Today, Image Comics might be best known for creator-owned epics like The Walking Dead and Saga. While those comics have earned legions of fans for their total unpredictability, every Image series doesn't have world-ending stakes.
One Image series that trades violence for charm is Moonstruck. Written by Grace Ellis and illustrated by Shae Beagle, this slice-of-life series focuses on a magical mystery in Blitheton, a modern college town where every inhabitant is a magical, mystical creature. Now, CBR is taking a closer look at this series and what makes it stand out from the crowd.
Moonstruck follows Julie, a Latina werewolf still who works at a coffee shop and is still coming to terms with her magical nature. She's just starting a relationship with impulsive Selena, who is also a werewolf. Among other things, both of them share a love for the book series Pleasant Mountain Sisters Series (a mash-up of Sweet Valley High, milquetoast PowerPuff Girls, The Babysitters Club and Nancy Drew).
Rounding out the main cast is Julie’s coffee house colleague and best friend, Chet, a zestful centaur from Texas, and Cass, a cheery seer haunted by disturbing visions about the harm that her abilities might cause.
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The first storyline in the series begins with Julie, Selena and Chet going out to see a performance from Dorian, a fox magician. Chet volunteers for a trick and then, to his horror, the fox “dehorses him,” transforming his horse-half into a pair of human legs.
As the opposite of Ariel in The Little Mermaid; Chet is horrified by his new appearance. When Julie suggests that having “normal” legs will make his life so much easier, he doesn't take that well, so Julie and Selena go on a quest to hunt the fox that took Chet’s legs. When Julie and Selena's contrasting personalities make them approach their search differently, their journey mimics the Pleasant Mountain Sisters series that they both love so much.
While it's fantasy trappings almost make Moonstruck feel like Fables' lighthearted sibling, the series also takes a page from Watchmen’s “comics within comics” approach by showing a short Pleasant Mountains Sisters story in each issue, complete with Julie’s annotations in red. Even though the fictional book series operates in unremarkable tropes, she feels obligated to conform to the standards set by her favorite fictional series.
In these panels, guest-illustrated by Kate Leth, the triplets are trying to find a missing puppy that was never actually missing. The “sporty” sister hid him and planted the clues to look like a hero, and the “smart” twin scolds her for hurting everyone. While Julie initially seems to take the story as another reason to hide her werewolf nature, she eventually confronts Dorian the Fox and learns a nuanced, hopeful message about self-love and self-acceptance.
Ultimately, Moonstruck is a cozy, feel-good LGBTQ+ urban fantasy romance and coming of age story with a diverse cast of characters and lovingly placed Easter Eggs that reference everything from Arrested Development to Michel Foucault to Star Wars and offer reflection on the stories we tell ourselves.
Although the first six installments of the series were published as individual comics, the series will move to a graphic novel format from now on. The last single issue of the series teased a new storyline involving fairy fraternities, and longer installments seem well-suited to exploring the wider world of this heart-warming series.