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Post by katshimmy on Feb 24, 2013 19:08:17 GMT -5
Well, there's the character reveal after dialogue on page 1, the seemingly hidden clues in graffiti/signs, and in the bar/party scene, there seems to be color indicators for characters of importance, the use of the city as character versus just setting.
Just off the top of my head.
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Post by Will on Feb 24, 2013 19:25:41 GMT -5
Page 1 was actually deliberately meant as an alternative to conventional introductions to female characters. This article makes the point really well, about the New 52 Catwoman that (in part) prompted the creation of MSCSI in the first place. www.comicsalliance.com/2011/09/22/starfire-catwoman-sex-superheroine/On page 1, the idea was that we see fragments of Cat, but that she's never sexualised or fetishised. It's true that the big reveal on page 2 follows a conventional rhythm, but I'm not sure if that's an echo of anything specific. The detail of Gloria City is no doubt indebted to Dave Gibbons' peerless depiction of NYC in Watchmen. You can't very easily set a superhero comic in an American city and entirely ignore the influence of Watchmen; even if you wanted to. The final splash is also fairly conventional in that it's a big surprise and reveal of a new spectacle/threat on the last page, and if anything I think that's influenced by the rhythms of Grant Morrison's scripts for Zenith and Doom Patrol. |
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Post by Will on Feb 24, 2013 19:28:13 GMT -5
OK kittens it's half midnight here and we've launched our new front page www.mysocalledsecretidentity.com/I'm doing another Q&A in three weeks, but next week it's 'Shoutin' Suze Shore's turn! |
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Post by Beth on Feb 24, 2013 19:32:28 GMT -5
Thanks Will!
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Post by Will on Feb 24, 2013 19:45:53 GMT -5
Will, with regards to the 1993 setting...there are a bunch of interesting comics about young women from that period, though not always ideal portrayals. (For some reason, the first issue reminds me a bit of Alan Moore's Promethea, not sure why.) Did you take any influences from comics from the early/mid-90s in constructing the story? Or any influences from other media from the time? It would be churlish not to stay up to answer Rhi's question! Yes, MSCSI is inspired to a great extent by the Vertigo imprint of DC Comics, from the early-to-mid 1990s in particular: specifically, Sandman, Shade and a bit of Doom Patrol. That comes across, I hope, in the fashions and overall feel of the comic, but also in the cover, which Sarah deliberately designed in the distinctively collaged style of early-90s Vertigo -- like Dave McKean's work for Sandman. The most significant single influence from comics on MSCSI is probably Neil Gaiman's 'A Game of You' arc from Sandman -- in terms of Cat's house and housemates, anyway. But I also wanted it to feel a bit like an episode of Friends, and of course Claire Danes (My So-Called Life) played into the network of influences, too. Enrique is based a little on Jared Leto and a little on Bender, from The Breakfast Club -- Cat is a little like Andie from Pretty in Pink. There are specific pages where I suggest to the artists 'this could have a Scott Pilgrim feel' or 'this could evoke the way Tim Sale draws New York in Daredevil Yellow', but there are other points where I reference West Side Story and The Catcher in the Rye. More obscurely, I wanted to try to capture the feeling of alternative bands I liked from that period -- Lush, Throwing Muses, Belly, Curve, Suede. |
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Post by Suze on Feb 25, 2013 11:37:06 GMT -5
Thanks for the answers Will, it's great seeing the background thought behind the writing!
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Post by Will on Feb 25, 2013 14:00:47 GMT -5
Maybe we could have an 'Ask the Artist' thread on the go, too? If anyone wants to ask me any more stuff, I will keep checking in here, but I also have some questions for Suze and Sarah  |
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Post by Beth on Feb 25, 2013 14:34:16 GMT -5
Your wish is my command.
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Rhi
Cat People
every story tells a picture, don't it
Posts: 68 
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Post by Rhi on Feb 25, 2013 18:58:02 GMT -5
Thanks for coming back on my question, Will. I feel a bit bad that you stayed up a bit longer to answer, though, I would have been fine waiting!
I actually haven't read A Game of You in a good decade, sadly, but I did relatively recently read the Morrison and Pollack runs on Doom Patrol, so the style is definitely fresher in my mind. I can definitely see where you're coming from with the Vertigo influence, just with a modern take.
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Post by Will on Feb 26, 2013 6:10:06 GMT -5
I never really succeeded with Pollack -- I don't know why, maybe her approach was too different to Morrison's (which I'd grown very fond of) or maybe it seemed like his, but just a bit diluted or wide of the mark. So I gave up on Doom Patrol shortly into her run.
What I really take from Doom Patrol, and Shade, and 'A Game of You' and 'The Doll's House' from Sandman, is the sense of a group of misfits -- kind of superheroes, and kind of just regular people with strangeness about them -- who all become a sort of family.
That's what I'm aiming for with the house Dahlia owns, and I think it will become more obvious starting with the first page of the 2nd issue (coming March 31!)
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Post by beccatoria on Feb 26, 2013 18:03:22 GMT -5
Yes, MSCSI is inspired to a great extent by the Vertigo imprint of DC Comics, from the early-to-mid 1990s in particular: specifically, Sandman, Shade and a bit of Doom Patrol. Awesome. Reading early-90s Vertigo books (in the mid-to-late-90s, out of the local library) was the thing that got me into comics in the first place. I may be manufacturing relevance out of nostalgia, but I suspect the same may be true for a lot of other women in my age bracket. |
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Rhi
Cat People
every story tells a picture, don't it
Posts: 68
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Post by Rhi on Feb 26, 2013 18:13:31 GMT -5
MOMENTARY OFF-TOPIC
I stuck around for all of Rachel Pollack's run mostly because I wanted to see what she'd do with her new characters. She did do some rather interesting developmental things with the female characters that Morrison hadn't done, and Kate Godwin/Coagula is generally fantastic (moar good trans* characters in comics please world). That said, Pollack did get very metaphysical on an Alan Moore-y kind of level near the end, which was both interesting in that she developed her own style but also difficult reading--again, see Alan Moore.
Seriously irritating, though not surprising, that it's never been put in TPBs. Not really DC's goal, these days.
Tying it back in, though--there's good expansion on the making a family narrative in the Pollack Doom Patrol that I sorta see here in MSCSI, though as Becca notes, that could be me projecting!
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Post by Will on Feb 26, 2013 18:36:38 GMT -5
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