Maus

I’ll be honest; I wasn’t excited to read Maus, because it is another Holocaust or World War II story. I do not mean to be offensive or insulting, but I am just not a fan of those stories. When reading, I found that in multiple places, I had to re-read pages, because of how it was written. The story seemed as if it was translated straight from Polish, or whatever language it was originally written in. Some of the translations were a little difficult to understand because of mixed up word placement, though it was only a minor problem. Though it was early in the story, one thing that stood out to me most was the joke that Spiegelman’s father made. When his father was telling about his birth, and the way his arm used to twitch, earning him the name “Hail Hitler”, I was so surprised that they could even make those jokes after what they had gone through. As much as I did not want to read Maus, after I started reading I got pulled in because it wasn’t exactly, like all the other stories. To start, I like that it was a story about writing a story, which made it more entertaining than just reading the story. I also like that it was a lot of pre war story, talking about how everything lead up to the war. Things I noticed in the story that were clever, was most obviously, the portrayal of the different characters. The Nazis were cats, and the Jews were mice, which gave the reader a real sense of evilness, of the Nazis and helplessness of the Jews. Because of this, I was really surprised whenever the Nazi characters showed compassion, or made jokes because based on the way they were drawn, I perceived them as being ruthless, heartless, and in general evil. A specific instance was with “The Shooter,” and how after learning Spiegelman’s name, he let him go with no hassle at all. Over all, I like the story better than I thought I would, though I did not get to finish it completely. 

Underground Comics

After reading the underground comics I noticed the big theme was sex and drugs. I read a story about a green dinosaur, (I can't remember the exact name) and this dinosaur by some miracle was easily picking up ladies and haveing relations with them in what seemed to be every other line. At a few points in the comic, the dinosaur is with multiple women at once. I wasn't really disturbed or offended by these comics, but was more so surprised. I was surprised that the comics were so blunt, and open. Also, that there were so many of them and they were so popular. I have no problem with them it's just surprising because there seems to be a lot more censorship now, or maybe I am just not looking in the places where these are sold. Either way, it was interesting seeing the "adult" side of comics.

Underground Comics

Based on all the underground comics we read in class, the general story line consisted of getting high and having sex. I read a comic about a green dinosaur (I forget the exact title), and every other line was this little dinosaur getting with one woman, then the next page he was with two, and it progressed to the dinosaur being with four or five women. I guess I'm used to comics and other forms of entertainment being a bit more reserved, and the underground comics all caught me off guard. I wasn't offended or disturbed, but surprised at how big the comics were and how much of them there were. I wasn't a fan of them, because I'm a big super hero lover, and the stories were pretty weak, specifically, the green dinosaur, but after reading and figuring out what these comics were about, it was to be expected.

Will Eisner

I did not read Blankets, based on the responses I heard in class, so I decided I'd read some of Eisner's other work. Though, I was sure the movie and the comic would be very different, I wanted to read some of the Spirit. I actually had a hard time reading it just because of the accents the characters had, and how they accented words were written. I had to actually read the story out loud to get the sounds right so I could figure out the words. But once I got the language of the Spirit down, I enjoyed it a lot. I was pretty entertained with Ebony. It/he/whatever, was just a funny character, mostly just because of how he was drawn, more so than what he says or does.

Early Comics

I read Tales from the Crypt, and as the name suggests the stories were a bit grim. The story that struck me most was the one with the prisoner trying to escape the island prison. The fact that he went through all that planning and did all those outrageous things amazed me. I could not see my self, for one killing a man, then desecrating that man's body, stealing his clothes, to hide out in a coffin on a boat only to be thrown over board that. I guess if you are really that desperate you'll do anything, but looking at it from where I am now, I just could not do that.