Mighty Jack and Zita the Spacegirl, everything you wanted it to be

The pregnant pause that older readers hear that two excellent, thought out characters will be in the same book can be painful. On one hand you want to see them in the same book, but you also hold your breath, in hope that the author is skilled enough to accomplish what fans want from the series. Mighty Jack and Zita the Spacegirl gave me a huge grin and hope for the team up when I heard that the third book in Jack’s series would be the team-up. If you know this series of graphic novels from Ben Hatke, the news probably did the same for you. Rest easy and read on, Mighty Jack and Zita the Spacegirl is everything you’d hoped it be and more monsters.

Zita the Spacegirl had three stand alone graphic novels. They started in 2011 with Zita rescuing her friend who had been kidnapped by aliens. Mighty Jack started in 2016 as a retelling of Jack and the Beanstalk, but with more elementary aged monsters and much more action. Both of these series were excellent and immediate hits with the upper elementary and middle school crowd.

At the end of Mighty Jack and the Goblin King we get a glimpse of the fun that happens in Mighty Jack and Zita the Spacegirl. The glimpse is just the sight of Zita in Jack’s backyard. Any alien threats or otherworldly dangers aren’t referenced, for all we know they’re going to be normal middle school kids. The payoff in the book is great and will not disappoint readers.

Even if you haven’t read Jack or Zita before now you’ll easily catch on. There’s a one-page recap that tells you exactly what each character has done and why they’re where they are now. Immediately after that we see a giant ogre locking himself behind a door and the story runs out of the gate. There’s an even bigger, more evil monster-with hundreds of monster friends, who is intent on getting past this door and going to Earth to conquer it.

Mighty Jack and Zita the Spacegirl is a well thought out story with action packed art to match. While reading it I felt like I did the first time I saw The Return of the King. Both separate their heroes into dire, adventurous situations and you, as a reader, want them to be reunited in a way that feels organic and not like the ninth season of Dallas.

New readers to the series will come expecting monsters, aliens, battles, plus our middle school heroes wrangling it all. What will surprise them is the human elements. The feelings that Jack, his mom, Zita, Maddy and the others go through. It’s real growth that every kid experiences and this book softly tells them that they will experience it and that it’ll be OK. Come for action, stay for the life lesson.

This book really accomplished that and makes it, plus any of the books in their respective series a must have for elementary and middle school libraries, or those home libraries for great graphic novels. Much like the climax ties everything up, the ending does so in a way that feels final, but also gives readers a subtle wink.