CBR: Permanent Damage - Dec 2, 2009

**CBR News** · 12-02-2009, 02:27 PM

This Week: The final word on narrative and what it means to the future of the graphic novel; comics books for Xmas 2009 - our recommendations; plus Wonder Woman, Rupert Murdoch, gays in Uganda, bankers with guns and lots of other notes.

Full article here.

**Thad** · 12-02-2009, 02:49 PM

I like the comic narrative/computer UI comparison; I'm going to have to put some more thought into their similarities and differences. God knows I like a comics narrative that defies convention a hell of a lot better than I like a user interface that does.

**iduckles** · 12-02-2009, 04:19 PM

I was a bit surprised to see this left of the list of good Holiday gifts, especially since it is one of the more interesting works to interrogate Narrative in comics that I have seen. My favorite sequence occurs towards the end where Asterios stubs his toe and this prompts a flood of memories about his failed marriage. Just a great example of how narrative can be used in the graphic novel.

**cfutino** · 12-03-2009, 05:03 AM

When I read last week's column, the first comic I thought was Promethea. It really is an interesting experiment on comics narrative technique.

**dancj** · 12-03-2009, 05:52 AM

Originally Posted by Thad

I like the comic narrative/computer UI comparison; I'm going to have to put some more thought into their similarities and differences. God knows I like a comics narrative that defies convention a hell of a lot better than I like a user interface that does.

Maybe sometimes. But in both cases if it's well designed enough it shouldn't become an obstacle.

The iPhone's interface was in many ways unconventional, but it's so intuitive that it doesn't matter. Of course is the result is that convention going forward has now been defined by the iPhone, so it's no longer unconventional.

**dancj** · 12-03-2009, 05:54 AM

Steven - Have you read Joe Casey + Charlie Adlard's Codeflesh? It's largely unremarkable, but there's a great narrative device in the final story in the TPB which I haven't seen before.

The art tells one story, but all of the dialogue in the story has been replaced by the text of the letter that the main character is writing to his girlfriend (IIRC). It works really well.

**deworde** · 12-03-2009, 06:10 AM

Reading the Daily Mail's an art-form, and if you're just looking to slag Britain off, it's a bit of a mistake to use it, because you inevitably end up looking as stupid as them.

Here's the actual meat of the article.
"The HSE inquiry was begun after a technician was crushed to death in 2006 in Barking, East London, when a pin-setting machine was mistakenly left plugged in."

So in other words, the workplaces were unsafe to a level where their employees were risking their lives. Ensuring that employers can't risk their employees' lives through laziness and cost-cutting is what Health and Safety is actually for, and it's an absolutely essential job, for reasons that should be obvious. As far as I can tell, this small section of the report says
a) People do try to run up to dick around with pins at a bowling alley - (This is true)
b) The machinery in it's current state is dangerous enough to be lethal if they do this - (If true, this is unacceptable. Enthusiastic stupidity at places that serve alcohol should not be a capital offence)
A quarter of a million spread across all bowling alleys in the UK is not a huge amount, especially for a comprehensive technical review of potentially dangerous machinery in a commercial environment. Or did you think that the Mail actually checked the whole, or even the important parts, of the report?

What this is, is careful cherry-picking of a comprehensive report to find the most mockable things, which appear to be "Loud Machinery does permanent ear-damage, and you need to protect your employers from this" and that there is the potential for customers to be harmed by machinery WHICH ALREADY KILLED SOMEONE, if the machinery isn't properly shielded/cut-outs aren't installed. Not really that mockable overall.

So basically, a man died, an investigative committee did their job, and now a comics blogger is treating an attempt to stop laziness and cheapness from killing people as "madness" via third-hand information. Good job there, I'd imagine his family would be really happy with you.

**Charles RB** · 12-03-2009, 07:56 AM

Originally Posted by deworde

Or did you think that the Mail actually checked the whole, or even the important parts, of the report?

It's possible.

It's also possible that right this minute, Al-Qaeda and the Real IRA are about to go on a pub crawl together. I doubt it though.

**deworde** · 12-03-2009, 09:22 AM

Originally Posted by Charles RB

It's possible.

It's also possible that right this minute, Al-Qaeda and the Real IRA are about to go on a pub crawl together. I doubt it though.

Well, how could we know? Oh...
http://www.hse.gov.uk/press/record/dm301109.htm

So it was actually £20,000, it discovered the problem was with all machines country wide, in that there are no physical safe-guards to prevent injury, and at least 3 fatalities and multiple injuries have occured, mostly to employees. But of course, if they fix the problem, how will the Mail run their headline "Machine Crushes Child Shock".
And here's their report.
http://www.hse.gov.uk/laU/lacs/47-20.htm

I especially like 5.5.5, which is the single area where customer safety is mentioned, and it specifically says that it's a difficult issue, and that some form of photo-electric sensor (ie the kind of thing found in every room of a burglar alarm system protected house), is probably the best that can be achieved. And that's it.
Hardly Health and Safety gone mad.

It's actually a reasonably level-headed, sensible and productive report, which outlines solutions that will prevent further death. Probably shouldn't have costed £250,000. But as it didn't, that's not a huge problem.

Short-hand. Steven is being quite American about this.

**Steven Grant** · 12-03-2009, 10:17 AM

Originally Posted by dancj

Steven - Have you read Joe Casey + Charlie Adlard's Codeflesh? It's largely unremarkable, but there's a great narrative device in the final story in the TPB which I haven't seen before.

The art tells one story, but all of the dialogue in the story has been replaced by the text of the letter that the main character is writing to his girlfriend (IIRC). It works really well.

I did, and I remember that bit. Did the same sort of thing myself in later issues of WHISPER, where the story going on in the art/dialogue has nothing to do with what's going on in the captions. Thing is: once they're juxtaposed, they're the same story, and reflect on each other. That's something that can really only be pulled off in comics.

You may recall awhile back I asked people to send in postcards. Without reference to the postcards, I then wrote a short story/essay, then lettered that in over the postcards, chosen randomly, and published the end result in the column as a "comic strip." I've tried on a few occasions to get artists to draw what they want for a few pages, within pre-agreed broad parameters, while I randomly flipped novels on my bookshelf open, blindly stabbed my finger down, and pulled out whatever paragraph I hit. The plan was to copy the paragraphs over, dialogue and all, changing only the given names to he/she/they pronouns, then applying those as captions to the art. What I call "found comics." Never could quite get artists to see the point of it, which is basically to see what you end up with when you're done. I've done a few "found stories" that way, just using text, and they can be pretty interesting. If you do it with the broad works of a single author, it's almost like getting a brand new story out of them.

And the results have never been as incoherent as one might reasonably expect.

- Grant

**king mob** · 12-03-2009, 11:28 AM

Originally Posted by deworde

Reading the Daily Mail's an art-form, and if you're just looking to slag Britain off, it's a bit of a mistake to use it, because you inevitably end up looking as stupid as them.

It's the danger if one treats the Mail as a newspaper rather than a far-right scaremongering rag.

**dancj** · 12-04-2009, 05:11 AM

Originally Posted by king mob

It's the danger if one treats the Mail as a newspaper rather than a far-right scaremongering rag.

True.

Just for the record Steven - I'd treat the Daily Mail with the same respect you treat Fox News.

**dancj** · 12-04-2009, 05:13 AM

Originally Posted by Steven Grant

You may recall awhile back I asked people to send in postcards.

Ooh yeah - I'd forgotten about that.

**John Asperger** · 12-04-2009, 03:47 PM

...Following the link for the JAMES BOND OMMNIBUS , I sere that it does not include the strip's adaptation of " The Spy Who Loved Me " , which I've been interested in reading !
Oh , well . Maybe " Vol. 2 "

?