Chapter By Chapter features me reading one chapter of the selected book at a time and reviewing it as if I were reviewing an episode of a TV show or an issue of a comic. There will be spoilers if you haven’t read to the point I have, and if you’ve read further I ask that you don’t spoil anything further into the book. Think of it as read-along book club.
In our last chapter Jake headed towards Mexico…which raises even more questions about the legal system in The Future! I’m no expert but if you just got out of “the joint” you really aren’t allowed to go outside the country for a while, right? At best it’s been a couple of days for Jake, and that was after spending years frozen solid, waking up to his friends missing and his family leaving him…how much pull does Bascom have here? I know he needs Jake to go to Mexico because of his history with a warlord who runs the territory the target may be at but still, that’s some serious influence he has.
Well, now Jake is in the thick of it. Another chance to either meet an informant or getting blown up, meeting a woman he was…involved?…with and her jealous psycho boyfriend, and at least his son is here, too. Yeah, I wouldn’t want to be this Jake right about now. I’d rather be more like my Jake and work on comics. Especially right now, because in all the confusion I had last week I forgot…Jake was being attacked by a cyborg with a knife hand when we left off.
BW’s Daily Video> The Writing Trap Of Current Day References In Comics
Catch more from Comics By Perch on YouTube
This isn’t a new phenomenon either, and I don’t just mean that this was recorded in 2020. Look back at comics from the 1970s, or earlier/later. Old people trying to write teenagers (read a Teen Titans comic from the 1960s), plot points based on current events that we look back upon with new information, the clearly dated references (even worse when someone is writing about the past having never experienced it and just references, say, a particular TV show that was popular in the past)…it all horribly dates when the comic takes place and kills a bit of that timelessness. Not as many people will get the Frasier and Niles Crane reference if they don’t know the show but was only put in there because the writer wanted to move Tony Stark to Seattle for his run. Reference responsibly, writers. The best comic stories are the ones that are still relevant years later.
Tell others about the Spotlight:
Posted by ShadowWing Tronix on November 8, 2022 in Comic Spotlight and tagged Comics By Perch, commentary, writing comics, writing tips.
3 Comments