Aren Agocha Comics and Graphic Narrative 2020

  I read the comic book called Maus. It is the events of the nazi party in world war two told with cats and mice. I find this way of telling the story to be brilliant, showing the nazi party's predatory nature towards the Jewish community and many other minorities similar to the stereotype of cats hunting mice. The story starts with the main character sad that his friends skated away without him and when his skates broke and complaining to his father about it. We got a good idea of the personality of this father when he said to his son, "be locked together in a room with no food or water, and for a week, then you could see what it is, friends"'. He is a lot more rough and condescending based on the experiences he has been through during the war. Later on in life, He came back to see his father and remarried wife, who had also lived through the war.  He asked his father about the war and what was like to live in Poland. The story goes back and forth between the son'

 I read, "I saw it the atomic bomb of Hiroshima"  I was curious how they were going to tackle these heavy subjects in this type of media. For underground comics, this is their chance to bring people into these horrific events and show that comic books are not just used for children's media. Comic books can tell the world's stories through illustration and text. For this comic book Keiji Nakazawa these this personal story of the horrific event of the Hiroshima bombing. And with this, he allows the audience also to have this first-person experience of these events. I liked how they used the halftones for the colors and even made the decision to color it at all. In the comic, He went through his experiences when he was younger and had to go into the bomb Air raid shelters late nights wet and cold every night and not having enough food to eat every day. The anxiety they must have felt every day, not only the children but also the parents knowing what is happening just try

 I have never read the Calvin and Hobbs stories before; however, I have heard many things about Calvin and Hobbs, and a lot of merchandise is produced to this day. These comics clearly connected with a lot of people, so I was glad I finally had the chance to read them. I enjoyed the Calvin and Hobbs stories. They were very wholesome, and I chuckled a few times while reading. The stories at first were mainly about the perspective of a child very involved with his imagination. The child started making comments that insurance and polls, but with a little kid's naivety, just hear these words from his parents.  I thought it was funny that the father and mother were so tired but still played along with Calvin's imagination. I liked how the audience could see both the reality of the stuffed animal and the imaginary tiger. Calvin's character is written like an actual child, both curious and sarcastic. The short comics brought me back to how it feels when I was little and played wit

The first comic I read was 'Cheech Wizard.' The plot was mainly about a wizard hat with legs being a challenge to a Russian officer's space race. The story was based on some propaganda where the cap, which I am assuming is Cheech, made fun of the proud Russian and his beliefs most of the time. And the more I think about it; they are probably talking about the real space race where the U.S and other countries were fighting to get to the moon but played in a fun and silly cartoon way. The rest of the comic was just the hat going on mini adventures and getting into trouble while using more adult topics and profanity. The next one I read was The little green dinosaur no1. It was a small green dino walking into a castle, cleaning and dusting off a rug where a Djinn lived inside who threw him into a portal for an adventure. In the first story, the Wizard of Oz, it played the whole story, but with a lizard instead of Dorthy and honesty until he finds the wizard and goes off to ano

 I loved the art in these Graphic novels. The book I read was Contract with God by Will Eisner. The issue I kept having with Contract with God was that I was so infatuated with the beautiful drawings I was not paying much attention to the story at first. I have this issue with many graphic novels that I read. I enjoy art and forget to read the story. The contract with God, the stories are dark. They don't have much of a happy ending. The story feels much more real and adult, seeing the world's hard truth that good people can and will get abused and hurt. Not every relationship is honest. The book talks about the darkest stories in and around the city with so much visual detail. I felt it was soo cool to see how the artist was able to capture the rain's heaviness on the clothes and the people. Each character's face can see the wrinkles, and each facial feature is so distinct. I read Blankets next, and the two novels are very different but just as well crafted. All of the

  After reading some of the featured artists' work for this week, I saw significant patterns in each work. I have heard from many others why many of these comics are so appealing and transcendent. I think that the comic I enjoyed the most was the ducktail series.  I have never read the Ducktales comics, but these characters are timeless and icons created by  Carl Barks's storytelling. With his storytelling, you get to know the characters' personalities quite well in a short amount of time. The comic was so wholesome with these cute animal characters, but each story made me feel very invested in their stories. I wanted to see each adventure with these characters and environments to the end. I enjoyed the suspense to make the reader want to turn the iconic page, characters, and their clear relationships, High adventure, and mystery. These ideas seem to be a common theme between these series with these characters in order to make an appealing comic. And the stories did not bec

   I have never read the Ducktales comics, but I was finally excited to read these famous works. All of these characters are timeless and iconic. I wanted to read these stories as I had never met these characters before to see what it was like when they were first introduced. I really enjoyed  Carl Barks's storytelling. With his storytelling, you get to know the characters' personalities quite well and their relationships with each other in just a couple of panels. You learn their goals, their enemies, and their families. The relationships feel natural like they have been there for years and the characters bounce off each other very well, and the conversation feels very natural and fun. The story throughout the comic links all the way from the beginning to the end. It's continuous, unlike the others I have seen where they break up into other stories. I like how the adventure continues to escalate and has an ending. I enjoyed the problem-solving scenarios that the characters

  I think EC comics dose well when talking about the adult issues while it hits on scary mysteries mixed with science fiction. Tales of the crypt was based more on horror stories. I had heard about this before but did not know it was a comic book.  I understand that after the comic with the Gore and adult concepts were unsettling to many parents. The imagines in the comics are based a bit more on realism and have more gore. I think the more realistic characters helps with the fear factors in the imagery. These comics genuinely stuck out to me with it science mystory and fiction to be a bit more interesting than the Saturday morning cartoon comics. For example, The first story was From Weird Fantasy. I love reading about weird mysteries, so I was curious about the mystery about the abandoned town.  The story was about a man in a town on mars, but the town was abandoned, and he started to panic. The adult Idea of finding someone to be with but put to the extreme of being the last people

  The first comic I read for Jack Kirby was the "New Gods." I had never heard about these comics before now. Every page is very bright with color and saturation. It is a Science fiction story about Heros, who call themselves the New Gods since the old gods died off in the last war.  The story focuses on Orion, the main character, and focuses on traveling to the different worlds, trying to save the universe from a second war. Orion, in his actions, feels more like an anti-hero. He is fighting to save the universe, but the way he fights, he seems like he will do anything to get what he needs. The Second piece I looked at was Jack Kirby's Fantastic Four storyboards. I was very interested in how Jack Kirby would show his storyboard work, and His story Boards are just as clear and as detailed as his comic pages.  There was still a lot of movement, and the story was so clear I did not have to read the script to understand what was happening in the storyboards. The story is Wiza