I guess the end of the semester has really had an effect on my fingers and hands. I missed a few blog writings but I have been keeping up with my readings. Although, our class meetings have been effected by the plague, I considered myself a victim of the plague, I have conducted my own English 300 Graphic Novels class, which was held on buses, in my bathroom, bedroom, kitchen of my apartment, and any random place where I can read between writing papers. My opinion of this graphic novel….well I guess I’m definitely not a good critic for this one because I wasn’t too fond of this book. I think it was because there were so many political themes and I hate politics. I do think it’s a creative way to get others that are interested in history and politics to read something that’s not of the ordinary involving politics. I had a feeling that Marthe and Kurt would hit it off but the other stuff was just a burr!!!Sorry history….Politics and stuff of that nature is just not my cup of tea!!
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This graphic novel was a little different from the other graphic novels we read in class. However, the theme of this specfic novel was political. In the first few pages, the characters Kurt and Marthe were introduced during a train ride. I understood that Marthe was a visitor of Berlin as well as a art student. Unlike Marthe, Kurt was very familar with the city Berlin and was a journalist on a special assignment. The book starts to introduce a ring of other characters that are associated with Marthe, dealing with the arts. But what I don’t understand is how the book does a time lapse in the middle by going back. I’m assuming there are political issues between the Germans and Jews. But I’m not sure what’s the point of introducing Marthe and Kurt. I speculate that Marthe is going to be expose to a lot of politcal violence that will open her eyes. I’m not too fimilar with the issues that occurred during this era, but I am familar with communism and the hatred of Jews. I look forward to figuring out or finding out the main purpose of this novel.
Fun house is more like a crazy house. It’s a house of disfunction not to mention a funeral home as well. Where should i start first? i will start with the father. Now I don’t know if any one else notice but the father is quite gay. You know what forget quite gay, he is very gay. It’s so obvious that the father is gay and shows no interest in his wife. I wouldn’t compare this family to the Adams family becuase the Adams family was werid but a happy family. Gomez showed interest in his wife. However, in the case of the father of Fun House(Allen) he showed more interest in his children’s babysitters, which were all men than his own wife. I don’t know what it is but the wife’s facial expression never changes. It’s like she has excepted to live this miserable life of unhappiness with this gay man. What’s so distrubing about the father is he acts as if his behavior is not inappropriorate or unnoticeable. What I can’t understand is why does the wife decide to remain in the picture if she knows her husband is gay and has cheated throughout their marriage. In one scene the mother explains to her daughter that her father has slept with several other men. That went straight over my head because she mentioned it as if it was okay. This family’s relationship is so unhealthy. it’s healthy to the point where the children are scarred from it….well at least the book talks about the daughter in the first half of the book so far. When I first started reading Fun Home I thought the daughter was a boy. There was nothing girley about the daughter. In fact she came to the realization that she was a lesbian. The ironic part about everything is that the father acted as if he had a problem with the way his duaghter carried herself. However, I don’t understand how could he have a problem when he was gay himself. It was kind of funny when the daughter starts to read all these scholarly texts about sexuality when she knew as a kid that she was a lesbian. The entire family has problems which makes this book a page turner. However, I’m not sure if I believe that the fathe killed himself. He was such a perfectionist. I would be surprised if the mother had anything to do with her husband’s death. She probably pushed him in front of the truck. But then on the other hand he was probably fighting with his sexuality and other problems. I also feel that the father had OCD. He was jus too controlling and wanted things to be perfect all the time. It was like he was the wife, but judging by the tight cut off jeans that suppose to be shorts, made me question which role he actually wanted to play in the family. FUN HOME DEFINITELY NOT THE ADAMS FAMILY!!!
I definitely liked the illustration of this novel. The plot was great too, but it’s something special about how Cruse use his panels. Portraits of Life panels has nothing on Stuck Rubber Baby panels. Some of his panels are used as backgrounds in funky patterns.
These specfic backgrounds, in my opinion serve as a narrative. Although the text is in black and white the patterns bring color to all the panels.
The cover of Stuck Rubber Baby is very interesting. After reading the first twenty pages I came to the conclusion that all the African American characters on the cover shared the the same characteristics, which were racial stereo types. On the cover, all the African Americans are all the same complexion and have very full size lips. I think others might find this to be offensive after finding out what the book is actually about. In the book, racial issues are introduced in a historical-contemporary. However, I didn’t find the book to be offensive. It actually had a twist to it….the issues of homosexuality and racism back in the day was pretty funny to me because both of these issues were serious back then.
Okay I know it’s not important but I really don’t like the illustrations. I notice that there are a lot of patterns used such as cross hatches and zig-zag lines. It’s not the fact that they’re done badly, it’s just that there’s no color. It’s just black and white and for some reason it hurts my eyes. The text also seem like it’s overdoing itself. I don’t know if it’s me but its explanations of each panel are extensive.
V For Vendetta was werid but I guess I have to get use to reading graphic novels. My overall thought of this novel in particular was that it was interesting but still change of strange. I had too many questions while reading which I think took away from the novel.
Again I’m so lost people. I can’t wait til Monday morning so someone can tell me what’s going on. Is V trying to be a mentor to Evey? I was so confused when V kidnapped and tortured her. The he said it he did it out of love. Their relationship is very odd. I’m still trying to figure out if V was sent to help Evey. Then at times V give me the impression that he’s Evey’s long lost father coming back to rekindle their long lost relationship. There were a couple of pages that got my attention. These were some of the pages that really made sense or I that I could make something out of.
Pg146: In the many several panels , V i s shown chasing Evey . He chases her until he has her in his arms. At this point I thought he was going to turn into the bad character again. I had no idea what was his motive was.
JUST ANOTHER DAY IN B DAY 
