Today in class we read chapter 6 of
Understanding Comics. Since we didn't have time to finish in class due to an extremely shortened schedule and College Counselling information, here are the questions on the chapter:
A. What does McCloud mean by “symbolic” on the bottom of page 144?
When he
states that pictures in the 1400’s were becoming less symbolic McCloud means
that any abstract aspects of painting were slowly fading away to a more realist
tendency which sought to depict people exactly as we saw them.
B. Define the AP Lang term on page 147.
Colloquial (adj): used in ordinary or familiar conversation,
not formal or literary.
C. Investigate one of McCloud’s allusions. What is the function of the
example in the panel?
On a panel in page 146, McCloud shows a small portion of
Georges Seurat’s painting Sunday
Afternoon on the Island of La Grand Jatte. The idea of showing this
painting is to explore the idea he posed in the previous panel: “Impressionism
sent Western art toward the abstract vertex, but in a way that clung to what
the eye saw.” The example of Seurat’s painting is perfect to express this idea
because the painting is an example of pointillism (a form of art that moves
towards more abstract style) while still representing a real scene we could see
in the world.
D. In one sentence outline the main idea of
this chapter. (Hint: Use the title)
This chapter explains how words and images can be used
together to show and tell a story in different ways.
E. Draw an example of one of the categories established by McCloud.
For practical purposes I didn’t draw a comic, instead I
attached an example taken from the famous Calvin and Hobbes comic series. In
this comic strip, the first panel shows an additive combination where the words
add on to what Calvin is doing: waiting for the bus. The next three panels
however, could be considered a parallel combination in which the images don’t
necessarily reflect the thoughts. The images and what Calvin is thinking in
these three panels are completely unrelated, making them a good example of a
parallel combination.
F. How does this concept reflect narration vs. exposition? Create a
diagram that demonstrates this.
Pictures Words =
(In comics)
= =
Show Tell
= =
Exposition Narration = (In
written material)
These two can be used in different combinations that help make stories more interesting and attractive for a reader. One can be used more than the other à
the author decides how to combine them and how much of each to use.
“What are the ways to create a superhero?”
According to This American
Life, a human mind is the only thing that can create one. They don’t
explicitly state this in the two acts I watched; in fact, in the radio show the
question is rhetorical and it is used only to introduce Zora: a woman who molded
herself into a hero using a to-do list.
Despite this, in both Act 2 and Act 4 of this episode on superheroes,
the creation of superpowers is a thing of the mind. Zora does it by writing a
to-do list of everything that a superhero needed to be in her head, and then
setting out to do every single one of the things she wrote down (these include
learning to drive a helicopter, martial arts, weaponry, and CPR amongst
others). The twins portrayed in Act 4 are completely different, it is the minds
of people around them that created their hero status. They were seen as the two
child super heroes of God’s Army in Burma mainly because God’s Army needed a
way to gain more followers and instigate fear in those who challenged them.
Everyone who knew the Htoo twins claimed that they had seen them using a super
power of some sort. If they just knew about the Htoo twins they could easily
narrate various stories about what the twelve-year-old kids could do in battle.
There is only one way to create areal life superhero and that is making people
(this maybe other people or yourself) believe that you are. It’s all a mind
game. The real question is: What makes a superhero? 
In her heroic dreams Zora saw herself as a woman who is powerful
above any law of nature. She has impossibly long silver hair and a voice that
sounds almost musical to anyone who hears it. In her dreams it is the magic
tattoo that gives her powers. In real life she doesn’t have silver hair and she
is not powerful past the laws of nature. Her powers aren’t granted to her by a
tattoo (even though she does have one), they are granted to her by years of
hard work and practice that she went through to achieve everything on her list.
The Htoo twins in Burma know that they are special and they talk as if they
were heroes, but it is mainly a craving for all the love and attention they
never get in reclusion with the army. Unlike Zora, in the twins’ case it is
other people and stories that give them power rather than any true accomplishment
of theirs. In Zora’s case what makes her a hero is everything she did with the
idea of helping people in mind, it is everything she still does to help people
despite being rejected from her dream job at the CIA. In the twins’ case what
makes them heroes is the fear they have instilled in other for the sake of
God’s Army and the war stories they are stars in. 
So what makes someone a hero? Some would argue it’s the urge to do
good for the community. Some would argue it is the possession of a power that
other human beings do not. Some would say it is doing things that others
wouldn’t do, not necessarily good… just different. Today the word hero has even
been used to highlight someone being funny or to encompass situations that
wouldn’t be considered heroic in the traditional sense (ex: “Everything the
teacher did he did the opposite, and then outsmarted all of her arguments. What
a hero.”) 
