Week 4 and Recommendation

Hey guys, unfortunately said I've somewhat neglected this weeks's readings and boy did I miss out. I'd say I got through about maybe 2/3's of the way through, but I really think there is some important stuff in here this week concerning what kinds of stories can be told in comics. I'm going on a hunch that a lot of the artist around the late forties began to find influence in early cartoonist of the 1900's. I find an amalgam of cartoonish devices being combined with superhero subject matter, especially in Shazam! and Supersnipe. There's a lot more personality added to the characters in these stories than a lot of the superhero stories before this. I also assume this is the age when batman took on a more kid's friendly look as well. It's a moment in time with a lot of other types of experimentation in what kind of subject matter is being portrayed. Murder Morphine and Me is a shockingly dark and violent story for it's time. We're beginning to see people favoring a lot more crime stories, a genre that will only continue to evolve and expand into the mid 50's. Wonder woman was just as silly as the rest of the superhero comics I've read so far, but once again, the subject matter of these stories is being pushed to many different demographics, only increasing the mediums influence.

As for my recommendation, I have no qualms with making wonder woman the selected reading. Lindsay won me over with her reasoning around that particular story, but a logical second choice for me would be popeye.

week 3

Well I can definitely tell from all the readings last week that comics are beginning to shift their way into becoming the romantic adventures and tales of heroism that post world war two comics have become known for. Obviously at this point in history, the general audience of American Caucasian cartoonists have a lot of skewed perceptions of the surrounding world and different race. But hey, they knew they're audience, and escapism sells! America is becoming more curious as it's dragged into the second world war. Prize comics attempts to treat kids of the time with a buffet of strange, perplexing, and harsh environments that they wouldn't know how to make heads or tails of. Are they using unfair and downright disgraceful stereotypes of real world cultures? Yes, but the kid's don't know that. Prize comics were definitely a humiliating read, but they teach us how far we've come in trying to break down racism in comics. Terry and the pirates seemed to have a few of those elements within it but it wasn't surrounded by horrible stereotypes like that in prize. It was much more classy, vaudevillian, and dynamic. The characters have a lot of personality to them, and caniff's wonderful execution of ink truly helps the stories to seem very theatrical.

The batman stories appeared (like discussed in class) as gothic stories. tales of adventure, the occult, and horror in general. I found it funny that I needed to take a look back after finishing it to figure out just who was a werewolf and who was a vampire. It was interesting to see batman with so little personality, I'll admit that.

The court case was very difficult to understand. I feel like it opened up cold at first and I wasn't exactly sure what they were arguing about. But I understand it's relevance in the sense that the fictional character's like superman suddenly had a lot of monetary value to them. Eventually a lot of other people wanted in on the whole prospect of fantastical escapism in cartoon form, solely on the use of these new archetypes.

Week Three Reading

Unless I am an idiot, this is the posting that is due correct? I got a bit confused....

Anyway. The Batman reading from week three was a strange  experience for me. I am used, as someone born in 1990, to Batman being much different, as a character and as stories. The development of the character and those working on him is now visceral to me; At least the end points are. He is driven solely by vengeance, seemingly. He doesn't seem to have rules or care about scaring the shit out of innocent monocled by-standers. It is interesting to view this from my perspective; My first Batman was Bruce Timm's Batman, so the contrast is very telling.

Another shocking thing was the quality of the comic itself. So different from today's (superhero or otherwise), especially from a storytelling standpoint. I don't want to say its bad, because that is untrue, but I do want to say that it is worlds apart, and hard to enjoy. Also, of course, there is the tinge of early 20th century racism.

Overall I learned a lot just from contrast, or maybe I just noticed things I took for granted more in modern comics? I think thats it.

Recommendations

Okay, so it is had to figure out exactly what you all are voting for, because some of you say "either X or Y". It is also just hard to rifle through all of the posts to find them.

I VOTE: POPEYE, cuz it's awesome and everyone should read it.

I tried to wait for everyone to vote, but it seems like a good time to post this?

That being said: From my count (correct me if I'm wrong), The most votes seem to be on WONDER WOMAN. When I say that, I mean it's the only one every voted on more than once. So, unless I am shitty at counting (possible) Or more people vote, our group's recommendation is the WONDER WOMAN reading.

Week 4

Plastic Man:

Plastic man was definitely a strange comic, though the story telling and slapstick humor was very well done. i thought it was interesting at the very end of the segment how this superhero must somehow capture himself, though not an entirely new super hero dilemma. The difference for plastic man, was that his other identity was a criminal instead of a normal person. It makes me wonder what that kind of scenario means in relation to the horrible story of Jack Cole. Was is some kind of a hint for what the author was going through before he decided to commit suicide, if maybe this comic strip was really the suicide note that the police never found. In the comic, the sculpture very sneakily used Hansel and Gretel book with the pieces of clay as a way for Plastic Man to find him. The artist used his own medium to get send the message HELP, why wouldn't Jack Cole do the same thing?

Shazam!

The captain marvel comics were incredibly cute and imaginative. It almost reminds me of the kind of stories my little brother would make up as a kid when we could be playing with his superhero toys and blocks. There was a kind of innocence with this superhero was you do not find with batman or even superman. I know captain marvel is really an 8 year old kids who turns into a full grown man when the right word is said, but you'd think that his personality and maturity would be influenced by that change as well. Because of this, the introduction of the marvel family kind of confused me. Billy Baton still looks like a young kid when he's supposedly married to Mary, who looks fairly young herself.

Art out of Time: Stardust

I found this comic to be uninteresting and bland. The story wasn't very well written and the art was super flat and static. There were more comics from that same era that had a better sense of depth and interesting angles for the artwork in the panels. The way Stardust decided to punish his foe was pretty brutal, though the enlarging and shrinking of the superfiend seemed somewhat pointless. It was just a way for the comic artists to show that Stardust had more powers.

Supersnipe:

This was by far one of my favorite reads for the week. I thought the comic was absolutely adorable and stayed true to what a little kid his age would be thinking. It reminded me of Dennis the Menace, especially when the policeman was chasing after Supersnipe, grumbling and groaning when he couldn't keep up with the nimble little kid. This comic shows that younger kids were very influenced by the characters they read about in comics or saw in the movies and tv shows. My brother would run around wearing one glove all the time after the first time he saw Star Wars. It didn't help that he was also a blonde, blue eyed boy named Luke. What is important about this is that these kids have such a strong imagination that they live in the characters. They become part of them in a way where these kids like to act it out when they play games or get dressed for the day. I'm sure plenty of us have stories like this in one way or another and I like seeing this played out in a sweet little comic about a boy and his love for comic books.

Wonder Woman:

I have been on overload with this character lately because of the nature of my paper, but I enjoyed being able to read some of the early stories. The story telling and artwork for these comics have been stellar since the series first started. The early comics still had a very square layout, but the artist still manages to play around with the size of the frames and composition for each panel. I find it funny how Wonder Woman seems to be the female counter part of Superman, and how Steve Trevor, the lois lane of this comic, is constantly being saved.

(RECOMMENDATION)

I would suggest anyone to read something of Wonder Woman if they are into comics. While at a comic store trying to find some more "research", I happened to come across a 2007 Wonder Woman comic called Love and Murder. The artwork is lovely and the story is touching and hilariously funny. It makes plenty of references to old wonder woman comics. Batman, Superman, and Black Canary also have their appearances here. It was quite hard to put down.

Week3 readings.

I'm lost as to whether it's blog for this post, or for the discussion board. I'll play it safe and post it on both.. Sorry guys. ^.^;

Week 3 - Prize #3, Batman, Adventure and Court Cases

Starting off with Prize 3 comics, I neither found them enjoyable or interesting solely because they were horribly racist. Maybe thats why we were supposed to read them. I simply found it astonishing that blatant stereotyping was deemed ok, even back in the 1940's. I know the mindset at the time was completely different, but none the less...

In the first comic of Prize#3, the evil emperor and his son were obviously based off the asian stereotype with 1, trying to take over the world, 2, bright yellow skin and 3, they even shrink the prince to "midget" size by jumping into a strange alien pool.

Then in the next adventure comic, which somewhat reminded me of Indiana Jones, all the black characters acted more ape than human and could not speak english very well. The main character was able to frighten one of them off by simply letting the man play with his lighter, as if a black man had never had much experience with fire before. Who knows, I could be reading into this too much and it wasn't meant to be viewed in this manner, but for some reason these comics got my goat as I was reading them.

I did however, find the Batman comic very interesting. I had never seen any of the old artwork before and thought it was funny how actual vampires showed up in the early story lines. I had to read the comic a few times before I fully understood what was going on. The story telling was a bit disjoined because there was nothing in the strip to signify the passage of time. Everything seemed to be happening at once. Other then that, it was enjoyable.

My favorite reading from this week was definitely Terry and the Pirates. From the individual strips, it was easy to get a grasp on who the characters were and their different personalities. I liked the group of them instantly. The strip where two of the characters found a friend of theirs dying after falling out of the back of the truck nearly made me tear up.

Terry and the Pirates is definitely something I would recommend to other comic readers.

The court case was incredibly difficult for me to get through. Ken Quattro's comments and summaries at the end of each posting helped me to understand what was going on. I still don't think I understand entirely was what going on in the case, though I did enjoy how short tempered the judge seemed to be. I'm definitely going to have to print out this case and re-read it again.

Reading Suggestion!

I haven't read many comics before this class, but one thing that a friend of mine did make me read was The Books of Magic by Neil Gaiman.

This comic is about a young boy named Timothy Hunter (who strangely looks exactly like Harry Potter) who is approached by 3 mysterious men who tell him that he could be one of the most powerful wizards of all time. Crazy adventures through mythical lands, other dimensions and time pursue.

The story is great, the artwork is incredible, and it's a fun read.

Derek Skar

The tea that made a tiger of him:

Out of all the readings this week I found that this comic to be both confusing and interesting. It also happens to do with the semester long paper topic I have chosen. A hero and the political development of a character. I liked this comic because the concept behind the characters indefinably reflected people of the time that this comic was written. The intro alone explains the subtle hints that the “tea” isn’t quite what it seams. It contains the ability to change and turn even mice into tigers. Not exactly your everyday tea?

The art I found to reflect the story it was not detailed but not lyrical either. The characters developed relations that complement each other well as they try to grow their katnip business. However I find the tea opens some wide doors that turn the story in different directions. I feel that the characters are very well developed as well because in my research I found that as distinct as these characters are in their duologues the writer originally had them as silent characters in his early strips. Some people also would say given the time this was written it was considered innovated and trend setting. So over all I enjoyed reading this comic and I commend Herriman’s and his krazy ways.

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1.03.01

Bengal Brew

            My immediate reaction to ‘Tiger Tea” basically consists of “so is this entire thing about weed?” After reading  others’ reactions, I feel vindicated in this. It’s interesting to read something from so early on that is related to drugs and their cultural and social impacts; In particular, because anything involving that nowadays seems highly biased in one direction or another. It’s also interesting to see this in the form of a humor-based comic strip. In many ways humor can diffuse any controversy, and therefore is a powerful tool for commentary and discussion of things taboo.

            Another things that I was thinking about as I read “Tiger Tea” was the minimal and distinctive art style. I found Herriman’s ability to create a distinctive space and thus a strong sense of place with very few lines very effective.  This goes for distinctive characters as well. His style is very strait forward and simple, perhaps deceptively so (especially considering above alleged political undertones.)

            One thing I found very frustrating was the vernacular/phonetic style of writing dialogue. I am not absolutely opposed to that kind of thing, but I feel at this degree it is a detriment to the reading experience. I feel the same way about Huckleberry Finn. That being said I love, love, LOVE alliteration, so that was a joy to me. Similarly to the dialogue, I think some of the gags where lost in time for me.  Some of the truly bizarre things made me laugh, but I feel many of the jokes where culturally irrelevant to me, which is disappointing.

            Overall it was an enjoyable and baffling experience, with the after taste of  cultural commentary (probably.)

Week 2/3 Reading

Comics before 1945-

Betty:

The first thing that struck me about this comic was how all the male characters still looked somewhat dorky and cartoonish while (mostly) the female characters looked like John Singer Sergent sketches. They were all incredibly elegant, especially Betty herself. A couple of pages back, there was a blurb of femine mystique and how female characters were becoming more prominent in comics. This was due to the rising of feminism and women finally being aloud to vote and have their own paying jobs. It makes me wonder why women weren't featured before in comics in other ways besides the "working gal" and the flapper.

Adventure Strips:

The adventure strips were noticeably different from the other comics that we have read for this class. They obviously had a continuous story line, instead of strips that continued to a continuous story, but could also be understood and enjoyed in one strip with their humor. I loved the more realistic artwork by Hal Foster.

Krazy Kat in Tiger Tea:

I had a hard time understanding what the ulterior message in this comic was. I understood the "tiger tea" as being a marijuana reference. Was the comic a statement about drugs/ drug use? Maybe. There was no proof wether Herriman ever smoked, or make this comic specifically about drugs. Was the comic about human nature? Could have been. It was most definitely funny and entertaining to read even though I had a hard time understanding what Krazy Kat was saying in his broken english.

(If there is someone who could explain the comic to me better, PLEASE HALP.)

He Done Her Wrong:

Again, I love Lynd Ward's work. I love his ability to be able to tell an entire story (and not an incredibly simple one) with practically no words. I liked how this book was a different style from some of the other work that we looked at in Wordless Books. The story was incredibly sweet and I was glad to see that the female character finally got her happy ending while being dragged around by the other characters. The huntsman was very funny. The artwork was fun to look at and made it easy to understand the story line. In some of Ward's other work, he uses a lot of symbolism that makes the reader take a longer time to look at each picture to understand the full meaning. He Done Her Wrong was definitely something more for the funnies, or a fun and quick read.

Week 2 readings

So this week was pretty amazing as well. "He Done Her Wrong" by Milt Gross was my absolute favorite read, almost defining the term cartoon epic. It relates to that erratic and fantastically whimsical form of humor so specific to the 30's, very relevant to the kind that Chaplin personified. I'm sure the entirely wordless aspect of the graphic novel Gross chose, was also inspired by the silent films of the time. The twists and turns of the plot were visually executed with much grace, especially when the protagonist's sweetheart finds the misplaced photograph as they rushed him into the hospital.

Krazy Kat and Ignatz is very interesting for the time. Even though it's debatable, it's pretty apparent that Tiger Tea has some relation to cannabis. I believe this because the many strips of the story that were collected during this time were around 1936-1937. Cannabis was officially declared illegal in the United States in 1937. From reading the introductions, I find it safe to assume that George Herriman liked to add political undertones to Krazy Kat and Ignatz, this shouldn't come as a surprise. Once again, I adore comics around this timeframe that focus on characterization down to the grammar of each individual. It's always a fun experience to actually sound out Krazy's voice while you're reading this book.

From The Comics Before 1945, Nell Brinkley and Hal Foster definitely use the most illustrative styles I've seen yet out of the readings. When reading Foster's work containing strong alpha male characters and elements of fantasy, I think it's reasonable to see him as one of Frank Frazetta's Key influences. I love that stuff. Nell Brinkley has a style that is incredibly vogue and attractive. I found out during 1916 she also did some world war one drawings. One of which called The Three Graces that personified suffrage preparedness and americanism as three very chic and powerful looking women.

http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAWbrinkley.htm