- We all love Marvel movies, television, and games,
but some people--
I'm not naming names, Kyle--
find comic books a bit, well, intimidating.
There are just so many comics over 80
years of Marvel history, and where do you even start?
Great question.
I've got the terms, the tips, and I'm going to make
you sound like a comics pro.
This is "How to Read Comics," and we're starting
with the basics, words.
Some of this stuff may seem pretty obvious, like, hey,
there are words.
I read them, the end.
But I'm going to show you how text in comic books
does a lot more than that.
So, let's do it.
The words on the page are written by the writer,
but then drawn by a person called the letterer.
They create the artistic styling of the words
or what we call "lettering."
Lettering is a lot more expressive
than just some old basic font.
Sorry, Helvetica, if that is your real name.
Characters like Thor even have their own special
Asgardian-style lettering.
Hello, mortal.
Lettering, in addition to giving us something to read,
can also tell us how a character feels or what they sound like.
Today, I feel worthy.
But where do the words go?
Usually, in panels.
The panel is this box containing all of the action and sound
from a moment in time.
But, we can't just have words floating around in space,
can we?
Absolutely not.
Well, usually.
The first way we contain words is caption boxes.
These little boxes fill in important context to the scene.
It might tell us if we're on another planet
or in an alternate universe.
It might let us know that we're in the past,
the present, or the future.
And sometimes, the caption box is the voice of the editor,
there with helpful information or to cite
a comic where something important happened previously.
Oh, look.
It's editor Devin Lewis.
Hi, Devin.
Hey, Lorraine.
This video takes place on Earth-1218.
Reality in the Marvel universe.
Thanks, Devin.
Generally, think of captions as the hotspot for narration.
Hot, hot, hot, hot.
But, our characters also like to talk,
and that's where word balloons come into play.
Characters' dialogue appears inside each word balloon,
with the tail facing the character speaking.
Oh, good tail.
The way it's drawn can also tell us
about the character's volume.
When we talk very quietly, the outline becomes dashed to let
us know it's a whisper balloon.
Or, it becomes very spiky to let us know it's a scream balloon.
But sometimes, we just need to hear our characters' thoughts,
so we use thought balloons.
Thought balloons are distinguished from word
balloons by this chain of diminishing
size circles instead of a tail.
These let us know only the reader and the character
are privy to what's in their head, you know,
unless there's a pesky psychic sneaking around.
By now, you may be asking yourself,
don't these words ever just get to be free?
Well, yeah, they do.
Some sounds are too big to be contained.
These are sound effects that explode onto the page
in big beautiful word form.
Some of my favorite iconic sounds
include Spider-Man's "thwip," and Wolverine's "snikt."
Kabooom, flarp, oh, that's fun.
A ton of work goes into bringing all of those words
to a comic book page.
That was just our first lesson on how to read comics,
but there is a whole lot more we're going to dive into.
So, what part of comics would you like me to explain next?
Art layout? Continuity?
The multiverse?
Tell us with the hashtag EarthsMightiestShow.
Plus, if you want to know even more about this topic,
I highly recommend checking out "How to Read Comics the Marvel
Way Number 1," which is a charming Spider-Man
and Mysterio story that breaks down how
to read comics along the way.
It's really, really delightful.
And that's it.
I'll see you next time.
I'm Lorraine from Marvel, your universe.