The Future of Comics

The final blog is about the future of comics, web comics and motion comics.  For this week, I read "Stand Still, Stay Silent" for the web comic. 

So Stand Still, Stay Silent is a post apocalyptic story about a boy in the Icelandic countries (Norway, Iceland, Sweden, etc..) and the "rash illness" that's spreading across the country and the government involvement.  The first thing I noticed about this web comic is the art style and panel layout. The artwork is actually really beautifully done, and the color tones match the atmosphere of the story (Warm oranges, toned down grays and blues) and the emotion of the story and characters.  The panels are inconsistent in their layout (which is a good thing), some pages have panels that overlap each other (same with speech bubbles), while other pages are full blown images that give a sense of intensity and emotion, along with informational.  The story, although I didn't care too much for it, was actually well thought out and written.  It has elements of personal story and a sense of government involvement, which ties the story together and makes you really believe that this is a living, breathing world. 

So I guess the big question is "What is the future for comics?", and to that, I think it's a mixed answer.  Do I think comics are going to go completely digital? And to that, I say no, because when comics become digital, they lose a certain credibility.  With most books now a days, digital isn't such a bad thing, because everyone has smart phones or tablets to allow for easy transport.  Although comics are the same way, there's a big element that makes comics unique, and that's because they're collectables.  People have been collecting comics since they were released, and it's not because they hope they're going to increase in value and then just sell them, it's because most people grew up with comics, they share an emotional bond with comics.  First editions, foiled covers, mint condition, there's a ton of reasons why people collect comics, and because of that, I don't think comics will ever stop being printed. 

With that being said, I don't think web comics, or digital comics is a terrible idea either.  We've learned in this class that it can take days, weeks or even months just to knock out just a few pages of a comic or a graphic novel, and I think that has a huge role to play in human error.  For example, if I'm drawing on paper, there's a chance I could mess up a line, spill something on the paper or even lose it.  But with digital art, you can "undo" mistakes, which takes out the human error and save time, thus making it easier and quicker to knock out pages.  Another reason why it's a good idea, stems from what I said earlier about books; they're easily transported.  My wife and I take a lot of cruises, so for her, she downloads a lot of books on her iPad, so that when we're laying in bed and relaxing before bed, or even by the pool, she can take all her books with her on a small device.  Well the same concept applies, allowing to download a collection of comic books on a device allows people to read it no matter where they are without holding a physical copy.  And that's kind of where all paper materials are going, it's mostly going digital because we're getting to a point in our lives that saving trees is more important than ever. 

So to conclude, I don't think comics are in a state now that they were in the late 80's to late 90's, where comic books were a big deal (at least they were for me when I was a kid) to kids as they use to be, but I also don't think they're going anywhere anytime soon.  The late Stan Lee, along with comic books were a huge influence for me as a young artist, and even though I didn't major in Illustration (I went for Graphic Design), it doesn't mean I stopped drawing, and never will.

Batman The Killing Joke

Question One:  I'm a little creeped out and a little intrigued by the text.  This isn't a normal Batman comic where the villain does something wrong and Batman goes to "save the day".  It's almost as if Batman has been tired of his "routine" (fighting crime with Joker) and wants to call a truce so to speak.  Joker seems to have gone off the deep end mentally and starts doing things that are not characteristic of his behavior (ie. Robbing banks, taking over a industry, etc...), he instead tortures a man by trying to make him go mad and shoots his daughter in the spine to cripple her.  

The ending was by far the weirdest part showing that Batman is only human, being taken down by a single bullet and ending the legacy, all from a nobody, just an ordinary guy.  He then talks about how he'd get married, settle down with a wife and go to heaven.  It's like the birthing of a villain, showing how easy it would be to take down a man in a suit.  Batman isn't invincible, he's a human man in a suit with no powers, and uses gadgets and inventions to help him fight crime.

Question Two:  I can connect to both Batman and Joker in this comic.  For Batman, he's stuck in a routine; Save the day by defeating the villain, locking the villain up, villain escapes, repeat.  Batman is looking for a way out of the endless cycle by coming to his senses and trying to break the loop by doing something different.  Batman isn't some off world superhuman being, his parents were killed by muggers, he inherited a fortune, but instead of seeking revenge, he used his own personal experience to help others. 

As for the Joker, there was a lot of backstory told in this comic that shows how and why the Joker became the way he is.  Sometimes it's a series of decisions or just life events that change who we are and test the character of ourselves.  For the Joker, it took a turn for the worse and because of that, he became a villain.  Some people can find rhyme and reason with doing bad things, others do not, and I think it's a test of who people are, the severity of the situations and how we react to these situations that show who we really are. I wasn't the same person I was years ago, no one is, and that's because situations and happenings change who we are as people, it's how we evolve. 

In the end, I have sympathy for both of them.  Both Batman and Joker were hit with hard times in their younger years, but the test of each of their character is what sets them apart.  Batman chose to help others while Joker's mental state vanished and he became mad.  

Question Three:   If I had to take this story into another medium, I would make it into a live action movie.  No animation, no cartoons, just purely cinematic.  

If I had to change anything about this to fit the live action movie, I would dive deeper into the psychotic of the Joker and how it came to be.  Reading the comic, I wanted to get more into the Joker's head.  I feel like if I did the movie, I would based it more around the Joker and his insanity than with Batman and his guilt of possibly killing the Joker.  Really get into the backstory of both characters to draw in the emotions from the characters to the audience to show that decisions made throughout your life shapes who we are today.

I also feel the live action movie would be the best format for this story because (although possible), it's hard to really get into emotions and a persons thoughts through animation, I feel as if using human beings to portray the level of craziness (I found that Heath Ledger played an excellent Joker), and sympathy is something that a lot more people can connect to on a personal level.   

I would also tie in the epilogue directly into the movie (the birth of a villain killing Batman), only for the sole purpose of just showing how fragile humans are.  When I think of a super hero, I think of unnatural powers, and almost a state of invincibility, and showing Batman die at the end just goes to show that at a blink of an eye, the once great legacy of Batman could all be ended with a small bullet.

Reconsidering the Superhero

For this week, I read Black Panther.  I know earlier this year the movie released, which I didn't see, but I knew about Black Panther from my teenage years, but never paid it any mind because it didn't seem like a Superhero or world I wanted to be apart of.  I now see what the hype is all about.

First thing that grabbed my attention was the story. Black Panther is the king of his people and has to deal with villains.  The thing for me that separates Black Panther from other super heroes is the fact that Black Panther is a king, which means it adds to the story about having to rule as a king and fight evil, whereas most super hero comics are about the heroes fighting the villains and nothing more.  It adds a complex level of struggle as the hero to fight and rule.

Art direction is the next subject.  The only thing that really confuses me about Black Panther (and maybe it was explained in earlier issues), is that they dress and fight like a tribe, but they have advanced technology to use. A lot of the panels are in large scale whereas most comics use smaller panels on each page.  More other than not, I found myself zooming out to look at a bigger panel, which is a good thing in my opinion because a single large panels can give emphasis on a subject matter or even tell more of a story than more smaller panels.  Another thing I noticed is the constant use of emotion in the characters faces, which helps drive the story being told. 

I can't say Black Panther is my new favorite comic book hero, but it has peeked my interest in learning more about it.  The movie also got decent reviews and I've heard it's good, so maybe I'll check it out sometime.

Women

This week I read "This One Summer" by the Tamaki cousins.  It's a graphic novel that narrates the life of Rose and her family's annual trip to a cottage for vacation. 

The first thing I noticed in This One Summer was the artwork.  In most of the graphic novels I've read in this class up until this point, the art style has been, kinda rough.  Not that it was drawn poorly, but the art is usually clean, bold lines and sometimes colored.  With This One Summer, the artwork is soft, and the line work looks like it was done with a paint brush which adds a delicate touch to the art.  I also think the choice of not using color was a smart choice, because towards the middle of the graphic novel, I found out that her mom is suffering from depression due to a miscarriage she had awhile back, and the solid black used with the monotone grays really shows the emotion of depression.

Another big thing I noticed was the story.  I'm not quite sure if this is fiction or non-fiction, because of how well the story is told.  Everything about the story is believable, there are no super heroes, no monsters or worldly creatures, just a story about a girl and her family on vacation.  The story starts off as just a normal girl on vacation with her parents, but then Rose meets the store clerk, starts to develop a crush on him, then finds out the girl he's been hanging out with is pregnant, and so on. 

The last thing I noticed was the characters in the novel.  Each character has his or her own personality.  Rose is the typical teenage girl, developing a crush on a older boy, rebelling against her parents.  Rose's friend's mom is a sort of hippie, all natural, spiritual.  Rose's dad is by far my favorite character, he's down to earth, kind of the "cool" dad (One thing I absolutely loved about his character was the fact that he mentioned Neil Peart, which is the drummer for Rush, which is my favorite band).  It's one thing to have a really driving story, which I believe was executed beautifully, but when you add in characters with their own unique personalities, it becomes a work of art. 

I was a little skeptical of how this novel was going to be, but truth be told, by the end of it, I wanted to find out more.  Did Jenny have the baby? How is Rose's mom dealing with the depression? Do they go back to the cottage next year, and if so, is her friend still going to be there?  I think that's what sets apart good novels and masterpieces, the constant desire to find out more about the story and characters after the final page.

Contemporary Literature

So this week I ended up reading Eightball by Daniel Clowes.  Eightball is a series of contemporary literature comics wrapped up into one book. 

It's hard to start about what I thought about this comic.  It seems like Eightball was written awhile back, maybe in the 80's or 90's because of the content.  It almost feels like an underground comic due to the nature of the content (Sex, nudity, drugs, cussing, etc...), but with a contemporary spin.  A lot of the panels didn't make a whole lot of sense, for example, in one of the comics the main character Clay is inside an adult theater watching porno, and he briefly describes the line in the men's room being awful and that he'd never go in there.  A specific porno shows up and he's drawn to one of the characters, so a guy in the lobby tells him to go to the men's room to seek answers.  When Clay arrives to the men's room, he's greeted by what looks like a guru of some sort.  There are many scenes like this in all of the comics that don't entirely make sense, although I'm not sure if they're suppose to. 

The stories are very character driven, but also has a strong story as well.  All of the comics usually show or talk about an issue in the current world (80's-90's in this case).  For example, in one of the comics, a man gets arrested and as they're driving down to the precinct, they see a prostitute on the side of the road working, so they arrest her.  Shortly after, the two cops are arguing about which one's "turn" it is to have sex with her, and one of them actually has sex with the prostitute.

Manga

This is going to be a fun week in this class because I absolutely love anime and Japanese-style art.  For this I decided to read Ranma 1/2, because I'm familiar with the name but not manga in general because it was not something I've gotten into reading (even though I've been told it's better than watching anime).

So one of the things I noticed about Ranma 1/2 (or just Manga in general) is the culture.  Even in typical American comics, culture plays a large role in the story and feel of the comic.  In manga, they show typical Japanese architecture such as dojos, schools and hospitals. They even go as detailed as to show trees that grow in Japan such as Hinoki cypress and cherry blossom trees.  They also use almost stereo-typical animals in their story, like Ranma uses a Panda in it.

Another thing that is different in manga and American comics is the art style and forms of impressions.  The art style for most manga has a distinctive style (ie. Large eyes, small mouth, slim bodies (almost no one is fat, and if they are, its exaggerated), etc..).  Another thing is the facial and body impressions.  For example, if Ranma is angry, the facial features are overly exaggerated, same with the body language.

And the last thing I noticed is the color.  The front cover is always colored, but the rest of the manga is black and white.  I'm not exactly sure why that is, but if I had to guess, it would be because of mass print and the company doesn't want to print in color to save money.  Other than that, the only other reason I can think of is because it's tradition (Japanese culture is big on tradition).  I don't think it takes away from the story at all, if anything, it makes it more interesting to use black, white and gray to portray depth and perspective. 

I thoroughly enjoyed reading the manga this week, I can't wait to find out more about it in next class.

A Wide World of Comics

So for this week, I decided to read Moebius' work (Mostly for Heavy Metal magazine). The artist known as Moebius is actually Jean Giraud from France. It's hard to describe his art style, it's a mixture between simple and complex.

The line work is very complex with simple watercolor-like coloring.  Most comic book artists that I've seen in the past several weeks go simple in design for small panels and very detailed in larger panels, but with Moebius, his artwork is always very detailed which shows that he's a very skilled artist. 

I think the biggest thing I've taken away from Moebius and his work is his storytelling.  I've noticed a bit of a pattern in his comics.  It seems he's a huge fan of science fiction, but there are rarely any happy endings.  It usually starts with a small back story of the main character and their purpose, then introduces alien-like creatures that feel like they belong in the story.  Each comic he shows feels like it's part of a bigger story (that belongs in a graphic novel), you feel like part of the story.  But the thing with Moebius' story, is that it usually ends horribly for the main character.  For example, in "The Twinkle in Fildegar's Eye", Fildegar play's the main character that follows a crystal to travel across the galaxy.  He lands on a planet and meets inhabitants, but gets pulled by a sense of wonder, where he comes across a talking mushroom-like creature.  He ends up eating a part of the talking mushroom and the crystal leaves and then turns into a super nova.  It leaves a sense of wonder and deeper meaning. 

I've been a huge fan of Heavy Metal magazine since I was in high school, and usually the art in there is very "underground" (drug use, nudity, sex, etc...), but Moebius doesn't really fit in that category, although there was breasts in one of his comics that I read, I wouldn't categorize him as an underground artist because of the deep story telling and not needing to put drugs and sex into his comics to grab the attention of the audience, his story telling and art does that already.