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Moment-to-Moment With Tobio's Death


Good Evening Blog, 
Before taking this class, I’ve never really gotten the chance to critically think and analyze comics and manga before. When I've read comics and manga in the past, I really just paid attention to the story and the pretty art. But, after reading Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, I’ve come to realize that like all other art forms, there are deeper reasons why a comic artist chooses to draw in a certain style and how they choose to present their ideas.  This is especially true in Tezuka Osamu’s Astro Boy. The way that Osamu has chosen to use specific techniques in his panel-to-panel has helped to bring out crucial points in his manga.
In McCloud’s book, he names 6 different types of paneling that are used in comics and manga: moment-to-moment, action-to-action, subject-to-subject, scene-to-scene, aspect-to-aspect, and non-sequitur.
I feel that one of the best scenes in Astro Boy is Tobio’s death. Not because Tobio died, but because the way that paneling was used to lead up to Tobio’s death. Like McCloud said, Western comics tend to rely heavily on action-to-action paneling. But, Japanese manga is different because it doesn’t rely heavily on action-to-action as much. 
What made Tobio’s death such a great scene is that Osamu took the time with his moment-to-moment scenes rather than go straight to action-to-action. Osamu takes 3 pages to build his foundation to then lead to the climax point in the manga. On pages 18-19 in Astro Boy, Osamu chooses to create only moment-to-moment scenes to draw the reader into the moment of the manga. On page 18, the reader feels like they are driving along with Tobio as the panels cut to the streets and background of the city, immersing the reader with the scenery. Then, on page 19, with the readers still immersed with Tobio, they helplessly watch him slowly lose control of his car. On page 20, Tobio’s death takes up half the page as these moment-to-moment panels led up to this action scene.  Osamu chooses to immerse us, the readers, with Tobio as a stronger way to present his death. If Osamu had chosen to depict action scenes to illustrate Tobio’s death, I feel like the impact would not be as strong. By slowing down the moment, Osamu was able to create a bigger impact on his readers. 
It was really interesting to see how different paneling changes the views of the reader. Now, when I’m reading manga or comics again, I’ll be sure to pay more attention to the paneling that the author uses. 

Thanks and goodbye for now! (also rip Tobio)

Works
Tezuka Osamu, Astro Boy
Scott McCloud, Understanding Comics

Comments

  1. YimmyApril 17, 2020 at 8:25 AM

    I also find this scene very important for the story itself as it may have symbolized that the traditional definition of human species is overturned. The newly extended definition comes to include the artificial intelligence in a human-like but robot form, such as Astro boy.

    This moment-to-moment construction seems to really amplify this symbolic moment in the story.

    ReplyDelete

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