The Graphic Novel

In class this semester we have focused a lot on various film adaptations. Of the adaptation we actually watched, Watchmen and Ghost World, it became clear to me that much of the graphic novel is lost in translation. This is not to say that I did not enjoy them or that they did not have any value. I just feel that some of the most interesting things about the comics were lost or edited out in the movies. In my opinion the form and use of symmetry was by far the most fascinating and meaningful element within Watchmen. These elements were not really included or stressed in the movie the way they were in the novel. In Ghost World the random cast of characters and the apparent lack of a storyline – the series of random conversations and events, as well as the idea of nostalgia are all kind of muted in the movie. There is much more of a focus on outside characters, less nostalgia, and a much more distinct storyline.

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After viewing Watchmen the movie, I knew it had to happen. In fact, I’m sure everyone knew it was going to happen. Never, except for maybe the Harry Potter movies, has a movie kept true to its book form. So surprise, surprise, director Zack Snyder left out some key things and also tweaked parts here and there, in particular the ending. Yet I’m sure those with a keen eye noticed Snyder wasn’t nearly that bad of a hatchet man, as he did in fact include several important facets of the book inside the movie, although they just weren’t as visible.

Now, to his credit and mainly to be fair, all that changing likely had to be done. After all, America’s attention span is less than an inch long and it’s tough for action movies to be successful while dragging on for three-plus hours. And hey, the movie adaptation could have been a lot worse (think Catwoman on this one).

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We have been bandying around the idea of adaptation now for quite some time and though it is not the same, it makes me think of redoing or revamping old comics. This can apply to published, physical comic books but the phenomenon that I am referring to happens more often and with greater ease in webcomics. Publishing something online brings to light questions that paper comics do not have to deal with. Instead of retconning an issue the artist can simply delete the comic, or edit it. Spelling and color mistakes, once pointed out, are generally fixed. Many webcomics that have been in production over a period of a few years show a significant change in the artist’s style. This begs the question of whether or not an artist should redo his or her older comics to match the new style for continuity purposes. Not only that, but in redoing the comic is the artist simply updating his comic strip, or creating a completely new one? Questionable Content is one such webcomic that has significantly changed over time. The image to the left shows a panel from the third comic strip which was published in 2003, whereas the one on the right shows the same scene that the author, Jeph Jacques, drew recently.

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Many people have recently been blogging about adaptations, namely graphic novel to movie. I also am going to talk about an adaptation, but what I stumbled upon was the graphic novel version of Coraline. Coraline was a book written by Neil Gaiman (yes, same author who wrote the Sandman series) which was then made into a movie, and then apparently made into a graphic novel. I would argue that though it is still an enjoyable read, the whole Coraline franchise has been taken too far.
I have read the book, watched the movie, and have now read the graphic novel. Out of the three of these different portrayals, the graphic novel brings the least amount of new life to the story. My biggest problem with it is that it is presented for the most part as a novel that just happens to have pictures. The illustrator P. Craig Russell uses many aspect-to-aspect transitions between the panels which at first is seemingly inventive, but lends itself to the novel medium.

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So I got halfway through this exact blog post and the internet went out, so here's for round two.

Unlike I think a lot of my classmates, my only real venture into the sci-fi genre, in any medium, is the television show LOST. I love lost. I would do unspeakable things to keep LOST in my life forever. unfortunately this is the final season. fortunately last night was the season premier and it was totally B.A.

But the whole time i was thinking of a way to immortalize lost outside of the medium. Of course, dvds are a solid way for now, but as technology changes, I don't want a modern classic of a story to be, pardon the pun, lost. So i thought about turning it into a book, but the story is too closely linked with the direction and cinematography, and so the best way to adapt it would be graphic novel.

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I can't stop thinking about adaptations. Book to comic, comic to movie, book to movie, movie to book, you name it! This probably stems from my unquenchable thirst for anything that has anything to do with a story I like. One of the things I love about Zack Snyder's movie adaptation of Alan Moore's Watchmen is just how much STUFF there is to go with it. So much of the process of making that movie was documented. I watched those video journals as soon as they became available on the Warner Brothers Watchmen RSS Feed, that's for sure. But in my search for all things Watchmen, I stumbled across something most interesting: the art of Adam Hughes. Hughes worked with Snyder on 300 and was asked to design the look of the characters in the movie. Hughes has since released several of these sketches and his influence on the designs is obvious.

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