Iran
By one metric, the book of the year
Time magazine named its person of the year—not this year, but the year that just ended last week—“The Protestor.”
2011 was the year of the Arab Spring, in which protestors took to the streets throughout the Middle East—often peacefully, sometimes not—and toppled regimes, threatened others, provoked responses that may ultimately lead to the downfall of regimes this year or in the next few. In the United States, the Occupy movement quickly grew from something the American media tried to ignore for a week or two into something no one could ignore, becoming part of the national conversation, revealing some of the savage urges of repression among our own police forces and outing Frank Miller as cranky old nutcase.
If The Protestor is the person of the year, then Zahra’s Paradise might just be the graphic novel of the year.
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- January 5, 2012 @ 02:00 PM by J. Caleb Mozzocco
Internet explodes over Superman renouncing America
It was quite the week for DC Comics, as John Constantine’s returned to the DCU proper, a new Justice League International series was announced at the end of Generation Lost and an “Earth-shaking twist” happened to Doomsday. But it was a short story in the back of Action Comics #900 that really set the Internet on fire this week. Spoiler haters beware …
- April 29, 2011 @ 02:17 PM by JK Parkin
Straight for the art | Persepolis 2.0
Persepolis 2.0
One of the more interesting comics mash-ups this week was Persepolis 2.0, a remixing of Marjane Satrapi’s groundbreaking graphic novel designed to draw awareness to Iran’s current post-election plight. Matthew Weaver of the Guardian talked to the comic’s creators, two Iranian exiles called Sina and Payman, who apparently did the work with Satrapi’s blessing:
Sina said the updated cartoon was intended to show how history was repeating itself in Iran.
“The reaction to Persepolis 2.0 has been great,” he wrote in an email. “We’ve had visitors from 120 countries thus far, and a large volume of emails from people asking how they can help support Iranians.
“This has really infused us with energy, and we’re now working on additional ways to help get the word out.”
- July 2, 2009 @ 11:39 AM by Chris Mautner