[In this new feature, guttergeeks will take on making sweeping generalizations about the form, its history and its future, based on close attention to a single panel]
Massimo Mattioli, Superwest
By Ryan Tokola
Pop quiz: name your five favorite writers
in comics…Okay, good job. Now your favorite pencilers. No
problem, right? How about inkers? A little harder, I think,
but go ahead, I’ll wait…I knew you could do it. Now name
your top five favorite colorists.
…
Done yet? No? I don’t blame you. It’s not an easy question.
Don’t get me wrong—I have nothing against colorists
themselves. For the most part they do a pretty good job. I
just can’t tell the difference between one colorist and
another. So where’s the problem? Why is color in comics so
unremarkable? I seriously doubt that colorists as a group
are either incompetent or lazy. I don’t believe they’re all
aiming for homogeneity. There must be something fundamental
to the way we approach comics that prevents color from
attaining the visibility of plot, script, or line.
Again, where’s the problem? First of all, it seems to me
that people just don’t pay much attention to color. In
fact, it’s most conspicuous in absence. For many, a black
and white comic screams “I have no color!” but a color
comic is just a comic. Color is the absence of a vacuum
between black lines. Color exists to allow a comic not to
be without color. Or, for some, it is reassurance that the
comic is not a pretentious, meandering piece of snobbery. A
color comic is a normal comic for normal people.
What else does color do? It enhances things, making them
easier to see. It doesn’t do much by itself. Color is MSG.
It’s good at reinforcing mood. Blistering reds, tranquil
blues, and icky fluorescent yellow-greens all remind you
how you’re supposed to feel, not unlike Hollywood’s
manipula..., er, emotional scores. It also helps distinguish things.
Giving distinct color pallets to locations and characters
makes it possible to discern who is where with a glance.
Color emphasizes form, too. Those artsy black and white
comics can get confusing with nothing but a bunch of lines
all over the place. It’s a lot easier to see the shape of
Superdude’s cape when it’s brightly colored. Finally, color
makes comics a little more exciting. There is an undeniable
physical power that comes with well-used complimentary
colors.
Since color doesn’t seem to do much, nobody gets very
attached to it. In fact, modifying the color of a
previously well-known comic isn’t usually seen as
substantially altering its content. The Essential series of reprints by Marvel reproduces
only the line art of classic superhero comics—the color is
completely removed. Scholastic isn’t having trouble selling
their colorized version of Jeff Smith’s Bone. Many of Carl Bark’s stories are being
reprinted with the color completely redone (not digitally
remastered like an old film, but really redone, with
computer-generated gradients and everything). These are all
fundamental changes and there hasn’t exactly been rioting
in the streets. Just imagine if Norton had somebody
re-ink A Contract
With God.
At the same time as it has received little to no respect,
color has also been significantly overused. Color is often
the overworked, malnourished, emotionally abused stepchild
in the Elements of Comics family tree. To be honest, I’ve
always kind of disliked color. I blame the people who think
that “It’s so colorful!” is high praise. After years of
shielding my eyes from garish abuses, I have concluded
that, like driving an automobile, the use of color is a
privilege, not a right. It’s way too easy to sling color
around without any real thought. It is generally accepted
that if color can be used, it should be used.
Okay. If color’s so unimportant, why am I wasting all this
time talking about it? I am here, friends, to tell you that
it doesn’t have to be that way. There is hope for color.
Not too long ago I was reading Superwest, a comic by Massimo Mattioli, when I
came across this panel, which just about made my head
explode:
I
mean, holy crap, right?
Before I get into too much detail, it’s important to know
that the coloring here isn’t completely different from the
rest of the book. The colors everywhere are very arbitrary.
Both what gets colored and what color it gets are without
obvious logic, like a drunken paint-bucket spree in
Photoshop. Things also don’t stay the same color from panel
to panel. Although these things are very important, we’re
not going to focus on them. There’s something much larger
at stake. Until this particular panel, the colors in
Superwest
followed the great unwritten
and unquestioned rule of coloring: stay within the lines.
Every panel of every comic I have every read until now has
obeyed the spirit, if not the letter of this law. Yes, some
people get all ‘artistic’ by coloring with big sloppy
brushstrokes and whatnot, but colors have always served the
image as it is drawn, and no more. When the view of
something is obstructed, the colorist is only supposed to
color the parts that are visible. Lines are placed with
great thought and care, and color is used to fill in the
empty space. Line is the great imperial power of comics. It
marches right into a page, surveys the land and then: “Hey
color! We’ve decided that it is our manifest destiny to
control these lands. Why don’t you be a dear and set up
shop in this little place we’ve reserved for you. Here,
take some blankets and something to drink.”
Friends, Mr. Mattioli has had a vision. He has seen a
greater future for color. He has seen freedom! Color need
not be crammed into the spaces deemed appropriate by the
lines. Just look at the panel above. We all know what
happened here:
Once upon a time there was a blank panel in a comic book.
It was generally known that the scene was supposed to show
a diner with a duck on a stool and a mouse in a chef’s hat
and a table with a bunch of stuff on it. Some lines put
together a committee and figured out where they should go
in order to illustrate the scene with proper perspective
and so forth. Then the proud, noble color blue came
sauntering up. It wanted to be a table top, but saw that
there was a bunch of stuff on it. Humble, subservient
colors in the past would have sucked in their gut and
squeezed around the radio, the salt shaker, the napkin
dispenser, the glass, the lamp, and the duck. Says our
hero, the revolutionary Blue: “Screw that. I’ve decided to
be the table top, and that’s exactly what I’m going to
be—no less.”
The salt shaker’s still there. The blue isn’t taking away
information. It’s not hurting anybody. It’s just doing what
it damn well wants to do, and making things more
interesting for everybody in the meantime. Mattioli is
doing something very, very cool. In this panel, color is
line’s equal.
Here I am, weepy with joy, and then I realize this is just
the beginning. Color can go further. Mattioli’s panel is
just the Fort Sumter of comics. Color’s destiny is total
liberation. Imagine a comic where the color had a narrative
that was completely separate from the story the lines were
telling. It would probably be confusing, but so are all new
modes of storytelling. That color would actually be
accomplishing something. That color would have earned its
keep and then some. And even if that comic of the future
sucked, I can tell you one thing for sure: I’d remember the
name of the colorist that made it.