This week I have taken a closer look at graphic novels. Graphic novels are, at their most basic, long ‘comics’ in book form with a more in depth storyline and usually dealing with more adult themes than comic strips. Of the more famous graphic novels are those in the Batman series. Frank Miller created Batman: The Dark Knight Returns in 1986, remoulding the protagonist slightly as a more sinister, more violent, and more troubled hero than ever before, sometimes blurring lines of morality and justice (Sabin, 87). This continued with Batman: Year One, which told the story of Batman’s origins, and the reasons behind his vigilante crusade. As this is a graphic novel which I have ready access to, having bought it for my husband last year, I have decided to use this graphic novel to explore the relationship of text and image in creating theatrics within Batman: Year One.
In his chapter ‘Comic Art: Characteristics and Potentialities of a Narrative Medium’, Lawrence Abbott spends much time discussing the physical use of text in a comic strip and its relation to the physical presence of the pictures, and also the use of text to control the flow of time in a comic strip. He also makes an important point about the submission of image to text in what is primarily, a medium that is ‘read’:
Of course, this subordination in no way reduces the importance of the comic art drawings, which can create images and enhance the narration with greater power and economy than words; it merely indicates that the comic art drawing, as a narrative element, must conform to an order of perception that is essentially literary. (1986, p. 156)
What I have found in looking at Batman: Year One is that, if taken as a primarily literary medium, the artwork within the comic strips acts as a visual representation of details that would be described if in prose form. In some cases this means that the story cannot function without the details provided by the pictures. In other cases, the narrative and dialogue elements are heightened by the effect of the pictures. This is what Abbott refers to when he notes the ability of the image to act with greater power and economy than words. This is especially true of the more theatrical moments within Batman: Year One.
An example of this is in chapter two, when Batman gate crashes a dinner at which several council men and the corrupt commissioner are present. In the frames leading up to the page below Batman is seen preparing his dramatic entry. When it finally arrives, Batman speaks with poetic flair:
“Ladies and gentlemen. You have eaten well. You’ve eaten Gotham’s wealth. Its spirit. Your feast is nearly over. From this moment on... none of you are safe.” (Miller, 1987, p. 38)
The dark eloquence of Batman’s speech is admirable by itself, but combined with the artwork for these frames, it becomes something much more impacting. In the first frame, Batman stands against an indistinguishable background, shrouded in swirling smoke and surrounded by shadows. His frame is silhouetted against an unknown source of light, making his bat-eared mask and billowing cape all the more formidable. The next three frames are much shorter. They show the face of a waiter, and of Batman, uplit by the flames of a brazier as Batman reaches for the brazier’s lid and moves to put the fire out, arm still silhouetted. The final ‘frame’ is in fact an empty mass of black, as the brazier is put out and the room is plunged into darkness. This page can be taken as symbolic of the impending end of the councilmen’s’ corruption at Batman’s hands, and Batman becomes a dark and fearsome figure. The impact of this scene would have been nowhere near as dramatic if not for the artwork. Similar theatrical scenes can be found scattered throughout the novel, and combined with the dark palette used by the artist throughout, create a brooding, sinister mood in which Batman and the corruption of Gotham city thrive.
Sources:
Abbot, Lawrence., “Comic Art: Characteristics and Potentialities of a Narrative Medium”, Journal of Popular Culture, 19, 1986.
Miller, F., Batman: Year One, New York: DC Comics, 1987.
Sabin, R., “ ‘Comics Grow Up!’: Dawn of the Graphic Novel”, in Adult Comics: An Introduction, London: Routledge, 1993, pp. 87-95
