Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Across the two-page spread



Two-page spreads across the comic page have their place and can have a powerful impact in the hands of someone like JH Williams III, who is a goddamn master at using the space. And when used correctly as a punchline or big moment, it can be effective as hell.

But I'm still amazed how many random superhero comics have a spread that is full of standard rectangular panels that don't bleed across the center line, and the action is nothing but talking heads, and you're halfway through the page before you realise you were meant to be reading across the line because these things are making even less sense than usual.

I used to have this issue with a lot of Brian Bendis' early superhero comics - there were large sections of the first Jessica Jones stories that became almost unreadable with this problem. But that's nearly 20 years ago and it's still happening in brand new comics, and it drives me nuts. 

Marvel comics are the worst for it, but does happen in several Batman comics, (which isn't narrowing it down much, because Batman comics seem to be the only thing DC publishes these days). I don't know if it's a failure on the writer or artist's part - I imagine it's a bit of both - but it is a failure.

Because I've been reading comics since I was three years old and I can't follow this shit when it happens, how can we ever expect anyone else to follow these things?

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