“Graphic novel” is a pretentious term designed for people ashamed of reading comics

This might be true, but I never could see the sense of the term ‘comic book’ in the first place. Nobody would call ‘Watchmen’ comic (as in funny), but it is more or less a novel told in visual form. This might not be the right etymology of the ‘comic’ in comic books, but it was always my association. Then again, I’ve never not been exposed to the term ‘graphic novel’, so I just don’t think of it very much at all.

I can’t say I know anything about comics, but I’ve been dying to read The Sandman for ages. I tried to order the first volume from the university library, except it’s apparently lost in Main Stacks, and if something is lost in Main Stacks that pretty much means it’s gone forever. I must get a copy elsewhere. :(

I’ve never had a real problem with graphic novel, since, as has been said, there are plenty of them that aren’t overly comical. And they’re not manga, which have their own definitions and rules around them. And maybe it kind of moves away from stereotypes that tend to be stuck to comic books.

“juxtaposed pictorial or other images in deliberate sequence”

JPOIDS.

“Graphic novel” to me has always meant “a comic book arc collected in one volume” or “sequential art originally written in book form, not in serial form”.

Ditto.

I’m not a big comics person, but later last year I got into the new Captain Marvel series starring Carol Danvers, and I highly recommend it. Issue 9 just released a couple of weeks ago and is the start of a new story arc, so if anyone’s interested that’s the best place to start. It’s written by Kelly Sue DeConnick, who’s currently writing Avengers Assemble as well, and it’s really fantastic and awesome. From following the series I’ve been tempted to buy other comics, but I’m trying to stick to just one. I’m not going down that rabbit hole!

But what about serious comics that do not narratively constitute a novel?

In serial form, I’d call them comics; in collected form I’d still call it a graphic novel if I was talking to a non-comics person. If I was talking to someone who knew about comics, I’d call it a TPB, but most people who aren’t into comics have no idea what that means. “Comics” no longer has the original meaning of “comical stories”. It’s just a generic word for serial, sequential art, in my opinion.

However, most of the time, if issues are collected into a single volume, it’s a single story arc (or some related story arcs), in which case I think “novel” would apply.

You want a bizarre how-I-got-into-comics story? I read Kingdom Come, which is probably the single worst comic to read as your first comic ever. And then, well, I’d seen the Nolan Batman movies and wanted to read more, so I started reading Batman… which got me into Nightwing and Robin and Catwoman and all the other related Bat-stuff… and everything sort of spiraled wildly out of control from there.

Don’t know what you mean. KC is great as all you really have to know is the basics of the major players, everything else is either explained in story or just bonus if you understand the continuity.

As far as comics go…

The Green Lantern family has been growing more disappointing lately except for New Guardians which is actually interesting. The worst is that by making the new GL muslim, you can’t critique it without everyone making it about race or religion. Then the latest JLA advert just looks like DC is trying to give the biggest middle finger possible to a certain set of people in order to gin up controversy and free advertising. Which just seems sleezy.

In better news, the archie comics Sonic & Megaman will be crossing over together in three more months. That should be cool.

I recommend.

Not sure yet if I’m looking forward to Man of Steel yet or not. I was working on a superman script myself then a copier ate the USB drive (long story). If anyone has some recommended programs (though there’s a lot of free ones I’ve tried, I may have to pay for it) let me know.

Don’t know what you mean. KC is great as all you really have to know is the basics of the major players, everything else is either explained in story or just bonus if you understand the continuity.

Yeah, but a story that’s basically about how the old-fashioned superheroes kicked out the horrible nineties ones is kind of a strange place to start. Because it’s so free from regular continuity, though, you do have a good point—you don’t need to have a firm grasp of much more than “Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman are cool”.

That’s what makes it good writing. It does have the subtext of a rebuttal to the grim 90s, but you can enjoy it and get more meanings from it besides that. Responsibilities… choices… It’s good stuff.

Also, just picked up my comic haul from the shop today. I forgot to mention, Batman Beyond: Unlimited.

Yeah it’s 3.99 but it’s one of the few comics I really feel like I get my money’s worth from. (and it’s awesome)

YOU CAN’T UNSEE IT!

I just call them comics because it’s easier to type out and say. Also, trying to separate their definition based on the idea of humor ignores the extraordinarily long history if the medium. It comes off the same way as someone describing as car as an automobile.

Currently reading Sandman Vol. 1. While I like the story, I keep getting distracted by the art. Sometimes the proportions keep falling out of place and the hair looks like the pencilist just scribbled down something and left the inker to guess what he’s supposed to do with it. I’d give it more slack if this wasn’t published. And considered one of the best comics of all time by many.

vol. 1 is probably the weakest of the Sandman comics

Well, better that it gets better as it goes along than the other way around, I suppose.

As for the art, well it is about an anthropomorphic personification of dreams, so you could just put it down to trying to be dreamlike.

I refuse to peg bad inking on it’s “dreamlike nature”. That’s like saying a book’s bad spelling can be excused because it’s written in medieval Europe. I’m not saying it’s enough to make it a bad series, but I do think the art I’m seeing here does get in the way of the story.