Week Four: The Comic Book

For the fourth week I decided to read some of Ec comics Tales from the Crypt. Growing up in a household where my mother was a major fan of anything to do with horror/scary genres and me being born October 30^th, sooner or later it would creep its way into my life. I remember growing up and watching Tales from the Crypt with the iconic Crypt-Keeper, and never knowing it was a comic book until now. I remember always enjoying the dark topics/stories of the show and while being scared still staying interested until the end. I very much enjoyed the fact that it was a series of different stories being told by a narrator which made me remember being told stories as a kid by a family member. In addition I enjoy how the crypt-keeper/ narrator comes in and out of the comic like a voice within the characters head, almost foretelling us of what is to come. The Maestros hand was one of the stories I read and I liked the twist at the end of the story, also how there was a sort of life lesson karma involved. I believe the drawing style used adds to the dark scary stories being told, the use of a lot of shadows and black helps to set the environment of a scary situation.

Week Three: Understanding Comics

For the third week I decided to read some of Charles Schulz’s Peanuts. Growing up in the 90s I remember watching the cartoon and not knowing they were a comic strip until looking further into the story. The Peanuts personally brings back childhood memories for me even though I can’t recall being a huge fan, it was definitely something I remember enjoying watching/reading growing up. For me the childlike humor throughout the comic strips brings a special quality to the comics, as well as their iconic characters and quotes. I also very much enjoy the simplistic drawing style approach to the comics, as well as the slight change of the look of the characters its interesting to see what they originally looked like and what they look like now. An interesting factor is that the comic strip is revolved around a society of kids and adults rarely if ever make an appearance. Also for this week I decided to take a look at Calvin and Hobbes, which I remember seeing as a kid growing up but can’t remember reading. Similar to the Peanuts comic strips I enjoy the simplistic artistic approach as well as the childlike humor and adventure. I think growing up we have all had a special stuffed animal or toy we played with and the creator of Calvin and Hobbes does a great job of taking us back to our childhood and remembering those times. I also enjoy how Hobbes goes from being a stuffed animal into a live tiger when in the perspective of Calvin. 

Week two: Understanding Comics

I found Scott Mccloud's book of Understanding Comics, entertaining and easy to read. It provided a lot of useful information about how to properly read comics, what a comic book consist of and things to look out for when reading comics. It was interesting to find out how involved comics can become and how they affect us. Also having the consistent character/narrator made it more enjoyable to read vs just having words without images. The book provides an in depth look into comics and proves that comics can be a great option when deciding to write a story, the medium offers freedom that no other media can. I also found it interesting that a comic doesn't need to have words in order to tell a story or convey a message; images can be just as powerful as words when trying to understand a story. Mccloud clearly has a vast understanding of comic books and makes it enjoyable for anyone seeking to learn about them easy to do. Lastly I found that the relationship between how we interpret certain things and how closely related they were to comic books was interesting and eye opening, a lot of thought process goes into making a comic in order to make it relatable and easy for us as readers to understand. 

Week One: The Graphic Narrative

Before attending this class I had run into Shaun Tan’s, The Arrival. After going through it the first time I found it interesting that there was no text, it caught me off guard, although made me intrigued because I had never seen anything like it before. The illustrations I thought were very precise and well done in order for us as the viewer to understand what the story was about. The pictures provided are filled with a lot of emotions one might feel when being foreign to new a country, I feel like a lot of people can relate to this moving to America since it is a melting pot of cultures and people from all over the world. The images provided are so well done that even though they use fictional elements it is easy to understand and still has as much of an impact or more than if it had words. The technique used as well helps to set the mood for the story without using color, and only relying on a value system. I thought the story had a positive impact on the reader because we could relate, we have all been new to something at some point in our lives and have felt all or some of the emotions portrayed within the story.