Week 9 European Comics: (The Long Tomorrow, Silver Surfer Vol.2, Upon A Star) (5pts)

 Right off the bat the first thing that stuck out to me was the use of color in The Long Tomorrow. After reading Maus, and March, it was refreshing to see such vibrant use of colors in this comic.  The sci-fi theme and plot of the story reminded me of an episode of Love, Death, and Robots that followed a similar plot line. I was shocked out how in you face the sexuality was. It was very real and honest for lack of a better word. I don't think that it was done in a erotic or pornographic way however. It just came off as realistic. It's very cool to see how the medium was taken more seriously in Europe than in America at that time an that Adults were open to reading comics. 

Silver Surfer was a great read, it was a longer story than The Long Tomorrow and it had more depth. At first, I was a bit lost because I didn't have much backstory on who the Prophet was or why his sister chose to escape and steal a helicopter but it started to make more sense as I read along. The language in this comic was much more sophisticated and a bit biblical like. I found it entertaining and it helped me further understand the personalizes of some of the characters like the Silver Surfer, The Prophet, and Galactus. I liked the line when the Prophet's sister says, If we are too fearful to question, then what will become of us?" I think that a lot of people didn't understand the importance of questioning systems and leaders in place up until last presidential election and for some this one. So it's very interesting to see that this was a theme being talked about in comics years ago. I think that it's important for artists and other creatives to talk about important topics like this in their work to help the general public see things from a different perspective and hopefully learn something. 

Upon A Star had a slightly more simplistic design in its characters that I found very cute. The message in the little segment before the actual story is actually something that spoke very loudly to me as I have been exploring my own childhood trauma lately and observing how other people's childhood traumas affect them. Many people don't like to face these traumas or don't understand others because of them so it was very cool to see that message in a comic. For the creator to say that everyone has some childhood trauma that sticks with them was very inspiring to see. One thing that I did find interesting in both The Long Tomorrow and Upon a Star is that the main characters were people of color and these are European comics. I'm not sure when thee comics debuted but its refreshing to see that these comics were more progressive than that of their American counterparts.