Researching Comics: Danger Girl

 Danger Girl is a comic I have read before, but want to re-look at it and decipher what makes it so compelling, besides the art and style that I have always adored for its use of facial expressions that are so characterful, exaggerated anatomy that is always perfectly drawn, .

Reading through this, it isn't the corny jokes, or the cheesy script full of cliche's that make Danger-Girl such a good read, but the way it is so face-paced and constantly engaging. The way this has been done is by the original font used, tight but wide, compact and letters being close together but easy to read. This lets the eye guide through the text quickly giving the book a fast paced approach.

Also, the panels are drawn unusually. Many comics use panelling in boxes during conversations and normal scenes, but use the panels to create excitement by using them creatively around the page, often overlapping, have characters or weapons bust out of their boxes and over other panels. In Danger Girl, the latter is used almost constantly. The page layout and the panels have been thought about, in my opinion, far more than they are in Blacksad, which almost always has its characters confined to the boxes of the page. Using this kind of panelling adds suspense and excitement, as each page is laid out different to the last. For example, the image below the one to the left of this text, uses a panel drawn rougher and on an ankle to show the pain of the two captured characters being kicked.



This approach is used often in the book, such as in the double page spread below where a character gets angry (slanted and rough panel of eyes) and then kicks a male character in the genitals (in which a metaphorical picture is used to describe his pain). This kind of inventive page layout is another reason Danger Girl is such a fun and brilliant book.