'Nuff Said: American Graphic Media

What makes the Arkham franchise so successful?  The answer is easy, the producers concentrate on what is the most iconic about Batman and return to it over and over again.  I risk repeating myself, but this is a point worth noting.  This semester I'm doing the first run of a new course inspired by my constant musing about the intersection between the real and imagine city in comics.  My Comic Book City course leans heavily on first identifying the major theoretical arguments linked to urban development in the United States. Then we chart how those ideas are integrated into the comic medium. The creators working on Batman need not understand the theory, they nonetheless must engage with them.  Moreover, those that successful do so, essential tap a node societal investment, they will draw attention and generate engagement.

One of the constant questions that I face as a historian is why do I spend time researching comic books and comic book culture. The reasons for these questions are numerous. On one level, it is a question of training (although seldom vocalized as such). This is fair question, I did not graduate from an American Studies Program—I graduated from a history program. Moreover, I do not focus on a “cultural” topic in same way some of my peers did. Indeed, I avoided the more exotic theory driven analytical approaches pursued by my peers. This was not from lack of understanding, if anything it was from annoyance (if you have ever been in a meeting with someone who won't shut-up, think about that person channeling dozens of other people who won't shut up—that is the grad student in love with theory. It gets old quick. These questions aside, my concern with the city has personal, professional, and ideological foundations. This is not a space I feel a need to explain every nuisance o...