Superhero comics are fine for adolescents and young adults, but they overshadow the
image of comics as a whole.
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Comics isn't a genre, it's a medium. Beyond superheroes there are many fantastic
comics for adults.
Love and Rockets, Jaime Hernandez, Fantagraphics/Titan
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Comics have a practically unlimited budget. Imagination can make rich fantasy scenes.
Epileptic, David B, Jonathan Cape
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(The words used to illustrate the rain are from an Arabic poem about rain)
Habibi, Craig Thompson, Faber and Faber
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There are many diverse styles, from the Arabic calligraphy & design of Craig
Thompson's Habibi to the faux-woodcuts used by Andre Diniz.
R: Picture A Favela, Andre Diniz, Self Made Hero
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Cartoony styles to give sympathy to difficult topics; Jason's misanthropic animals.
Athos in America, Jason, Fantagraphics
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Art as meta-narrative. Two opposing styles, angular & sketchy, combine to make a
whole when the relationship starts.
Asterios Polyp, David Mazzucchelli, Alfred A. Knopf
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Comics allow you to linger in a way film & books don't. A lot of time can pass in a single
frame. Like narrating over a photo.
Footnotes in Gaza, Joe Sacco, Jonathan Cape
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Gives good creators scope to try clever things. Chris Ware's work incorporates
information design.
Jimmy Corrigan: The Smartest Boy on Earth, Chris Ware, Jonathan Cape
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Things which are impossible in other media, like this infinite loop. Characters can hear
themselves elsewhere on the loop.
Promethea, Alan Moore & JH Williams III, America's Best Comics/Wildstorm/Titan
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Although not all creators use it, sound can be vital to comics. Sound treated as a visual.
Love & Rockets is up there with the great modern literary works IMHO.
Love & Rockets
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Sound can be used for comic effect, or tragic; a disdainful laugh becomes a physical
thing in a failing relationship.
Mister Wonderful, Daniel Clowes, Jonathan Cape
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Word balloons also tell a story, like here where marital status is shown in a state of
uncertainty.
The Italian name for comics is 'fumetti', meaning 'little puffs of smoke', named after
word and thought balloons.
Asterios Polyp
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In this sequence the speech balloon is shown coming from somewhere else, from
somewhere dark and elsewhere beyond the body.
City of Glass, adap. of Paul Auster by Paul Karasik & David Mazzucchelli, Faber and
Faber
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Panels can be cleverly used like here where toilet pipes indicate panels.
Brazilians call comics 'historias in quadrinhos', or stories in little panels.
Alan's War, Emmanuel Guibert, First Second
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Large panels slow things down, acting as punctuation at the end of a sequence.
Pyongyang, Guy DeLisle, Jonathan Cape.
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Having the panels also allows you to break them, deconstructing the grid to show a
mental breakdown.
City of Glass
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Unique to comics, panel size can vary to signify time and speed. Here a long series of
events are compressed into a short sequence, using repetition to convey the story.
ACME Novelty Library #19, Chris Ware, Drawn & Quarterly
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Removing the panels entirely suggests more quiet, easy times.
The Little Man, Chester Brown, Drawn & Quarterly
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To understand the language of comics as a unique medium, this is the place to start.
Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud, HarperCollins.