Customer Reviews

The Complete "Omaha" the Cat Dancer: Volume 3

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If you haven't seen the Omaha comics, you've missed a minor phenomenon. At first glance, it seems a little ordinary. The characters live out lives like anyone else's. Omaha moves in with her lover, Shelley moves in with hers, Robby finds love and leaves it - but not the way you might think.

There's a bright, sensual atmosphere over it all. Omaha, the lead character, is one of the best exotic dancers around; some of her friends are prostitutes. All of them get respectful treatment, though. They're professionals in professions of making people happy, and basically nice people with good friends. The series is "adults only" because of some unabashed sex scene, including one where the woman is trying to adapt to wheelchair life and the love life it allows her (quite nice, it turns out) and another featuring a same-sex couple. Although the sex scenes are quite explicit, they're not smutty at all. The comprise only a small part of the story line, the part where lovers would naturally let their love get physical. They aren't the point of the story, they aren't even especially exciting - but they are warm and friendly, with one striking exception.

That brings us to the dark side of this plot: the moralists trying to shut down the dance clubs and adult entertainment, led by a senator drawn like a bull (I keep waiting for the china shop). He's the exception, the one who strikes his paid sex partners. He hires their service, then reviles them and leaves them black and blue. And Robby, the gay guy, gets his store burned with him in it and his home ransacked by persons unknown. Evil is at work, and it hates people with happy sex lives.

There's a lot more to this story, coming up in later volumes of the collected comics. This collection helps to set the sage for it. If you demand avant garde artwork in a comic - well, sorry about that. Fans who need superheroes and BamPow action: nothing to see here, move along. If you want likable characters, positive models for sensual living, and believable situations (except for the part about humanoid cats and dogs), you came to the right place.

-- wiredweird