Get to it already…
The Short Version:
Each panel is (about, give or take, etc.) 1% of the book, and each panel needs to be used efficiently. Once those panels are gone, you don’t get them back. Did that panel provide anything to the story? Each panel is an opportunity to give the reader ‘data’, which is what a story is presented as to the reader. Like a row of Reeses Pieces leading E.T. from the shed and into the house, it leads the reader down the path you have plotted for your book, panel by panel.
The opening to a comic book can be a difficult thing to craft.
When does ‘the shoe drop’? Is your opening taking up too many pages? How long into the book does it take for us to meet all of the main characters and to understand their relation to each other? In a 24-page book, for me, it’s by page 8; otherwise, there better be a good reason. On the other hand, if you get to page 13 and whatever incident or happening that the main character responds to has not happened yet, there’s likely too much set-up or ‘backstory’ going on.
There are a lot of little things that are standards in writing scripts that sort of dictate, in some way, how that path of data is given to the reader. This post does not cover all of that but rather gives my personal advice on the subject. I also get a bit more into story theory.
Get to the point…
No, really, just get to it already. Don’t worry about ‘building mystery’ in the first issue, and don’t waste entire pages, let alone many, to ‘atmosphere.’ Sometimes you have to sacrifice a page or two to pacing, to separate events. It might feel wasteful, but sometimes it does need to be done. (The scene with the horse in the ‘Yorvik’ script mentioned later is one example.)
When they get into indie comics, most people have no real idea of the time and effort it takes to put out a decent-looking finished comic. So a lot who start will not finish, or they will have some economic reckoning with the actual cost, or so on. I don’t know the percentage, but my guess is most never finish issue one, let alone get to issue 4 and so on.
For now, just make one book. Just one means choosing one of those dozens or hundreds of characters, not 25. Maybe 2, but there’s a limit. Have you got ‘thousands of story ideas? Great. Choose ONE.
Now, remember that a regular book has 22 pages, and 5 panels per page, for a total of 110 panels. Each panel represents about 1% of the space available to use. Each is an opportunity, and once gone, it’s gone. It would help if you learned to be efficient, not to waste panels. You need to see the story not ‘as you write it’, but as if you were the reader—[Note: Use however many pages you need or want. I’m just mentioning the standard. For print, you need multiples of 4, so I usually aim for 24 or 28. If you need 25, you’re going to print 28. You might as well use those pages, right?]
Do not waste panels giving information to the reader that he does not need to know. If some plot point is not essential for the reader to know, like some war they don’t need to know even exists until the next issue, do not worry about explaining it all now. Mention it, and reference it; that will tie the books together and get the reader curious. But do not feel you must tell the entire history of your ‘world’ to the reader in issue one. It’s like the characters and the stories…you have to be able to limit how much you need to tell the reader, or else the comic becomes a glossary, some testament to informing them of how fantastic your ideas are and how clever you are instead of telling a story. Don’t be that guy; just tell ONE story.
The opening. Get that ball rolling…
Crafting a good opening to a comic book is practically a skill all by itself. The trick is to convey necessary information to the reader, to engage them and get the story going, but also to not take page after page to do it. Remember that you do not have an unlimited number of panels to work with.
You need to find the right scene. I’ve found that most of my effective openings have to do with some major change. A death, a birth, a change of life in some way. Maybe moving away, or graduating.
Generally speaking, I like to introduce the main characters and how they relate to each other, as well context for the setting and such within the first two pages.
Look at the opening to my script ‘Yorvik’, for example (http://www.mobys.ws/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Shadoworlds-4-Yorvik-1.3.pdf). You’ll notice how in the first four pages (of a 36-page book) we meet all the main characters, and we know how they relate to each other. We know Yorvik is the son of Odin and Freyja, that he’s more about plants than fighting, that a certain young Valkyrie in training thinks he’s the bee’s knees. We are introduced to Valhalla, and we see, right in the middle of the first panel, the tree Glasir. This is important because the tree plays a major point in the plot later on.
Here is another example, an opening I crafted for a friend, editing an existing book to make it flow better.
You can click the image to see it better. You’ll notice that we meet Sorlac and the symbiote Chopucapba on page one. We also briefly are introduced to his grandfather, who we will become better acquainted with later, but for now, we know:
‘I have been looking for you for a long time’: So now we know Sorlac is important.
We know his grandfather is somehow supernatural and weird. He gives people special coins or whatnot. There is a war mentioned, so we have some idea of what is motivating all of this, some clue of what is going to be at stake.
We get all of this on page one, in four panels. There is no need to show pages of him walking through doorways, parking a car, and so on. Just get to it.
Getting the shoe to drop…
So, we have our opening, now we need to let people know what this book is about, and we need to let them know by about page 8, give or take. Wait, really? Yup, page 8. In a 24-page book, this is about 1/3 of the total pages. This will allow for there to be a plot for about 10 or 12 pages (that pesky bit in the middle that always reads ‘stuff happens’ in my outlines), then a closing bit.
A bad opening will have your character parking a car, saying hello to someone, changing into work clothes, tieing his shoes, and so on until he’s just walking onto the worksite on page 6, and you still have not introduced any other characters and we have no idea what is going on. Don’t do that, instead just show an establishing shot of a job site in panel one, on top of page one, and then we see him greeting someone good morning before the boss or whoever speaks to him urgently. Get to it, get that ball rolling. We don’t need to see him tie his shoes, OK?
Be careful of DO NOT USE BALD EXPOSITION.
I read a script once where the plot was that there are these rifts in space that ships fall into, transporting them across the cosmos. They would end up in the territory of a faction that was at war with some other faction, and they would ‘impress’ these spacefaring, stranded sailors into military service. OK, all well and good.
The terrible part was that this was explained by ‘the commander in chief of the entire faction’s military’ on page one, with him addressing a group of these impressed sailors (various aliens as superheroes) in a hanger before they got onto a ship to begin their enslavement term of service.
Got that? The head of their entire war effort was taking time to explain to people that fell through rifts in space transporting them to the territory of a people at war that those people would impress them into service. He was telling this to a group of such people as if they need to know this. It was like having some scene where Stan Lee explains to the Marvel bullpen what a comic book is, and why they should care. It was fucking horrible. Don’t do that.
Of course, he was not really telling them, he was trying to tell you, the reader. How to convey all the necessary data to the reader without being obvious about it is a skill you learn, but you have to care enough to keep at it and figure out how to avoid having one character say things that just don’t seem natural.
Usually, the way you do this is by having a conversation. If it’s a lot, bring in a third character. Or add the view from a security camera. ‘What’s that?’ asks one character, and the other informs him…and you. You need to conceal your data dumps.
Again, look at the opening to ‘Yorvik’. You will see how we learn about everything in those first four pages both by showing and telling and with no narration. We see Yorvik working the plants, healing his mother’s plant. One of the girls teasing Darlughdica mention’s it, using it as a way to also inform us he’s no warrior, but he is a son of Odin. Who’s Odin? Oh, there he is, on page three. See how I did that? Oh, look, Odin mentions dead warriors and asks how many the Valkyrie are bringing this day. So now we know their purpose and motivation.
Use dialog, and some narration, but avoid bald exposition at all times.
Do not have the dialog mirror what we are seeing in the panel
So, I’m reading a book and a guy is walking through the door, he’s wearing a business suit and it looks like an office. Then I see the word balloon: “I went into my office.” Awesome.
Why not use the panel as an opportunity to give us context. WHY is he going to the office? Is there some reason? It would be better to have the dialog move the plot along, something like ‘I had to come in early to hide the evidence’ or ‘it was the job that was killing me’. The reader can put two and two together, so let them. The suit, tie, office, ‘My job is killing me…’. Um, I’m guessing he works in an office, maybe this office?
Don’t have the words describe what the reader is seeing unless it is needed. Mentioning the ‘Golden Thingy’ in a panel showing the ‘Golden Thingy’ for the first time? Sure. But avoid the ‘I walked through a door’ stuff.
This is enough for now, I’ll try to add more of this insane ranting later. I hope it helps someone.
