Comics

Comics are representative of consumer culture both as forms of entertainment (consumption) and as reflections of popular culture and subcultural groups. Themes central to critiques of consumer culture, including the sexualization of women, fantasy, hedonism, escapism, violence, erotica, and visions of utopia, are represented, captured, and mimicked in comics.

The term comics, generally speaking, is used to deal with both newspaper comics, comic books (which are magazines), and all other kinds of narrative texts or art forms that have the following characteristics: they are told in drawings; the drawings usually are in frames; there are recurring characters; the dialogue is in balloons; other information is found in panels, often at the bottom of frames. All of these conventions are sometimes violated but [Page 209]generally speaking, comic strips and comic books follow them.

In his book, Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, which is itself a comic book, Scott McCloud suggests the best way to characterize comics is to start with the way the comics artist Will Eisner does, as “sequential art.” Comics differ from cartoons in that cartoons generally are found in a single frame, don't have recurrent characters or a narrative line, and generally do not have dialogue in balloons. Cartoons generally have text in captions underneath the frame of the cartoon. Not all cartoons are humorous, either. There are funny cartoons but there are also political cartoons that comment on events of importance.

In analyzing comics, there are three components of comics to consider: the art style, the narrative line, and the dialogue. While this discussion focuses on comics in the United States, it must be understood that comics are a global art form, and there are important and interesting comics in most countries.

The art style of comic strip artists varies from realistic portrayals, such as Alex Raymond's Flash Gordon and Harold R. Foster's Prince Valiant, to highly stylized ones, such as Walt Kelly's Pogo, Al Capp's Li'l Abner, Charles Schulz's Peanuts, and Chester Gould's Dick Tracy. Gould's use of grotesques such as “The Mole” and “Flattop” and strong blacks and whites made his strip a powerful one. It was one of the first, if not the first, to show murders and graphic violence. Comics artists also use bold face lettering to emphasize certain words and make use of certain graphic conventions, such as having thoughts appear in little clouds.

In addition to the art style found in a comic, the narrative line must also be considered. Humorous comics generally have a narrative that ends with some kind of resolution each day, whereas serious or dramatic comic strips have episodes that continue for weeks or months.

The final consideration is the way language is used in comics, which often embraces regional dialects and mimicry by way of offering a commentary on popular culture. George Herriman's Krazy Kat illustrates the subtleties of comics language. The plot of this strip was always the same: Ignatz Mouse, a malevolent mouse, spends all his time and energy figuring out how to “Krease that Kat's bean with a brick.” Defending Krazy is Offisa B. Pupp, who loves Krazy and struggles valiantly and usually unsuccessfully to prevent Ignatz from hitting Krazy. In the first frame of one episode, Pupp sees Ignatz hitting Krazy with a brick. He says “Transgression.” In the next frame, he grabs Ignatz and says “Apprehension.” In the third frame, he takes Ignatz under his arm and heads toward jail. He says “Retribution.” In the final frame, the jail hasn't been drawn, so Pupp says “WA-A-L … Finish it!!! Y'got Kartoonist's Kramp?” and Krazy says “Ah. Sweet Procrastination.”

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