MAN, I’ve got to update this more often. This month is kicking my ass, though; I’m taking a really awesome class on ethnicity and race in comics/graphic novels, but the reading is intense and I’ve got to write three papers in five weeks. Urk. Time for a media dump!

I’ve been to the movies a bit lately. WALL-E is beautiful and sweet and charming without being cloying. Kung Fu Panda was hilarious and touching and gorgeously animated. I… er, saw Iron Man again. For the fifth time. I am a fangirl, what can I say? I’ll probably see The Dark Knight on Thursday, and I’m definitely seeing The X-Files: I Want To Believe (or as it should be titled, The X-Files: Incredibly Clunky Subtitle) on Friday. Hellboy is here from Netflix, waiting for me to watch it so I can eventually see Hellboy II: The Golden Army. I want to see Tropic Thunder mainly for Robert Downey, Jr.

The movie industry is out to torture my wallet this summer, seriously.

I’ve been reading lots of comics for class. If you’re looking for some good indie comics, try the Love & Rockets series by the Hernandez brothers. I read Human Diastrophism and Perla La Loca over the weekend, and both are very well-written with interesting artwork. Next up on the comics reading list is four volumes of Lucifer’s Garden of Verses by Lance Tooks and the rest of Stuck Rubber Baby by Howard Cruse. In non-class-related reading, I’m in the middle of The Hippopotamus Pool by Elizabeth Peters. Amelia Peabody = ♥

In video game news, I’m playing Dark Cloud 2 whenever I have a free minute. I love the combination of RPG, dungeon fighter, and worldbuilder, and the animation–particularly the environments–is gorgeous.

So… I’ve wasted enough time that should be used for paper-writing. Well, I’ve wasted enough time blogging. Now I should waste some more time making icons…

I’m taking a summer class on multi-cultural comics, and that (along with a rather heated discussion in a children’s lit class last spring) got me thinking about labels for this particular form of media.

Do we call ‘em comics or graphic novels?

When I was first introduced to the concept of graphic novels, the term was used to refer to collected comics. Marvel takes six or so issues of X-Men, binds them together, and voilà! A graphic novel. Or a trade paperback. But it’s still comics.

So what the heck do we call this stuff?

Wikipedia defines a graphic novel as “a type of comic book, usually with a lengthy and complex storyline similar to those of novels, and often aimed at mature audiences.” The problem with this definition is that many comic books (single issue-based magazines with sequential art-based storylines) often have lengthy and complex plots. Hell, anyone who’s spent a year reading the X-Men comics can tell you that the plotlines are complex sometimes to the point of obscurity. Wikipedia acknowledges the mutability of the term “graphic novel” and also brings up a point that I think is incredibly important.

Some people use the term “graphic novel” to try to set apart certain titles on the basis of so-called artistic value. Now, this is a slippery slope on the best of days. Artistic value is incredibly subjective; each person is going to have a different view of what defines art. Remember that guy at the museum, bitching about Jackson Pollock? “My three-year-old could make that!” Or the woman who turns her nose up at anything that isn’t modern, because it’s passé?

Though I often use the term, it feels to me that many people do call ‘em graphic novels out of a sense of snobbery. “I don’t read comics. They’re for basement-dwelling fanboys. I read graphic novels.” Gee, you think that term might have been invented by publishers who were just dying to sell more comics, but wanted to paint on a veneer of respectability? Really, whatever the subject matter, it’s the same thing. It’s sequential art. Words and images juxtaposed to create a story. As with any storytelling form, there is an enormous variety of content, and each person is responsible for deciding what floats their boat, what’s valuable to them as a reader. Is it high art? Is it low art?

Who the hell cares? It’s all comics.

For further reading:

• Neil Gaiman’s thoughts on the matter. (scroll a bit to get to the question about comics v. graphic novels)
• Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art by Scott McCloud

Some recommended comics/graphic novels/whatever the heck you want to call them:

• Bill Willingham’s Fables series
• Maus by Art Spiegelman
• Wolverine: Weapon X by Barry Windsor Smith

Also check out my Comics/Graphic Narrative shelf on my GoodReads profile. Graphic narrative! Ooh, how wanky! ;)

In a bit of comic criticism, is anyone else sick to death of these HUGE EVENTS that pop up every four months or so? The damn things must boost sales, but I hate crossover stories, especially when they involve books I don’t usually read. And anyway, an event should be something that pops up every once in a while, not every four issues. In the past couple of years we’ve had what, House of M, Decimation, Civil War, Endangered Species, and now this Messiah Complex thing mentioned in this article?

Hmph. You know what would be great for Marvel comics right now? Decent, steady storytelling that doesn’t hinge on a Big! Event! to carry it off. Writing like Peter David’s on X-Factor, or Joss Whedon’s on Astonishing X-Men (if only the issues would come out more frequently than every three months, hmph).

And while I’m wishing, I’d like a pony and a plastic rocket…

This isn’t a storyline that does much to advance the Wolverine mythos. It’s not about his past or his returning memories or his eternal fight with Sabretooth or anything like that. It’s a stand-alone storyline in which Wolvie is forced to face the fact that he’s stuck somewhere between being a man and an animal. The story itself is about Logan dealing with the leader of a Mexican gang and being tailed by the DEA agent who made her first appearance in the previous Wolverine story arc, “The Brotherhood”. I won’t go into the story, because a lot of it is meant to surprise you, but I will say that this story does a LOT to establish Logan’s humanity. Even after killing dozens of men in a rage, he is forced to deal with the fact that he’s not all animal… nor is he all man. This is a nicely complex character development story that I enjoyed immensely.

The art is also better, IMO, than Robertson and Palmer’s work on “The Brotherhood.” I know Wolvie’s short and stocky, but I don’t like art that makes him look like he just stumbled out of his cave. The art in “Coyote Crossing” captures his stature, but also conveys the elegance and ease of movement that he’s known for. I’m a bit ambivalent on the fact that his face looks a lot like Hugh Jackman’s; I prefer a bit more separation between the movie and comic ‘verses, but I really like that he’s drawn with long hair. That needs to be done more often, heh.

I’ve wanted to start reading Fables for quite a while. A friend of mine did some of her Master’s work on the series, and I’m all about fairy tales and modern adaptations. So I was overjoyed when my boyfriend gave me Fables Vol. 1: Legends in Exile as a graduation gift. I finally sat down and read it the other day, and… wow. This is everything I’d hoped it would be.

This volume both sets up the Fables world and draws the reader into a murder mystery. All of the fairy tale creatures were forced from their world centuries ago by the conquering Adversary, and they’ve set up shop in New York City, calling their new settlement Fabletown. The story begins with Jack (of beanstalk fame) dashing across town to find Bigby (of “Huff, puff” fame), Fabletown’s detective. There has apparently been a brutal murder, and Bigby must solve the mystery.

Along with finding out what happened to Rose Red, Bigby must work with her sister, Snow White, who happens to be second-in-command to the mayor of Fabletown. Legends in Exile gives the reader not only a great murder-mystery but also begins building wonderful tension between Bigby and Snow White.

There are too many retellings of fairy tales to count, from Marvel’s Fairy Tale miniseries to Robin McKinley’s novels. Some of those adaptations are good, many are crappy, and some make you wish you could bleach your eyeballs (Anne Rice’s The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty comes to mind). Fables rises to the top of this pile; it blends the familiar fairy tales with modern sensibilities, often with sharply funny results. Snow White runs to Bigby’s rescue in a business suit, heels, and toting a gigantic sword, Beauty and the Beast find that centuries of togetherness do not a happy marriage make, and so on. The artwork is simple but gorgeous, and the covers are particularly lovely.

I’ve promptly added all of the other Fables collections to my Amazon wishlist. This stuff is addictive.

“Comics court girls inspired by Japanese manga.”

While I think it’s great that comic companies are finally starting to acknowledge that girls, in fact, to read comics, I’m not sure they’re going about directing their marketing at females in the right way. First of all, they’re focusing on teenage girls and practically ignoring adult women readers. DC’s Minx line’s (don’t get me started on the title) titles sound like they were pulled off of Nickelodeon’s Saturday morning lineup. Now, if I’m remembering my days as a teenager right, I never read or watched anything marketed at teenagers. I liked that stuff when I was a preteen, and my friends had similar tastes. I didn’t read comics as a teenager (I picked up my first comic when I was 20), but if I had, I more than likely would have read the stuff I read now: superhero comics, the stuff directed at adults. Nevermind that DC’s efforts completely disregards the female readers that they already have, teenage or adult. What about the girls who already read the superhero comics?

The article points out a couple of efforts Marvel has made to appeal to women, namely bringing in Eric Jerome Dickey and Joss Whedon to write X-Men titles, along with the new Anita Blake series. While I think the Anita Blake comics are laughably bad (same with the books, but that’s a different rant), I do see how they can appeal to adult women readers, much like the book series. Paranormal romance is very popular right now, and it might be a smart way to draw in female readers. Hell, I wouldn’t mind more comics along this line, as long as they’re not based on Laurell K. Hamilton novels.

Now, I definitely appreciate Joss’s run on Astonishing X-Men. Joss knows how to write strong women, and John Cassaday’s art doesn’t turn the women into sexpots (well, except for Emma, but that’s her schtick). Kitty and the female students like Hisako look like real young women, and it’s refreshing. I haven’t read the Storm mini, so I can’t comment on that. But the thing is that these writers are men. If Marvel really wants to make steps toward both bringing in new and satisfying current female readers, I think they should start bringing in female writers on their major titles, not just smaller projects. Bring in women to write X-Men and the Fantastic Four, the superhero titles.

And work on that whole “drawing women as huge-breasted semen receptacles thing.” Let’s just start somewhere, eh, comic companies?