Tales From the Crypt

Tales From the Crypt brought me back to my childhood since I used to watch these as show adaptations.  They were very dark and never had a good ending.  This was a problem for parents and adult figures in the community.  It was something they thought were influencing children in a negative way.  Unfortunately, this was the reason for the demise of the series. 

I thought it was interesting the way the series was told from the perspective of the Crypt Keeper.  Occasionally he pops up throughout the story lines, but for the most part he was a creepy character only half seen sitting in a sinister looking crypt.  Every story is different, kind of like how Twilight Zone is set up.  The different stories always kept me reading because even though the story was over, you wanted to know more about the characters and what happens after their horrible events.

The demise of these comics was unfortunate.  The line was drawn in the sand, so to speak, for the difference between adult and children’s comics.  It put in place a censorship system that would change the world of comics.  Today, the internet has provided us a way to get the comics that would have been censored or sold underground. Before the use of the internet, though, it would have been much more difficult for the comics to thrive.  This is why many comic series by EC comics did not survive.  

Underground Comics

This week we read some examples of underground comics.  This by far was my favorite week.  Some of the comics I read were Tits and Clits, Tijuana Bibles, and The Furry Freak Brothers.  These comics covered everything from sex and drugs to rock and roll.  The best part about the The Furry Freak Brothers was the story line about Fat Freddy’s cat.  The story line about the Furry Freak Brothers themselves was stoners getting into everyday trouble.  But the cat seemed to have more character development. 

Tijuana Bibles were funny.  It was kind of poorly drawn, but still gave a style that was easy to follow.  They were short and to the point, which was nice.  Looking at the way they treat the sexual encounters with women were a bit sexist.  It is so outrageous it is difficult not to take these comics’ view on women as a joke.  They are there to do nothing more then please the men involved, especially in the “Erroll Slim: Shoots an Arrow?”  I think it would have been better if the women were more then just a means to an end.  None the less these comics were entertaining.  

Maus and Barefoot Gen

This week in lit class, it got pretty heavy, reading comics from a different and a closer perspective to World War II.  I was introduced to Anne Frank in sixth grade when learning about World War II.  However, as an adult, reading stories like Maus and watching movies like Barefoot Gen brings on an entirely new perspective for me.  It is so beyond emotional because you do become attached to the characters.  Maus is the story of Art Spiegelman’s father, who was a survivor of the Holocaust.  

This story changed the minds of many to include comics as a legitimate form of narrative beyond children’s stories.  It is a graphic novel in which there are parallel stories both involving Valdek, who is Art’s father.  Art Spiegelman is telling an autobiographical story involving the journey he and his father are taking to become closer in the present day line.  The other story is about Valdek’s story of survival during the Holocaust.  With the use of his animal characters paralleling the real life people involved with the story, it adds a humor element that makes this comic easier to digest as opposed to Barefoot Gen. 

Arriving at Non-Verbal Communication

The Arrival is a wordless comic.  In this comic, you are able to gather a story about this immigrant without words for communication.  Just for a moment, let us stop and think about non-verbal communication.  At first thought, it is very difficult.  The average person uses words so frequently; it is difficult to imagine what it would be like without them.  However, the reality is just about 86% of all communication is non-verbal.  How you may ask?  It is about the body language and facial expressions.  This comic is successful at utilizing these elements as well as the environments Tan depicts.  There is one particular point where Tan depicts the immigrant trying using his non-verbal skills.  It is difficult for him to communicate since he obviously does not speak the language of his new environment. 

Which, speaking about the environments, are amazing.  The surrealism in the environments makes this comic, in my opinion, timeless.  Plus, everyone can relate to this story since there will be a time in everyone’s lives that you will be in a new and uncomfortable environment.  The immigrant’s story is literally about someone moving to a new and foreign country where he has to learn to adapt.  People will always be adaptable, or we would not survive. 

Contracts With God Never Work Out

In the comic Contract With God by Will Eisner, I found that the character Frimme Hersh was not able to catch a break.  It was akin to a Twilight Zone story.  Right as he thinks he finds happiness, he drops dead.  I feel like his story is very parallel to the story of Moses.  Moses has the stone tablets stating the Ten Commandments, which is his version of a contract with God.  Frimme has the stone tablet he wrote when he was younger.  Moses never got to the promise land.  He dropped dead before he could reach it, which is totally mind-boggling.  Moses followed what God told him to do almost to perfection, but he doubted God for one second and he dies.  In Contract With God, Frimme doesn’t really break the contract to begin with, but God breaks the contract.  It is a story of intense anger and you get that in the story.  You can really feel his rage and feel bad for him.  But, by the end of the story, his death doesn’t hit me like I thought it might.  He spites the very thing that tried to help him through his daughter’s death.  The tenants did not deserve to be treated the way he did.  But I know this was not supposed to be happy ending.  I feel like the way Eisner wrote the story almost made me feel more anger then if Frimme had been a nice guy through the entire story.  He became a dirty old man and died with that appearance, even if he had changed his mind about his ways right before his heart attack.  I guess the moral of the story is, don't make a contract with God.