Jack Kirby Time

     Hello friends! I’m back with another post for this week. Last week on Saturday, I visited a Jack Kirby exhibit at the CSUN Art Gallery. Although I don’t have a great knowledge about this man, I do know that he was a famous comic artist. His work in the exhibit were very intriguing and fascinating to see. As I wandered and looked around, it was hard to tell which of his works were sketches and actual prints. That is how good this guy is.

     As I wandered around the exhibit, I became very intrigued with this comic cover. This comic cover, made on February 1968, is called Battle. The red box states “Your pulse will pound with excitement when…WE ATTACK THE COMMIES!”. It shows a bunch of soldiers in battle. This seems to be a war comic as implied by the comic cover title. At first, I just thought it was some U.S. propaganda during the Cold War. Then I examined it even further. The soldiers on the right resemble U.S. soldiers. The solider being attacked in the left side looks Asian. I thought about it and then came to the conclusion that this war comic heavily looks like something from the Vietnam War. With that in mind, I chose this comic cover since it heavily relates to my blogs topic about justification of white characters predominant in comics. One of the perspectives I’m focusing on in our group’s blog is how no matter how racist a certain comic was, there was a certain justification for it and should not be considered racist.

     During the 60’s, there was a war raging on in Vietnam. The U.S. sent thousands of troops to protect South Vietnam against Viet Cong rebels and influence from communist North Vietnam. Eventually, the North Vietnamese Army became involved in the war. North Vietnam was a communist country who were allies with the Soviet Union and China. This comic cover is depicting that the Vietnamese are evil people that are against the U.S and its ideals. The way the enemy soldier is depicted facially makes him look like a menace with an intent to kill. It made him look ugly as well. This is portraying him as an evil, ugly person who is against Western ideals. According to Molley Bang, “We feel more scared looking at pointed shapes”, concluding that the features on the enemy soldier’s face makes the reader afraid (70). Back then, communism was a big “no-no” in the Western World. It was associated with barbarism. A lot viewed communism as the end of life and were greatly against it. In addition, the color of the American and enemy soldiers’ face and uniform provides more insight into how they are portrayed. We normally associate light colors like blue and orange as nice and good. The American looking soldiers on the right side of the comic cover are wearing green which depicts them as good guys. To add on, the American looking soldiers are white. White is usually associated with purity and safety. However, the enemy soldier’s uniform is dark blue and contains the color red on his shoulder and hat. To add on, the skin color of the enemy soldier is a darker color. According to Bang, “What is red? Blood and fire” indicating that red implies danger (8). During the Vietnam War, both sides fought and killed each other. This makes the enemy soldier daunting to the reader, knowing that the Vietnamese were fighting and killing Americans for their own ideals. To add on, the stars on the enemy soldier’s hat and uniform depicts untrustworthiness. During Bangs description on triangles, she states that, “It isn’t huggable. Why not? Because it has points” concluding that the star is dangerous. A star, if taken apart, is made up of many small triangles. Add that to the fact that red star were heavily associated with communism in Asia. When we hug someone, we are either happy, accepting, or caring. Communism wasn’t huggable and something to be happy about during the 60’s. In other words, communism wasn’t accepted in Western society.

     Overall, this picture is practically depicting Asians, possibly Chinese or Vietnamese or both, as ugly, evil people. The colors, shapes, and facial features in this comic cover are all associated with evil. Because of the Vietnam War and Cold War tensions, you can say it was justifiable in depicting Vietnamese/Chinese as evil people during the 1960s. The fear of communism spreading in the world was high during this time period. It was a time of national crisis; a communism vs. capitalism era. While today the picture would be looked as racist, it is justifiable to say that because of the time era and the events that happened during that time, it was ok.