Our Songs Are Better: Part 3
| |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
| “Our Songs Are Better: Part 3” | |||||||||||||
| First published | March 22, 2017 | ||||||||||||
| Written by | Kelly Thompson and Sophie Campbell | ||||||||||||
| Art by | Jenn St-Onge | ||||||||||||
| Colors by | M. Victoria Robado | ||||||||||||
| Letters by | Shawn Lee | ||||||||||||
| Edits by | Sarah Gaydos | ||||||||||||
With life as a Misfit not all she'd imagined it would be, Blaze faces a decision regarding her future with the band.
Synopsis[edit | edit source]
Despite their reality show’s crew continuing to intrude into their lives, The Misfits have finally settled back into a steady groove, having ironed out the kinks that came with Pizzazz’s lengthy absence and with adding their new member Blaze. As they finish practicing, however, Blaze seems like she’s in an awful hurry to get away from her bandmates. Though Pizzazz, Roxy. and Jetta are all suspicious of her behavior, Stormer defends Blaze’s right to come and go as she pleases when they aren’t working, a right she then exercises herself. Taking a drive out to a house out in the suburbs, Blaze ducks underneath the cracked open garage door and is met by two other women who are none too happy about all the time she’s sending with The Misfits as it takes away from the time she has to spend with them… her other band! After a few hours of practice, The Lunas’ guitarist Skye and drummer Jade are in agreement that they’ve gotten good enough to go public with the band but Blaze isn’t so sure. Frustrated with the band’s singer, Jade takes Blaze to task over not embracing the band she’s built and using The Misfits reality show as a platform to launch The Lunas but Blaze insists that the time isn’t right and makes her exit, needing to get back to Pizzazz’s mansion. As she heads back out to her car, Blaze overhears Jade complaining that she’s never going to be ready, stirring memories in her head…
As they sit in her car, Courtney Dwyer tries to rush her little sister Leah to finish her makeup, not wanting to miss any of country superstar Luna Dark’s performance! However, they soon hear the show beginning, causing both of them to take off running! As she watches Luna perform, Leah suddenly realizes what she wants to do with her life: become a singer just like Luna Dark!
Two years later, Leah and her friend Clash are up in her room listening to music. When Courtney comes in and asks them to keep it down, Leah asks her to give the new group Clash just turned her on to a try. Courtney declines, saying she can’t keep up with her constant barrage of new band recommendations, but Leah can’t help it when she’s constantly finding new artists that sound like her entire world distilled down into music. Leah is hurt when Courtney asks with a rather dismissive tone if she and Clash are going to start a band but still decides to tell her the stage name she’s settled on when she becomes a singer like Luna Dark: Blaze!
In the present, Blaze makes a stop at the grocery store before returning to Pizzazz’s home. As she gets ready to leave, she orders a sandwich as well but quickly drops it. Thankfully, a stranger picks it up off the ground for Blaze, a stranger she soon finds out is actually Luna Dark! Starstruck, Blaze has a slightly curse-y reaction to coming face to face with her idol and only grows more excited when Luna reveals that she recognizes her as that great new guitarist for The Misfits! Overjoyed by Luna's compliments, Blaze tells her that she's named her new band after her. When Luna asks if her being in a new band means she's leaving The Misfits, Blaze gives a slightly rambling explanation on how she's not sure if she should focus on the new group she's started or just focus on the total lottery win that is getting to be in The Misfits. Feeling that Blaze must of started The Lunas for a reason, Luna says that she should stick with them but that doesn't necessarily mean she should leave The Misfits behind, encouraging her to follow her passion even if it leads her somewhere uncertain. Blaze is reminded of when Luna put out Tremors, an extremely experimental album that was off putting to a lot of Luna's audience but is actually both of their favorites. As Luna uses the fact that she did that album because she wanted to and didn't care about the reaction to it to drive her point home, a crowd begins to gather around the two of them, prompting Luna to decide she needs to make an exit. As they go their separate ways, Blaze now realizes what she must do...
Returning to Pizzazz's home, Blaze spots her sunbathing out on the beach and asks to talk to her, preferably off camera. Taking her audio pack off, Pizzazz follows Blaze a bit out into the ocean where the approaching Ellen and Brock won't be able to hear them or get any worthwhile footage. Once they have a certain degree of privacy, Blaze lets it drop that she has a new band. She explains that while getting to be in The Misfits at all is still a dream come true for her, what she's always wanted is to be a singer and only getting to sing for them for a single concert before Pizzazz came back really drove that point home for her, so she started this new group in order to follow that dream. Believing that The Misfits won't have her if she has a side project, Blaze tells Pizzazz she's leaving, as the dream of getting to sing is more important to her than the dream of getting to be in her favorite band. However, Pizzazz meets Blaze's resignation with laughter and asking why she doesn't think she can be in two bands! While Pizzazz would've been mad if Blaze had kept her other band a secret from her, she says it's smart of her to have something on the side like that, having known that she was a lead singer from the first time she met her. Since obviously she's the only one who can be lead singer for The Misfits, Pizzazz says she's okay with Blaze being in both The Misfits and The Lunas, believing that there will come a day when Blaze is ready to fully spread her wings and become her own musician. Overjoyed, Blaze embraces Pizzazz and thanks her for understanding.
Though the reality show's crew is upset that they weren't able to document Blaze and Pizzazz's heart to heart, they soon get to make up for it by filming The Lunas perform, giving them the show as a platform to make their debut.
Featured characters[edit | edit source]
Characters in italic text appear only in flashbacks.
(Numbers indicate order of appearance.)
| The Misfits | The Lunas | Others |
|---|---|---|
|
Quotes[edit | edit source]
Notes[edit | edit source]
Jem references[edit | edit source]
- Luna Dark is a minor character from the Jem animated series who made appearances in the late season one two parter The Jem Jam. In the animated series she was a Madonna stand-in rather than a country singer, however.
Other trivia[edit | edit source]
- This issue is cowritten by original IDW Jem artist (and Blaze's co-creator) Sophie Campbell.
- Originally solicited for release in February 2017, this issue was delayed and eventually saw release near the tail end of March.
Covers (3)[edit | edit source]
- Regular cover: Blaze in Pizzazz's shadow, by M. Victoria Robado
- Subscription cover: Teenage Blaze and Clash, by Jenn St-Onge
- Retailer incentive cover: Cowgirl Blaze, by Sophie Campbell
