Art or Writing?

[Carabas]

The book in question that started the conversation was an issue of "2099 Unlimited" with Hulk 2099 on the cover.

In all fairness, if I bought books like that I wouldn't read them either.

[Sousa]

People say that the art is the most important thing, though wasn't the 90's notorious for great art and bad writing which is a big reason for people hating the 90's? I think writing is more important than people give it credit for, I can't read a story if its written poorly. Think of it in terms of video games, whats more important gameplay and story or graphics? Or what about movies that have explosions , great action sequences and looks great yet has a poor story? Art is important of course

[FanboyStranger]

The book in question that started the conversation was an issue of "2099 Unlimited" with Hulk 2099 on the cover.

That's definitely not a Bolland cover. (It's not a terrible book by any means, though.)

[FanboyStranger]

People say that the art is the most important thing, though wasn't the 90's notorious for great art and bad writing which is a big reason for people hating the 90's? I think writing is more important than people give it credit for, I can't read a story if its written poorly. Think of it in terms of video games, whats more important gameplay and story or graphics? Or what about movies that have explosions , great action sequences and looks great yet has a poor story? Art is important of course

I think there's a lot of misconceptions about the '90s in comics. There were a lot of very well-done books, but the focus is often on the poor books that sold very well. Most of those books did not have good storytelling art-- they were essentially pin-up pages strung together. I'm not sure any writer could have saved most of them. Consider, say, Alan Moore's Judgment Day with Liefeld, which was an interesting story essentially butchered by Liefeld's art. If the testimonies within the stories didn't have other artists attached to them, the book would have been a total disaster.

On the other hand, you had some of the best artists in the industry come up in the '90s: Michael Lark, Sean Phillips, JP Leon, JH Williams III, Tommy Lee Edwards, Tony Harris, Peter Gross, Phil Jimenez, Carlos Pacheco, etc. They were doing interesting work under the radar for the most part while people were buying chromium covers and a billion variants.

[RobinFan4880]

Good writing can excuse bad art, good art really cannot excuse bad writing.

[Otherworlder]

Even Rocafort and Booth (both of whom I adore to no end) can't make me sit down and read Scott Lobdell for real (I have picked up stuff to just stare at pictures granted), but I will follow just about anything if the writer is good enough, even if I curse the artist's name from first page to last page every time.

[Sousa]

I think there's a lot of misconceptions about the '90s in comics. There were a lot of very well-done books, but the focus is often on the poor books that sold very well. Most of those books did not have good storytelling art-- they were essentially pin-up pages strung together. I'm not sure any writer could have saved most of them. Consider, say, Alan Moore's Judgment Day with Liefeld, which was an interesting story essentially butchered by Liefeld's art. If the testimonies within the stories didn't have other artists attached to them, the book would have been a total disaster.

On the other hand, you had some of the best artists in the industry come up in the '90s: Michael Lark, Sean Phillips, JP Leon, JH Williams III, Tommy Lee Edwards, Tony Harris, Peter Gross, Phil Jimenez, Carlos Pacheco, etc. They were doing interesting work under the radar for the most part while people were buying chromium covers and a billion variants.

Fair enough then, I really didn't know. The extent of 90's comics that I've read are the Long Halloween and the Knight Trilogy . All I ever hear is how the 90s were awful in terms of writing and story telling. Thanks for clearing that up!

[thetrellan]

To expand a bit, the art and the writing, in a comic, should go together like a song's music and lyrics. Obviously, the lyrics are very important (to songs that have them), but it's usually the melody and/or the beat, that first grabs your attention. And, at least for me, it's hard to sit through a song where the melody/beat is bad, no matter how good the actual lyrics might be.

Excellent anology, BTW.

It seems strange to me that readers talk about writers getting their attention first. You can't tell how good a writer is until you've finished reading, and no writer is so good that every story is a gem. For instance, Bendis did excellent work with Daredevil and Scarlet, while his more super-powered work has failed to impress (although Ultimate Spider-Man wasn't bad, it wasn't the must-read they were). But with art you can tell at a glance. What you see is what you get.

I read this question as a matter of course: all things being equal, covers aside, what is it that grabs your interest first? Writers vary, some subjects simply trigger creative juices better, but art is far more reliable, changing in quality only slowly over time. I can read a weak story because I read novels, and novels take time to read (sometimes taking as much as 100 pages before reaching that point where you're hooked), and therefore patience on the reader's part.

Following the same logic, I can get through an entire years worth of writing before even drawing a conclusion about whether it's likable or not. But if the art is bad, I most definitely will not like the story. After decades of collecting, I know this well.

[thetrellan]

I've never understood this. They're both visual abstractions. And most folks can sight read as fast as they can interpret complex pictures.

The S-shield or Superman name is as quickly identifiable as the whole man drawn.

But the art draws the reader in and helps maintain interest and pacing. Consider times when artwork was excluded from a story. Even if the typical captions/dialogue balloon motif persisted, didn't it take longer to read?

Mind you, I love reading novels, but my first thought when seeing this is "they actually expect me to read this mess?"

Actually, my first thought is "Saving money on the artwork again, I see". But even considering how all this thinking- as well as the shock of switching to a different technique- is a shock to the pacing, reading slows down. In particular I remember how, beginning with "Jaka's Story", Cerebus suddenly hit the bottom of my reading list because the comic became a chore to read. And I really loved Cerebus up to that point. Eventually the series adopted a novelized approach, and I was forced to drop the book.

[thetrellan]

Good writing can excuse bad art, good art really cannot excuse bad writing.

Not if you know anything about art. For art lovers, art exists for its own sake, and putting up with an artist less skilled in some area or other than yourself is intolerable. Because you think you know better, you expect the artist to at least be better than yourself. Which, I admit, may not be entirely fair to the artist. It is what it is.

[RobinFan4880]

Excellent anology, BTW.

It seems strange to me that readers talk about writers getting their attention first. You can't tell how good a writer is until you've finished reading

Patently untrue. If I sit down to read a Batman comic and he's making a fart joke to Alfred, then I know he is a bad writer (or at the very least not the kind of writer I would be interested in for Batman comics).

Additionally, art can be just as malleable as writing, even within a single issue. One simply has to look at some of the amorphous blob faces in Batman Eternal #5 to see what I am talking about.

To expand a bit, the art and the writing, in a comic, should go together like a song's music and lyrics. Obviously, the lyrics are very important (to songs that have them), but it's usually the melody and/or the beat, that first grabs your attention. And, at least for me, it's hard to sit through a song where the melody/beat is bad, no matter how good the actual lyrics might be.

Yes and no.

Music without lyrics can be nice but one simply has to look at the popularity of classical music to see that without lyrics, music would grow to become a tiresome chore.

Don't get me wrong, the opposite is also true. I am not looking forward to Kanye West's three hour long spoken world album.

Comics work best when both writing and art fuse together to form something special and unique. Separately, they are nothing but novelties to be admired for no more than a few minutes before moving on to the next novelty.

Not if you know anything about art. For art lovers, art exists for its own sake, and putting up with an artist less skilled in some area or other than yourself is intolerable. Because you think you know better, you expect the artist to at least be better than yourself. Which, I admit, may not be entirely fair to the artist. It is what it is.

Do not presume I know nothing of art. In fact, you should presume everyone here knows at least a little about art, if not a great deal. In fact, you should probably not phrase sentences like that at all, as they are provocative (i.e. so-called "Fightin' Words"). To assume a stranger is stupid or ignorant is just wrong.

If you have issues with artists you think are bad but are getting to publish work in mainstream comics, then that is on you. If you think you can draw better, then try and get a job at DC. Honestly, stop wasting time on forums and submit your work (or start drawing indy comics and get noticed!). Meanwhile, I will read XKCD, Cyanide & Happiness and Order of the Stick and not feel like their creators are undeserving of their fame and fortunes because they use stick figure art.

[Alan2099]

If you combine a half a gallon of ice-cream with a half a gallon of manure, you get a gallon of manure.

Horrible art OR horrible writing will ruin a book. There are critically acclaimed graphic novels that I simply can't get into because I think the art looks like garbage. Likewise, there are some great artists working with some absolutely horrible storytellers and I don't read those books either.

Now sometimes a strong artists can make up for a weak writer and sometimes a strong writer can make up for a week artist but you don't have a comic without both.

[General Nerditry]

If you combine a half a gallon of ice-cream with a half a gallon of manure, you get a gallon of manure.

Horrible art OR horrible writing will ruin a book. There are critically acclaimed graphic novels that I simply can't get into because I think the art looks like garbage. Likewise, there are some great artists working with some absolutely horrible storytellers and I don't read those books either.

Now sometimes a strong artists can make up for a weak writer and sometimes a strong writer can make up for a week artist but you don't have a comic without both.

Very well said. At the end of the day, comics are a fusion of writing and art. Both are inherent to the medium, so obviously both are important.

[SteveGus]

Patently untrue. If I sit down to read a Batman comic and he's making a fart joke to Alfred, then I know he is a bad writer (or at the very least not the kind of writer I would be interested in for Batman comics).

This is exactly why art takes precedence over writing to me. Good art draws you in. So long as the writing is competent -- the writer demonstrating familiarity with the genre and character, and uses the characters appropriately -- I can enjoy the book. I take it more or less for granted that most professional comic book writers are able to deliver a series of appropriate stories which provide the occasion for interesting art.

What the writer can do is blow it: show unfamiliarity with the characters, ignore genre conventions, go for shock value, adopt an adversarial or superior posture to, or otherwise disrespect the source material. This sort of thing will jar and spoil enjoyment of even the best art.

So there's a group of artists I like and follow. The writers are more of a discard pile: there are certain writers I actively avoid.

[General Nerditry]

On the flip side, artists can blow it, too. Incoherent story telling, poor composition, ugly art that is painful to look at, etc. If someone wants to enjoy art just for the sake of art, they can buy sketchbooks. The point of comics is to be an illustrative storytelling medium, and that works best when both the writing and art are great. Sure, some folks lean toward one more than the other, but I personally don't have the time or interest to waste my time on boring stories that aren't engaging.