Week Fourteen: The Future of Comics

Comics Affinity - A large community, Transmedia Multimodality Unframed Comics Identity.
Comics have been around since at least the middle-ages, we see it being used to create a narrative or a point. The graphic narrative developed the comics and then being created in comic strips in the future. In more modern day, the medium itself never really has a definition.  Mediums change throughout time, comics, novels, and illustrations. We see comics being transformed into films and media, also it's counted as more of fine arts now when it's done traditionally and digital is what it's being used in. It's hard to pick apart film, comics and animation, they overlap and combine from each other. We can see comics maybe reaching into VR without frames, living within the picture. Comics should be as inclusive as possible, we should have a tradition and what is recognized and legitimized as comics. We should accept comics as all forms that can be broken up.

Electric Dragon 80,000 V is a digital film, made a short movie influenced by comics and manga tropes. Classic Superhero movie a face-off between two rivals. The plot is ridiculous and silly. I'm surprised to see such a well developed film that had short production. It follows the same idea of how a superhero comes to be, by accident. I see a lot of the elements of comics within the film. First being the fact thats it's black and white, and giving it more of a traditional form. The sequential shots, the lettering in the series and the dialogue also reflect a comic strip. No normal dialogue happens naturally and every single action has ridiculous sound effects.

The comic I chose to finish up the course is the World of Warcraft issues and comics. It's interesting that one of the most famous MMO's has a comic series that was created after it to give even more context and caricature to characters in the game. Back then we didn't really have a lot of information in the NPCs in the game. Even from standard questing we can't really see the lore of the characters. I think it's interesting that in this context we are using comics to better understand a world, and expand upon it.

Recently 8 years later they have picked up using comics again for their storytelling, even offering free issues on their website, they also include sound and voices from in game characters. I think this gives more interesting content to the player to enjoy and rewarding for them and I haven't really seen this before. This also adds to my idea of the future being more a mixture, with interactive comics.

Also along with developing comics, they have been developing short motion animatics resembling a sort of comic book style, I think this is a good example on how comics are becoming more multimodality:

Week Thirteen: Reconsidering The Superhero

The movement of the Superhero had lots of changes. An example, Batman was first created as a character in the 1930s as more of crime fighting character. However in between he becomes more of a sillier character over time. He is more of a vigilante past, and was reinvented in the the 1980s to be more like how he originally is. In recent times, Batman has been revamped in recent the lego movie as once again back into more of a silly character. We have more of a back and forth and revamping of Superhero characters. Superman is also quite a problem as in being too many invulnerabilities, or we have resetting the character after a set of years. The changes is by generation, not overtime where the Superheros actually learn from their mistakes.

Arkham Asylum is the comic I chose for this week, and I think not only is the stylistic choice reflects the world and the state of mind of the characters we get a definitive sense of mood. Another interesting part is that Batman himself admits that he's afraid of being similar to the Joker. It also really looks at the psychology of the actual characters and Arkham itself.

Batman The Killing Joke Questions:

1. What is your reaction to the text you just read?

The text I read I think is very much more into the actual relationship of both Batman and the Joker. It is about their relationship and how both characters are actually very similar. The comic starts off with the actual dialogue of Batman talking about how they will never truly stop fighting until both of them end up killing each other. The most compelling part of the story was the ending when they both are laughing at the whole situation which Joker explained in his "joke". As Batman and the Joker laugh it seems to have at this part Batman may of went to go kill joker rather than his usual capture. This is a very surprising end and it ends on the notion that Batman killed Joker.

2. What connection did you make to the story? Discuss the elements of the story with which you were able to connect.

I think what I connect to the most is how morally ambiguous the whole plot is. We are challenged because Joker's backstory seems to be tragic however at the same time the current story that we are following he is basically killing people relentlessly. I feel like I can connect and have empathy to Joker's early life. Being a failure, and being someone who experienced loss.

3. What changes would you make to adapt the story into another medium? What medium would you use, and what changes would you make?

If I were to adapt this story into another medium, I would possibly suggest a mixture between 2D and 3D animation for medium sort of like how they did Into the Spider-Verse film. The story would not have to change too much into animation, and style can still get across successfully. Using a combination of hand-drawn and a virtual reality environment combining them and keeping the same stylistic choice.

Week Twelve: Women's Comics

I read a few comics this week, starting with My Friend Irma. Irma is a innocent character that seems oblivious to what is being said and how she is understanding it. They use the stereotypical dumb-blonde humor that made this character popular. It's actually quite interesting because Irma never really faces any consequences to her being a scatterbrain. Women would represent women in this time different then how we would represent women today. Irma is a good example of how even women used to write women as being their stereotypes. Early comics representing women are not really the reality of how women are, or how they would write themselves. Irma is a cartoony character of a stereotype of a woman that men embodied in the comic. This may be why the myth that if you are blonde you may be stupid probably originated from. I think it could be compared to Archie in the sense of how ridiculous it is and how it objectifies and uses the idea that girls are dumb to play into the wants for the readers.

Diary of a Dominatrix is written by a woman and it can be seen in the style and artwork of this comic. This work is not only from the perspective of a woman but a one that mainly dominates men and that's her career. The concept of a dominatrix is already considered taboo and I think giving the character realistic proportions and not this fictional body adds more to the work. This comic is powerful, and I think it's powerful because of the author and her own control that she has. The author changes the idea that the fetishization of women and objectification are only for men but also women can embody this and take control of how they are seen or even a part of their own identity.

Women are not given credit to their work throughout history of comics and lots of art forms. They are seen to not have contributions to the work and are believed that they should stay unemployed, and at home. This is obviously faded with time as in recent years, women have been more popular and now majority of comic readers.

Week Eleven: Comics in Contemporary Literature

I have read My Favorite Thing is Monsters by Emil Ferris.  It challenges how graphic novels are usually structured. You can tell that the artist used her own life and the dark themes that were integrated in her storytelling. When reading it's strange that in this seemingly normal would we follow this "monster" girl. In this case I thought it was strange how the graphic novel doesn't ever have a real narrator but rather it seems to be told through Emil. It is very clear that the "voice" is quite literally the author telling the story through herself. The art definitely reflects that it's not a child simply drawing in a ruled notebook. It's interesting how the author really loves these monsters, how she feels sympathy for them and how these monsters are seen as out-casts. It's almost like the monsters themselves represent good rather than the bad which seems to take more form of a human. I really like that there is not definite good or bad guys in this graphic novel. I think this is a realistic way of portraying how actual people can be complex and not just one type of label.

For the class assignment, we had to read a comic of choice and I was paired with Tiffany Apple. We decided on Asterios Polyp. It seems to have very intricate and detailed close-ups, but also has very simplified shapes when it's trying to get across a action. Analytical illustrations that remind me of almost a mix of sci-fi. It also seems to alternate from flow and loose forms to almost geometric.

Fun Home was also another novel we are looking at and it seems to follow a very sequential style with the same coloring that is in Asterios. It seems that this seems like a very personal comic to the author or maybe he has taken more interest in the novel portion rather than graphic. It seems more like it's a story thats explaining a trailing into different topics rather than jumping around. It also seems to be in a European theme. I think the house is a good reflection into having such a large family.

Every Girl is the End of the World for Me seems to have like an adult cartoon like style, the panels are even squares are in 4's each page. It also doesn't seem to be professional in the sense of layout and characters however this feels more like comic rather than a novel telling a more simple story rather than something long and complicated. It seems something I can just pick up and read and finish rather than other graphic novels that are more like a novel. When this comic came out I was exactly 6 years old, 6 months and 9 days when this comic was published.

Masterpiece Comics is taking classic stories and using popular cartoon comic characters ad using them to tell the stories. I think whats interesting is that its mixing stories and styles. This is kind of what this whole assignment is about. It's a mix of Garfield, Batman, Charlie Brown and various other popular comic characters in a different story, era, with common tales. These all reflect different styles ranging from semi- realistic to cartoony, even dramatic or funny.

I also decided to read Molly Kiely Diary of a Dominatrix, it's about a female who works as a dominatrix and talks about the career. The illustrations are definitely more realistic in art style and in how they portray females. It seems to open up a conversation about being open about things that are seen as taboo. The style reflects this, showing realistic proportions and showing realistic relationships. It reflects more of a women's perspective on dominance and rather only focusing on the content. Even the layout of it seems really DIY rather than consistent storytelling like explaining a lifestlye. This will be more explained next week when we talk about Women.

Week Ten: Manga and the Japanese Comics Tradition

Buddha is the comic I read for this week is by Osamu Tezuka God of Manga. He starts this work in 1972, and wanted to take on more serious matters. It's definitely of the more interesting works as it brings up more ideas about the world. It's his own interpretation of Gautama Buddha the founder of buddhism. It was one of his last epic works that he ended up creating. It takes place in ancient india, a lot of issues were going on at this time and people were suffering. Soon a young prince was born named Siddhartha, who would embark on a important journey becoming Buddha. And attempts to help people that are desperate.

I was able to read some of the biography that was passed around in class.

Tezuka was a principal figure in starting the industry of manga and anime. He's created 700 volumes, and 150,000 pages in his lifetime. He will have a whole cast of characters that are designed to be able to be modified. Tezuka would popularized manga in post-war Japan. He created the style of "big-eyed" characters, creating anime, and influencing other creators after. Tezuka would mentor several artists and over time would develop Gekiga. Gekiga had more expressions than normal Manga, eventually this would become a standard for Manga.

Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind is the film we watched in class and it brings up elements like environmental awareness and peace. The animation and manga in Japan would go hand in hand and animation is also influenced by other factors in Japan. It all started in the 20s and 30s with paper cuts and puppetry animation. I plan on finishing the movie on my own time.

After discussing the film, we talked about about manga in Japan and it's importance in it's culture. Manga style also could be described as playful pictures or whimsical sketches. Manga was created in Japan, and they have a complex pre-history earlier in Japanese art. Early forms of manga could be found in scroll painting. The scrolls were long strips of paper, left to right pictures of images and stories that are being told and illustrated. There's a lot of comedy and playfulness in these early images, or showing mudane life. Manga is still very popular in Japan, and sales are way higher in Japan than America. The comics market is still expanding in America, however manga is still making more sales currently.

Other important types and categories of Manga that was talked about in class:

Shonen was popularized by Dragon Ball and One Piece. The audience is usually around younger boys usually following a formula of a younger boy growing up.

Seinen was towards men in their 20s to 50s. Lone Wolf and the cub, and Ghost in Shell both explore mature themes.

Shojo Manga usually directed towards women, usually involving love and relations.

Josei is the adult form of Shojo, usually developing real relationships and talks about late adolescence and fashion. 

Yaoi Manga and Yuri Manga are gay erotica that are also popularized and fetishized. They will develop romantic crushes and domestic relationships.
Gender and Orientation and Diversity is also being developed in manga in the recent years, even though there is a lot of homophobia in Japan yet, is still being in the process of being accepted.

Week Nine: A Wide World of Comics

In class we discussed Eurocomics and some important people who created early comics in Europe. Rodolphe Topper, was one of the most influential people in european comics, making albums and pass them around. Marie Duval was one of the first french cartoonist and contributed to a journal her husband was apart of. Caran d'Ache was a Russian who also made caricatures in the early 19th century and these were the beginnings of comics and the creations. We talked about the multiple influencers who were also in our reading for this week.

Nikopol Trilogy seems to be in a dystopian France taking place in 2023 that faced a lot of nuclear wars and also has alien inhabitants. It begins talking about a particular governor who is wants to trade all of his oil in return of immortality. He ends up not being successful. While this is going on we meet a character that falls from the sky and his name is Nikopol. He loses a leg in this process, and ends up waking up in a metro station bleeding to death. This is when we meet Horus who ends up building him another leg, and subsequently possessing him. They seem to agree on a common goal, Nikopol's goal being political and humanitarian and Horus' personal revenge of a divine by seizing control of the oil. Some personal thoughts is I like the fact they have press clippings talking about the politics and even can include some author's notes. This is kind to show the progressing of what they are doing and how it's effecting Paris. Afterwords we follow a character named Jill. The story from there progresses strangely, and she becomes almost like another main character. It's interesting that we see this theme of nuclear war and dystopian Paris living alongside aliens, this makes for a very interesting set illustrations. I think it keeps this theme of french sci-fi with Egyptian gods and the political power between them because it's so strange.

Week Eight: Stereotype and the Ethics of Representation

Comics and Graphic Narratives can sometimes represent both males and females bodies and personalities in ways that people would deem as perfect or in some way interesting because of a trope that they usually follow. This week we are talking about how we see representation in these. Superhero comics are the most popular comics and have characters and that can be influenced to toxic masculinity, or tropes that follow very unhealthy and abusive ideals. Like how male protagonists are shown to have emotional detachment, aggression, hyper competitiveness, and violence. These are seen to be positive aspects of a character however I think it is harmful to have ideals or representation that people need to be a certain way. Just like how females in media are sexually objectified and have expectations that aren't real or healthy.

Stereotypes like these are there for people to feel okay for the prejudice they carry with them. You don't have to make racist characters because of stereotypes.

Week Seven: The Legitimation of the Comics

Maus is one of the first comics to be considered to be an epic, and to this day is considered giving significance to comic narratives by introducing mature concepts. Maus uses imagery that I feel helps the reader understand and acknowledge the images graphically rather than their imagination. The Holocaust is usually not perceived in this way, from what I remember most depictions are usually through literature and images, but Maus uses detailed drawings that contains the emotion.

We also see, usually animals that talk and are upright are "funny" Maus breaks that mold and instead uses it as representation. Using mouse maybe just another way to maybe not put a identity and awareness into the comic and we can use it to go into another world. I think this adds to it, as it now focusing more on the narrative of the story rather than what the character looks like. This gives it more of an experience rather than just simply reading a story about it. Unlike other mediums like art or film, comics stay the way they are and the story does not progress unless the reader or audience continues to read and process the images.

Barefoot Gen is a short movie we watched in class based on the World War II bombings on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It follows a boy, Gen Nakaoka who lives on the outskirts of Hiroshima. He lives with his pregnant mother, dad, sister and little brother. Life is hard for all of them, both because of malnutrition because they cannot afford food, and from the constant bomb threats from overhead American planes that fly past. The parents are very obviously upset by this but keep their hopes high for themselves, there soon to be born child, and there kids.

During the night, they go into the bomb shelters nearby while the American planes pass by, although they are struggling, they continue to fight for each other in hopes that the war will end soon and life will improve. Soon, however, the atomic bombs drop when least expected and horrible imagery and themes of death, despair and destruction ensue. The colors shift and distort, time stops and everything around Gen is impacted in that instant. Gen is lucky enough to have been behind a concrete wall however, the girl standing besides him was not, and is shown melting on screen to the horror of the bomb going off.  We follow Gen as he awakes among the carnage wrought by these bombs, as he wanders through a now destroyed Hiroshima, shambling men, women and children walk by like corpses, practically melting as they groan in agony. There bodies withered, and fusing together in unnatural ways. This movie shows us the horror of this war and what these people went through because of the government. This is only the beginning as it follows him after the initial calamity, and for much later. The fight for food only becomes more dire, the mothers newborn daughter requires constant supervision and care. the military is unsure of how to help, and dead bodies and destruction still surround them.

Week Six: Underground Comics

Drawing for comics is about picture writing, and getting ideas across through this process. We can see that the same experience we get from literature, seeing the story and imagery and world through the person eyes. For the Underground Comics, I can see a lot of the content in them has more mature themes that would disturb some and also at the same time make others laugh. It's the freedom of expression of the artist and their ideas. There are no fundamental rules for comics like film or like novels. We have been using this type of imagery for a long time, like political cartoons. Just like video games it created a panic of it influencing people to be bad, or stupid. It can be used as another tool to help. A lot of people in the Underground were taking risks, and because now the decades of trying to be legitimized we can see this eventually created the term "Graphic Novel" now seen as a art form and as a piece of literature. It's a media that will keep being revolutionized the same way. I can already see graphic novels developing into having mini animations.

Week Five: Eisner and Thompson

This week we are analyzing Eisner and Thompson similarities as storytellers. In Will Eisner approach he tries to implement his personal memories and experiences in Contract with God. In Eisner's Blankets, he also is telling highly personal stories relating to their real life. They use real people and real emotions to develop their stories that they tell. I think this is why both are so successful. Both styles are very similar and different, we can see that both explore and use lots of black lines and depressing tones. The figures are more simplified in Blankets, Whereas Contract with God had more detailed figures. These comics are depressing stories about victims that jump back and forth between stories. I also like how both have seasons they both particularly favor like snow in Blankets and rain in Contract with God. Both comics are questioning god and religion. They ask the question: If I'm a good person then why am I punished? They ask these question whenever something unfortunate and out of their control happens. They both at points discuss racism even, with hateful remarks.  Will Eisner believes that this medium is a new literary form that is just told with drawings. It's interesting that a there is so much stigma against graphic novels and comics. Of course, Thompson's comic seems to take place more towards modern day, that graphic novels still have some stigma but are more accepted. Reading both thoroughly, I think Blankets felt more natural. Probably because the length is longer and the interesting visuals.I feel and can relate to a lot of the imagery and story elements that are brought up, as someone who has similar situations happen, or at least feeling. In Blankets, I can understand what it's like to be an artist, and to care about others. The thoughts of childhood and growing up to be an adult through experiences.

Week Four: The Comic Book

I decided to start by reading Carl Barks and The Art of the Comic Book by Michael Barrier before I read the other comics to kind of get more information about Carl. The most interesting part of reading Michael Barrier’s interpretation is that he doesn’t see really feel nostalgic or the memories of childhood. He talks about looking back at Carl Barks comics is that the feelings were relatable and magnified emotionally even the negative ones. Reading over his bibliography, he seemed to have a very hard-working and difficult life. Doing a lot of labor jobs like working on cars or farms and a lot of times he had only a bit of money to his name moving around the country. 

Even the comedy of the comics is based in some amount of seriousness. Common themes of the comics are self-pity and taking a closer look at them its about doing our best or die trying. He starts to talk about Carl Barks being quite unique as an artist and I’m inclined to agree. Especially in more of a world and characters that are supposed to be funny, like Donald Duck and Uncle Scrooge. While reading, I found out that he became a full-time cartoonist around the Depression and is probably what influenced the type of story-telling he does. Rather than Donald was being developed and changed by Carl its said that Donald was the one the influenced Carl. Donald started to become a more interesting and funny character for this reason and being more fleshed out. Carl Barks seemed to be more interested in getting more interpretation out of one drawing rather than a sequence of them trying to tell a whole story. I think the most interesting part about Carl Barks is that he was an artist that seemed to be able to relate to his characters and their experiences and they don't seem two dimensional for this reason. He wanted to have characters that people could relate too also, the gags are well thought out because he really thought about what he was drawing and trying to get the audience to perceive. I also added this image of Carl Barks reference sheet because its the most popular and reference for Donald Duck. I think this adds to another layer of being able to understand a character deeply.

Week Three: The Comic Strip

For this week, I read the collection of Little Nemo comics, Krazy Kat and The Rarebit Fiend. The specific story I thought was interesting the The Dream of the Rarebit Fiend comic strips. These newspaper comic strips began on September 10, 1904 and ran until 1925. They were released under the publisher, New York Herald and were immensely popular for their time. They were drawn and written by American Cartoonist, Winsor McCay.

All of these comics follow a different set of characters, all having the same dilemma. They all embark on a strange and often unfortunate dream, with extreme cases of luckiness or misfortune. They involve shrinking to unhuman sizes, taking medicine to grow taller for the women of your dreams, licking too many postage stamps and repeatedly sitting, laying, leaning and stepping in multiple slabs of sticky bug paper.  The idea is meant to be fantastical, as none of this could really happy, minus the sticky paper.

There meant to represent dreams and how far fetched they can be, and how they can leave a lasting impression on you after you wake up. The comics themselves follow a very common layout. Starting at the top left, and ending at the bottom right. They do not ever break this layout and part of that is obviously because of there limitations.

These comics were printed on the tiny corners of newspapers back when they could only print in black ink and with very think edges. meaning a lot of the clean crisp lines or comics would be lost. The art here is shaded with dots and etching, and line work is very minimalist and readable from far away, usually relying on silhouettes and readable caricatures. Comics like this would be the inspiration for many American comic artists of the early 1900's and the beginning of the comic book franchise.

Week Two: Understanding Comics

When talking about Understanding comics, an interesting topic brought up by Scott McCloud in his Visual Magic of Comics TED talk is the idea of viewing a monitor of a computer as not a page but as a window. He discusses that we can take advantage of the digital medium for comics by creating an infinite canvas along any axis that we'd like, and that creating our comics with this infinite space in mind can lend to the viewers experience. His examples include having circular narratives that are actually circular, having a infinite comics on the X axis, or Y axis, having turns and bends in our panels and breaking narratives that literally break into two separate story lines.

This method was used by other artists and is used by many online E-comic pages today, one example is Lezhin Comics, a webtoon portal based in Korea offering artwork and comics in English, Korea and Japanese. This website takes advantage of one of Scott's ideas, that of an infinite scrolling Y axis. This way the comics, instead of going from left to right and constantly changing pages, goes from top to bottom and always continues scrolling down from the beginning of the comics to the end. Many comics that I have enjoyed on this site take this feature of the site to their advantage, having cuts and long fades from black to white and using minimalist style to help emphasize a scene to the audience.

Scott McCloud states that the idea that he's looking for is a Durable Mutation. Something that can change how we view comics and enhance it without losing what makes them so unique. Comic books and the genre as a whole are an expansive genre and not all of it fits into the same narrative arch and panel structure. Some artists will stick true to a basic panel layout while others will do everything in their power to deviate and try to change how
the viewer takes in their work by changing the panels and the structure.
This is no different and I believe it is the next big step to
changing comics for the digital post print generations.