Worshipping The Wicked + The Divine #19

Or an attempt to explain the quiet brilliance of lighting in WicDiv #19
by Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles; Image Comics

The thing I struggle to write about the most in comics is colouring. Colouring is obviously an important aspect of comics; fleshing out the world, influencing the mood of the story, and frequently participating directly in storytelling. It is absolutely integral to comics. Colouring is also obviously a craft filled with meticulous choices by creative experts. And I think there is valuable insight in talking about the thought process underlying colouring decisions. When colouring is participating in storytelling by doing something unorthodox or obviously deliberate, it can be fairly straightforward to analyze and build an essay around. But a lot of the time colouring is kind of subtle, something that permeates the composition but is so... there... that it can maybe be taken for granted as a creative choice. It's like... colour in the real world: filled with beauty and information, but easy to not dwell on directly. And I think that ignoring the way colouring, even the more subtle aspects of it, builds the comic world is a mistake.

So bearing all of that in mind, I think WicDiv #19 is subtly a masterwork in comics colouring.

There will be *SPOILERS* for WicDiv #19 below.

An aspect of colouring that I feel doesn't get it's due is lighting. (And I say this as someone who has never written an article on lighting.) Lighting in visual media can be as simple as making things seem real, since real-life human vision experiences highlights and shadows. An absence of attention to light sources can, with certain styles of pencils, distractingly deviate from our expectations. Lighting can also add certain elements of mood. On a simple note, cultural/biological training means people are trained to view bright things as cheerful and safe and darkness as uncomfortable or dangerous. The way lighting is used can dramatically change the experience of art. And, in a coloured comic, the light quality is governed by colour choice and how the shading of those colours are effected by light sources more than anything else.

Take the above selection which shows Dionysus being dragged out of a cheap-looking takeaway restaurant into the shadowy underground. The sequence first shows the fluorescent lighting of the restaurant, with its institutional even lighting causing soft highlights and shadows. Then the comic switches to the Underground, a virtually lightless world of shadowy, desaturated figures. Portraying the Underground as greyed-out characters on a black background is an inspired choice because it replicates human night vision. Human night vision is effectively colourblind since the most sensitive light sensing cells of the eye operates on a light/no-light binary; designing a colour palette that is true to that sells the darkness of the location and helps make the comic feel more real. The choice of plunging the Underground in a nightvision darkness also, I think, plays into making this location feel desperate, paranoid, and hidden which helps inform the mental state of the characters. All of this lighting collectively provides a clear scene change break, but also helps cement the Underground as a real and particular kind of place. 

(Looking at this sequence again makes me wonder to what extent the WicDiv use of the Underground is inspired by the use of the London Underground as a bomb shelter during WW2...)

An area of particular strength in WicDiv #19 is the use of discrete light sources. Because so much of the comic occurs in low lighting, light sources stand out more than they would in a brighter comic. The above selection has one very obvious light source in the third panel, where the green light from the owl's projector eye is especially apparent. In this panel, the path, highlights, and shadows of the light are apparent. In addition, the open doorway throughout the composition is a source of blue/white light that influences the overall colour and the highlights of all of the depicted characters in the scene. What is great about this selection, is that you can see how the system of highlights and shadows change in response to the two light sources above. It's such an effortless thing to read through, but dealt with in a granular, deliberate way it becomes apparent how much thought must have gone into crafting the lighting in this sequence.

I kind of can't get over how effortless the execution of these multiple light source sequences are in WicDiv #19. Like, this page here has diffuse green projector glow, a dark panel, and then panels governed by the concentric glow of a cigarette. Which again, is a lot of visual information for the colourist to build into the page. On top of that, this sequence does such smart things with the colour. In the top row of panels, Gentle Annie is suffused with an otherworldly green glow, while vicious Badb is plunged into darkness. This, I think, captures the differences and transition between personas. The next panels are governed by Persephone's cigarette, which in the third panel give her visual primacy. This gives he a kind of leader-type-feel and, by planting the reader's attention so firmly on Persephone, sets the pacing for the final dramatic beat of the comic. This is all really smart storytelling predicated largely on the use shadows and light sources. Which again, is so subtle but so smart.

And in amazing burying the lead news, WicDiv #19 also has a drag out battle between the gods in the darkness of the underground. Which is really just a total fucking light show, since so many of the gods have powers that involve glowing things. Baal is throwing out white-blue lighting, Persephone controls glowing green tendrils, Amaterasu flies like a radiant sun, Woden and company have fluorescent Tron armour, and Baphomet is laying about with a big flaming stick. It is a riot of different light sources throwing out highlights and shadows interacting in a complex, motion heavy scene. Making this lighting mess visually sensical and effortless is truly epic comics colouring. 

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design
WicDiv #11 and stretching the moment
WicDiv #12 and layout encoding
WicDiv #13 and retroactive narratives
WicDiv #14 and re-mixing comics

WicDiv #15 and fading out

WicDiv #17 and some things I liked

Worshipping The Wicked + The Divine #17

Or a look at the importance of a blank page in WicDiv #17
by Kieron Gillen, Brandon Graham, Jamie McKelvie, and Matt Wilson; Image Comics

A thing about comics that I sometimes think doesn't get enough wonky attention is how important page order is to story experience. Individual pages function in printed comics are like discrete storytelling units, and controlling the rate and way readers encounter these units can dramatically alter the way the story is experienced. On a very basic level, the order of pages matters to how a comic is read much like how the order of panels matters. The most obvious example of this is the page turn, where readers suddenly get access to a new page that was previously hidden, making a kind of quick cut and the potential for a surprising reveal or comedic moment. But it goes beyond that, and I think WicDiv #17 does something interesting and really smart using a blank page to optimize the page reading order in the issue.

(This is also, a thing that I think is important to talk about because, incidentally corporate comics *SUCK* at this by jamming ads for like, beholder bobbleheads and Gumby the collectable card game into their magazines screwing with the delicate order.)

There will be *SPOILERS* for WicDiv #17 below. Like, serious spoilers!

Now before I try and convince everyone that what is basically a blank page is super interesting and ignoring the rest of the comic, I just want to point out that WicDiv #17 is pretty great ad features Brandon Graham's great artwork and style in the fantastic world of Gillen/McKelvie/Wilson's WicDiv world and that results of this collaboration are frequently pretty great. Like, there are few people who can draw an orgy that is somehow sexy and goofy looking and still somehow not exploitive or could make a scene where a dangerously unstable cat goddess wallowing outside the cage of a bird goddess look so lackadaisically charming. There are some really fun, unique moments in this comic.

(For the record, a 4.9 earthquake happened right now and... woah! It's been a while since a big one's hit in these here parts, and the first one I've lived on a double digit apartment floor for. Quite a lot of swing and torque, it turns out...)

There is also some really astute storytelling on display throughout the issue. I especially love this page and how it uses reader tracking to make the pacing of the page fit the action perfectly. The tangents in the first panel that cruise through the background lend that panel a sense of speed (which works beautifully against the static Baal). Or the second tier of panels which has a hard left-to-right directionality that captures the motion of the sequence wonderfully. The second panel also takes advantage of the transition from the first panel to the second row, and slams the reading motion in opposition to it making for an extra impactful panel (that additionally shows the a consequence of the motion that already happened). The next panel has also has a pretty great abrupt stop built into the panel. The bottom three panels have a looping meandering path through artwork and dialogue captures the lazy, calm after the intense top panels. Collectively this page, I think, captures the polarity of Sakhmet, her danger and fury, but also her playful laziness in how the page is read, and therefore experienced.

So knowing that WicDiv #17 is a pretty great comic for a lot of reasons, let's talk about how great the solid black page in the comic is. The story of this sequence is that Sakhmet has descended on her childhood home and murdered and eaten her father. This sequence works as well as it does because it reveals this information in a series of growing surprise reveals. The first page sets up the sequence, and looks downright benign, with Sakhmet reminiscing and smiling pleasantly (such a perfect panel btw) and then we get the all black page. It's ominous and empty, a long hard cut that it implies the passage of time and a significant story shift. The next page, which benefits from being after the page turn, shows cavalry arriving in an ominious situation. It's obvious something horrible has happened and that Sakhmet has been involved in some sort of altercation, probably violent and probably involving her dad. But it isn't until after the next page turn that we learn Sakhmet has *eaten* her father and the downright casual way she is reacting to that. It's a scene of slowly building horror that really benefits from having two adjacent page turns to ramp up and then up again the fuckedness quotient of the situation. And that black page shifts the other pages around just enough to make this construct work. Which is such a little thing, but such a smart, smart choice.

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design
WicDiv #11 and stretching the moment
WicDiv #12 and layout encoding
WicDiv #13 and retroactive narratives
WicDiv #14 and re-mixing comics

WicDiv #15 and fading out

Worshipping The Wicked + The Divine #15

Or a look at the use of dialogue fade in WicDiv #15
by Kieron Gillen, Stephanie Hans, Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles; Image Comics

The thing about WicDiv I love is that it's always showing me something cool. It can be some dramatic trick of layout or colour that does something truly remarkable or unprecedented. It can be a shocking story twist or a slow burning irony that drags like an icebreaker through the series. It can be clever character design or some bit of fun mythology. Or maybe it's a cool artist you've never met before. Or maybe it's just something little and smart and worth taking a closer look at. 

WicDiv #15 manages to show me a couple cool things.

There will be *SPOILERS* for WicDiv #15 below.

One of the cool things about WicDiv #15 is of course the artwork of Stephanie Hans. Her painted style is perfect for the story since it brings a glow and attention to light that is distinct from the rest of the series. This is absolutely perfect for the issue which focuses on Amaterasu, the sun goddess of the WicDiv pantheon and Kami of Shinto mythology: it's as if the entire issue was bathed in sunlight. I am very pleased to be acquainted with the artwork of Stephanie Hans.

The other cool thing about WicDiv #15 is a small details kind of thing that I think is kind of neat. The issue ends with Amaterasu attending a Shinto shrine in Tokyo to hang Ema prayer cards for her dead and dying friends. She says prayer after prayer since she has many friends in dire need of help and because she is apparently, at her core, a good person in a shitty situation. (Despite her dubious cultural appropriation: sometimes good people do problematic things?) What I love about this sequence in a wonky comics kind of way is that the dialogue boxes go from normal and solid and fade in sequence until the last one is barely readable. This is cool because it's like the visual storytelling equivalent of a sound fade out where the sounds of Amaterasu's prayers slowly fade out as we leave the story. It's great because it's visually encoding a a sound-based storytelling tool and because it stretches this scene temporally: we can easily picture Amaterasu saying many, many more prayers after the sound fades out. It's a tiny choice in the grand scheme of things, but I think it's adroit stuff. 

The Wicked + The Divine, always good for a few cool things.

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design
WicDiv #11 and stretching the moment
WicDiv #12 and layout encoding
WicDiv #13 and retroactive narratives
WicDiv #14 and re-mixing comics

Worshipping The Wicked + The Divine #14

Or breaking down the comic remix in WicDiv #14 
by Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, Clayton Cowles, and Dee Cunniffe; Image Comics

WicDiv #14 is formally a very interesting comic book. I'd like to talk about why. 

There will, as always, be *SPOILERS* for WicDiv #14 below.

WicDiv #14 is, to a certain extent, a flashback comic. It recontextualizes numerous events in the comic from the perspective of Woden, who beyond being a creepy enigma, Knows Some Things. Like a lot of flashback comics, WicDiv #14 takes advantage of existent panels and artwork to show memories. It's an expedient choice because it let's the comic replay the events exactly as we all remember them and because it makes sense not to unnecessarily spend time redrawing events. What makes WicDiv #14 interesting is that it constructs the entire issue, including current and unseen events almost entirely out of recycled artwork.

WicDiv #14 is interesting in that it repurposes artwork from previous issues to construct entirely new comics. Given no other information, this discussion above looks and feels like entirely native content, that it's a brand new sequence custom drawn to deliver a pitch perfect sequence. Kind of incredibly, everyone panel on this page is lifted, without major alteration from an earlier issue of WicDiv. It's pretty cool stuff.

WicDiv #14 takes the experiment further by building new comics out of not only its own past, but also from depictions of its characters from other comics. Specifically, WicDiv #14 also uses artwork clipped from Sex Criminals (by Matt Fraction and Chip Zdarsky), which contained the WicDiv porn parody, 'The Lick-ed and the Divine". Beyond being a fun little meta-circle jerk, this choice really advances the question about remix culture and comics: if you have the vector artwork of digital pencils (or a vectorized scan), just how much comic can you build using recycled artwork? If you make it seamless enough, like WicDiv #14, is using reused artwork markedly worse or lesser than new artwork? And, as a creator, can you use recycled artwork to increase the length or speed you create comics without compromising comics? WicDiv #14 is an intriguing story, but as a critical experiment, I think it really opens an interesting discourse on the nature of comics.

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design
WicDiv #11 and stretching the moment
WicDiv #12 and layout encoding
WicDiv #13 and retroactive narratives

Worshipping The Wicked + The Divine #13

Or a look at the use of active narration in WicDiv #13
by Kieron Gillen, Tula Lotay, Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles; Marvel Comics

Despite a rotating cast of creators, The Wicked + The Divine continues to be a comic worth examining for creative flair. WicDiv #13 features the addition of Tula Lotay to the team, and honestly I'd write in depth about it, but it would mostly be a series of superlatives about how much I like it. Since I think it might be more interesting and instructive, I'll just take for granted that the art in WicDiv #13 is really great, and instead focus on the narration in the comic, which pulls a very interesting trick.

A trick that is made of *SPOILERS*, so this post is going to be quite *SPOILER* heavy.

The Wicked + The Divine has established itself as a comic with an active narrator, a character within the story who relates some amount of the events and glimpses of their inner lives. At first glance WicDiv #13 operates by the same rules, with Tara playing the role of narrator. With this we get a glimpse of "fucking Tara", the immensely popular pop idol goddess who the rest of the pantheon views with a certain jealousy and disdain. What we see initially is a pretty sympathetic portrait of a woman struggling with being respected as an artist in the face of her glamorous image and divine powers. As a purely surface narration device, this inner monologue is an arresting look into the fraught relationship between beauty and fame, and the toxic environment that can exist there.

That is until you reach the climax of the comic and realize that the active narration in WicDiv #13 is the contents of a suicide note written by Tara. Which, after being lulled into complacently by the familiar seeming narrative structure, leads to a shocking reframing of the entire comic. Instead of being a story about a woman struggling with the costs of beauty and fame, or a cautionary story of about how even the most shallow seeming star is a complex human being, it's the last testament of someone who has already given up, already been destroyed. This of course, adds a serious weight of gravitas to the end of the comic. But, more interestingly, the narration reveal allows WicDiv #13 to be experienced twice, once as a complex character study and again as a darker tragedy. Which is really cool comics.

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design
WicDiv #11 and stretching the moment
WicDiv #12 and layout encoding

Worshipping the Wicked + The Divine #12

Or a look at panel shape in WicDiv #12
by Kieron Gillen, Kate Brown, Jamie KcKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles; Marvel Comics

The newest issue of WicDiv represents a change in The Wicked + The Divine. Instead of the familiar artwork of Jamie McKelvie, the series is now going through a cycle where a number of group artists are joining the comic for a series of character focused issues. WicDiv #12 represents the first issue and is drawn by Kate Brown, and continues the WicDiv tradition of being formally interesting comics.

There will be *SPOILERS* for WicDiv #12 below.

Sometimes the smallest things in a comic end up being really effective story telling tools. In the case of WicDiv #12, the small but important tool is panel shape. WicDiv #13 follows a team of Cassandra's former documentarian assistants as they make a film about the gods. It is established very early in the comic that these rounded edge panels are filmed segments of the comic. This was done in a clever way by showing a deceased character in the frames with a date-stamp and with film symbols like fast-forward and pause to cement the technique.

On a surface level this choice allows the reader to easily distinguish the filmed sections of the comic from the real time parts of the comic. This way the comic can intersperse the different threads of the story effortlessly and without having to take the time to formally establish which is which. It's a tiny thing but it makes the issue work really well.

But I think this tool works on another, more subtle level as well. By using these rounded panels for quiet, static documentary shots, WicDiv #12 gets into a kind of rhythm: we get into a pattern of repetitive, dialogue shots that give sections of the issue a certain stillness. Which I think works like an anchor.

So that when the action breaks lose in WicDiv #12, everything looks different. Instead of the rounded edges of the quiet panels, there are the sharp, jagged lines of danger. Instead of the neat, orderly panels with clear celluloid margins, there is chaos, with events breaking through margins in a swirling vortex of wild violence. These amazing compositions would be effective regardless, but the contrasting styles, I think, really emphasize just how wild the action scenes in WicDiv #12 get. It's a tiny choice, but for me it results in some really great comics.

Also, I absolutely love how clinical and static the camera lens elements in the action scenes are. It's a fun commentary on the role of observer to events, which I think plays with the role of creator and audience in interesting ways. 

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design
WicDiv #11 and stretching the moment

Deep Sequencing: Dead Trees

Or a look at the unusual story structure of Trees: Volume One
by Warren Ellis and Jason Howard; Image Comics.

with additional commentary on The Wicked + The Divine Vol. 1 
by Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles; Image Comics

There is a weird thing that happens when you follow enough comics people on twitter: you find yourself eavesdropping on conversations between creators where they talk shop. You feel like a total creep, but you are also exposed to some really cool and insightful ideas. One such idea, floated by Kieron Gillen, is that Trees by Ellis and Howard, has an unusual narrative structure that has more in common with prose novels than the majority of direct market comics. And when I eventually read Trees, I was struck by how profoundly right Kieron Gillen was about this and that this choice is pretty interesting. 

As part of my day job I teach Academic Science writing to Biochemistry students. A byproduct of this is that I tend to think about writing in the context of objectives, that every block of writing is designed to tell the audience something. In academic writing the goal is often to explain something very complex as quickly as possible using a combination of plain English for clarity and jargon for efficiency and specificity of meaning. (I am probably not the fun TA...) Science writing is extremely formalized though, and usually breaks into common sections in Academic Journals that each have a particular objective. An Introduction section is designed to declare what the main goal of the presented research is and to contextualize that goal so the audience knows just what the hell you are trying to figure out. A Results section presents data that Scientific Readers can study themselves and reach their own conclusions on (Quoth the Science Guy: "But don't take my word for it!"). A Methods section explains how the research was done so a reader could try these experiments themselves if they wanted to. And so on. My point here is that the overall goal of Science Writing is made of subsections that have smaller goals that when added together function together to make the larger piece of writing work.

(This previous paragraph was designed to introduce the idea of objectives in writing and portioning them off into sections. Conversely, it may have just been super boring and made you fuck off from reading the rest of this.)

In fiction the broad goal is something like to entertain an audience and make them feel feelings. This larger goal is conveyed by chunks of story, delivered in a variety of mediums, that each serve some broader objective to the larger story in an aesthetic way. But the way the individual packets of a larger work, the quanta of the story, actually assemble together to make the larger fiction work can be radically different. And as Kieron Gillen pointed out, Trees delivers its information in an unusual way.

(Seriously, how have you not fucked off already?)

Because Kieron Gillen infected me with this idea and because I think his work with Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles are excellent examples of a certain mode of comics storytelling I want to look at The Wicked + The Divine as an example of the usual approach to direct market comics. WicDiv has an overall objective of entertaining an audience and making them feel feelings. The series is first published as monthly magazine format comics in the direct market. If we look at these monthly format comics, the smallest published unit, each individual issue works like a semi-independent story. The objective of each unit is to tell a complete narrative arch that is a satisfying reading experience on its own: each issue introduces a premise, forwards the plot and character development, builds to a climactic event, and usually ends on a cliffhanger that builds interest for the next instalment. At the same time, each of these individual issues are also designed to work as components of a larger story, a chapter-like arch of collected issues, as well as a discrete whole. Essentially, in this model every issue of comics is an episode witch each collected chapter functioning as a season with discrete, equivalent chunks. Or put another way, WicDiv and similar comics work, broadly speaking, like TV.

 

Trees, by Warren Ellis and Jason Howard, is a whole other kind of beast. While the overall story is meant to be entertaining and make the audience feel feelings, it doesn't break down clearly into discrete episodes. In fact, reading Trees Vol. 1 as a trade paperback, I found it difficult to find the seams of the direct market issues that made the larger whole. Instead of discrete, complete episodes, Trees works in shorter narrative blocks that focus intensely on the subplots that comprise the larger story. These smallest story units also have a similar focus on objective: they deliver these intense bursts of plot advancement or character development or information. They are also mostly pretty short, and quickly switch between subplots. This makes Trees Vol. 1 read like a single chapter in a prose novel, split into short "***" divided sections that move between viewpoints. The entire collected "chapter" tells a cohesive chunk of story, but it's constituent components do not. Which, I imagine, must make monthly issues of Trees read like opening a story mid-chapter, reading a few pages, and then bailing out before finishing the chapter. 

When comparing WicDiv Vol. 1 (Above) with Trees Vol. 1 (Below) you can see just how different the two story structures are. These sketches are not to scale or anything, but just general sketch out the shape/structure of the plot.

The collection of WicDiv takes advantage of having a more focused narrative where the creators use events and layout to throttle the tension as the story continues. WicDiv also takes advantage of having discrete chapter breaks to pace the reading experience and give convenient points for readers to put the comic down. The plot structure works very well, and really, WicDiv is a great example of a focused single plotline comic done well.

Trees, conversely, has multiple story streams that all sort of build smoothly, since the comic seldom focuses on individual narratives to throttle the narrative. Instead story tension is buil t initially by a gradual progression of events, and later, by very quick, short clipping between eventful sections of subplots. It's tension from editing. Which I found very effective when combined with the lack of obvious breaks: Trees was consistently a very hard comic to put down because there was always another moment of discovery coming. I am not sure how well this approach worked in individual issues but the tradepaperback was a very engaging and cohesive reading experience.

Which, I guess, goes to show that there are legion ways to make good comics, because despite radically different story structures, Trees and WicDiv Volumes 1 are excellent comics.

Previously:
So I Read Trees Vol. 1
So I Read The Wicked + The Divine Vol. 1

Worshipping The Wicked And The Divine #11

Or a look at presenting a reveal in WicDiv #11
by Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, Matt Wilson, and Clayton Cowles; Image Comics

The Wicked and The Divine is a comic that I fined endlessly fascinating. It presents a compelling, textured story about pop culture and mythology, fame and creativity that is depicted with some aggressively interesting comics. It's also a comic that fearlessly delivers a fresh and surprising experience, which in a world of slow moving, safe storytelling is a pretty precious commodity.

This current post is going to be about layout and surprise deployment, and it is made out of *SPOILERS*. If you haven't read up to WicDiv #11, DO NOT read on in this post.

Last time around I mentioned I had a theory about how WicDiv might end. Given the events of WicDiv #11, it's safe to say that I was completely wrong.  Which is really cool: it's a pretty rare thing in fiction to be thoroughly and completely surprised and WicDiv #11 managed to kick the chair out not once, but twice. And, as is becoming routine for my experience with The Wicked and The Divine, I'm pretty fascinated in some of the choices the creative team makes while deploying these surpises.

Which is mostly me just vamping so that I can say again: There are *SPOILERS* here, please go away now if you aren't up to date. 

The above page represents the larger of the two reveals in WicDiv #11 and I love the choice of page layout here. This is a *reveal* shot, a big dramatic moment meant to be deployed in a perfectly paced burst for shock factor and maximal emotional effect. I feel like the conventional wisdom is to frame these kinds of shots as splash pages with a single image splayed out over an entire page or double page spread. The logic being, as far as I can tell, that the bigger the story importance the bigger the story space devoted to the moment. While WicDiv #11 does have a large image spread over a single page, it's brilliantly chopped into three panels that do not quite line up completely. And this is fantastic comics.

I think what makes this so effective is that it manages to significantly change the pace of the moment while still giving it space to be impactful. The use of single core image spread over the page manages to replicate the scale effects of a splash page by giving the reader a large, significant picture to contend with. It is, in the language of comics conventions, a big deal. But by breaking the image into panels, this moment is also stretched out. Rather than being a single burst, the moment reveals itself ever so slightly slower, making this moment yawn horribly on the page. The multi-panel approach also has the added benefit of emphasizing aspects of the underlying image: the grim, bloodstained face of Ananke, and then her clenched and bloodied fists, and finally the burning corpse of her victim. Which actually feeds back into the more gradual reveal: as a reader we experience the bloody clues of the image before the final, horrific reveal in the final panel letting this moment grow with each new piece of information. What I collectively love about this page is that it provides space for the reader to have realization dawn, to have the hope for a different twist quashed, and time for the reader to reconcile that yes, yes that crazy fucking thing just happened. It's a perfect comics moment.

It's amazing how much seemingly small comics choices can reverberate as dramatic storytelling effects.

It's also amazing that I can clearly say I have no fucking clue what comes next.

Previously:
WicDiv #1 and popart head-splosions
WicDiv #2 and the use of black-space
WicDiv #3 and character design
WicDiv #4 and body language 
WicDiv#5 and facial acting
WicDiv #6 and possessions as character
WicDiv #7 and the power of lettering
WicDiv #8 and the disorienting layout
WicDiv #9 and the economics of design
WicDiv #10 and powers as character design