InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "I hope your apple pie is freak"

sandoz_iscariot (sandoz_iscariot) wrote in scans_daily,
@ 2009-08-09 21:17:00

Current mood:	sleepy
Entry tags:	char: fantomah, creator: fletcher hanks, era: golden age, theme: racism

Fantomah from Jungle Comics #7.
More insanity from Fletcher Hanks, this one featuring my favorite of his creations, Fantomah.

...wat.

(note to mods: the comic is in the public domain, so I'm posting the complete story.)

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skalja
2009-08-11 12:08 am UTC (link)

That doesn't really solve the fundamental problem of "we're setting this comic in an area which is almost entirely populated by black people, and yet we still need to make it about a white person," and then writing said comic in the tarzan subgenre, which has this whole loaded racist and colonialist history.

I mean, if you're going to develop the tribespeople and make Fantomah enigmatic, why not write a comic about the tribespeople, and have Fantomah as a side character? (Putting aside the issue of whether or not said comic would sell.)

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schmevil
2009-08-16 04:00 pm UTC (link)

I think that's kind of what he was going for... develop a much wider cast of characters, and do some of the stories from Fantomah's pov, and some from various other characters. But Fantomah features prominently in the majority of the stories, and is a background presence even when she's not around. This way you keep the history of the character, but you can interrogate the race/sex/colonialism issues. Just speaking structurally, this would help put those issues at the forefront. By necessity, you'd have to address them more often, and in the hands of a skillful writer/artist team, that would be one cool comic.

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	schmevil 2009-08-16 04:10 pm UTC (link)
	He, meaning Doc Hermes, that is. (Reply to this) (Parent)

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