Galaxy

 

Galaxy

The Prettiest Star

by Jadzia Axelrod

art by Jess Taylor

DC Comics

2022

 

 

Galaxy: The Prettiest Star is probably one of the better-known of DC's young-adult graphic novels. It got some attention in the press for introducing a new trans character, and was nominated for a GLAAD Media Award. It's not really a superhero story at all, although the idea gets mentioned a couple times, and apparently Galaxy has appeared as a supporting character in some recent Hawkgirl comics.

 

Galaxy is metaphorically like a trans person, but what she literally is in the book is an alien princess who goes into something like witness protection, and is completely biologically transformed into a human boy as a disguise. When the story opens, she's been living as 'Taylor' for 6 years, watched over by a couple guardians who are disguised as her dad and older brother, and accompanied by an adorable talking corgi who records everything she does for security reasons. So she's not actually transgender in the way that I am, but she's living in a metaphor for trans-ness that can only happen in fantasy or scifi.

 

We're told that these disguises were chosen because Earth tv gave the dad guardian the idea that they'd be inconspicuous. Giving Galaxy a boy's body is another security measure. But the logic seems flawed since we're also told that the aliens hunting Galaxy can detect a crystal hidden in her chest, meaning she doesn't really need to appear human, or live in a town near a telescope where no one can use cell phones to avoid appearing on social media. All those measures seem mis-aimed, protecting against the wrong kind of threat. Which is convenient for the narrative, because it means when it's time, Galaxy can shake off all these precautions without consequence, since they never served a functional purpose.

 

Early on, we see Galaxy as Taylor going to school, playing basketball, experiencing something akin to gender dysphoria, and missing her dead parents and her previous life as a beautiful princess. A new girl comes to school from Metropolis, where aliens are common and accepted, and Galaxy gets a crush on her. Kat is Black, queer, has dyed green hair and a prosthetic leg, and no romantic interest in Taylor ... until Galaxy steals her guardian's push-button disguise device and transforms back into her alien body for the first time on Earth. After that, Kat and Galaxy start dating, and then Galaxy accidentally breaks the disguise device, which conveniently leaves her stuck in her alien femme form with no way to go back to looking human.

 

We get a montage of trans pain scenes after that. Galaxy fights with her guardians, gets kicked off the boy's basketball team, gets bullied at school by mean girls in the restroom and a lunchroom where no one wants her at their table, has a fight with her one previous friend, and gets expelled because the school board doesn't want to allow an alien to attend. (So, not even for changing gender.)

 

After all that, Galaxy is sad, argues with Kat, contemplates suicide, considers trying to wreck the school building, then makes up with her family and Kat, and the girls go to the homecoming dance together.

 

Jess Taylor's art is very colorful and has no outlines. It's a style that reminds me of some queer fan-art I've seen, as well as the webcomic Lore Olympus. I particularly like the way they rendered what humans look like through Galaxy's eventual alien super-vision. And it's cool that DC found a trans author and nonbinary illustrator to make their trans-friendly comic.

 

I have a sense that Galaxy is written more for non-trans audiences, to convince them to empathize with Galaxy, because she grew up as a non-trans girl on her home planet, then was forced to into a male body that is literally foreign to her and literally a disguise. She's very meek and polite, she doesn't intentionally cause a fuss. She's unable to stand up to her bullies, for example, and she only starts living as an alien because of an accident that leaves her unable to change back. She doesn't really decide; it just happens. Later she can stand up to her guardian because his security measures really were pointless and excessive, and again, because there's nothing any of them can do to reverse the transformation. 

 

So like, most of the potential points of conflict, or areas where Galaxy could have exercised agency, where it might've been possible for the audience to wonder if she was doing the right thing, have been written in a way that precludes any question or choice or doubt. These are authorial decisions that I suspect are aimed at persuasion, at simplifying a complex reality to an unambiguous metaphor that you can't argue with, so hopefully you just accept.

 

In a pretty short format, Axelrod is trying to tell a complete transition story - from vague dysphoria, to wanting to be a girl, to coming out to one person, experimental cross-dressing alone and with a trusted friend, to suddenly coming out to family and attending school as a girl, to experiencing initial rejection, to arriving at a place of self-acceptance. It's a lot of plot, especially combined with all the alien backstory. 

 

I think if I'd read it when I was a teenager, I probably would've felt Galaxy's story was a kind of wish fulfillment - I too wanted to magically and instantly have a non-trans woman's body, and to have everyone just have to accept it because it was an irreversible fait accompli. Sadly the reality is much slower and less satisfying than that. But maybe as a closeted teen, I'd have appreciated seeing the dream come true for someone. At the time, I didn't know there was a real, non-magical, non science-fictional path to go from being a teenage boy to being an adult woman. 

 

Today, as an adult who cannot possibly still be considered 'young,' what I want is less trans magic and trans metaphor, and more trans reality. But that's not really a fair demand to make of a YA superhero comic. So I hope that Galaxy's intended audience enjoys her origin story.