July 13, 2004

• One glance through the pages of Sandman or 100 Bullets will answer all doubts about comics being able to rank up with the best of literature.
• Yeah, I'm kind of kicking myself for not posting any Gaiman links. I'd love to have the full set of Sandman trade paperbacks. Never read 100 Bullets, though.
• I'm also kicking myself for not proofreading more thoroughly.
• 100 Bullets is an amazing story about conspiracy, vengeance, and betrayal. Its run hasn't ended yet, but there are numerous trades out for it. One of them, Hang Up on the Hang Low won all kinds of awards. The art really plays off of the narrative, and it has a very distinct style (in the same sense as Loeb/Sale comics are distinct).
• Comics have been mainstream in their influence since Krazy Kat. It's just that now, people are willing to admit it.
• Transmetropolitan.
• One glance through the pages of Sandman or 100 Bullets will answer all doubts about comics being able to rank up with the best of literature. "Best" meaning "most entertaining" or "best" meaning "most significant"/ "most insightful"?
• From Warren Ellis' Bad Signal from a while back "There's a bit in Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell's From Hell where the fake psychic, Lees, says: 'I made it all up, and it all came true anyway.' That's how I'm starting to feel about Transmetropolitan. 'Feedsite listeners' are multimedia bloggers. Girls with necrotising fasciitis scars from the streets of the City turn up in Marilyn Manson videos. Two-headed cats. Smiling politicians throwing advisors to the wolves following suspicious deaths. Glasses that take photos. We're living in the future. "And God help you all, it's my future we're living in."
• I should have noted that I am a literaturd and that I consider comix and literature different mediums that, much like film and literature, are not easily compared.
• Skrik, all but significant, although if the trend continues, it's only a matter of time until there is a comic that compares to significant literature. (Although, one could argue that Sandman is slowly becoming that due to the influence that it has had on writers and artists)
• Well, most of the most often mentioned breakthrough stuff, Watchmen, Dark Knight Returns, Maus were all done in the late 80's early 90's. Sandman has been done for 5 years or so. Cerebus just finished. Blankets is the current comic that has all the buzz, but i've not read it. Miller's sequel to the Dark Knight Returns was recieved with a mixed reaction, to be polite. I thought it had some fun moments, but didn't reach the level of the original (which I must admit had so odd bits like the page with the woman with swastikas tatoos, which I never got the point of). I'm not all that much on "Literature" so I mainly stick to the superhero stuff, and superhero teams at that (I'm a huge Legion of Superheroes dork and am PISSED they are messing with the continuity AGAIN!) Personally, I fall back on the same argument that I raised when we asked if videogames were art, "Why should we care?" I have more than 9 long boxes of comics and it isn't going to make me walk with my nose held up higher to know that some of them are "Literature."
• "Why should we care?" Because getting more people interested and into a certain thing makes it possible for more quality work to be done. I mean, the whole reason that you see so many good games out there right now is not because it is just what a bunch of people like to create. It's because an awful lot of people have become interested in it after it received press, word-of-mouth, and by extension, sales. It may not make you feel any better to know that they are literature. But it may make someone who would never have picked up a TPB pick one up and maybe like enough to get more.
• I have a question: what is the difference between COMIX and COMICS? Is it as simple as Crumb v. Archie? Using jargon to create a more definitive genre, and impose elitist standards of 'art'? Or personal preference like come v. cum? (sorry - reading Dan Savage this morning; blame him) Something else? Genuinely curious. And, though I clearly know little about the topic, I think it is entirely appropriate to consider comic/x/graphic novels literature. There are lots of genres, this is just a different one. People generally don't debate the eligibility of someone like Nick Bantok to be literature and I don't believe this to be different. It's like most books: some of it is literature, and some of it is just "fiction".
• Comics as 'new novel' kind of rubs me the wrong way. There are a lot of great comic artists out there, but I don't really understand the need to frame the debate in reference to another form. I agree with Skrik that they are different mediums and deserve independent aesthetic criteria. Beyond that, I kind of take issue with the worship of Moore and Gaiman. Sandman is pretty overrated, I think and it seems Moore's best work is long behind. Spiegelman created the best representation of the holocaust in any medium, but has yet to produce a compelling follow up (though he did a wonderful job as art director at The New Yorker and contributed some excellent covers). From an aesthetic point, none of the above three really overthrow the narrative conventions of literature and embrace the potential of comic as form. For that we have to look to the younger generation led by Chris Ware and, to a lesser extent, Dan Clowes (see in particular Eightball #22) and Joe Sacco. These three tackle their subjects quite differently and the third very much in the trail of peole like Spiegelman and Crumb, but the first two have found ways to take the text beyond what a novel allows. Instead of writing a story with cute little pictures (comic book tradition) they use illustration as pure visual language, as important, and occasionally more so than the accompanying text. Spend a few hours with Jimmy Corrigan and you'll find yourself immersed in a world inacessible through any other form. Additionally, there is important work being done outside the long form stuff. Michael Kupperman, Tony Millionaire and Kaz pack more into a three panel strip than most sitcoms do in thirty minutes.
• I'll try to sound like an old fart. No, I don't like it at all. In the comics I have seen the imaging is mostly copied from or inspired by interesting movies that did a better job. The stories are all too familiar. The ways of telling a story is not half as imaginative as a common french novel. The only good thing of comics and SF is that it brings high and low culture slightly closer together. How did I do? [on preview: as good as shotsy?]
• [Sorry, shotsy, I think I am much older and fartier.]
• it's only a matter of time until there is a comic that compares to significant literature. I think we're already there. I gauge a book (or movie or music or whatever) by how it makes me think and feel, and how it sticks with me afterwards, and how it effects a change in my world view. Graphic novels succeed and fail in this as well as any other medium, and some of the best can proudly hold the 'significant' label.
• Speaking of Warren Ellis, he has something new coming out in October: Ocean.
• The filthy monkey, it plans!
• On second thought, everything ilyadeux said, only less coherent. Though then, I'm a newcomer to this sort of thing and haven't pondered this over years of defending a much-put-upon habit. Coming in cold, it looks rather simple. There is a variety of comics just as there's a variety of prose. Or anything else. I don't worry about stereotypes, because I don't respect the sort of mindset that leads to forming them. ...'Course, I'm pragmatic to a fault. On another note, "comix" brings the pain; I hate to even type it. Is there a reason it's used? (Hopefully not "to distinguish from those other books" and thus reinforce the stereotype?)
• Comix (from Wikipedia) Imagine Bob Crumb standing on a street corner, selling Zap #1 by hand. 'Comix' got people's attention at a time when Disney ruled the industry.
• so comix is a strictly historical designation, rather than reflecting small press or alternative subject matter? [from the Wiki "post-underground" is a nifty phrase I'm going to have to remember] thanks!
• "comix" isn't much used these days. It connotates for me either, R. Crumb and folks like him, or porny comics. I don't know that it is used much by people inside the comicbook subculture.
• /old codger rant I loved the best, usually european, graphic novels' offerigns that Heavy Metal magazine used to offer. Moebius, Caza, Drulllet, Ramos, and later Kuper, Spiegelman, Bisley, all the greats were there. But, IMO, they went overboard with the the violence and sex , while quality, as well as style diversity went down the toilet. The last GN I've bought were the two MAUS tomes, some Kuper stuff and some european stuff, years ago. Now I just snicker and point at all the anime and eurocomics imagery springing in mainstream hollywood movies. /rant
• Thanks for the explanation. My inner spellcheck still cringes, but at least I know what it means.
• To add to jccalhoun's notes, it mostly came out of the period when comics were CCA approved and a tightly regulated "child-oriented" medium. Comix and the numerous spelling variants were meant to indicate sometihng for grown-ups. (Although I've always found Crumb decidedly sub-Woody Allen overall). shotsy: You realise casually saying, "Sandman" is overrated makes you sound like one of those dreadful "cooler than thou" types so common in alternative music circles... Moore's main problem is that his diverse interests and perfectionism mean he NEVER FUCKING FINISHES ANYTHING, and, yeah, the 90s were mostly wasted years for him, with the aborted projects like Big Numbers and whatnot. That said, League of Extraordinary Gentlemen was great fun, and he's finally finished Lost Girls, which is pretty damn good. Personally I find Chris Ware boring - all structuralist experimentation and no meat. Dan Clowes is easily the best of the Crumb descendants working off the autobio basis, and has avoided the whiny navel gazing that most of them (like Chester Brown) fall into. Stray Bullets is good, solid stuff; Frank Miller's 300 is OK. Probably the single best thing in recent years from my point of view would be Howard Cruse's superb Stuck Rubber Baby, with Joe Sacco's Palestine coming a close second.
• One glance through the pages of Sandman or 100 Bullets will answer all doubts about comics being able to rank up with the best of literature. Exactly right. Hell, Neil Gaiman has already proven he can write novels that are just as compelling as his graphic novels. rodgerd: How can you say Frank Miller's 300 is just "OK"? Hah. Come on, man, I know we often disagree about politics, but 300 was a classic, both in story and in art. It was tremendous! One of the few books where I've felt compelled to go out and buy the originals.
• Literaturd! That's amazing.
• Main niggle with 300 wasn't the art - which I agree was very good - and Miller is a fine storyteller, but his characterisation of the Spartans slagging off the other Greeks as "boylovers" kind of rankled, considering Spartan social norms an' all. If he hadn't spent so much effort on trying for accuracy (and telling us about said effort 8), it probably wouldn't have bugged me at all. Oh, and "The Cartoon History of the Universe" deserves props, although I have a few niggles with it.
• Grant Morrison's The Invisibles is the greatest work of fiction of the late 90s regardless of medium.
• Are trousers the new slacks?
• ilyadeux; "Comix" (or Speigelman's 'commix,' a clumsy neologism intended to convey commingling and mixing) is indeed opposed to "cpomics" in the comic-creator subculture, much as "science fiction" and "sci-fi" have oppositional meanings to science fiction writers and fans. Personally, I think the perceived need to distinguish is a bit precious, but it's one of those subcultural markers that informs your readership how familiar with the subculture you are.
• wait, wait, wait. I was following this all, mainly, but this is total news: science fiction and "sci fi" are qualitatively different things? This is what happens when I pay attention to nothing. And I apologise for further derailing this. But. Is this like science fiction=The Dispossessed/I Robot/Day of the Triffids and sci-fi=the novelisation of Forbidden Planet and Mercedes Lackey books; or an endless debate about whether "Stranger in a Strange Land" is literatoor? I am starting to understand why I don't get invited to book clubs.
• ilyadeux: comics/comix and science fiction/sci-fi (and the even more ludicrous "sci fi" vs "sciffy" prnounciation debates) are essentially the meaningless purviews of petty cooler-than-thou exclusionists.
• Somewhat back on topic: I was REALLY disappointed by the article in question. We've gone from "POW! BANG! ZAP! Comics aren't for kids anymore!" to "So say, comics eh? I'm cool!" The writer, Charles McGrath, admits to not being a comic book reader in the front of the freakin' magazine. Couldn't they have gotten somebody vaguely knowledgable about the genre to write the damn piece? I mean, damn, _I_ coulda done better than that...
• It seems to be a standard device in both pop criticism and feature articles at the moment - witness all the reviews of the Lord of the Rings movies that started out with the reviewer expressing their contempt for the genre of fantasy, chuck in a few stereotypes about mouth-breathing no-lives that like it before proceeding to explain that the movie must be wonderful because, well the reviewr liked it. So yes, forks, it gets on my tits, too. Presumably it appeals to an audience of ignormauses who are terrified that learning about or liking something may turn them into uncool untermenschen.
• *yawns* They had this debate in Europe 20 or more years ago. See, eg, Eco's The Role of the Reader. It was more or less subversive once. Now it's just selling glossy lifestyle magazines. See, also, debates on "is film the new literature?" from the 1940s. Who wants to buy a BMW?
• much as "science fiction" and "sci-fi" have oppositional meanings to science fiction writers and fans. Ohhhh. Infighting wankery that mainly serves to alienate newbies and make the group look stupid to outsiders, thus blowing their chances of gaining respect, which everyone claims they want even though the prospect of gaining respect from the hated "mainstream" sends them into fits. I gotcha. (I know every group has this, I'm not targeting SF fans. It's equally stupid in every group.) "Marking that it is for grownups" strikes me as divisive, too - another thing that reinforces the very stereotype it supposedly challenges. But I'm stating the obvious again.
• Anyone pick up volume 13 of McSweeneys which is edited by Chris Ware of Jimmy Corrigan fame?
• I am a fan of storytelling. If you want your story to be in the form of a novel, a comic, a movie, a play, whatever, that's fine. It's about figuring out what story you want to tell and then which medium will best convey the sense you want. Bone is an awesome comic, but it wouldn't work in the form of a movie or novel. The panel format allows for a certain kind of pacing in a joke. I'm pretty much with rodgerd on this one. Of course everyone is going to have aesthetic differences on what they like and don't, but calling Sandman "overrated" is like saying Citizen Kane is overrated. Debateable as to whether it is the *best,* but no one can deny to effect it had. There were earlier and possibly greater works, but the impact it had was HUMONGOUS. I suppose Watchmen would be a better example to use, but I am a Gaiman-phile. It pains me greatly that they are making a Watchmen movie, even if David Hayter is writing it. And while Frank Miller is awesome, DK2 SUCKED BALLS
• That disappoints me. I still haven't read DK2. I will, because I love Frank Miller, but I've not read a more-than-tepid review of it. But more than anything I want those damn Sandman trades. Stupid house payment...
• Frank Miller's always been dreadfully uneven, though. The first Sin City was breathtaking, but it quickly went downhill thereafter, for example.
• brokevespa: Anyone pick up volume 13 of McSweeneys which is edited by Chris Ware of Jimmy Corrigan fame? My copy arrived in yesterday's mail. Looked at only as a beautifully-made artifact, the book is delightful, starting with Ware's exquisitely drafted comics on the fold-out cover. As an anthology, it appears to cover all the bases you'd want covered: starting with Crumb and Clowes and ranging over a nice spectrum of current work. Highly recommended.
• Alan Moore, who reinvented the comic book as the cutting-edge literary medium of our day, talks about beheading, the diabolical power of the media, the Bush dynasty and the fall of Tony Blair.
• Oh, and reaing through a bunch of stuff I was just given, I am reminded that Will Eisner is possibly the least mentioned genius in the field.
• Alan Moore has written a novel, btw, which is quite good.
• The Revolt of the Comic Books