Skip to main content
CNN.com /TRANSCRIPTS

CNN TV
EDITIONS





CNN LIVE AT DAYBREAK

Comic Books Growing in Popularity and Growing Up

Aired May 29, 2002 - 06:25   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: The front lines from the war in Afghanistan, the history of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., England's urban class single scene, it sounds like subjects from "The New York Times" bestseller list, but those subjects are actually in recent comic books, a medium growing in popularity and growing up.

Andrew D. Arnold is a columnist for time.com and an expert on comic books. He joins us live from New York this morning to talk comics.

I couldn't believe when I was looking through these that these were comic books. You know most people think of "Batman" or "Superman," but comic books aren't about that anymore, are they?

ANDREW D. ARNOLD, TIME.COM COLUMNIST: Well, they haven't been for a long time. In fact, super hero books are becoming less and less the interesting thing about comic books. There's a much larger variety of subjects to be found in that medium.

COSTELLO: Like the war on Afghanistan. I was looking through "To Afghanistan and Back," and it has, you know, little cartoons in it just like you would see in like a "Superman" thing, but it's about a much more important subject. How do they address these topics in a comic book manner?

ARNOLD: Well, "To Afghanistan and Back" is called a graphic travel log. It's by Ted Rawl (ph), who's also a political cartoonist. He went to Afghanistan after September 11th and traveled around and was able to write about it in a comic book format. It's a fascinating different way of approaching the subject you see on TV and in newspapers a lot.

COSTELLO: Do you think people can learn more from this genre, perhaps?

ARNOLD: Learn more about the subject of Afghanistan?

COSTELLO: Yeah, because you learn about it in a different way. It's sort of like serious and kind of funny at the same time. And I don't mean funny, ha, ha, but kind of in a sarcastic manner.

ARNOLD: Yeah, it is, but, you know, it also allows for an extremely personal view of Afghanistan, which you don't always get in other mediums. COSTELLO: The other comic book that I found interesting is called "King." It's about Dr. Martin Luther King, and it kind of destroys the myths surrounding his life and talks about some of the more controversial aspects of that. Can you explain?

ARNOLD: Sure, it's described as an interpretive biography and it's going to be in three parts. The first two parts have already been published. And it's a man named Hoche Anderson's (ph) version of the life of Dr. Martin Luther King. And so he takes a sort of a novelistic approach, which is unusual in the biographical genre.

COSTELLO: And, again, looking through this book, it's just like a comic book, if I could show this. See, it's just like a comic book, but it really gives you a sense of history. And it also, as I said, is controversial.

Do many people read these comic books? How big is the audience for this kind of stuff?

ARNOLD: It's growing larger and larger. The number of choices in comic books has greatly expanded over the last 10 years or so. You'd be surprised. I mean, here I am on CNN.

COSTELLO: Exactly, and we like that. Hey, tell us your Web site so that people can check it out, because you do reviews of comic books that are actually quite interesting.

ARNOLD: That's right. I write for time.com, and you can go to www.time.com/comix.

COSTELLO: OK, Andrew, thank you for joining us this morning. We sure appreciate it.

ARNOLD: Thank you very much.

COSTELLO: And thank you for introducing us to a whole new genre of really cool books.

ARNOLD: My pleasure.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com





 
 
 
 


 Search   

Back to the top