By Daniel Vlasaty

I'm a recent convert to the world of Street Angel. The first time I even heard about the character was with the recently released Street Angel: After School Kung Fu Special. And I enjoyed that. So, I read everything I could get my hands on of this homeless teenage skateboard crime fighter and her adventures. I killed everything that was available online, and I bought a couple of older collections I could find. And then, this summer, Image released another hardcover story – The Street Angel Gang. And I read that one too and enjoyed it. So, what I'm trying to say is that I'm a fan of Jim Rugg's and Brian Maruca's creation and that I was also super excited to see that they had another book coming out. Unfortunately, Street Angel: Superhero for a Day kind of missed the mark for me.

Street Angel: Superhero for a Day follows Jesse Sanchez through a single day in her life on the streets of Wilksboro. It's a day full of perpetual hunger, terrible friends, dead bodies, and magical alien rings. So, you know, a normal day for Jesse "Street Angel" Sanchez. A quick run-down of the story here: after a rat steals Jesse's sandwich she meets up with some friends to go on the search for food. Jesse is starving. It's the only thing she can focus on. So, when she and her friends find a dismembered body sporting a glowing ring, Jesse's first thought is to pawn the thing for food money. But her friends have other plans. They want to try the ring on. They want to wear it and see what it does. But all Jesse wants to do is fucking eat. Emma puts the ring on and is instantly changed into a superhero – think Green Lantern and his ring, except this superhero is bright-ass pink. The friends discuss what Emma should do with these new powers. They try to decide if she should fight crime and what her superhero name should be. But Jesse keeps just talking about how hungry she is. She finally bails as the friends continue to shout possible superhero names from the rooftop. 

That's it. That's what the book is about. We soon find out who the ring actually belongs to and what happened to Jesse's friends after she left them to go search for food alone, we find out about the feast the girls were given aboard the alien spaceship. How they ate so much, they're surprised their stomachs didn’t explode. All while Jesse starved alone in the streets. Like, what the fuck? I've had some shitty friends in my days, but these girls are the worst. Who does that to a starving homeless friend?

There isn't anything quote-unquote wrong with this book. But I'm just left with a simple question: what was the point of it? Was there even a point at all? There isn't a real "story" here, and not much happens. This story is a story that finishes off the page. Somewhere us readers were not given access to. There probably was a climax and all that, but we didn’t even get to see it. We're basically just given an oh, man; it was so crazy – you totally should have been there an explanation by the characters who were there, and I just have to ask what the fuck? 

As always, though, Jim Rugg's art is great. It has a playful quality. It's fun and light. The characters are colorful and cartoony, which contrasts great with the burnt-out, devastated, and gritty landscape. The way he perfectly illustrates the extremely run-down city. The page layouts and the panels, they're also great. Again, it's a simple style that fits the tone and goofiness of the story. There is just a playfulness to it, even though for the most part it's depicting some pretty terrible stuff.       

Honestly, the art was almost good enough to save this one for me. But unfortunately, I just can't get fully behind this book. It was too lacking for me. I just wanted more. More story. More character development. Just more. I don't like telling people that they should or shouldn’t read or consume something because people can make up their own damn minds. But with Street Angel: Superhero for a Day you have to understand that you are paying twenty bucks for essentially, in my opinion, an incomplete single issue. What I will say, though, if you're looking to get into some Street Angel stories there are far better ones out there to dig into first. 

Score: 2/5

Street Angel: Superhero for a Day
Image Comics