over in an hour. "Yeah he does that" says Nancy.

The information is valuable, but they can't figure out how she escaped in the first place.   Her prison was forged by Odin himself and the only way out would be through Asgardian manipulation and they don't know of an Asgardian who would do that. Then Loki appears and laconically says it might be his fault.  The others stare at him.  "What?!  I said 'my bad'" he protests.

Back with Squirrel Girl, Tomas and Ken, Ratatoskr has hold of the two men and mind controls them into attacking Squirrel Girl.   Fortunately Squirrel Girl swiped Spider-Man's web shooters when she knocked out the Avengers and is able to stop Tomas and Ken without hurting them.  She fires a tonne of web fluid at Ratatoskr and wraps her in the webbing.  But she uses her mind control to get a crowd of people to pul the webbing off her and Tomas and Ken get free too.

*laughs helplessly*

Back in Asgard, Nancy tells Loki she's a big fan. He asks her to name her favourite celebrity and he'll shape-shift into them. Odinson says they have no time for this frivolity but Nancy quickly says Cat-Thor.  Loki shifts into Thor with a cat's head saying "Nancy Whitehead - where have you been all my life?"

Irritated Odison asks Loki how he was responsible for Ratatoskr's escape.   He says he had many schemes on the go and some took centuries to ripen:

Loki: "And when a fella has so many irons in the fire, it's clear even the most harshest judges of character must forgive him for forgetting one teeny, weeny, tiney, winey little scheme. And therefore in conclusion, that's how come it's not my fault Ratatoskr escaped."

Loki says he doesn't want Midgard destroyed so he'll help them out, but they won't be able to get close to her without her using her powers against them.  Nancy has an idea though.  They can block their ears and use bluetooth to communicate with each other.

Back on Earth, Ratatoskr has Squirrel Girl being held by several people including Tomas and Ken. Ratatoskr says they are loving this because part of them resent Squirrel Girl for being "superior".  Squirrel Girl says using mind control doesn't count, "the real Chipmunk Hunk and Koi Boi wouldn't do this."  Ratatoskr is about to whisper in Squirrel Girl's ear when Nancy, Tippy-Toe, Thor, Odinson and Lokui appear.

But inspirational speeches should always work!

Nancy hurls Tippy-Toe at Squirrel Girl who puts earplugs in her ear.  Loki uses "Mewnir" to free Squirrel Girl and knock Ratatoskr away from her.  Then Thor uses Mjolnir to temporarily take out Ratatoskr. But Squirrel Girl says they need to break her spell on everyone.   Loki provides her with a megaphone and Squirrel Girl gives an inspiring speech to the bewitched crowd.  Unfortunately it doesn't work and the crowd starts to attack.

Then suddenly Ratatoskr is engulfed in rainbow light and disappears. The crowd stops attacking and mills about wondering how they got there. Loki says he saved the day.  Squirrel Girl's speech did work, Ratatoskr had to direct her attention to reinforcing her mind control and took her attention away from the "Bifrost blocker she had going".  Loki noticed and sent down the Bifrost and now Ratatoskr is back in prison in Asgard and Midgard is saved.

He has returned his head to normal for which Odinson is grateful.  Loki says those who were mind controlled will feel way more jealous than normal for afew day but will be OK. "We did it.  We did it!" grins Nancy.  Afew days later Squirrel Girl, Nancy, Tomas and Ken are hanging out and Tippy-Toe is teaching them how to speak squirrel. Squirrel Girl says if they keep up this level of progress they'll be "unbeatable."

All friends together again.

And that brings the series to an end.  But thankfully the series is not cancelled, after the 2015 universal Marvel reboot, everything is started from number one again.  And Squirrel Girl is back, with the same creative team and the same characters which is great because Nancy is definitely one of my favourite supporting characters in comics right now.  The Cat-Thor stuff had me genuinely having to put the comic down and compose myself I laughed so much.  This is a wonderful comic, Ryan North and Erica Henderson have bought us a fantastic series full of fun where brute force is never the answer and being clever and kind is the way to solve problems.  The final page comes after the letters page and shows Ratatoskr back in her prison being trolled by Loki who has sent her a talking Squirrel Girl doll who says she is updating Ratatoskr wikipedia page to say she is a big baby and Ratatoskr bites its head off in anger which shows Loki remains king of trolls.  There is also a couple of Squirrel Girl stories from prior to this series included in the trade.  But the artwork shows Squirrel Girl as a more traditional looking "sexy" superheroine and lacks the charm of Erica Henderson's more cartoony rendering of her.  I'm so pleased this series has not been cancelled and I shall be following it as it gets released in trades as long as it keeps up these high standards of art and writing. Awesome stuff.