WEEK 2 : Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud

Understanding Comics is a good read for any comic reader and lover. It's a helpful tool to understand the logic and strategies behind the makings of comics because it breaks down reasoning as well as structure. Reading this helped expand my knowledge of comics, especially comics I read years back.

The topic about how our culture responds to a cartoon much more than a realistic image very interestingly true. McCloud starts off by explaining that artist use "amplification through simpliflication"(McCloud 30). This means that by cartooning an image, you're only focusing on the specific details. This message helps put the focus more on the message that is trying to be passed from the comic to the reader, instead of using a realistic image of a person throughout the book. The focus would be on the person instead of the underlying meaning. The part of this idea that really caught my attention was when he talked about how we're a self-centered race, see ourselves in everything, and make the world over in our image (McCloud 33). Looking at cartoons, we see them as ourselves and this causes us to be easily sucked into the cartoon. "We don't just observe the cartoon, we become it" (McCloud 36). I think we do this because you don't have to worry about having to deal with anything in a fantasy realm. It's easy to do things we can do or face things in reality. There aren't any consequences to our actions or feelings to be cautious of. We want for that to be our reality, so we drift. It's the greatest escape.