Literature of Comics & The Graphic Narrative

I read Maus many years ago and I was originally was going to re-read it because I thought why not? I'm glad I decided to step back and say let's read something new so I picked  I Saw It  since I thought it was an interesting title and wow I did not expect it to be about a survivor's story about the bombing of Hiroshima. I thought Nakazawa's intro to his story was interesting on how he started it in the present and then when he reminisces about his mom and begins his actual story on how he survived and his experience of the after-effects of the bombing of Hiroshima. I enjoyed the transition because to me it was very cinematic on how he laid it out. I liked that in the beginning despite the constant threat of an air raid Nakazawa saw some positivity in that situation and I liked that since it's very much the perspective you would have a kid since as kids we tend to find some way to see positivity in things despite the situations and children tend to adapt to their sit

  So I read five comics ( Air Pirates ,  Dirty Duck ,  Little Green Dino ,  Mu: The Land that Never Was , and  Hungry Chuck Biscuits ) and in all honestly, I mostly picked these at random except for  Air Pirates  which I remembered from the History of Comics and was really interested so it was the for sure pick I was going to read. I have to say  Air Pirates  is wild but it really is something I see as an underground comic. The whole no self-censorship along with letting it all hang out attitude, it first came off as kinda a whiplash because you have Disney characters doing sexual acts to each other, cursing, violence, you name it but also it's kinda funny since we typically kind of associate Disney characters especially Mickey to be a pure kind of a character since the association with the movies and cartoons which the target audience is younger. I find the humor while obviously crude, pretty funny honestly. Between the other four while there were some similarities with bold sexua

  So one of the readings I did for the underground comics was  Tits and Clits  which was an underground comic done by women. It was very interesting and nice to read since it is from the perspective of women. It was cool to see such a different variety of art styles. Some were very simplistic while some were more defined but besides the styles of the comic, it was about what they wanted to convey. It was nice and interesting to see women's views on sexuality and other topics in underground comics. I thought there were some good comedy bits in the comic like the fake advertisement of the vibrator cozies (also like the little description for each cozy which I thought were pretty funny). I did enjoy that there were personal experiences or thoughts of the comic creators like the one for example where one of the artists had a fantasy on wanting to peg a man and eventually actually doing it. I overall like that this is very much still an underground comic there is no censorship and it is

  I have to say I read Eisner's  Contract with God  and it is very interesting how Eisner lays out his panels since a lot of them are more open and not in an actual panel frame but also like a spot illustration. I find the flow of his story and how simple yet expressionistic his characters are really pushed his story that was more adult in nature since a lot of the events that happened within the comic are harsh and the narrative is a bit exaggerated it still reflex real-life struggles people live in, in those type of environments especially during that time period. I think Eisner has a way of doing things suddenly that gets the reader just reacting like 'what just happened?' like The Super short story it was so sudden of the girl robbing the man and even poisoning his dog I remember vocally reacting and I was in shock. Not saying the man was a good guy but I think that is the nice thing that Eisner did when making these characters that they aren't perfect they are huma

Before this class and diving into Jack Kirby's work, I knew the basics of Kirby then after reading the History of comics it opened my eyes to the hardships he went through but overall Jack Kirby is such a legend when it comes to comics. His work is always so dynamic and vibrant too when it comes to the colors in his work. It is a shame that while Stan Lee and Kirby had a collaborative relationship in Marvel, Stan Lee held more of the limelight. While it was not my particular favorite read  Best of Young Romance  did have dramatic stories that were filled which cliches (maybe not for the time) but it is interesting reading the Young Romance's stories since I mostly associate Kirby with superhero comics but it just shows his range of work and how versatile he is. Looking over Kirby's storyboards for the Fantastic Four storyboards they are wonderful. They are very clean and simple but still getting the bigger across. I like how he would combine boards to get this big picture b

  Before reading some of the Smithsonian comics I skimmed through all the strips and I loved seeing how vibrant and different each one was especially the styles in each comic. It was nice seeing some of McCay's work again since I remember seeing some of his work from the history of Illustration but it is nice to be able to fully read some of the comics we skimmed over during that period. It was a blast to re-read  Little Nemo in Slumberland  especially the strip where the characters go through a distortion similar to a funhouse mirror, it is just fun and engaging how they fill out within the panels. It is interesting looking at the comics and the shifts in styles. In the early 1900s, we see detailed characters and over time you see a shift to more simplistic and cartoon-like characters, especially in the fifties where it seemed very popular. While I enjoyed most of the comics for their vibrancy I did notice there was some unsavory use of pretty racist stereotypes. Like the "im

 I have to say McClouds' format on understanding comics was engaging and easy to read. I enjoyed the flow of his comics while still very much being informative, like when he makes the comic panel a film strip to compare a film to be a very slow comic. Or the section when he discusses icons and how different icons represent concepts or ideas and philosophies (symbols) and others communicate language and science, then icons we called pictures which represent their subject. I just thought it was nice how he visually communicated that concept. So for symbols, he drew very well known icons like the American flag or religious symbols, etc. And still, on the subject, it's interesting thinking about pictures as icons since really thinking about what pictures are they are images designed to resemble their subject. It is interesting when we humans tend to endear ourselves more to simplified symbols like inanimate objects and how we assign identities and emotions where it does not exist,