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Erik's Reviews > Making Comics: Storytelling Secrets of Comics, Manga and Graphic Novels
Making Comics: Storytelling Secrets of Comics, Manga and Graphic Novels
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Although I was never a huge fan of his retro-esque work on the 80s Zot!, Scott McCloud has become – in my eyes – the hero of modern comic book structural theory and analysis. And one heck of an effective writer and artist at conveying the hidden truths of this ever-developing medium, I might add. He is neither condescending nor intellectually ambiguous – despite his evident braininess.
As the author/artist of two earlier ground-breaking works – Understanding and Reinventing Comics (both of which I devoured a decade back when they were first published) – McCloud does what few in this arena have done before (with the sole exception of the late great Will Eisner): Deconstruct the medium of comics and graphic novels through the medium itself. Which, I might add, he uses in a brilliant and clever way when he illustrates – quite literally – its myriad structural techniques.
The first three chapters detail his theory behind the five structural choices (moment, frame, image, word, and flow) that the writer and artist must consider, human expression and body language that the artist must attend to, and then to the written word that the author must select for greatest effect (which may be maximized by using no words at all). These chapters, in my estimation, comprise the brainiest and most theoretical portion of the book – which may just put artistic and intellectual novices to sleep.
The last half of McCloud’s treatise focuses on world building (best exemplified in manga and more modern American comics like Watchmen and most Vertigo and indie titles), the tools of the trade (which whet my appetite for those care-free days of the 80s when I would sit down at my drawing table and pen and ink voluminous tales of super-heroics and science fiction), and genres of the three over-lapping mediums (comics, manga, and graphic novels).
If you ever held the disparaging opinion that comics are the daytime trash of the publishing industry, think again. Pick up any of McCloud’s three volumes deconstructing this under-praised and –acknowledged medium. And then pick up any one of the Eisner or Harvey winners in recent times (The Sandman, Bone, Eightball, et al.), and prepare to be awed.
As the author/artist of two earlier ground-breaking works – Understanding and Reinventing Comics (both of which I devoured a decade back when they were first published) – McCloud does what few in this arena have done before (with the sole exception of the late great Will Eisner): Deconstruct the medium of comics and graphic novels through the medium itself. Which, I might add, he uses in a brilliant and clever way when he illustrates – quite literally – its myriad structural techniques.
The first three chapters detail his theory behind the five structural choices (moment, frame, image, word, and flow) that the writer and artist must consider, human expression and body language that the artist must attend to, and then to the written word that the author must select for greatest effect (which may be maximized by using no words at all). These chapters, in my estimation, comprise the brainiest and most theoretical portion of the book – which may just put artistic and intellectual novices to sleep.
The last half of McCloud’s treatise focuses on world building (best exemplified in manga and more modern American comics like Watchmen and most Vertigo and indie titles), the tools of the trade (which whet my appetite for those care-free days of the 80s when I would sit down at my drawing table and pen and ink voluminous tales of super-heroics and science fiction), and genres of the three over-lapping mediums (comics, manga, and graphic novels).
If you ever held the disparaging opinion that comics are the daytime trash of the publishing industry, think again. Pick up any of McCloud’s three volumes deconstructing this under-praised and –acknowledged medium. And then pick up any one of the Eisner or Harvey winners in recent times (The Sandman, Bone, Eightball, et al.), and prepare to be awed.
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Making Comics.
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Reading Progress
Finished Reading
January 24, 2009
– Shelved
