The Future of Comics: Strong Female Protagonist, Atomic Robo, and 17776

While I wish I could have only read comics over thanksgiving break, I was only able to make a dent in a few of the webcomic recommendations, but I adore the ones I read and intend on continuing to read them in the future!

I started with "Strong Female Protagonist" which is both incredibly insightful and acutely aware of the problematic situations that real-life superheroes can create, as well as being very realistic in how there are real-world ramifications and how it might actually feel to be a superhuman in a society that is a mixture of normal humans and supervillains. I also enjoy how complicated the main character is, and how she isn't handed anything on a silver platter, but instead is having to deal with real-life situations that are only amplified negatively by her powers at some point. She struggles deeply with what it means to be a hero, and how she can impact the world around her after quitting the hero's life. She is deeply flawed, violent, and sometimes emotionally unstable, and it's so much easier to connect to a character that can be just as flawed and human as I am.

I also read "Atomic Robo" which I feel shares a less gory kinship to that of characters like "Deadpool" and "Captain America." I was pretty much sold on the comic after he wrote "Steven Hawkings is a bastard" on Mars with rocks, because Atomic Robo is a character who you are almost 80 years old, and struggling to continue fighting evil forces as the future continues to push past him. He's incredibly tough and hardworking, while also showcasing a snarky sense of humor that I deeply enjoyed. Even though I'm still not entirely clear on Atomic Robo's past, how he was made by Tesla, and why he was made in the first place, I'm pretty hellbent on finding out. 

Last, but not least, is my own personal recommendation to...well I wouldn't go as far as to call it a "webcomic," so maybe the term "web narrative" is a better solution. While it may not fit the parameters of a comic in full, I think it is a brilliant work of multimedia storytelling that is available to read online. The page is titled "What Football Will Look Like in the Future" but the true title of the work is called "17776." It was created by Jon Bois and is posted on a sports blog page, but don't let the page deceive you when you click the link below. Simply scroll to enter the wonderful, crazy experience! I would say more, but it sort of ruins the fun. Enjoy!

https://www.sbnation.com/a/17776-football

Assessment: "The Killing Joke"

What is your reaction to the text you've just read?

I would say intrigue, but also a little pessimistic as well. It was an incredibly intense story, and also very complex. I know there have been a lot of attempts to reinvent the Joker or elaborate on his past and how he became the mad villain he is, and while this story seems to fall in line with painting him under light of having a bad break in life and being driven to madness and evil-doing, it also alludes to the fact that this could be a hallucination or a fake memory created by a lunatic. So is the story Joker is remembering as the comic progresses true? Who's to say, in all honesty. I do enjoy the fact that Batman is still trying to leave a violent end out of the realm of possibility between the Joker and himself, even though Joker gives him ample reason to hate him or even kill him. In some ways, this comic made me consider if Joker was even the craziest character in the series. He is highly intelligent, incredibly dangerous, and had strange goals, while batman is highly intelligent, incredibly dangerous, and trying to thwart crime in a city. In the two similarities out of the three, Joker and Batman are very strong parallels of what could happen to any in a bad situation: They could become either a moral correct character or a morally deviant character. Still, the lines between the two are very much blurred, and I think that's what made their dynamic so intriguing

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

Well, I don't connect with the Joker or Batman completely, as they are both characters that work within shades of moral gray. Joker is portrayed to have a broken, terrible past that has influenced him to be who he is today, and the same sentence could be said for Batman. The two characters operate the way they do, whether good or bad, because of that. I think the most relatable aspects of each character are the traits that make them still human. Joker is a character who I can relate partially to because he questions the hierarchy of this world and the structure that maintains it's ordered. He questions all aspects of it, it's fairness, its intentions, its reasoning or logic. He represents a side of humanity that can potentially be driven insane by the confines of this work and how humans operate within it. Especially when humans are dealt a bad hand. Batman, on the other hand, represents humanity's desire to maintain stability and believing in what is right and good for the better of society, regardless of what hand you've been dealt with in your life. He represents our human desire to be good people in spite of the horror and pain that the world creates every day. Ultimately, they are two sides of a social coin that all people can relate with: "Why should I take the world seriously when it's all crazy anyway?" and "Why wouldn't I fight for this world and protect the goodness in it?"

What changes would you make to adapt this story into another medium? What medium would you use, what would you change?

I would adapt this story into a silent film. No words, only instrumental. I would want to challenge the story by interpreting it into a medium that completely relies on visual understanding and representation of a story, especially when it comes to Joker reliving what could be his past. As much as I like the dialogue and the script for the story, I think it would be an excellent challenge to try and convey the message of the comic only through visual actions and representations as the story progresses. It would be hard to convey some of the more specific thoughts and dialogue between the characters, but I also think that removing the words would enhance some of the more ambiguity of the story and what is actually being perceived as true memories, as well as what the ending is.

Reconsidering the Superhero: Sandman and Black Panther

Honestly, I was pretty confused on seeing Sandman comics in the Week 13 recommendations besides Watchmen and Ark Asylum. I had only heard about the Sandman comics and had a vague idea of its concepts, so I wasn't sure how it could fit into the superhero genre. Still, it was published by DC Comics and I'd been recommended it a few time so I gave it a shot.

Specifically, I read Vol. 5 "A Game of You" which was, at first, pretty confusing still. I got warmed up to it though as the story progressed, and was surprised that the story featured lesbians and a transgender character right off the bat in the 1980's New York.  The main protagonist, Barbie, was also fairly unusual to be the main character as she was a divorced woman with (as far as I interpreted) no supernatural abilities other than her connection to a specific dream world that begins to bleed into reality. Overall, I found the format and characters to be very intriguing even though it was hard to discern contextual history about Sandman (Morpheus, the Dream King, all that jazz) and I was really only able to follow this specific story arc. What I also found intriguing was that there was no true heroic victory in the end. Instead of the usually bang of a superhero comic ending, it was more of a whimper that mourned the death of Wanda (the only transgender character who I thought had no reason to be killed off in the first place) and left the main character in a situation that was not optimistic or proud. I could definitely see how darker fantasy storylines could begin to shape how stories are told, and instead of always allowing the "hero" of the tale to have their victories, it felt more realistic to the world to showcase what can be the consequences of supernatural or fantastical events.

As for Black Panther, I was also very surprised by the current story (as of 2016) and hadn't had much exposure to the story outside of the film and very brief comic readings. It also shares similarities to how Sandman seems to portray a hero who is not victorious or always within the right. Instead, it portrays a king, T'Challa, who struggles to reclaim his identity as a hero and provide for a country that feels betrayed by him. He is full of guilt, remorse, and is also very lost in his sense of heroism, and while he goes through the motions in trying to do what he believes is right, he is confronted by his own people who are full of conflict but are trying to manage their lives without entirely relying on him to solve their problems. As much as I enjoy the Black Panther film and how the story was handled, I definitely appreciate the more somber gravity that helps the comic orbit around the universe of Marvel.

These comics, with all their differences, showcase the evolution of a hero that can't always win and overcome so easily, and that the world is no longer black in white in morality. Heroes are not always heroic, and villains can have good intentions. The lines blurring between good and evil adds so much more realism for readers because our lives don't always have a clear victory or happy ending. We can't always resolve all the problems of our lives, but the heroism is redefined in both seeing characters try to resolve them, and us continuing to live our lives as best we can just as heroes keep fighting to do what they believe in. After all, that's really all we can do.

Women in Comics: "Fun House"

While I feel the quality and intellectual level of the graphic novel was incredibly high, I actually found that I didn't enjoy this work as much as I enjoyed "My Favorite Thing is Monsters." It has a very similar tone of seriousness to that of "This One Summer," which I had read over the summer.  The whole narrative is very much a diary and monologue thoughts of Allison Bechdel, and a lot of her words were very hard to chew on in terms of her incredibly strong vocabulary, but also the stream of consciousness became hard to follow if you couldn't interpret her words well enough. I had to reread sections multiple times to understand any of it.

Overall, I'll admit that Bechdel's distinguished intellect was out of my reading level now that I don't get to read as much as I used to, and it made the comic very hard to dig my teeth into. I also feel that the intense struggle with coming to terms with a father figure and how they may not have always been who you thought they were was very relatable, but I also struggled to continue reading because my own personal experiences and associations with my father were things that I didn't really want to address or think about (even though they weren't nearly as intense or shocking as Bechdel's father was, I mainly have a sore spot when it comes to anything about my father) so they comic also became a bit of a chore to read in my mind. I feel like I should have enjoyed it more, but I have to be honest and say I wasn't as much of a fan, and I share a similar opinion on "This One Summer," which was also very hard for me to digest when I read it earlier this summer.

Contemporary Comics: "My Favorite Thing is Monsters" by Emil Ferris

I genuinely don't know where to start with how to discuss this book. It was completely not what I had been expecting, and the story (albeit very hard to follow) kept me chasing the ending long into the night.

My gears are turning. Let me try to explain what my brain is full of.

The illustrations and format of the comic. Absolutely confounding and incredible. After I had finished reading (and scoured the internet for more information about the series and the author) I learned that Ferris had a lot her ability to draw at one point, and she worked tirelessly to create this work. While it's deeply impressive, I genuinely couldn't believe that she had gone through so much and made many incredible illustrations. I love the characters and the way the comic is always formatted in a notebook, and I felt a nostalgic whiplash of being the student who ruined notebooks with drawings instead of notes. It made me deeply miss the youthful freedom to make art on anything you had available, whether it was walls or paper or ceiling tiles.

The way she illustrated and the format of the whole novel felt like looking into the Sistine chapel that also happened to be my middle school. The incredible feeling of wonder and amazement coupled with the youthful and realistic view of the darker side of like was deeply bittersweet, and its hard to describe just how much the drawings alone brought me to places in my life where I had been doing the same thing in notebooks.

There is also so much to cover in terms of the story that was wildly intriguing to me. Everything in the story, though jumbled and quilted together, kept me waiting on the edge of my seat to try and understand the world from the view of Karen as she struggles to cope with her situation, and I found her struggles profoundly relatable to some of my own experiences as a child. Still, so much pesters me about all of the topics left unaddressed. Who is Victor? What happened to Anya? Does Karen ever confess her affections to her crush?

This book, like "Blankets", cut me down to my core, and although I do feel wounded by this story and profoundly empathetic for all that has happened to Karen, this book also made me reevaluate some of the ways I view my life or my past from familiar but different angle. I won't forget this book for a very long time, and I'm deeply gratefully I was given the opportunity to read it.

Manga: "Buddha (Vol. 1)" by Osama Tezuka

I feel like I've seen other works by Tezuka before or at least his work has been influential to other works that I've read. Overall, even though I get a little confused by the story, I really enjoyed it and found it very entertaining. I will say some of the immersion in reading the story is lost by the English translation that is more modern-day slang words, but I do understand that its also to make it more relatable to younger readers. I did find it interesting that Tezuka illustrated the head monk, Master Asita, having a pack of cigarettes and food hidden in his robes that hints that the book was more modernly written and as a little inside joke. Even though I only know a little about India and its history, I found the mixture of Japanese manga and historical Indian culture and stories to be really refreshing. The art style is also very unique but I enjoy that is it very clear and easy to tell where the environment is as well as the characters being very easy to identify.I also noticed that this book read from left to right, or at least the layout of the comic's panels allows for American readers to easily digest the information or understand the situations. The use of action and motion in panels for fights was also really fun and enjoyable to read, and I felt a lot of the impacts based on drawings alone. If I find the other book volumes, I would gladly read them!

The Wide World of Comics: "Persepolis"

It's easy to forget how much we can people of privilege in the United States, and while I try to stay informed with international news like BBC and Vice News, its very easy to forget that the world outside the states is incredibly different from what I've come to know here.

After reading "Persepolis" by Marjane Satrapi, I was plagued with these thoughts, but I was also incredibly surprised to read a comic of such a mature caliber so easily. As we had discussed in class, many countries outside of Europe were not confined by what children could read and not read, and they're also were able to spread their demographic beyond children and also expand to adults when it came to comics. A small side note, I was also intrigued when Satrapi discussed her comic book versions of complex beliefs and ideologies that she would read every now and then because it only seemed to heighten the gap of how different my childhood readings were from that of a child outside of the states.

Overall, I really enjoyed the simplicity of the comic style and illustrations, as well as Satrapi's narration of the story to help explain or describe things I didn't understand. The way the novel is written and drawn also made me realize that the comics were truly for anyone and everyone to read. It wasn't confined to the genre and languages of children or made too graphic that youth would be scarred from reading it. It was simply a story for any person to consume, and I think that's the main reason I kept reading despite sometimes begin unable to relate fully. I also feel like it helped me expand my worldview on what life can be like for international students, and how greatly the lives of American youths can differ in both good and bad ways.

It did make me a little depressed to realize that, we as a country and the flow of information is controlled and distributed, have not allowed our generations to be able to grow and acquire knowledge as freely when we favor conservative lifestyles and prefer to restrict what youth learn in order to maintain old-fashioned values or to dictate the image of our country to the young masses.