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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Because of the medium, I think it is easy to read graphic novels as if they were films. It makes sense; the novels act as the drawing board for a movie, with the certain camera angles and accompanying action. Sometimes these adaptations work (The Dark Knight and Persepolis come to mind) and sometimes they doesn't (Watchmen to some extent, DragonBall Z). But I think Scott Pilgrim vs the World will end up being a solid adaptation.
http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi390202393/

Primarily, I like Michael Cera in the lead role. I know, I know, typecast. I get the backlash too. BUT typecasting doesn't make it a bad fit. Scott Pilgrim even shares some innate characteristics with Cera. They're both Canadian (Cera might even be from Toronto), they're in their early twenties, Cera plays a mean guitar while Pilgrim plays bass, they're both socially kinda awkward, they both fit into an "indie"-hipster kind of stereotype, and they even look the same for the most part. I think Cera's sense of comedy should play well into this role, kinda like a cross between his Superbad character and George Michael Bluth.

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When I first picked up Brian O’ Malley’s Scott Pilgrim, I was confused. It looked like Manga, at least drawing style wise. The content of the story was even Manga like, but it didn’t open like a regular Manga novel nor was it made by a Japanese author. It looked like a western version of Manga and that made me question its style: does it really count as Manga? Can I honestly call this comic Manga, even though it is not made in Japan?

As I asked these questions to myself, I didn’t realize that many others were having the same discussions just more publicly and online. I decided to try to find my answers through Google and as I searched online, I encountered many discussions on whether this comic could be called Manga. Specifically this online post, and the conversation that followed it, seemed to highlight the difficulties that people were having with calling this comic, Manga: http://www.earlyword.com/2010/04/09/manga-or-not-manga-that-is-the-quest....

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First blog-post in a while! Congrats to me!

Anyway, this blog post is about a trend I've started to notice (that has been going on for a whiles now) of different forms of media popping up in other forms of media, or, as I like to call it, a media cameo. Admittedly, I first thought of this while looking for a Sunday Calvin and Hobbes strip to write the analysis paper about:
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While I ultimately decided to not write about this strip, it interested me because the majority of the strip depicted motion in a frame-by-frame fashion. Normally, I would have just taken that at face value, but as we discussed earlier in this class, Scott McCloud stated that film reels, which this comic greatly resembles, were not comics. So, does that mean this strip is not a comic?

In a way, I think yes, the majority of this strip is not, in fact, a comic, but a cartoon. If that doesn't quite fly, then perhaps it's a comic with a cartoon plopped into the middle of it for comedic effect, or a media cameo.

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References