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Lucky Penny: Color Edition
"I LOVE IT! Penny is a human disaster after my own heart!" — ND Stevenson, bestselling author of Nimona
If Penny Brighton didn't have bad luck, she'd have no luck at all. She lost her job and apartment on the same day, and with no other options, she started crashing at her best friend Helen’s storage unit. As a last resort, Penny snags a job at the laundromat, which is managed by Helen’s surly twelve-year-old brother. Things couldn’t get much worse, but that doesn’t keep the ever-buoyant Penny down. After all, she’s been sensing boyfriend potential with the cute receptionist at the community center who’s been sneaking her in so she can use the shower. Maybe things are looking up! But if Penny knows one thing for certain, it’s that luck has never been her strong suit. How long can this last?
If Penny Brighton didn't have bad luck, she'd have no luck at all. She lost her job and apartment on the same day, and with no other options, she started crashing at her best friend Helen’s storage unit. As a last resort, Penny snags a job at the laundromat, which is managed by Helen’s surly twelve-year-old brother. Things couldn’t get much worse, but that doesn’t keep the ever-buoyant Penny down. After all, she’s been sensing boyfriend potential with the cute receptionist at the community center who’s been sneaking her in so she can use the shower. Maybe things are looking up! But if Penny knows one thing for certain, it’s that luck has never been her strong suit. How long can this last?
208 pages, Paperback
First published March 2, 2016
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 561 reviews
July 11, 2017
Penny gets fired from her job and booted out of her flat all in the span of a day. Ooooh, I gets it, the title’s irooooonnnnicccc! So she moves into a storage unit and goes to work at a laundromat run by her friend’s kid brother for comedy reasons. But romance is around the corner in the form of nerdy Walter - could Penny... get Lucky, (ohohoho, nudge nudge)?!
I quite liked Ananth Hirsh and Yuko Ota’s comic Lucky Penny - up until the final act anyway. In the same vein as Scott Pilgrim and Giant Days, it has a very easygoing, charming style to it that’s amusingly quirky but not annoyingly so. Penny and Walter are both likeable characters and their predictable romance, if not original or surprising, was pleasant to see unfolding. See, I’m not a heartless ogre!! Walter naming his car Ophelia and quoting Hamlet at it was the only moment that was too twee for my blood.
Buuuut… the wheels on the bus fall off in the final act for me. In Scott Pilgrim, Scott’s fantasy fight sequences were just that: fantasy. Hirsh/Ota attempt something like that here but it’s not fantasy. So the characters engage in weird Kill Bill-type fight scenes, smashing machines with their fists - it’s much too ridiculous. These are just ordinary young people! It would’ve worked far better if it was fantasy; as it is, it’s a misstep that totally lost me.
Also, the “villain’s” motivation was awful, trite nonsense and the kids trying to bus’ into Penny’s storage unit was a pointless subplot. Ota’s art is decent but it’s standard manga illustration and nothing special.
Lucky Penny is a delightful romance comic for the most part that overreaches when it broaches Bryan Lee O’Malley territory. I’d still say it’s worth a look if you’re a Scott Pilgrim/Giant Days fan but it’s also not as good as either of those titles so don’t get them hopes up too high.
I quite liked Ananth Hirsh and Yuko Ota’s comic Lucky Penny - up until the final act anyway. In the same vein as Scott Pilgrim and Giant Days, it has a very easygoing, charming style to it that’s amusingly quirky but not annoyingly so. Penny and Walter are both likeable characters and their predictable romance, if not original or surprising, was pleasant to see unfolding. See, I’m not a heartless ogre!! Walter naming his car Ophelia and quoting Hamlet at it was the only moment that was too twee for my blood.
Buuuut… the wheels on the bus fall off in the final act for me. In Scott Pilgrim, Scott’s fantasy fight sequences were just that: fantasy. Hirsh/Ota attempt something like that here but it’s not fantasy. So the characters engage in weird Kill Bill-type fight scenes, smashing machines with their fists - it’s much too ridiculous. These are just ordinary young people! It would’ve worked far better if it was fantasy; as it is, it’s a misstep that totally lost me.
Also, the “villain’s” motivation was awful, trite nonsense and the kids trying to bus’ into Penny’s storage unit was a pointless subplot. Ota’s art is decent but it’s standard manga illustration and nothing special.
Lucky Penny is a delightful romance comic for the most part that overreaches when it broaches Bryan Lee O’Malley territory. I’d still say it’s worth a look if you’re a Scott Pilgrim/Giant Days fan but it’s also not as good as either of those titles so don’t get them hopes up too high.
August 10, 2019
Alright, I'm gonna go ahead and break one of my own reviewing rules for this one. I typically refuse to compare things that I'm reviewing to other creators' works (for better or for worse), but I have to say first and foremost that I think anyone who read Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and either 1) loved it, or 2) like me, thought it had great potential but wanted it to Do Better, will adore Lucky Penny. It's got the same hilarious, cutesy, vaguely bizarre and delightfully geeky vibe to it, but I loved it about a million percent more.
Penny is a trip, first of all. She's super unlucky, but she's also just kind of a brat, in a totally comical and lovable way — she doesn't mean any harm, but she's a little careless and doesn't seem to have much common sense. Walter, her love interest, is the cutest, most harmless little geeky bean, and I really loved the paradox between his love of tabletop gaming and her obsession with really weird fantasy romance novels. I mean, come on, her hero is a dude who lounges around shirtless with lions and her shelves are full of books about dragon shape-shifters wooing innocent young dames... Penny's a total nerdy weirdo in her own right, and I love it.
Not to mention, the whole thing has a wrench thrown in near the end when we suddenly change from a cutesy slice-of-life story to a challenge complete with villains, villainous sidekicks, girl-power gangs, and a delightful little guard kitty. It wasn't what I expected at all, but I totally want more of it.
Penny is a trip, first of all. She's super unlucky, but she's also just kind of a brat, in a totally comical and lovable way — she doesn't mean any harm, but she's a little careless and doesn't seem to have much common sense. Walter, her love interest, is the cutest, most harmless little geeky bean, and I really loved the paradox between his love of tabletop gaming and her obsession with really weird fantasy romance novels. I mean, come on, her hero is a dude who lounges around shirtless with lions and her shelves are full of books about dragon shape-shifters wooing innocent young dames... Penny's a total nerdy weirdo in her own right, and I love it.
Not to mention, the whole thing has a wrench thrown in near the end when we suddenly change from a cutesy slice-of-life story to a challenge complete with villains, villainous sidekicks, girl-power gangs, and a delightful little guard kitty. It wasn't what I expected at all, but I totally want more of it.
July 21, 2016
Penny, maybe 20, loses her job, has to move into a storage unit, gets a job working for a 12 year old manager of a laundromat. Bur if this sounds like some bleak analysis of the contemporary economic scene--nope! This is essentially a cute rom-com, down by Yuko Ota, that owes much to the manga-ish drawing style of Faith Hicks (The Adventures of Superhero Girl, Friends with Boys, The Nameless City, who blurbs the book by calling it "perfect.") and (especially) Bryan O'Malley's Scott Pilgrim series. It's basically the women's Scott Pilgrim, complete with battles, but not quite as funny or entertaining.
Well, maybe this is a little "softer" than either O'Malley or Hicks because of the budding romance, because the heart of it is Penny's gradual crushing on this boy. So it has this cute quality to it. The story is light and breezy and fun. It's about the transition between teens and twenties, that transition to adulthood.
Oh, there's one little thing I like a lot: when they all go out drinking, there are these drink scorecards above each person's head so you can see the number and kinds of drinks they have had.
But overall I liked it just fine. I smiled a few times, think of it as a kind of 3-3.5, but I bump it up because of the crushable artwork by Ota and because it is a kickstarter project that really took off, I want to support this kind of work and help it get it out there.
Well, maybe this is a little "softer" than either O'Malley or Hicks because of the budding romance, because the heart of it is Penny's gradual crushing on this boy. So it has this cute quality to it. The story is light and breezy and fun. It's about the transition between teens and twenties, that transition to adulthood.
Oh, there's one little thing I like a lot: when they all go out drinking, there are these drink scorecards above each person's head so you can see the number and kinds of drinks they have had.
But overall I liked it just fine. I smiled a few times, think of it as a kind of 3-3.5, but I bump it up because of the crushable artwork by Ota and because it is a kickstarter project that really took off, I want to support this kind of work and help it get it out there.
March 26, 2023
I feel sorry for the friend. Super chaotic main character but it’s an entertaining read. Loved the art style and the graphic novel is short. Enjoy it while the characters suffer in these few pages. Shouldn’t be relatable but there are moments in our lives we lose our jobs, having the best person to lean on when we are at out limits.
I was so tired before I pick up this book. It was a gruelling week at work. I got even more tired. But I would say it’s a quick weekend read.
I was so tired before I pick up this book. It was a gruelling week at work. I got even more tired. But I would say it’s a quick weekend read.
Want to read
November 3, 2022I Love It! The Art-Style Reminds me of TV Shows like She-Ra & the Princesses of Power & Steven Universe, This is One for the Bookshelves.
(Thanks to Net Galley for this Book).
(Thanks to Net Galley for this Book).
August 15, 2016
New Adults. Emerging Adults. Whatever you call them, this genre tends to deal with collage age-ish people and their woes and misadventures. I can see how this would appeal to many in a similar situation, but unless the story sheds some new light they don't work for me.
This graphic novel is about a young woman who loses her job, loses her apartment, and ends up living in a storage unit. The story is light and fluffy, and given some of the issues lightly touched upon, this would have been a much more interesting read if the author had dived deeper. The art is cute and manga-ish, with all those large eyes. A fast read that I will not remember having read in a week or two.
This graphic novel is about a young woman who loses her job, loses her apartment, and ends up living in a storage unit. The story is light and fluffy, and given some of the issues lightly touched upon, this would have been a much more interesting read if the author had dived deeper. The art is cute and manga-ish, with all those large eyes. A fast read that I will not remember having read in a week or two.
May 30, 2018
This was SO much fun.
May 23, 2025
This had potential but then completely lost me at the end. At first, this was a story about a down and out girl who’s trying to get back on her feet. But then it turned into this wacky Unrealistic situation with a 12 year old boy and his weird grudge. Don’t know where things went so sideways.
July 18, 2021
This graphic novel’s about Penny, a twenty-something with the absolute worst luck in the world. Penny loses her job and apartment in the same day, but somehow still has a positive attitude.
The story is sweet, the art is cute and just as you are sure about what kind of a book it is you’re reading, it does a 180 and surprises you - in the Scott Pilgrim kind of way!
The story is sweet, the art is cute and just as you are sure about what kind of a book it is you’re reading, it does a 180 and surprises you - in the Scott Pilgrim kind of way!
October 13, 2016
This was pretty great, though I have to say the ending really didn't make sense and just went totally over my head.
Most of this book is about Penny. Penny who has no home, no place to stay, so she lives in a storage box with all her stuff. :P She works for a 12-year old kid at the laundromat (don't even ask, I also have no clue why or how), and her luck is terrible (like really terrible). Throughout the book you see her fall in love, get in trouble, kick kids their butts (also very weird), find a cat and name her Boyfriend (she thought the cat was a he), and much much more.
As I said it borders at times on way too silly, but the ending was totally weird. So kids steal her stuff? Suddenly there are 100 middle school kids, there is an epic battle? Walter is captured? Wrestling commences, and much more other stuff? Was that all a dream? Or just something else? I know one thing, it makes me deduce one point from the book.
Penny was an epic MC though, I really liked her and how even though stuff doesn't always go right, she continues on her road to find happiness. I loved how resourceful she is (showering at the gym, staying at the storage unit, sending her mail to her work, etc.), it really shows great character. No matter what lands on her road, she will defeat it. Her love for romance books (with awesome titles though also a bit cringey) were fun, especially when she saw various things in real life as something out of her books. :P I loved her enthusiasm for her books and how she was able to make everyone love the books, even if they never did before. Even me. I normally stay away from those books, but I wouldn't mind reading them now if they were as awesome as Penny's books were.
The art was AMAZING! Really, it was! Sometimes I am a bit on the mixed side of things, but I just adored the art here. The expressions of Penny (and also others) they just made me laugh so much.
Walter and Penny were a cute couple, and I liked how they grew to each other. It wasn't instant lust, as some books do when people meet, instead you can see them get closer to each other, until that first kiss, which does take a while to happen. <3 <3 After that they became even cuter. :P
All in all, I truly enjoyed this book to bits, though again, that ending could have been so much better. :(
But I would still highly recommend it. It has romance, comedy, a great cast, and fantastic art.
Review first posted at https://twirlingbookprincess.com
Most of this book is about Penny. Penny who has no home, no place to stay, so she lives in a storage box with all her stuff. :P She works for a 12-year old kid at the laundromat (don't even ask, I also have no clue why or how), and her luck is terrible (like really terrible). Throughout the book you see her fall in love, get in trouble, kick kids their butts (also very weird), find a cat and name her Boyfriend (she thought the cat was a he), and much much more.
As I said it borders at times on way too silly, but the ending was totally weird. So kids steal her stuff? Suddenly there are 100 middle school kids, there is an epic battle? Walter is captured? Wrestling commences, and much more other stuff? Was that all a dream? Or just something else? I know one thing, it makes me deduce one point from the book.
Penny was an epic MC though, I really liked her and how even though stuff doesn't always go right, she continues on her road to find happiness. I loved how resourceful she is (showering at the gym, staying at the storage unit, sending her mail to her work, etc.), it really shows great character. No matter what lands on her road, she will defeat it. Her love for romance books (with awesome titles though also a bit cringey) were fun, especially when she saw various things in real life as something out of her books. :P I loved her enthusiasm for her books and how she was able to make everyone love the books, even if they never did before. Even me. I normally stay away from those books, but I wouldn't mind reading them now if they were as awesome as Penny's books were.
The art was AMAZING! Really, it was! Sometimes I am a bit on the mixed side of things, but I just adored the art here. The expressions of Penny (and also others) they just made me laugh so much.
Walter and Penny were a cute couple, and I liked how they grew to each other. It wasn't instant lust, as some books do when people meet, instead you can see them get closer to each other, until that first kiss, which does take a while to happen. <3 <3 After that they became even cuter. :P
All in all, I truly enjoyed this book to bits, though again, that ending could have been so much better. :(
But I would still highly recommend it. It has romance, comedy, a great cast, and fantastic art.
Review first posted at https://twirlingbookprincess.com
May 18, 2016
What do you do when you lose your job and your apartment on the same day? Well, if you have a friend with a storage unit, you move in there! Penny lands a job with her friend’s family too at their laundromat working for a 12-year-old manager. As Penny figures out the tricks to living in a storage unit, she also meets a boy who works at the community center. At first she tries to trade him a date to be allowed to shower there, but their connection grows. Still, there are problems with living in a storage unit like heat, kids trying to break in, and more. Perhaps it will take a villain and his henchmen to battle to change Penny’s luck. Or not.
I loved this playful graphic novel that will work for both teens and adults. Penny is clearly out of high school but also in that bizarre interim before becoming a “real” adult. She is entirely lovable in her own unique way with a tattoo she hates, plenty to worry about and very few plans for the future. Still, she manages to take care of herself, keep a job, flirt a little, and fall in love.
I particularly enjoyed the way that the book would suddenly have battle scenes. The majority of the book is a slice-of-life from Penny’s world. It is filled with small moments that are charming and lovely. Still, there is real humor here such as the scores above characters’ heads as they drink in a bar. The fighting too brings this graphic novel to a different and unexpected place where it pays homage to plenty of hero comic tropes.
Funny and smart, this graphic novel will be appreciated by older teens and adults, some looking forward to life beyond high school and some looking back to when they weren’t adults either. Appropriate for ages 15-18.
I loved this playful graphic novel that will work for both teens and adults. Penny is clearly out of high school but also in that bizarre interim before becoming a “real” adult. She is entirely lovable in her own unique way with a tattoo she hates, plenty to worry about and very few plans for the future. Still, she manages to take care of herself, keep a job, flirt a little, and fall in love.
I particularly enjoyed the way that the book would suddenly have battle scenes. The majority of the book is a slice-of-life from Penny’s world. It is filled with small moments that are charming and lovely. Still, there is real humor here such as the scores above characters’ heads as they drink in a bar. The fighting too brings this graphic novel to a different and unexpected place where it pays homage to plenty of hero comic tropes.
Funny and smart, this graphic novel will be appreciated by older teens and adults, some looking forward to life beyond high school and some looking back to when they weren’t adults either. Appropriate for ages 15-18.
August 8, 2016
Penny could easily have been me in college.
We all have That One Friend, who for some inexplicable reason can't seem to get their shit together, sometimes through no fault of their own, sometimes because they just suck at adulting. That is Penny in a nutshell.
While I lived in hippie flop houses and sometimes slept in the lab, Penny takes over a storage unit and scares a local boy into letting her use the gym showers. See also: some serious Scott Pilgrim moments, complete with
The story is sweet and filled with just-this-side-of-probable moments in the life of a twenty-something from the fine folks (namely Ananth Hirsh and Yuko Ota) over at Johnny Wander.
When I finally got my hands on a print copy, I was slightly disappointed that the added epilogue was a bit short, but it's still worth it.
If you want to read online, start here.
We all have That One Friend, who for some inexplicable reason can't seem to get their shit together, sometimes through no fault of their own, sometimes because they just suck at adulting. That is Penny in a nutshell.
While I lived in hippie flop houses and sometimes slept in the lab, Penny takes over a storage unit and scares a local boy into letting her use the gym showers. See also: some serious Scott Pilgrim moments, complete with
The story is sweet and filled with just-this-side-of-probable moments in the life of a twenty-something from the fine folks (namely Ananth Hirsh and Yuko Ota) over at Johnny Wander.
When I finally got my hands on a print copy, I was slightly disappointed that the added epilogue was a bit short, but it's still worth it.
If you want to read online, start here.
March 13, 2019
Mixed feelings on this. It's about a girl who is "lucky" because she wears the same pair of lion head underwear everyday. But she's the opposite of lucky. She's really just nasty...I mean she wears one pair of undies...c'mon. This was kinda cute, and would recommend for fans of Scott Pilgrim.
March 17, 2021
This was cute. It reminded me of Giant Days in the art style and story. Lost me a bit at the 75%-ish mark with an odd fight scene, but it came back in the end. Though I do wonder why someone would let their twelve year old run their business.
August 24, 2021
The ending was veeeery confusing
March 6, 2018
"They seriously fired you?"
Penny is a twentysomething who, ironically, isn't lucky in the slightest.
She loses her job and gets kicked out of her apartment on the SAME day.
Her best friend Helen, setting out to move in with her husband, has the burden of an empty storage unit to bear.
"Sell this thing to me."
"Sure? I don't see why- OHHHH NO. No no no. You're a crazy person and there's no way I'm gonna be part of this."
"You're a succubus, Penny Brighton."
"What's that?"
Helen might think Penny's lost her marbles, (which she stole anyway) but Penny thinks, at a hundred bucks a month, she struck a pretty good deal... That she can't tell the unit manager about.
Even better than that, Helen hooks Penny up with a job at her family's Laundromat. Penny DOES kind of have to bow to Helen's tyrannical twelve-year-old brother David, who thinks he's the manager, but in exchange for free laundry, Penny can deal with that.
"You've washed your clothes. Now wash yourself."
"Hey! That's no way to talk to a lady!"
"I'll let you know if I see one."
It's scrounging for free showers at the community center where Penny hits a snag.
That snag is the dude who works the front desk, Walter.
And the snag's not exactly a bad one.
Adventures in storage-unit-living, 'dates' that involve babysitting and DnD, a pocket-sized dictator for a boss, and a gang of miscreant middle-schoolers terrorizing her home, our Penny is definitely an unlucky one.
But, hey. Bad luck, is still luck.
"I wish I knew what to do next..."
"We'll think of something."
Lucky Penny is about being a fuckup.
Believe it or not, many, many people are fuckups purely because they're born that way. We don't all have the work ethic of a mollusk and the attention span of a gnat. A lot of us do our best and try our hardest, and still end up unemployed C-students.
... Right?
Regardless, Penny is not lazy, entitled, or stupid. She's just unlucky.
Lucky Penny is, unsurprising seeing as it was published by Oni Press, (notice me Sensei!) very much a more down-to-earth, role-reversed Scott Pilgrim. With that same feeling of loudness and absurdity with less fantastic circumstances, this book is obviously aimed at that fanbase.
The only problem is that Lucky Penny is so normal and down-to-earth that the ending, not fantastic in the Scott Pilgrim sense but still hard to believe, didn't fit with the slice of life aspect of the first seventy-five percent.
It had the ending of an eleven-minute cartoon segment, in that bows were too neat and things were too easy.
So, yeah. Three stars, more like a 3.5 with deducted points for the ending.
It might sound like Penny and Walter's relationship takes center stage. It DOESN'T.
What takes center stage is these two dorks' struggles to get together, stay on the same page, and not be such fricking weirdos in general (to no avail).
I'm not a romantic and I didn't mind their hookup at all. It was snortingly accurate.
art specs
Yuko Ota's art was prefect for this story. While the content was an obvious nod to Bryan Lee O'Malley's magnum opus, Ota's art stands far away from that manga/arcade-inspired style and gives you more of a soft, animated feel (think Steven Universes or Gravity Falls).
The art is a five-star, easy.
Lucky Penny is a worthwhile read for graphic novel fans, cartoon fans, Scott Pilgrim fans, millenials, fuckups, unlucky ducks, or any cross-section thereof.
"Am I bad luck?"
"Eeeehhh... Wellllll..."
Penny is a twentysomething who, ironically, isn't lucky in the slightest.
She loses her job and gets kicked out of her apartment on the SAME day.
Her best friend Helen, setting out to move in with her husband, has the burden of an empty storage unit to bear.
"Sell this thing to me."
"Sure? I don't see why- OHHHH NO. No no no. You're a crazy person and there's no way I'm gonna be part of this."
"You're a succubus, Penny Brighton."
"What's that?"
Helen might think Penny's lost her marbles, (which she stole anyway) but Penny thinks, at a hundred bucks a month, she struck a pretty good deal... That she can't tell the unit manager about.
Even better than that, Helen hooks Penny up with a job at her family's Laundromat. Penny DOES kind of have to bow to Helen's tyrannical twelve-year-old brother David, who thinks he's the manager, but in exchange for free laundry, Penny can deal with that.
"You've washed your clothes. Now wash yourself."
"Hey! That's no way to talk to a lady!"
"I'll let you know if I see one."
It's scrounging for free showers at the community center where Penny hits a snag.
That snag is the dude who works the front desk, Walter.
And the snag's not exactly a bad one.
Adventures in storage-unit-living, 'dates' that involve babysitting and DnD, a pocket-sized dictator for a boss, and a gang of miscreant middle-schoolers terrorizing her home, our Penny is definitely an unlucky one.
But, hey. Bad luck, is still luck.
"I wish I knew what to do next..."
"We'll think of something."
Lucky Penny is about being a fuckup.
Believe it or not, many, many people are fuckups purely because they're born that way. We don't all have the work ethic of a mollusk and the attention span of a gnat. A lot of us do our best and try our hardest, and still end up unemployed C-students.
... Right?
Regardless, Penny is not lazy, entitled, or stupid. She's just unlucky.
Lucky Penny is, unsurprising seeing as it was published by Oni Press, (notice me Sensei!) very much a more down-to-earth, role-reversed Scott Pilgrim. With that same feeling of loudness and absurdity with less fantastic circumstances, this book is obviously aimed at that fanbase.
The only problem is that Lucky Penny is so normal and down-to-earth that the ending, not fantastic in the Scott Pilgrim sense but still hard to believe, didn't fit with the slice of life aspect of the first seventy-five percent.
It had the ending of an eleven-minute cartoon segment, in that bows were too neat and things were too easy.
So, yeah. Three stars, more like a 3.5 with deducted points for the ending.
It might sound like Penny and Walter's relationship takes center stage. It DOESN'T.
What takes center stage is these two dorks' struggles to get together, stay on the same page, and not be such fricking weirdos in general (to no avail).
I'm not a romantic and I didn't mind their hookup at all. It was snortingly accurate.
art specs
Yuko Ota's art was prefect for this story. While the content was an obvious nod to Bryan Lee O'Malley's magnum opus, Ota's art stands far away from that manga/arcade-inspired style and gives you more of a soft, animated feel (think Steven Universes or Gravity Falls).
The art is a five-star, easy.
Lucky Penny is a worthwhile read for graphic novel fans, cartoon fans, Scott Pilgrim fans, millenials, fuckups, unlucky ducks, or any cross-section thereof.
"Am I bad luck?"
"Eeeehhh... Wellllll..."
December 28, 2016
It's a Scott Pilgrim ripoff plain and simple. Ananth Hirsh read Scott Pilgrim, said 'what if Scott was a girl' and wrote this ripoff. There are subtle changes like instead of ex-boyfriends, there are these girls that her new boyfriend has hung out with since high school and they aren't evil. Instead of being all about music, she's obsessed with romantic fantasy books. The really awesome action scenes that littered Scott Pilgrim are all squeezed into the last 10 pages of this bullshit and make no sense. Little things that mask the fact that if you covered the top half of the cover and showed someone, they would think it's a new Scott Pilgrim book.
Let's get past the lawsuit that Brian O'Malley should be hitting them with and address how the story here is dumb. She gets fired for no real reason, her friend is moving out the same time she has to, so she moves into her friend's storage area and works at her parents laundromat that is run by her friend's 11 year old brother. She showers at a local gym because the guy at the door becomes her boyfriend and hides her mail in a dryer. There's a scene where she is in her underwear greeting customers. It's forced quirky bullshit that makes it seem like Penny is maybe actually retarded. I fucking hate it with fire. I read it in 30 minutes and I want that time back.
Let's get past the lawsuit that Brian O'Malley should be hitting them with and address how the story here is dumb. She gets fired for no real reason, her friend is moving out the same time she has to, so she moves into her friend's storage area and works at her parents laundromat that is run by her friend's 11 year old brother. She showers at a local gym because the guy at the door becomes her boyfriend and hides her mail in a dryer. There's a scene where she is in her underwear greeting customers. It's forced quirky bullshit that makes it seem like Penny is maybe actually retarded. I fucking hate it with fire. I read it in 30 minutes and I want that time back.
January 21, 2019
Penny is a girl who gets fired and loses her apartment in the same day. Her solution? Move into a storage unit (kids don't try this for a home). What follows just gets even stranger. Working at a laundromat for an 11 year old kid, Penny finds a way to con everyone around her into liking her and helping her out.
Sometimes you rate a book just by how much you enjoyed it. So while the story of Penny is kind of weird and the plot doesn't always make sense, reading about a girl so positively unlucky is kind of fun and interesting. I wound up liking Penny and even Walter grew on me. Overall I'd give this a 3 star on technical merit, but I'm bumping it up a notch just because I had fun reading it. Cute book!
Sometimes you rate a book just by how much you enjoyed it. So while the story of Penny is kind of weird and the plot doesn't always make sense, reading about a girl so positively unlucky is kind of fun and interesting. I wound up liking Penny and even Walter grew on me. Overall I'd give this a 3 star on technical merit, but I'm bumping it up a notch just because I had fun reading it. Cute book!
December 22, 2022
Rating: 3.75 🌟
First and foremost, I'd like to express my gratitude to Netgalley and Oni Press for providing me with an e-ARC of this comic.
The best part of this book, in my opinion, is the way the characters grow towards the end. The artwork is adorable and the storyline was pretty good. Highly recommended if you want to read a slice-of-life comic with a hint of romance.🤍
February 7, 2019
Cute concept, funny characters, fast read, WILD ending.
That about sums up Lucky Penny.
I am still not sure whether the climax actually happened or happened in her head....
Recommended for lovers of comics, silly humor, and a little bit of ridiculousness.
That about sums up Lucky Penny.
I am still not sure whether the climax actually happened or happened in her head....
Recommended for lovers of comics, silly humor, and a little bit of ridiculousness.
January 10, 2020
Very fun, this was a light read about a girl down on her luck, trying to get through life. A bit of romance, and a lot of humor.
November 20, 2017
The story seemed a bit confusing and convoluted at times, but I LOVED the art style and the compelling characters.
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January 16, 2019Lucky Penny is about a girl named Penny who, unlike the title, is generally very unlucky in her life. It is a seemingly light hearted book with a bit of comedy, but still has a real type of life happenings. Things from Penny get fired from her job and having to live in her friends storage unit, to being harassed by children and robbers. But eventually she meets a guy named Walter, who eventually become her boyfriend, and her luck starts to turn for the better. Walter is able to make Penny happy, helps her out, and stays by her side no matter how weird she seems to him. The art style is very round and cartoony, and adds to the more lighthearted feel of the comic. And even though its cartoony-ish, it still is able to portray the characters emotions. I really liked this book, with it being a more realistic story that doesn't dwell on making a perfect life for Penny, but instead makes a life of a character that seems real enough to be that this person could exist. Add the comedy aspect on to it and the art style, and it's a really good story. The main characters, Penny and Walter, are very likeable characters. They each with their own special quirks, and even though they are drastically different from each other, they mesh together very well to make a super cute couple. The characters do grow in the story a bit and change as they learn more about each other and learn how to better cope with their world. I would recommend this comic to anyone who likes comedic books, and to anyone who likes books that don't try so hard to depict a perfect life.
September 8, 2018
This graphic novel was weird for sure. I often struggle with one-volume graphic novels, because often they don't fit a full story. Lucky Penny does feel complete, but I was basically going "chickawuuuuuut" the whole time. There's a lot that's unbelievable and strange about this book, but it was also a super fast and entertaining read.
Penny has had a number of misfortunes, though it may be more that she's rather thoughtless and impulsive than actually due to poor luck. She's vibrant and energetic and completely unhindered by boundaries. Despite the fact that she's all over the place and makes terrible choices, there is something quite endearing about Penny.
Anyway, after getting kicked out of her apartment, because she's low on money, she gets the idea to move into her friend's storage unit. She actually makes it pretty cute and cozy, as storage units go. Meanwhile, she works at her friend's family's laundromat, which, confusingly, appears to be run solely by the eleven year old brother. The Scott Pilgrim-style plot that appears is perhaps even more baffling but of brief duration.
I like this graphic novel for having an atypical heroine and her romance with an awkward nerd who can barely talk to her initially. I think it will appeal to fans of Scott Pilgrim.
Penny has had a number of misfortunes, though it may be more that she's rather thoughtless and impulsive than actually due to poor luck. She's vibrant and energetic and completely unhindered by boundaries. Despite the fact that she's all over the place and makes terrible choices, there is something quite endearing about Penny.
Anyway, after getting kicked out of her apartment, because she's low on money, she gets the idea to move into her friend's storage unit. She actually makes it pretty cute and cozy, as storage units go. Meanwhile, she works at her friend's family's laundromat, which, confusingly, appears to be run solely by the eleven year old brother. The Scott Pilgrim-style plot that appears is perhaps even more baffling but of brief duration.
I like this graphic novel for having an atypical heroine and her romance with an awkward nerd who can barely talk to her initially. I think it will appeal to fans of Scott Pilgrim.
February 6, 2017
Illustrations are adorable, but the story itself is generally lacking real substance. The main character, Penny, is a young adult (early twenties) and trying to figure out how to navigate her life. The book revolves around her working at a laundromat, where her boss is a tiny tyrant, and she is living out of a friend's storage unit. However, she is almost endlessly upbeat about making things work and turning her bad luck around - especially when a cute nerdy guy becomes a prospective love interest.
One of my problems with this book is that Penny is supposed to be irresistibly cute and quirky (the manic pixie dream girl role we have seen a hundred times before), but her "charming qualities" come across as more sociopathic akin to a con artist...however, this is not too detrimental to the story since the story itself is pure mindless sugar coated fluff. If you don't read a lot of graphic novels or haven't seen a lot of indie or rom-com movies, this story will be fine, but it does not bring anything new to the table.
One of my problems with this book is that Penny is supposed to be irresistibly cute and quirky (the manic pixie dream girl role we have seen a hundred times before), but her "charming qualities" come across as more sociopathic akin to a con artist...however, this is not too detrimental to the story since the story itself is pure mindless sugar coated fluff. If you don't read a lot of graphic novels or haven't seen a lot of indie or rom-com movies, this story will be fine, but it does not bring anything new to the table.
September 21, 2016
Penny Brighton is an unapologetic casual smoker, has a neck tattoo of a snake beginning to coil itself around a heart, and reads steamy romance novels with titles like “Succubus Seduced” for fun. When she is fired from her job and is forced to move out, she convinces her best friend, Helen, with coffee (a dash of milk, two sugars, and cinnamon) to get her a job at Helen’s family’s laundromat and let her stay in their storage unit.
Review:
http://noflyingnotights.com/2016/09/1...
Review:
http://noflyingnotights.com/2016/09/1...
August 2, 2016
Just plain fun with high energy and enjoyable characters.
June 22, 2016
Had a Scott Pilgrim-vibe.
Very cute artwork.
Overall enjoyable.
Very cute artwork.
Overall enjoyable.
April 6, 2019
Kind of a weird change in tone near the end, but otherwise a fun and quick read. I liked the protagonist and her challenges, and the way she lived her life.
November 26, 2020
¡Me ha encantado!
Me ha pillado totalmente de improvisto, la verdad. Pensaba que no me iba a decir nada y, ¡BAM!
La protagonista, Penny, no es que me vuelva loca, pero no me cae mal. Al principio su historia no me estaba diciendo nada, hasta que empieza a trabajar en la lavandería. Y a partir de ahí la historia no hace otra cosa que elevarte al reino de los cielos.
La amiga de Penny, su hermano, el chico del centro cívico, las amigas de éste, las preferencias de lectura de Penny . Mira, me caso con todos los personajes, con la trama, con el dibujo. Es jodidamente maravilloso. Y sé que no os estoy contando nada, pero es que creo que es uno de esos cómics que es mejor leer sin saber de qué va, como he hecho yo, y dejar que te sorprenda. Parece que va a ser una típica historia de millenials (búsqueda del trabajo soñado, de un hogar y una pareja) y de repente ESE FINAL. Me caso.
Necesito muy fuerte que la misma gente que adaptó al cine 'Scott Pilgrim contra el mundo' haga lo mismo con este cómic.
Y que le dén el papel de David a Aidan Gallagher, por favor y gracias.
Me ha pillado totalmente de improvisto, la verdad. Pensaba que no me iba a decir nada y, ¡BAM!
La protagonista, Penny, no es que me vuelva loca, pero no me cae mal. Al principio su historia no me estaba diciendo nada, hasta que empieza a trabajar en la lavandería. Y a partir de ahí la historia no hace otra cosa que elevarte al reino de los cielos.
La amiga de Penny, su hermano, el chico del centro cívico, las amigas de éste, las preferencias de lectura de Penny . Mira, me caso con todos los personajes, con la trama, con el dibujo. Es jodidamente maravilloso. Y sé que no os estoy contando nada, pero es que creo que es uno de esos cómics que es mejor leer sin saber de qué va, como he hecho yo, y dejar que te sorprenda. Parece que va a ser una típica historia de millenials (búsqueda del trabajo soñado, de un hogar y una pareja) y de repente ESE FINAL. Me caso.
Necesito muy fuerte que la misma gente que adaptó al cine 'Scott Pilgrim contra el mundo' haga lo mismo con este cómic.
Y que le dén el papel de David a Aidan Gallagher, por favor y gracias.
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