Darrells Blogs

Throughout the weeks of reading comics, I’ve come across interesting topics. I've learned about the philosophy behind comics, the development of a comic strip and its characters along with many other fascinating lessons. However, when I stumbled upon the story of Maus I noticed an in-depth and almost darker take on comic book storytelling. Maus takes place during the Holocaust and tells a tale of the father of the books author. In the beginning, Artie Spiegelman the author of Maus ventures of to meet with his father whom he hadn’t seen for quite some time. Artie speaks with his father about sharing his story so that he could create the book Maus. His father mentions that he should just stick to his drawings instead of storytelling but then agrees which lead to the books creation.  The Holocaust is an intriguing topic by itself, however, instead of using humans Spiegelman used animals for his story. It was as if Spiegelman decided to take the metaphorical direction on this comic by

Nowadays we have television and computers to see explicit imagery. However, before these commodities, comics served as a way for people to get their X rated fixation. Underground Comics served as a way to allow comic book readers to view explicit imagery in illustrated form. Heavy drugs and alchohol were also portrayed throughout these comic books. Underground Comics weren’t usually sold in typical comic book stores. They were sold in head-shops alongside bongs and cannabis. The comic book series Arcade caught my eye this week. Not only did it have explicit imagery but it was fused with a mid 1900’s cartoon style similar to early Disney cartoons. Overall, the X-rated factor of Underground Comics wasn’t new to me, however the tie in of explicit illustration was a whole new subject matter that I found entertaining.  

Emotions are easily recognizable, especially through facial expressions. When someones eyes and mouth are drooping they are usually sad. On the other hand, someone with widely opened eyes and mouth express excitement. However, when it comes to body language, emotional expression is very similar to the face. Will Eisner strongly believed that Body language can translate as an emotion. Even though the face can portray emotions, Eisner heavily used body language in his comics. In Dropsie Avenue, Eisner focused on a mid 1900’s New York with tons of fascinating characters. Each one portrayed multiple emotions through body language.  A character that was slumped over would show sadness while a character that had their hand flailing in the air would show shock, or excitement. Eisner was as much of a story teller as he was an illustrator. He heavily believed in storytelling not only through narrative but though the characters imagery and expression through body language. 

He’s seen time and time again, however, this weeks reading was most pleasing with the addition of Donald Duck. Carl Barks Donald Duck comics showed the iconic Donald Duck that we know and love. Donald Duck would go on miscellaneous adventures and would tend to get himself into trouble each time. He is usually accompanied by the triplet ducks or Scrooge McDuck on his journeys and other noticeable characters would be shown as well such as Pete. These Comics played out like a Saturday morning cartoon. There were tons of bright colors, action-packed gestures and comedic storylines.