Movement in The Killing Joke

The Killing Joke is an origin story for the famously known Batman villain, the Joker. The story follows the clown in a pre-Joker era, where he is a family man attempting to make ends meet. He then begins to roll with the wrong crowd in a desperate attempt for money and tries to break into the chemical plant he used to work at. A confrontation with police officers ensue, to which the man panics and runs, falling into toxic waste just inches before Batman is able to catch him.

Movement throughout The Killing Joke, according to Wolk, movement of a comic in general is strongly in one direction, panel to panel flow—but not exclusively. When this flow is interrupted, however, the effect it has on the comic as a whole is that it makes readers pause to take in the shift/change of flow. This can be done, as it is in the above two page spread, with placements of character in panel space. It is evident that Batman is interrupting the flow of comics temporarily to prevent the would-be Joker from falling into the toxic waste. The irony of this is that Batman is usually the one trying to prevent Joker from causing mayhem in Gotham, thus creating another layer of meaning in the placement of characters in this space. Furthermore, Moore and Bolland’s choice of doing this creates another added tension in the sequence, and as Hatfield would describe, comics is the art of tensions. 

- Alyssa Litynesky

Flashback in the New Ms. Marvel # 1

                In this issue of Ms. Marvel, the creators, G. Willow Wilson, Takesha Miyazawa, and Adrian Alphona, have used a number of elements to indicate that a flashback is occurring. The first element are the words spray-painted on the wall “ Bruno and Mike Meet Cute!”, which is what Gerard Genette calls a paratext. Paratexts are elements that surround a text and present it.

PG.21                                                                                       PG. 21

Specifically, this is a peritext, which is a paratext located within a text, for instance a chapter title, which is essentially what these words are.  This peritext indicates a change to the reader, as it is the only such internal title. Additionally, in the context of the character’s conversation , the discussion of when Bruno and Mike became a couple, the reader can easily recognize this peritext as an indicator of a flashback. Looking at the context of the conversation is an example of the multimodal reading of this section.  As Dale Jacobs explains, comic books are read in multiple modes, readers make meaning through multiple modes of conveying information, verbal, visual, gestural, ect. In this case, the conversation that gives context is verbal information, and important information is also gained visually, through the change in clothing. Bruno, while in the same location, is wearing significantly different clothing, indicating a shift in time. Additional visual information is gained through the peritext, via Groensteen’s idea of braiding. The peritext is surrounded by elements that are taken from the previous run of Ms. Marvel, for instance, the simplified cartoon Kamala and the sloth with wings. These are arthorlogical connections to the previous run, connections that the reader can braid together and understand that the following sequence is a flashback. In essence, it can be recognized as happening before the current run.  The most obvious indicator of a flashback is also visual, and it is the change in art style and page layout. The style changes from a fairly clean line to a sketchier style, the large clean gutters with distinct panel lines become rough edges with small gutters and panels that often overlap, the art stops being contained and breaks out of the panel.  This style is the style of the previous run, and in fact the entire flashback sequence was drawn by the previous run’s artist (Adrian Alphona). All these call backs to the previous run depend on the reader’s resources for design, on whether or not they read the previous run. If they did, they can use braiding to connect all these elements and easily recognize the flashback. For readers who did not read the previous run, it is still recognizable as a flashback because the shift in style and clothes is distinct, and the peritext is clear enough. The creators used the available affordances of comics to make the flashback clear to first time readers, and also to reward readers who have been reading since the beginning.

 (PG. 22)

Nathanya Barnett

The "Mise-en-page" of Tokyo Ghost #2

Thierry Groensteen's theory of "spatio-topia" has held my interest throughout the semester, especially with regards to what Groensteen refers to as "mise-en-page" or "page layout." The different ways that comics artists manipulate the "distribution of spaces" and "occupation of places" on a page-by-page basis to create meaning are simply fascinating to me. To this day, creators continue to innovate as they find new ways to use paneling and other methods of manipulating space to communicate their narrative or get across some kind of idea or emotion to the reader.  This fact is more evident than ever in Issue #2 of Tokyo Ghost, written by Rick Remender with art by Sean Murphy and colouring by Matt Hollingsworth, which features numerous examples of creative use of page layout.

The first instance we'll examine comes from page 7 of the issue. After a meeting with their employer, Debbie and Led descend down from the enormous shopping mall into the city streets and eventually the sewers through which they will make their escape out of Los Angeles. The makeup of the page is quite ambiguous, with only the top panel distinct as its own entity. The rest of the page is marked by the scene pictured above.  What appears to be a burn mark tears across the page, separating the high-class people of the surface from the impoverished commoners living underground. Although the mark draws a clear line between the two scenes, they remain connected through the path our two heroes take to get from one to another. It is also worth noting that the marking tears through not only the panels, but the gutter as well. This drastic image could easily imply a change in more than just scenery.

The second striking use of page layout comes on page 9. Led, after being "woken up" from his tech-induced mental slumber, experiences a shock to the senses that is displayed through a burst of panels varying in shape and size. The panels show scenes from different points in Led's life and are imposed over a close-up of his pained and deranged face. This image combined with the layout of the panels paint an effective portrait of Led's current mental state. The reader can almost feel the emotions exploding from within him, and may even have a difficult time taking in all of the information presented to them. The "fhraaaa--!" present in the speech bubble indicated that Led is having a similarly difficult time.

The final page worth noting is one that I already touched on in my paper, so I'll keep it brief. The usage of colour, paneling and page layout on page 12 to tell Led's backstory is simply exquisite. The choice to let the images do the taking while providing supplementary information via text along the sides of the page comes across strong. It's thanks to the smart layout that readers are able to digest the story the way they want, and ultimately read into the narration at whatever pace they feel fit. 

Written By: Andrew Masse

Works Cited:

Groensteen, Thierry. The System of Comics. Tr. Bart Beaty, Nick Nguyen. The University Press of Mississippi, 2007.