[Fun Home, ch. 1-4, Alison Bechdel]

I began to read Fun Home before the semester even started, so I've been excited to get to this one for months now. Quick note on it: from the very beginning, Bechdel uses text outside the panels, serving as a kind of voice over narration; I love this style. However, I'm going to hold off gushing over it until Wednesday, because I have Watchmen stills from the upcoming movie. They're next to panels from the original comics, so it's pretty cool to see how it's all shaping up.

Nixon poster

Newsstand

Gunga Diner

Treasure Island

No, I don't normally browse Maxim.com; I got linked to their Watchmen galleries through another site.

[ch. 5-12 of Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons]

In honor of Rorschach and his experience in chapter 6 with the Rorschach ink tests, I'm posting some blot paintings Andy Warhol did. By the way, seeing Rorschach/Kovac's real face? Yeah, he should wear the mask, no question, and, hi, didn't need to see the dogs bloodied. Very unnecessary.

See, my issue with these is I never really see anything in them.

This one's a little Tim Burton-y. But still, I just think, Oh, hey, symmetry.

Yellow!

Seahorses maybe? Except not really, and I'm struggling to make anything of it.

More colors.

I don't know. I'm apparently not cut out for these. I don't think I lack in creativity, but eh. They're supposed to evaluate personality characteristics. So the fact that I see nothing in them means either, a) I have no personality OR b) I refuse to give anyone anything they can psychoanalyze me with.

Mostly I think the tests are creepy looking because of the crawling black ink overlapping again and again. It's like a flurry of movement trapped in some single moment.

What I really want to know is what YOU see in them? Can anyone out there actually make pictures out of the mess?

On an Ending of Watchmen note, I loved the scenes of utter destruction toward the end, in chapter 12. The apocalyptic nature of it all. Just that hopelessness, it's engaging.

[chapters 1-4 of Alan Moore's Watchmen]

Has anyone else read Umbrella Academy? It's a new comic, just started in fall of 07, and it's last issue's supposed to come out this month. Anyway, I'm seeing a lot of similarities between it and Watchmen. It's neat to be able to see how things are inspired by basic thematics. The autobiography pages are replaced by dictionary pages in UA, but authentic memoir pages are used also, to look back from the POV of a used-to-be "superhero." Also, the idea of turning away from that life, becoming an outcast and an antihero, though, yes, widely used, is similar between the two. The funeral of a friend is another strong correlation.

Sorry, I guess I'm not really analyzing Watchmen, it's just, I take English and Cinema Studies classes all the time, you know, so I'm used to having to see patterns. My favorite thing about the novel thus far are all the political implications. Mentions of the USSR, Cold War, Arms Race, etcetera. It's all chilling, the idea of fall out shelters everywhere.

Speaking of, Altgeld is an official shelter, isn't it? I'd swear I've seen the metal plaque above its north door. It always seemed crazy to me, that constant paranoia everyone lived in during the second phase of the Red Scare. Children cowered under desks in drills, as though that would actually help in the event of nuclear war. We just watched On the Beach in my film class, which is about the nuclear holocaust. Australia has another six or so months to live, due to currents and air pollution (or something- it's never fully explained), so it's about the citizens coping with the fact that they'll all die soon. It's a great film, and interesting because it doesn't have happy ending at all- everyone still dies!

Even further, I think there's evidence of McCarthyism in Watchmen, which, in my opinion, is the truly frightening part of all of it. The unmasking of the superheroes is similar to the unmasking of all (personal) identity that went on. Everyone strove to be the same in the period, in order to not be labeled as "Communists."

Here's a clip from On the Beach at the beginning of the film; notice that it's Anthony Perkins, who goes on to become a Psycho.



McCarthyism at work: a completely useless tactic to avoiding being destroyed by a nuclear weapon.




And then there's this. Some kid's history project, where he based a McCarthy video off the theme song of Pokemon ("Gotta catch 'em all," and all that, I guess). I didn't actually watch all of this, but it's funny for a little while.