This was my week!
Batman has got to be my all time favorite comic book character ever since my love began after seeing the first Tim Burton film when I was a toddler, my mom made me a costume and I would proclaim "I'm Ba-man." After growing up seeing all the other movies and watching the animated series while simultaneously becoming more interested in art, I eventually realized that the two intersected in the comics and I knew that's what I wanted to do. As I eventually got more into traditional drawing and painting I sort of lost interest in the overly clean and shiny digital art of much of mainstream comics. Once I discovered comics like Arkham Asylum could be works of art, I once again realized my two worlds could come together.
I don't think these types of art-focused comics should replace the need for words altogether but I do think they are valuable to have. I don't think the art detracts from this story or even that it is making up for a lacking story but is in fact very appropriate for this story. From What I've seen Grant Morrison is really good at giving some of the reigns to the artists he works with. I think the choice to give McKean a lot of control was appropriate for this comic since it gives the reader a different kind of psychological experience not having text to rely on for information in some portions but rather being more dependent on the surreal visuals with a few bits of dialogue which I feel puts the reader in sort of lost and confused state appropriate for a story about madness and insanity.
I also think this story shows very interesting takes on some of the characters like Batman, Joker, and Two Face. Joker tells Batman that he just as crazy as the rest of them, he is really depicted as being vulnerable and still tortured about the loss of his parents. Joker is described as not being insane but rather "super sane" reinventing his personality everyday. Two Face is shown as being completely lost and incapable of making simple decisions like going to the bathroom without his coin.
Monday, December 12, 2011
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Asterios Polyp
This is another one I haven't finished yet but I can already see some of the amazing things it's doing. Even though I haven't finished I can see that this comic is brilliantly designed with not only every aspect of it's visuals but also with the arrangement of the narrative as well. This is really an example one of works that comes along an pushes the boundaries of this medium and others by exploring all that is possible and delves into what wasn't even known to be possible, implementing new techniques and bringing about new thoughts and ideas for the reader as well as other current and upcoming creators.
In this Graphic Novel everything including the design of the pages, characters, and even speech bubbles are reflections of Asterios and the people and world around him. This comic would not be the same at all if it was trying to be more representational. I especially like the portions where every person in a panel has a unique visual representation that reveals their inner-character and the way they think.
This is really a great example that comics can get people thinking as much as anything else can. I'm really looking forward to getting through the rest of it.
In this Graphic Novel everything including the design of the pages, characters, and even speech bubbles are reflections of Asterios and the people and world around him. This comic would not be the same at all if it was trying to be more representational. I especially like the portions where every person in a panel has a unique visual representation that reveals their inner-character and the way they think.
This is really a great example that comics can get people thinking as much as anything else can. I'm really looking forward to getting through the rest of it.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
Moebius
So I couldn't pick just one story to write about because this guy is too awesome!
When I happened upon Jean Giraud Moebius' work in Heavy Metal magazine and Lieutenant Blueberry, I was blown away and found myself overwhelmed looking at his intensely beautiful images. Even my friend who says he always reads through an entire comic without peaking ahead to see the pictures like myself, yet he couldn't help but flip through and study every page when he read an issue of Blueberry.
Each panel of his comics could stand on there own as great illustrations yet they join together to bombard the senses. Moebius displays a masterful handling of everything he does in his comics, with his unique rippling lines that flow around forms, his wide spectrum of unpredictable color choices using warms and cools to draw emphasis where he wants the reader to look. His compassions are also enjoyable often showing a figure in an immense environment of living structures, his panels and page layouts also assist his compositions with many large, long, and tall panels to show off his beautiful imaginative world that flow through the pages. Even though the art is stunning and commands a lot of attention I still felt engaged in the stories.
Also I just want to quickly finish off by saying that I know Blueberry may be full of stereotypes but I don't think it was the goal to be historically accurate, just like many classic Spaghetti Westerns as well as Samurai and noir films that are often unrealistic and full of stereotypes, I think these are more about style and emotional feeling. Also I thinks it's funny that forigners seem to make some of the best movies about the american west which are also sometimes based of samurai film.
When I happened upon Jean Giraud Moebius' work in Heavy Metal magazine and Lieutenant Blueberry, I was blown away and found myself overwhelmed looking at his intensely beautiful images. Even my friend who says he always reads through an entire comic without peaking ahead to see the pictures like myself, yet he couldn't help but flip through and study every page when he read an issue of Blueberry.
Each panel of his comics could stand on there own as great illustrations yet they join together to bombard the senses. Moebius displays a masterful handling of everything he does in his comics, with his unique rippling lines that flow around forms, his wide spectrum of unpredictable color choices using warms and cools to draw emphasis where he wants the reader to look. His compassions are also enjoyable often showing a figure in an immense environment of living structures, his panels and page layouts also assist his compositions with many large, long, and tall panels to show off his beautiful imaginative world that flow through the pages. Even though the art is stunning and commands a lot of attention I still felt engaged in the stories.
Also I just want to quickly finish off by saying that I know Blueberry may be full of stereotypes but I don't think it was the goal to be historically accurate, just like many classic Spaghetti Westerns as well as Samurai and noir films that are often unrealistic and full of stereotypes, I think these are more about style and emotional feeling. Also I thinks it's funny that forigners seem to make some of the best movies about the american west which are also sometimes based of samurai film.
Akira
I had't seen the Akira movie until this year and loved it so I was excited when I got this opportunity to to read the manga as well.
The drawings of Akira are beautifully done and hold there own without the use of color to lean on. The compositions and panels are very dynamically designed and laid out. The slow portions are open and airy with minimal visuals to emphasis important things and a sense calmness then often there are sudden explosions of fast-paised action with a lot of visual noise and activity to create meaningful energy and drama. The compositions reflect both speeds with simpler squares and long rectangles for the calm portions and more tight angular panels creating tension and discomfort. I can see that this method of pacing is a style also used in classic Japanese film.
Something interesting that I noticed after seeing both the manga and film is that even though they were both made by Katsuhiro Otomo, they are each arranged differently to accommodate for the differing strengths and weaknesses of each medium. I think this shows a lot of strength on Otomo's part to be able to translate his story into both the seperate languages of comics and film. To me it feels like the film flows nice and logically without giving away that it was cut down and condensed from the original manga.
The drawings of Akira are beautifully done and hold there own without the use of color to lean on. The compositions and panels are very dynamically designed and laid out. The slow portions are open and airy with minimal visuals to emphasis important things and a sense calmness then often there are sudden explosions of fast-paised action with a lot of visual noise and activity to create meaningful energy and drama. The compositions reflect both speeds with simpler squares and long rectangles for the calm portions and more tight angular panels creating tension and discomfort. I can see that this method of pacing is a style also used in classic Japanese film.
Something interesting that I noticed after seeing both the manga and film is that even though they were both made by Katsuhiro Otomo, they are each arranged differently to accommodate for the differing strengths and weaknesses of each medium. I think this shows a lot of strength on Otomo's part to be able to translate his story into both the seperate languages of comics and film. To me it feels like the film flows nice and logically without giving away that it was cut down and condensed from the original manga.
Fun Home
So, I got some blog posts to get done. Lets jump right in shall we?
Some early reactions: I can see that Alison Bechdel really knew what she was doing with this, image and art that say just enough each, unlike many who you can tell are more of a writer or illustrator, she marries the two well.
Something I didn't expect was that it didn't take long to get to the depressing stuff without much build up, which I guess is effective to let the reader know what they're getting into.
Personal connections: So I didn't get super far into the story but it didn't take me long to feel a familiarity between this story and stories my mom tells me about her childhood. Similar to this story, my mom had an abusive step-father who would beat her and her sister if the house wasn't cleaned exactly the way he wanted it. Even though her step dad treated her horrible most of the time, my mom still think back to glimmers of good times she had with him and also she doesn't hold a grudge for him since his death.
Some other interesting connections I noticed include My dad looking exactly like the dad in the story with everything including the glasses, big nose, shaggy hair, wrinkles along his mouth and in between his eyebrows, his jawline, and even the hairy legs under short shorts he wears when he works around the house. Another thing that I thought was interesting that is like when the protagonist talks about the image she gets of the mail man as a milk man in her grandmother's story, is when ever my mom tells the stories about cleaning the house for her step dad I always imagine her natural dad's big old house that looks a lot like the one in the story.
So I definitely hope to finish Fun Home and maybe even try to get my mom to read it at some point too.
Some early reactions: I can see that Alison Bechdel really knew what she was doing with this, image and art that say just enough each, unlike many who you can tell are more of a writer or illustrator, she marries the two well.
Something I didn't expect was that it didn't take long to get to the depressing stuff without much build up, which I guess is effective to let the reader know what they're getting into.
Personal connections: So I didn't get super far into the story but it didn't take me long to feel a familiarity between this story and stories my mom tells me about her childhood. Similar to this story, my mom had an abusive step-father who would beat her and her sister if the house wasn't cleaned exactly the way he wanted it. Even though her step dad treated her horrible most of the time, my mom still think back to glimmers of good times she had with him and also she doesn't hold a grudge for him since his death.
Some other interesting connections I noticed include My dad looking exactly like the dad in the story with everything including the glasses, big nose, shaggy hair, wrinkles along his mouth and in between his eyebrows, his jawline, and even the hairy legs under short shorts he wears when he works around the house. Another thing that I thought was interesting that is like when the protagonist talks about the image she gets of the mail man as a milk man in her grandmother's story, is when ever my mom tells the stories about cleaning the house for her step dad I always imagine her natural dad's big old house that looks a lot like the one in the story.
So I definitely hope to finish Fun Home and maybe even try to get my mom to read it at some point too.
Saturday, October 15, 2011
Maus
I feel that Art Spiegelman handled the delivery of this story very well. His choice to use anthropomorphized characters was very smart, it helped him avoid depending on the usual stereotypes that would conflict with his message. Using animals allowed Spiegelman to also apply symbolism like the overall Game of cat and mouse since the jews were constantly on the run from the Nazis, also how each group was viewed, the Jews were seen as vermin that needed to be exterminated, the Nazi Germans were the predators and there to clear out the vermin, the Americans were the dogs that got rid of the cats, and the Poles were Pigs. Another benefit of him using animal characters is that it helps to get past many peoples
auto-response to avoid anything that looks depressing, getting the message to more poeple.
Spiegleman made affective use of the graphic novel medium. His use of diagrams laying out locations and the construction of secret bunkers was helpful for me to get a better picture in addition to getting across that Vladek is explaining and drawing these things out for Artie. I also liked how he used the pig masks to represent when the Jews were pretending to be polish.
It was interesting to see how Artie tries to keep the underground comic mentality of writing objectively, yet he is dependent on his father's biased and filtered version of things, also since his mother's journals were destroyed.
Maus has a whole different level of complexity since it not only about Vladek's experience going through the Holocaust but also about Artie making the comic, the two of them connecting, and trying to figure out why his mother Anja committed suicide.
It is really horrifying to see and hear about the thing that were done to all the victims of the Holocaust, I had to keep reminding myself while reading that it all really happened. It's also unbelievable how clever these people had to constantly be just to survive. It's really sad though that even after going through all of that racial persecution that some people like Vladek still don't learn and continue to hold onto racism.
auto-response to avoid anything that looks depressing, getting the message to more poeple.
Spiegleman made affective use of the graphic novel medium. His use of diagrams laying out locations and the construction of secret bunkers was helpful for me to get a better picture in addition to getting across that Vladek is explaining and drawing these things out for Artie. I also liked how he used the pig masks to represent when the Jews were pretending to be polish.
It was interesting to see how Artie tries to keep the underground comic mentality of writing objectively, yet he is dependent on his father's biased and filtered version of things, also since his mother's journals were destroyed.
Maus has a whole different level of complexity since it not only about Vladek's experience going through the Holocaust but also about Artie making the comic, the two of them connecting, and trying to figure out why his mother Anja committed suicide.
It is really horrifying to see and hear about the thing that were done to all the victims of the Holocaust, I had to keep reminding myself while reading that it all really happened. It's also unbelievable how clever these people had to constantly be just to survive. It's really sad though that even after going through all of that racial persecution that some people like Vladek still don't learn and continue to hold onto racism.
Underground Comics
I really appreciate the full artistic expression that underground comics made possible for artists of that time. I find it really interesting how such powerful works of art are often produced at times of the most artistic oppression, these comics are perfect example of this since they were born at the time when mainstream comics were under the Comics Code with strict rules and guidelines enforced.
My friend saw the Underground Comics section on the course resource page and was ecstatic when he saw The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers since he saw it as a child and forgotten what it was called. He found it stashed somewhere in his house and like any little boy, was amazed to see bad words and naked ladies in a comic book. He didn't tell anyone about this until seeing it again with me.
I think it's really neat how just like when the Pulp magazines were fazed out and brought about the birth of comics, the dying off of Underground comics was then followed by Graphic novels coming into being. They helped pave the way and shaped the following generation of graphic novel creators and readers by demonstrating unhindered self expression with artistic experimentation as well as showing that any topic and subject Whether it be humorous or serious is fair game.
My friend saw the Underground Comics section on the course resource page and was ecstatic when he saw The Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers since he saw it as a child and forgotten what it was called. He found it stashed somewhere in his house and like any little boy, was amazed to see bad words and naked ladies in a comic book. He didn't tell anyone about this until seeing it again with me.
I think it's really neat how just like when the Pulp magazines were fazed out and brought about the birth of comics, the dying off of Underground comics was then followed by Graphic novels coming into being. They helped pave the way and shaped the following generation of graphic novel creators and readers by demonstrating unhindered self expression with artistic experimentation as well as showing that any topic and subject Whether it be humorous or serious is fair game.
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