Blog #4

This week was by far my favorite week of the term so far. I love comics and everything they encompass. They stress creativity and fantasy, while simultaneously reflecting what’s happening in society. It’s a very deep form or art that is extremely underappreciated. All of this was why I was excited to get into my comics. The comics I chose were Spider-Man: Miles Morales, Vol 1 and Invincible Ironman: Ironheart Vol. 1: Riri Williams. One thing these comics really had in common was that they went out on a limb. They didn’t go the tradition route of making the successor a heir of the former super hero like Wolverine. They were unique characters with unique backgrounds. It’s also awesome to see young heroes of color in mainstream comics. Miles Morales is the main character of an Oscar winning movie. That is something no one could predict a decade ago. It feels like relief to minorities. For years, African american readers could only read B-list books of Black Panther and Luke Cage. Putting more heroes of color in the forefront, like making Sam Wilson Captain America, is encouraging for those of us who didn’t have role models who look like us. Personally, I didn’t see a lot of avian american representation. The only one off the top of my head I can think of is Sunfire and he never had a leading role. Seeing the likes of Amadeus Cho is encouraging, especially after seeing white characters take Asian roles like Ronin, Daredevil, and Electra. It seemed like Asians were just bad guy ninjas for the longest time.The two articles I read were “Marvel is wrong about comics killing diversity” and “Keeping score in the DC vs. Marvel diversity arms race.” This articles seemed at odds with each other even though they were about the same topic. Comics diversity talked a lot about what was bad with Marvel, while arms race had a lot of praise for Marvel. While both articles agree that more work needs to be done, it’s interesting the different approaches they took. In the first article, it brought up the lack of minority writers of comics. This is a very good point, however I disagree with the ripping of white men writing colored comics. Yes, there is a lens but it’s unfair to criticize someone who’s doing their comic the way they see the characters. For the second article, I thought it was missing a large chunk of it’s argument. It talked a lot about how all comic movies stared white men. It completely leaves out the larger issue which is how to make money in hollywood. For example, Black Panther only made the amount of money it did because it had Marvel attached to it and a backstory. An independent movie like Black Panther could not have the same impact. The movies staring white men like Iron Man have allowed marvel to experiment and branch out the create more diverse movies. The 99 was an interesting comic. I thought it had a good premise, however, there is the overarching middle eastern bias. There’s nothing wrong with that, it just goes against the initial idea. I think it would be stronger with multiple author because it would provide more perspectives. It was nice to read about a different type of comic. I’m only familiar with Western comics. I’m really excited for anime week. My girlfriend really likes anime and I see it as a chance to expand my horizon. There is beauty in all types of comics. That’s what makes the comic art form so amazing. It’s so flexible and personal. The style of the art and writing can be so unique and tell the same story in countless different ways The comic we made on Wednesday was about body positivity. We saw a lot of dogs around us when we went outside and were talking about how much we love dogs. Then I brought up how dogs come in all different sizes and we still love them. We ended up going with multiple different dogs in the panels with different backgrounds and histories. We really wanna drum up the point that no matter what we look like, we’re all the same.