At first, prior to reading “Understanding Comics” by Scott McCloud, I had some trouble understanding how this would relate to communications lab. However after reading the first four chapters, it totally made sense to me. Comics I feel tend to have a negative connotation in society since they’re viewed as not “real” readings and are very quite visual. However, McCloud goes in to describe how comics in reality, have always been a part of our life subconsciously and how the “medium” that’s involved within comics is quite different from other literary texts. Comics as McCloud describes, play out like a small film, and with the texts and how the scenes are drawn, the reader is able to fully understand the context and setting of the story within the graphic novel. I personally have read comics that have no bubble texts in them and even with just pictures and the visuals, I could still have a deep understanding and appreciation of the story and what was going on.
In current society, there are now 2 popular mediums of comics out there. One is American comics such as Marvel and DC (although the comics have significantly died in popularity but the films have generated a lot of profit) and Japanese manga which is very popular all around the world. Many manga readers will even prefer the manga over the animated version of that manga or even avoid the light novel. I think a main reason why is that the manga will usually have the rawest and truest story and with the visuals in it, it will be easier to trace the actions and the detailed art amongst the texts.
I also found it very interesting to how when McCloud said that comics were everywhere, he even used ancient examples such as the Egyptian hieroglyphs and how they followed a linear path the way comics do. Not only that, but he also described how people will use their features in creating things and how comic art is often simplified so much that practically anything could be associated with a human face of feature.