Final Post (Response to Question 1)

Given our readings, both of traditional text and in graphic form, I have found key differences in how information is communicated. I feel that the most successful graphic novels are those that more fully break free from the idea that they need to be written like a novel. The early, Golden Age superhero comic stories were the first of their kind. Few comics prior to the development of serial characters like Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman were invested in the continuation of the story in a longer format. Because these superhero stories were written with the intent to build a franchise from an early point in their inception, they tend to be text heavy and reliant on action to action transitions which start to feel clunky, repetitive, and excessive. Especially when the backstories of the superheroes are introduced, the writers do not fully depend on the illustrators to successfully depict the history of the character. This results in swollen dialogue and caption boxes, making the comic feel less streamlined and more like a novel with pictures.

Later in the development of graphic novels, the visual depiction of characters and plot become more nuanced and complex, depending less on text to describe the scene. This is where I think comics and graphic novels truly separate themselves from the novel format. Comics like The Dark Knight Returns and Watchmen are able to marry text and visual depictions so that the images are what truly tells the story. The development of the splash page and the breaking of the traditional format- like the "TV" shaped panels in The Dark Knight Returns helps to make the scene more real to the reader, and as a result provides an arguably more immersive experience than either comics of the Golden Age or standard novels. By definitively relying on the images, the comic book form has created a niche for itself that text-based mediums cannot fill.