Understanding Comics, Scott McCloud

 I would have to say Understanding Comics was an interesting read and that McCloud brought up some interesting points. But I think he spent too much time trying to create a definition for what a comic is. It became to complicated and for myself a bit confusing. It made me feel like I lost some important point to the defining process. To me comics have always been in a very simple definition of, a series of image put to a page to tell a story.  Now McCloud goes through word after word and complicates it a bit too much. But that’s the only time he really lost me.

Now his discussion on how we perceive faces and why we are more willing to see ourselves in a cartoon environment than one that is completely realistic, was interesting. Especially in that we see ourselves more in the characters drawn simply; than the one drawn realistically. But to me that is still just the surface.  He discussed a bit on content and writing but not much. Which in some ways disappointed me because sometimes our identity that gets tied to characters isn’t by just how they look its by how they act and how they are written. Content also plays a big role because you have to be interested in the content before you even can feel an identity to a character.  So by solely going about it in an image based sense excludes some of comic books other aspects.

But I think he was just trying to keep it simple for the viewer. His break down on how stories progress and our filling in information that isn’t there with panels was very interesting. And the variety of the basic panels gave a good look at to what you find in most western comics, I would say. He did delve into the eastern but mostly on Japan. And how their pace in story telling was much different. I do agree to this view, western culture is mostly go, go, go! While eastern holds onto moments so you can see what they mean or to actually enjoy the moment. This does create an interesting comparison and gives another view into how to pace a story.

But (yes just one more but) overall I felt a bit restricted in McCloud’s views, he gave a very systematic view on comics. Which is fine if you’re a person who hasn’t read a lot of comics or maybe needs a clearer understanding. But it felt to cold to me at times, that I was restricted to a view that sometimes would open up. His points were clear and not false, but I didn’t feel excitement while reading it. This may be that I read Will Eisner’s Sequential Art  and for me that one was really about movement and actor, action, stage so in a way it felt like a play. So maybe I should cut some slack with McCloud, he in the end was in a search for a better definition or comics.