Week 14: The Future of Comics

I briefly read through a couple of the posted titles but couldn't find any I liked until I cam across a really cool short comic called Demian Vogler's "When I Am King". This is a webcomic with a cute simple style full of animations and flashing colors. The color transition was really nice and a great way to convey the story. The comic was wordless but it didn't need words to be understood. The story follows this "king" who losses his crown and none recognizes him and his forced to go off and find it. He happen upon a camel that falls in love with him and follows him around eating people to protect him. Its a short funny story but really i think the best part of it was the way it was presented and the animations that accompanied the story line. I'm not really interested in webcomics but there is one I really like and its called The Oatmeal, its a series of short comics about random things in todays popular culture and also advice for things you really don't need advice on.  

Week Thirteen: Reconsidering the Superhero

So I thought reading HellBoy would be interesting since I love the movies and I certainly was not disappointed. It starts of that Hell boy was the one responsible for the death of Hitler and was a cover up. Then come to find out they had saved his brain and put it onto a huge gorilla body that is known as Brainiape. I swear I laughed for a good hour after finding this out about how he had came to be telling his life story and how he faked his own suicide. I glad that Hell boys personally it the same in the comic as it is in the movies because i love his wise cracks and witty comebacks. I'm not entirely sure what is going on because I know nothing of the background story of one the characters named Dragon. I guess they call him dragon because he is huge and green with some kind of webbing on his head but he doesn't look like a dragon to me. Also I'm not familiar with the antagonists like the guy with the chicken head and the guy named Cyberface (what kind of name is that anyway?) Im guessing this is like a crossover comic where one super hero make an appearance in another's comic and they tag team or something because either of them are familiar with each other. I thought it was a funny take on history and how HellBoy fits in the real world.

Week Twelve: Comics by Women

Dairy of a Dominatrix was a interesting read, a lot of information I hoped to never know was fully described in this well executed comic about the life of a Dominatrix and the many duties she performs for the sake of her clients. Well it was very educational and gives a look into the world of being a dominatrix and what it takes to be a good one, I like the fact it portrays a woman who is comfortable with her sexuality and is able to harness it in her work. I like it when women are show confidently and become the dominate presents with in the story. This comic reminds of a website called Oh Joy Sex Toy. com that one of my favorite artist on tumblr (GhostGreen) contributed to. The site is a sexual education site that features comics to convey instructions of safe and enjoyable sex for everyone. All the comic are super well done and are a good and educational read, they get artists to make comics for them about a certain subject or whatever the artist wants and posts them to their site.  They educate to readers about proper use of sex toys and and how to enjoy your body, both Dairy of a Dominatrix and the comics on this site are very similar in their approach oh how they want to get the information out there for people to see and understand touchy topics about our bodies and how to be more confident with them.
website: http://www.ohjoysextoy.com/category/comic/

Week Eleven: Comics as Contemporary Literature

This week I read Sandman Preludes and Nocturnes Vol.1 and Doll's House Vol.2. I really liked the stories in Doll's House and the first one was quite interesting. It was about pasting along a story through the generations, this story told about a city made of glass that was ruled by a beautiful queen. The queen had fallen in love with the lord of dreams and was unable to be with him because their love caused disaster because a moral couldn't be with the immortal; and their love caused the destruction of the city and its people. The story I read from Preludes and Nocturnes was about the Sandman recalling his memories and recovering items like his sand and dream stone that were stolen when he was gone. He travels through different realms to acquire what was his. The set style is super graphic and other worldly and I really like the artist's interpretation of Neil Gaiman's stories. Each story had the re occurring theme of dreams and the Sandman who controls the world of dreams. This is my first time ever reading this series, I never knew Neil Gaiman Had created a graphic novel since I'm familiar with his books like American Gods and Anansi boys. I look forward to reading more of this graphic novel and acquire a new favorite from him.

Week Ten: Manga and Japanese Comics

Rumiko Takahashi is my all time favorite manga artist. I grew up watching and reading Inuyasha, Ranma, and Urusei Yatsura, so for this weeks reading I decided to read mermaid Forest. Its a super creepy manga but also a very interesting take on the folklore of mermaids. The story is about a young man named Yuta who accidentally ate the flesh of a mermaid only to discover he is immortal. After the ongoing years without aging he find out he can gain mortality by eating the flesh once again and goes on a journey to find a mermaid. Yuta comes across a village of only woman and discovers they are murmurous mermaids and try to kill him, he escapes by taking of of their own kind, a girl named Mana as hostage. Mana turns out to be a sacrifice for the mermaids in order to regain their youth and a lot of other stuff happens as well.  I really enjoy the depth of all her characters and love reading all of her work, I recently got into her newest work called Kyokai no Rinne. Its a really great story about a young girl named Sakura who can see the apparitions and a boy named Rinne who is a shinigami or also know as a reaper of souls and also Sakura's class mate. They go on ghost hunting jobs together to cross over the sprits, meeting demons and journeying over to the afterlife. Recently the anime came out and it is just as good as the manga and I'm excited to see where the story goes.

Week Nine: A Wide World of Comics

So this week I read Mobius's "Stories from Heavy Metal" and the first thing I thought about was Nausicaa. It has the the landscapes that go from dessert to forest and the same kind of strange riding birds with some variation. I wonder if with Miyazakior Mobius were influenced by each other's work? I had see Heavy Metal the movie and it just wasn't my kind of film. I didn't like all the gore and violence that the comic has also, but I love the color palette Mobius used in his work.

Week Six: Underground Comics

For this week I read Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers, Fat Freddy’s Cat, Zap Comics, and Tits and Clits. My favorites were the Zap Comics and Tits and Clits because some of the stories were hilarious. In one comic from Zap, people were getting hit with meatballs and it was the best. I also enjoyed the surrealist comics that seemed to be ads for Mr. Peanut and Camel Cigarettes among other things. A couple of comics from Tits and Clits featured a woman who had abnormally large breasts that she would beat men up with, the stories were really funny and was my favorite series of the comic. All of the stories were about women taking charge of their own bodies and what they did with them. In other comics its more what men would want to read and the man having control over a women’s body and using it to their own needs. Personally these kinds of comics are a bit to crude for me and some of the art (mostly all) makes me cringe due to the offensiveness, bad anatomy and some really ugly people. I wouldn't be surprised if the artists on SpongeBob were influenced by these comics because the art reminds me of the horrifying detailed close-ups of some of the characters and environments.

Week Five: Eisner & Thompson

For my reading this week I read Eisner's Contract with God and Thompson's Doot Doot Garden. I enjoyed the first story in Eisner's Contract with God about the man losing his daughter and breaks his contract with god that he made when he was young, then after breaking the contact becomes rich from lying and stealing and tends to only the needs of his own instead of others like in the past. He then realizes that all the money and his new mistress can't fill the emptiness inside of him that he once had with his daughter and most importantly the contact he had made between god and himself. After realizing this he repays what he had stolen and gives up his rights to the buildings he owns and strikes a new contact with god thinking to start over and have a new life and family that he once had only to suffer a heart attack and die. This story is ironic in the way that he leads a good life by god only to suffer but when he breaks the contract and leads a selfish life it seems he has it good and everything is going his way. Although he suffers he finds happiness with his belief in God and that is better then any material items he can ever acquire.

The other stories I read were a bit much with the violence and didn't enjoy reading them I stopped at maybe the 3rd story because it just wasn't my cup of tea. But one another note i really like how moody his work is and when there are parts where its rainy and wet I can put myself in that moment and feel what the characters are feeling. I could really feel Hersh's frustration with life and the conflicting emotions within himself. He is a truly relatable character and the subject matter of his inner turmoil with his religion is an issue that is also common for many people. 

Thompson's Doot Doot Garden was super awesome, I laughed the whole way through. I really like his cutesy style with undertones of crudeness. None of the stories really made sense but they were cute and had real life situations like friendship and loss, but not the chocking on a turd part, I'm quite sure that is not a common issue and at least I hope not. Anyway it was a really good read and would defiantly like to read more from him in the future.  

Week Four: The Comic Book

This week I decided to read Tales from the Crypt and Vault of Horrors. I really liked the stories in Tales from the Crypt because they are super nostalgic of the 50's-60's horror genre. Most of The stories were based on psychological horror or other events that could actually take place in real life and made the stories scarier then if there had been a monster and or paranormal occurrences that are most popular today in the horror genre. When I was reading the comics I kept thinking of movies I've seen that reflected on the comics. For instance, House of Haunted Hill, The Thing, and House of Wax. I also noticed that a few of the men resembled Vincent Price who was the 1940's-50's horror Icon of the time. When I was younger I remember the show Tales From the Crypt and the scary Crypt Keeper who hosted the show, but I didn't know it was derived from a comic book and reading the comic book version I thought it was a a lot better in it's portrayal of the stories. 

Tales from the Dark side, one of my favorite horror/scary story shows was based on the Tales from the Crypt and The Vault of Horror, so I guess thats why I enjoyed the comic so much. I grew up watching Are You Afraid of the Dark, and Goosebumps (I also had the complete collection of books) so I really enjoy scary stories and urban legends and these comics certainly had plenty of creepy tales to satisfy me.  I'm a big fan of classic horror movies from the 50's and especially the 80's. A My favorite horror movies from the 80's are most definitely poltergeist, The Lost Boys, and The Shinning, only to name a few. 

 

Week Three: The Comic Strip

This week I decided to do the Artist Track and make a quick comic inspired by Winsor McCay's Little Nemo.  I wanted to put my own spin on it so I decided to have a female character instead. 

Week Two: Understanding Comics

In class panel descriptions of William Hogarth's wordless Graphic Novel

Panel one:

A street performer making money through dance and having their chicken do tricks.

Panel two: mad scientist who experiments on humans in order to become the perfect fusion of chicken and man.

Panel three: a continuation of the mad scientist’s experiments and shows how some have failed and is hiding the bodies in his house.  

Panel four: the scientist is looking for the perfect mate in order to share his existence with. many have denied him because he is an abomination.

Panel five: he is thrilled that his cock fight has successful and someone trying to escaped was killed in the process. 

Panel six: the scientist has now mastered necromancy and is fooling young women.

Panel seven: apparently he is giving one of the women a headache because all he can talk about is the awesome stick he found on the way to the theatre.

Panel eight: raptor chicken is one the look out for anyone who would try to escape from the mad scientist’s home where they are kept prisoner.

Panel nine: some kids got into the home based on rumors of the mad scientist and are messing around and having fun scaring each other. 

Panel ten: chicken men are now being mass produced and following their natural instincts to escape and find mates.

Panel eleven: The scientist rushes to find and capture the escaped chicken men and kill them due to them being more animal then human.

Week One: The Graphic Narrative

Shaun Tan's, The Arrival, was beautifully done and well constructed. Because of his attention to detail his work helps the viewer understand the narrative without the assistance of words. Tan uses multiple panels to describe a man's emotional and physical adaptations to a new country/world; while he’s there he forms an understanding of the language and the cultural differences between himself and the inhabitants of the new world, He is able to find a place to live and finds different jobs in order to save up enough currency to bring his family over to be with him and get away from the country they once called home.

 I believe the reason why he was so successful depicting the this world itself was due to it being completely unfamiliar with the reader and also the main character; it made each person reading the comic put in their own individual interpretation and could sympathize with the man for the lack of understanding of his surroundings. Nothing is familiar to the reader, for instances the written language is indecipherable consisting of odd shapes and lines, among other things like house hold appliances, food, and even the animals that co-exist with the people. The comic can be read internationally and is completely comprehensible due to the realistic illustrations and easy to follow panels that help the story transition.