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From: gino@sdchema.UUCP (Eugene G. Youngerman)
Newsgroups: net.comics
Subject: what comics are?!?!?!?
Message-ID: <183@sdchema.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 24-Jun-84 18:58:26 EDT
Article-I.D.: sdchema.183
Posted: Sun Jun 24 18:58:26 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 27-Jun-84 02:49:46 EDT
Organization: UC San Diego Chemistry Dept.
Lines: 62

I've been following the comments on this with interest.
It's also a question I have been asking myself.  Of course, its
all tied up with the question that we all must have been asked
about a million times:  "Why are you, an intelligent, mature
XX (fill in a number) year old person still reading comic
books?".  You all know the question, it comes form parents,
siblings, lovers, husbands, wives,and even total strangers.
My answer is....Entertainment.  And a lot of things are tied
up in that.  Comics are pretty, they are short, (in terms of
how long they take to consume), and sometimes they even make me
laugh (or cry).  {Manthing 9-10 still make me cry, so did that
recent story in Spiderman with 'The Kid who collected Spiderman'}

Anyway, on to the point (maybe).

Let's examine comics, as compared to other forms of story
telling. 

1)  Comics are a combination of words and pictures.  This in itself
    is enough of a difference from regular text books.  As a matter
    of fact, the only other forms that I can think of like this
    are magazines, and movies (TV, and cartoons included).
2)  The stories are told with the pictures.
    this is a big difference between comics and for example Time
    Magazine.
3)  Comics are self-paced.
    By this, a comic is read at a pace chosen by the reader.  With
    movies (etc.) the pace is determined by producer (director, 
    editor, whomever).  Of course, a videotape gives the consumer
    some measure of control.  But its hard to watch a movie backwards,
    and I have read many a comic backwards.  {Or sideways, thank you
    John Byrne and Dave Sim}.
4)  Comics have different size picture panels.
    This is a big difference from the movies, hwere the size of
    the screen is the size of the screen.  When a comic artist 
    wants to make something more important, he can play with
    page position, or even just blow up the whole thing to
    a full page panel.  (Boy, what a horrible sentence.  Good thing
    I'm a chemist, and not a writer.)


So, what is the conclusion?

Comics are a medium of story-telling.  And they are totally unique
in the way they can tell a story.  Of course, they are very well
suited to fantasy, superhero and other.  But, as has been pointed
out frequently and recently, they can be adapted to other kinds
of STORIES just as well.  Is Jon Sable fantasy?  Is Cerebus not
Satire?  (and not just of comics?)  How about all the old western
comics?  Or the War stories?  

I for one am glad that the creators of comics have now realized this,
(or re-realized it), and are giving us lots of different kinds of 
stories.  Fantasy, superhero, space-opera, western, everything.

COMICS ARE FOR STORIES

I am 
GINO!

ps.  The intro to the reprint of the Kree Skrull War stuff had
     an interesting editorial, comparing comics to movies, sort of.