The Rise of the Graphic Novel

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Author’s Note: This is a republished historical post after the Feb08 relaunch of Soulincode:

Graphic Novel:

A graphic novel is a novel or novella done in the medium of comics. It is typically a long-form work rather than a short publication such as an individual comic book, analogous to a novel rather than a short story. A graphic novel need not be a complete work unto itself, much as some novels are merely installments of an even longer work. When a graphic novel is a reprint of stories from a periodical publication, it is referred to as a trade paperback.

The term is also used by creators and readers who want to differentiate their work from lighter works intended for children.
Source: Wikipedia

At the time of the pioneering graphic novelists, I was still a child, an avid comics fan with a monthly subscription to many titles. Back then, I paid more attention to my favorite illustrators than writers: John Byrne, Jim Lee, Todd McFarlane. Neal Adams, Norm Breyfogle. My focus on writers rested mostly on the rule that they better provide enough story opportunities for my artists to shine.

Then I began to notice that some of these illustrators were also writers, and more importantly, that a even a great illustrator cannot hide a bad story. And then a bomb dropped within my understanding of the world: Frank Miller’s Dark Knight Returns. In this radical Batman story, an aging Bruce Wayne brings his alter-ego out of retirement to face a more deadly and violent Gotham City. Gotham is a seedy pit of apocalyptic despair, Superman a tool of the state who eventually abides by the powers-that-be to do battle with his old friend Batman…for a kid who grew up a big fan of Superman as the purest hero of mankind, this kind of writing is an absolute shock. In Frank Miller’s Gotham, good and evil exist in the grey zone, characters age and die spectacularly, and reflections of real geopolitics are integral to the plot. For older fans, this comic, along with Alan Moore’s “The Watchmen”, are the seminal works which provided the foundation needed for the steady rise and advancement of the graphic novel genre.

This post explores the current place of the graphic novel in our media culture and mythology, with a particular look at the way the graphic novel and comics are affecting Hollywood.

Whereas traditional novels rely on letters and words within sentences for symbolic representation, graphic novels and comics use a richer visual language which smoothly combines pictorial and textual symbols in a unified narrative form. The best graphic novels are a cross between poetry and graphic design, mixed with an understanding of novel and cinematic story principles. As poetry, a graphic novel’s textual story elements must be condensed, controlled, and rhythmic within a limited page space. As a graphic design, care must be taken to integrate panels, characters, landscapes, and the graphical symbols into a unified story design across time. What leads to what, where does the audience eye move on the page, how does the “reading” relate in terms of text vs. images?

In terms of book meets cinema, words, graphics, panels, dialogue, and action blur and merge in a reader’s head as the pages turn; frame to frame, the authors (writer and artist) create a continuous understanding of a visual/textual story in motion. Some graphic novels, such as Alan Moore’s infamous Watchmen, or the stories and graphics of Moebius, read cover to cover like a film storyboard sequence. At the same time, unlike cinema, the graphic novel explodes the frame/screen at times. Graphic novel panels and subpanels can be fractured, overlaid, the “frame” or “window” expanding and contracting to fit the flow and scenes. In addition, whereas the viewer of a film is locked into a 24 frame per second timecode lockstep of images, a graphic novel reader only sees keyframes of action, his/her mind filling in much of the implied motion and action of the story.

Graphic novels, comics and Japanese manga/anime represent a significant contribution to the postmodern conception of hero and myth. Only in the past few years has the entertainment market brought the more traditional aspects of this subculture to the mass market: Spiderman, The Hulk, Daredevil, The Punisher, Hellboy - all comic book characters and stories brought to the big screen. The more mainstream titles fit well into traditional epics, clear black and white divisions of heroes and villains, storylines that reinforce the American definitions of good and evil.

But there is a more complex, eye-opening underground within the graphic novel sphere, with its writers and artists overtly and covertly affecting postmodern culture. Artists like Moebius are long-time contributors to core visual and story concepts in Hollywood films like “Alien”, “Tron”, “Dune”, “The Fifth Element”, “The Abyss”, and “Blade Runner”.

Matrix creators, the Wachowski brothers, who used to write for Marvel Comics, hired Geof Darrow to create many of the visual designs for the movie. As well, the entire Matrix movie was storyboarded by comic book artists in a graphic novel style, where the panels represented keyframes of the script’s beats. This comic format not only served to inform the way the story and cinematography made it on-screen, it at first provided a strong sell-point to Hollywood executives who needed a clear easy-to-understand vision to help them visualize and understand such an ambitious film project. Later on, the brothers went on to make Matrix off-shoots that harken back to their comics and anime passions: Animatrix, animated shorts by top Japanese writers and animators that expand Matrix story, and Matrix Comics under the Burlyman label. Example of storyboard vs film:

Darren Aronofsky, writer and director of “Pi”, modeled his film’s aesthetic on Frank Miller’s “Sin City” graphic novel, a noir design with black and white, no grey tones whatsoever. A big fan of comics, Aronofsky eventually partnered with Miller to develop a film version of another title, “Ronin”. Later in his career, Warner Brothers signed Aronofsky to rework the Batman franchise along with Frank Miller, something that excited fans greatly. Unfortunately, both Ronin and the Batman collaboration have not yet yielded results onscreen, but Aronofsky is rumored to be the current director on the film adaptation of Alan Moore’s “The Watchmen”, one of the most amazing cult favorites within the graphic novel genre. Check it out:

Why are so many filmmakers, designers, writers, animators, and artists moving in these same circles of thought? The answer is easier explored via direct experience exploring the vast intellectual and story reaches of these productions. In particular, with the titles I link to via the cover images at the top of this post, there is a focus on fantasy, science fiction, cyberpunk, sociopolitics, and ways of seeing.

Much of these art forms harken back to archetypal mythologies; comic characters are complex yet graphically more simple than film or video. In this space between reality and symbolic representation lies a more fluid space to explore conscious and subconscious, where viewers have an easier time looking at drawings as a mixture of fantasy and reality. Only video games can come close to representing a form of story and media as deeply entrenched in this postmodern experience of reality.

In addition to the wide creative palette of graphic novels, the form, medium and distribution via print follows a long history of propagating fringe cultural ideas ahead of their time. The fact that this artform is relegated by most cultural critics to kids pulp fiction acts as an advantage for its subcultural camoflauge. In terms of guerilla semiotics, comics exist beneath-the-radar as coded narratives embedded within the product streams of capital. They are collectible items in the form of serials, relatively cheap and are readily accessible to youth populations. The graphic novel thus exists as a sort of cultural cryptography, replete with revolutionary ideas hidden within amazing comic book stories fit for children and adults alike. Comics are no longer just fun and games.

The header image of this post shows a cross-section of major titles to check out, from authors Frank Miller, Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Scott McCloud, Warren Ellis, and Grant Morrison. The links lead to Amazon entries for each title, where you can learn more. Below is further reading on the topic of graphic novels:

Wired Article: Moebius : Jean Giraud’s stunning cartoons scan like movies

Ugo.com : Interview of BurlyMan Matrix Comics Spencer Lamm interview with

Integrative Arts 10 : Post-Modern Graphic Novels

New York Times Magazine: Not Funnies, a look at the more novelistic and less hero/myth oriented graphic novelists like Art Spiegelman, Seth, etc.

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