1. Uzumaki
I like manga so Uzumaki was bound to rank high for my list but it was more than that. Uzumaki has a dark mood that slowly smoothers you. The images are striking in all of their gory detail and the book throws things at me that I have seen before (Shuichi’s dad rolled up in the tub). What can I say, the spiral drew me in.

2. Watchmen

The colors are bold and the characters are doubly. I loved the way Watchmen brought the superhero down to our level and rolled it in the mud. Also it was really fun picking out all of those little details that seemed to pop up everywhere. The only thing keeping this from number 1 was the ending, it just sort of deflates there.

3. Fun Home

When I first started my list Fun Home was further down but it crept up. Out of all of biography types of graphic novels we read, I really liked Fun Home the best. I think the way it was not entirely in chronological order made it stand out. Bechdel created this more like a flow of consciousness that while terrible in Jimmy Corrigan was pulled off well here. Interesting characters and attention to detail round out the reasons I liked this.

4. Dark Knight

Female Robin. End Post.

Seriously though the Dark Knight visually was stunning with all of the water colors creating a very muddy and dirty Gotham. The storyline was much more mature than your average Batman, and seeing Superman shriveled up like a raisin made my day.

5. American Born Chinese

The artwork for ABC was very clean and simple. I felt like I was reading something the vein of the TV shows like Dexter’s Lab during the monkey king parts. This was a good thing. Chinky made my day when he was first introduced and I loved how honestly stereotypical he was (which turned out to be a major part of the plot). An interesting story with moral to it rounded this book out.

6. Maus

The story was the major driving point in Maus. I found Vladek’s story captivating in its honesty and detail. The art for Maus would have to be its week point. I liked the few visual easter eggs (like the swastika road), but there just were not enough of them. The characters looked blain and that may have been intentional but it often made it difficult to tell who was who.

7. Persepolis

As with Maus the story was the major driving point for this well, but unlike Maus it was not as compelling. Marjane’s story really starts to drag its heels when she goes to Europe and though it picks up when she comes home I don’t think it ever recaptures the interest I had at the beginning. There are even less visual easter eggs than Maus and the art did not even have the novelty of critter people to make it standout.

8. Jimmy Corrigan

Ugh

Ok I know this was suppose to simulate the confusion of the main character but you know what? Confusion is not pleasant and I really don’t feel like going through a confusing book. I would not have finished this if it were not for class. The main character is also about as unlikeable as you can get, and in a confusing bunch of whatever for a story, a compelling main character could have kept me anchored but no. Jimmy alienated himself from me like few characters have. By the end of the story I was praying for him to spontaneously explode.

I find it interesting that the assigned section covers Marjane’s identity crisis. I don’t know if it what was by design or coincidence but it was nice either way.
The first chapter of the section for the week was The Vegetable. I like how it started off with a very detailed look into the awkwardness of growing into an adult. The self consciousness of how you know they are staring at your foot that is bigger than the other one, or that random mole or blemish. It is an interesting look into the personal fable of all teenagers.
The more Marjane tries to fit in the more she ends up becoming the person everyone else wanted her to be. She cuts her hair to look more punk, and smokes joints because her friends do. There is even a point that she lies about heritage at a bar to just fit in.
She goes back and forth between moments of experimentation and returning to herself. After she gives up the punk look she goes through a brief period of returning to herself, but then she starts dating. It is no longer about pleasing everyone, but instead pleasing that one person. Marjane even goes as far as becoming a drug dealer for Jean Paul.
Finally when she returns home she finds out how far her life in Europe has taken her from what she was. In one scene her girl friends ask her about sex and when Marjane tells them she has had sex with multiple men they call her a whore. She goes from one extreme a sexual revaluation to the repressed ways of the fundamentalists. At this point I think it is when Marjane realizes that her attempts to be accepted in Europe made it so she no longer fit in at home.
I think it is sad to what lengths people will go to fit in. Peer pressure is a powerful thing, even more so when a person is in an experimental stage of their life. In trying to find where she would fit in during her years in Europe, Marjane loses sight of everything she was. The thing I found profound about this section is that this is where the influences of Marjane’s past mix with her present desire to be accepted, and are boiled down in the crucible of her adolescence to leave behind what will solidify into the person she becomes. It is a very personal journey and one she is lucky to survive despite her suicide attempt.
Also just to add about Marjane’s suicide attempt, I wonder if it was something did wholly on her own or was it because of a compounding effect of the drugs. Anti-depressants have a history of provoking suicidal thoughts, even more so for anyone still going through adolescences because of the constant fluctuation of hormones.

I was really taken aback by the quote we looked at in Tuesday’s class. I cannot imagine how anyone could say something so pretentious and just plain wrong. Then again people never fail to surprise.

Needless to say that I defiantly think the art of Persepolis is capable of standing on its own. As I looked through the pages picking panels that I found would look particularly good in a frame on some art exhibit wall I started to analyze the style Satrapi choose to use.

I am no stranger to black and white comics because I am a major fan of manga which is mostly black and white with some gray shading. It seems to me that there a few different reasons why Satrapi choose to black and white. First of all I just don’t think color would have been appropriate for something as serious as this. Color while pretty is just too cheerful, and it would have been more so considering the abstract art style would take on a child’s picture book look if it were rendered in color. The abstract pared down style is essential to Persepolis because like McCloud said the more abstract something is the more people can identify with it. Satrapi’s target audience are non-Iranians, so this style allows the reader to better identify with the main character and her life in Iran. More detailed illustrations while potentially more faithful to the story would only serve to alienate the audience.

I think the monochrome is also a play on irony. Many people will go into Persepolis with a very stilted media biased view of what Iran is like. The first thing that crossed my mind when I thought Iran before reading Persepolis was terrorism and the extremist fundamentalists. Persepolis breaks down this view built up by mass media and really makes it more personal. In short Satrapi lures the reader in with the black and white they are expecting, but then the only place they really find it is in the ink and paper.

When I started reading Maus, I quickly recognized that the artwork while adequate to tell its story was not on the same level as The Dark Knight Returns, or the Watchmen. At first this put me off but after a few pages the art grew on me a bit. While not as evocative as graphic novels and I did some interesting things like the different animals for the different ethnics and Vladek wearing the pig mask when he faked being a non Jewish Polish.
What I noticed above all else though is that Maus reads more like a novel than anything else we have read so far. When I think of the story I see more of my own mental images in my mind than Spiegelman’s art. At first I found this a bit unsual but I kept reading the story really pulled me. Soon I was at ease with the feel of Spiegelman’s work and the pages started to fly by.
The story itself is the strongest point of Maus so far. The dynamic between Art and Vladek as father recounts his story to his son is very relatable and familiar. I often see much of my own relationship with my father play out between the two with their simple family banter. I feel this really made the story more approachable which is important with such a grave plot.
Vladek’s tale is a bit slow at first but picks up when he goes off to war. I found the scene on page 50 to particularly chilling as Vladek shoots an enemy solider disguised as tree and continued to shoot him even after he surrendered. The story only grew more depressing from there, hopefully there will be some light at the end of this tunnel.