Slapstick, Comics, Film, and Dance - Mickey Mouse Adventures

Far different from reading a book or watching a movie, the act of reading a comic strip is an experience in itself. When watching a movie, it’s spelled out for you on the screen how a scene will play out along with all of the mannerisms of its characters, and in a book, you’re giving almost free rain to determine how or what the characters and scenes look like. As for reading a comic strip, it’s somewhere between the two.  An artist has already depicted the scene and the author the story, but it’s up to the reader to imagine the little things such as voices, sounds, and colors, or what happens between the panels.

            The author and artist are able to bring their strip even more to life by using sound words, or ridiculous words made up in order to heighten the experience for the reader. For example, on page 34 of “Mickey Mouse’s Race to Death Valley”, Pete and Shyster are making their getaway when their tire pops. A “BANG” is written in all caps next to the deflating tire with smoke and dirt flying around. In this particular scene, it probably would have been enough for the artist to leave the image with Pete and Shyster looking shocked and confused with the tire popping. However, I do feel that by adding the onomatopoeia makes it much more dramatic, and brings the reader into the story, as if they themselves were hearing the bang as well.

            Not only is this aspect true for all of the onomatopoeias in the story, but I believe that if you were to take away most of the word bubbles, the reader would still have a good hold on what is happening in the story. For the most part, the speech bubbles that the characters fill are just obvious statements to reinforce what the audience might not have gotten in the panel, or the characters making witty statements to themselves to entertain the audience. Because these strips were supposed to appeal to all ages, I think it enhances the story. These witty statements that the characters make give them personality, and make it appealing for everyone. For example, throughout the strip, Mickey is constantly saying the phrase "durn it". Everyone usually has something they say when they're in a pickle, and knowing Mickey does too makes him more relatable as a character, because we get to know him a little better. In my opinion, without the type in these comic strips the characters would seem very flat, and even though they do a lot of outrageous actions, their dialect is part of what makes them special and brings them to life for all readers.