Week 9 - A Thought on Blacksad

I’ve been meaning to read Blacksad for a really long time. I haven’t read nor watched much noir, but the art was what pulled me in. I love that the authors are just as concerned with beauty as they are with other aspects of the story. The composition in each panel can stand as its own illustration. 

What’s so beautiful about the watercolor medium is that it is very flexible; the colors can start off faint but are buildable to a saturated color. This makes it very easy to create smooth translations for vastly different moods from scene to scene. 

I read the first volume of Blacksad, which is centered on the murder of an alluring movie star, whom I noticed has relatively less anthropomorphic features than the men do. Speaking in Scott McCloud's terms, why is that Blacksad, whose facial features appear more cat than human, is viewed as an iconic figure, while this femme fatale, whose appearance is vice versa, is more representative? If the representational style is indicative of allure in the Blacksad universe, it’s only fair that Blacksad himself would look more human, as conventional heroes are handsome and charming. I know the answer is obvious: it's because the demographic is strictly adult male. I’m assuming it would be easier for men to identify with Blacksad if he looks more cat than human. There is no reason to find Blacksad sexually attractive… but is necessary for men to find the anthropomorphic female attractive. I’m not implying that the femme fatale should be any “less sexy”, I just think that she could’ve been made sexy without having to humanize her.

This comic was published in 2000, so the things I find mildly sexist probably weren't a big deal to them. The story isn’t about political correctness, but more on a general issue: the moral ambiguity in us. But still, you would think that there would also be anthropomorphic men who visually lean more towards human. Maybe they actually do exist in the Blacksad universe, as I’ve only read the first volume. 

To conclude my observations, I’ve included this interesting blurb on anthropomorphism from Reddit: 

"...perhaps the more animalistic art of male anthropomorphic characters reflects society's expectation of females to be more "refined" and the males to be more "savage"/"beastly", in attempts to cultivate greater identification with the characters based upon gender roles? Just a thought…

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