The Art of the Panel

No. Not even in the face of armageddon.  Never compromise. Watchmen pops up all over the place when discussing comic books, and for good reason. It is the universal holy grail of the graphic novel genre, the pinnacle of comic storytelling, and as complex and deep a run as any before or after have come. This one broke the map, and critics and scholars are still analyzing its themes and symbolism decades later. Writer Alan Moore and artist Dave Gibbons outdid themselves, creating a masterpiece satire of the superhero genre while bringing the comic industry from the bronze age into the modern one. It was the pinnacle of darker, more thoughtful storytelling that weighed the actions of superheroes with real-world consequences. Ironic, given the lack of actual superheroes within the story itself. Watchmen features a cast of morally grey characters, each one representing a different aspect of society and humanity. Their flaws ultimately prevent them from doing what is right, ...

Well?!?     Are you here to see a god die? After Brian Michael Bendis dragged the Marvel heroes through the mud for nearly seven years, the company rebooted its thematic overlay after 2010's Siege and moved its readers into a new era dubbed 'The Heroic Age.' The transition saw a shift in focus for the Avengers and co., removing the internal turmoil that had been crippling heroes for the past decade alongside the political roadblocks and letting them just be superheroes again. The goal was to capture the old feel of comics, where the heroes were icons of moral just readers could get behind and the villains were dastardly mustache-twirlers who would attempt to outmuscle the heroes before ultimately being defeated and retreating. Artists with a more old-school style of drawing, like John Romita Jr., were brought to the forefront, and several classic villains like Kang the Conquerer returned as most major Avengers titles, both for the teams and individual characters...

You can't put yourself above us Clark.    You're right. I'm not saying I'd act differently if I had your abilites. I'm not saying I wouldn't try and impose peace. But you... You're a better man than I am. Comics based on a video game provide an interesting medium. Marketability is small, reliant on the success of the source material and then the accumulation of enough interest in further exploration of the lore. Typically, these stories are also not attacked with the best talent a company has available either. Add in an online-only medium and Injustice: Gods Among Us was a project set up for failure. It defied expectations. The video game offered an interesting, if not formulaic, premise to build off of: Superman versus Batman. The game had alluded to a catastrophe set five years prior, one where Joker tricked Superman into murdering Lois Lane (who was pregnant with her and Clark's child) and triggering a nuclear bomb to destroy Metropolis. ...

Take back our story! Scott Snyder is known for his outlandish plots paving way for extraordinary action sequences, and this feels like the epitome of his work. The series hits the ground running and doesn't look back, pulling readers along for a thrilling ride through space and time as the Justice League (and Snyder brings back the original Justice League rather than the "Rebirth" counterpart) attempts to stop what is essentially DC's Dark Dimension from consuming reality itself. The art is fantastic, as is generally expected of Greg Capullo at this point. His gritty style lends itself well to the thematic material and Snyder's lavish story direction. Each panel is packed with information, and they are important to study to pick up the entire story. The variety of locations he handles are also admirable, taking readers everywhere from Atlantis, to a dusty tavern, to a desolated Gotham City, to Thanagar. The drawback of the story is that following it is no ...

I'm not going to let what happened change the value of my life.   And shame on the rest of you. Shame on you for giving up. After reviewing two fantastically written and drawn series, it is time to pivot to one that was universally less well made. 2013's  Age of Ultron  (no, not the movie)   is, to say the least, confusing. It's a post-apocalyptic tale made at the wrong time, with seemingly no place or purpose in the overextending Marvel Universe. The character decisions are bizarre, the art is all over the place, and the stakes are raised extremely high right from the get-go and then gradually made non-existent as decision after ridiculous writing decision ruined any kind of credibility the story was hoping to achieve. The Brian Michael Bendis take on Avengers deconstructed the heroes to their lowest points, stripped them of all support and forced them to face a hostile world and make it learn to love them again. It was a dark time that forced many characte...

We're not fighting for the people anymore, Falcon... Look at us.  We're just fighting. The first  Civil War  is a prime example of subtext done right in comics. At its surface, it is an all-out brawl between superheroes, a fan-service to finally show what would happen if teams like the Avengers and Fantastic Four were to split right down the middle and fight one another. This premise works well, it's easy advertising for one. 'Whose side are you on?' became as synonymous with the Civil War run as the name itself. It featured two of Marvel's biggest stars: Captain America and Iron Man. A reader coming in blind could pick their favorite and cheer for them like one would a football team as they read seven issues packed to the brim with superhero slugfests. But the story itself delivered so much more than just pages of people in spandex getting beat up over and over again. It is easy to write good action in a comic book. In fact, with Marvel and DC, that ...

Streets were littered with bodies. Grotesque nightmares of fictional invaders. Clock started over. We had a chance.  But they blew it. All of them . Alan Moore's Watchmen  was heralded as the quintessential graphic novel of all time, the only one to crack TIME's best 100 novels of all time.   It's dark and gritty take on society was met with acclaim, and the complex moral greys the main characters grappled with showed readers a world in which the good guy did not always fly in and save the day. Superheroes may not always be one-dimensional champions of justice. They were human, and therefore flawed. This change in storytelling to a darker, more character-focused narrative transitioned the comic industry from the bronze age to the modern age. Moore favored leaving the franchise as just that, but DC begged to differ. Though Moore never bestowed his blessing, Watchmen was made into a live-action movie and received a prequel comic, both of which were met...

All we ever see of stars are their old photographs. Welcome to the Art of the Panel, a weekly blog to discuss all things comic-related. We'll be diving into a wide variety of Marvel and DC series, both ongoing and past. When a popular movie or television show releases, hundreds of professional critics weigh in with their thoughts, spreading publicity and attention as well as highlighting the technical success and failures of the product. Comics do not receive the same treatment. The goal of the blog is simple: critique and analyze comic stories in the hope of shining a light on the artistic value they bring to the table. Comics, like regular books, are a form of literature and a form of art, and are unique in needing to combine both writing and visual within the same picture, or panel. I hope to show readers that comic books can achieve great literary heights, manage complex themes and tell compelling stories. And so we begin.