Discourse Beyond Words, or the Ideological Analysis of Comics

Alejo Steimberg
Translation by Elizabeth Lerner and Lynne Bolton
Discourse Beyond Words, or the Ideological Analysis of
Comics: Interpretations of El Eternauta and Slot-Barr
What Images Have to Say
The Description of the Language of Comics as Essential Requirement
When it comes to discussing the relationship between art and the society it originates from, few concepts have proved as
theoretically productive as the “structures of feeling,” as put forward by Raymond Williams (1978). Beatriz Sarlo explains that,
concerning these “vague clusters of meaning and practices, characterized by the lack of definition of their terms and by their
dynamics, which are distinctive of the present and its features,” art
can propose figurative representations, even when more systematic discourses of objective description and
explanation have not analyzed them or have not crystallized their ideological formulae (Sarlo 1987: 33).
The structures of feeling, Sarlo goes on to say, shape the haziest areas of social experience, and this is why they are especially
meaningful in certain situations, such as the Argentinean dictatorship,
where every obstacle hindered the possibility of building shared concepts and, consequently, obstructed any
kind of autonomous explanation for the conflict that differed from the thinking of the military state (Ibidem).
For this reason, a broad array of Argentine literature can be read as a critique of the present:
Set against a reality that was hard to grasp, since many of its meanings remained hidden, literature searched
for other indirect ways (and not only because of censorship) to place itself in a meaningful relationship with
regard to the present and to start assigning meaning to the chaotic mass of experiences detached from their
collective explanations (Ibid: 34).
Given this combination of factors, the author concludes, literature can be read as a critical discourse, although it adopts (or
rather because it adopts) the forms of ellipsis, allusion, and figuration.
There is a general consensus among those who have studied and are studying the Argentine artistic and literary output
during the dictatorship regarding the importance of what we might call “avoidance strategies.” This article is no exception.
If we use these reading methods to analyze a highly graphic art form, such as the comic, we must pay close attention to the
singularity of the language we are analyzing. We must avoid the risk of considering these works of art as coded messages, and
the chosen artistic form as nothing more than the container for enclosing the work’s “message,” which can only be understood
on a narrative level. Comics are basically images, and every attempt at analysis must acknowledge the primacy of the visual.
Although the forms this production of meaning assumes informs many polemics in literature as well as in the other arts, the
lack of consensus on this subject is exceptionally outspoken in the field of comic research.
The conception of comics this article subscribes to and that forms the basis for my analysis, is close to Thierry Groensteen’s
view as developed in his Système de la bande dessinée. Firstly, we can agree with the view that comics are a language; that is to
say, a unique set of mechanisms for the production of meaning (Groensteen 1999: 3). However, this does not mean that the
language model is to be applied without variation. We agree with what Benveniste has to say about the image: it provides an
example of a semiotic system without signs, or rather without a fixed system of signs. Thus, the smallest unit of analysis would
be the individual panel. Overall, Groensteen proposes that the only ontological foundation for comics is their sequencing
of a plurality of single images; images that are considered to be connected within a given order, provided they have the dual
characteristic of being separate and of being artistically and semantically overdetermined by the very fact of their coexistence
in praesentia (Ibid: 21). From this point of view, the most relevant analytical procedures are therefore those that enable us to
study the layout and ordering of elements, both within and outside of the single frame; within the space of the page, as well
as the entire comic book or just one episode.
Going Too Far, or not Far Enough: The Difficulty (and Specificity) of an Ideological Analysis of Comics
In his Clefs pour la bande dessinée (1978: 203), Jean-Bruno Renard explains why the ideological analysis of comics is relevant:
Comics are produced by media groups and authors who, on the one hand, make their own philosophical,
political and social choices; on the other hand, they share the mores and customs of their society. This is why
their works reflect ideologies, that is to say, conventional beliefs and behaviour.1
A decade before, Umberto Eco (1969) had already taken this line of analysis. In “The Myth of Superman,” he had pointed out
that in Superman, evil merely constituted an offence against private property. The problem with most ideological analyses
of comics is that they seem to assume that comics language is straightforward, that comics in themselves are nothing more
than vehicles for delivering a message. At the same time, commentaries on the graphic aspect (which is after all the most
important constituent of the medium) are conspicuous by their absence. Comic theorist Jan Baetens (1997) has pointed out
that the relationship between comics and politics tends to be reduced to the mere contents of a work, where their rebellious,
conservative, progressive or reactionary quality is supposedly emphasized. He goes on to say that this is a mistake: the simple
study of political themes and motifs in a comic cannot constitute a sufficient analysis, since the material aspect of the work is
not just a cover for the ideas it contains. On the contrary, it determines the way we approach it: “When you change the form,
you are already making a political statement” (Ibid: 137). This is why retaining an established form in order to develop new
themes can weaken the intended break (with convention). Inversely, by adopting a hitherto unknown form can transform an
otherwise uninspiring subject matter into a compelling one. The (supposed) division between form and content only serves
an explanatory purpose: Baetens is clearly trying to demonstrate that such a division is impossible (and futile).
It is clear, then, that it is a serious methodological error to begin an analytical reading of comics without taking the images
into account. Therefore, it is necessary to use clear analytical criteria. This is precisely what Thierry Groensteen does (1999:
125) when he defines the image as enunciable, describable and interpretable: enunciable since it can be replaced by an enunciating statement; describable and interpretable, since the readings of an image are necessarily a selective description and personal interpretation.2 Groensteen says “describable” and not “descriptive” for the same reason he uses the term “enunciable”
instead of “enunciation”: it is the reader’s task to furnish a description (Ibid: 147). Besides, the image – and particularly the
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image in comics – is doubly ‘describable’: firstly, because it always shows more than is needed to make the action intelligible
(it provides information about the context); secondly, because it is the result of a unique form of graphic writing, in which
every trace reveals specific details (technical, motive, aesthetic). The description of a panel will not be complete if it does not
take into account the elements that are featured as well as the manner in which they are drawn. Groensteen goes on to complete his definition of interpretable: an image is interpretable because, in a sequential narratives such as comics, images always
have to be connected to other images, situating each one within the story. Evidently, an image can allude to external referents.
Thus, any interpretation must take into account “every relevant element belonging to the culture, the collective memory (socio-historical) or to the individual memory of the reader” (Ibid: 149-150).
We cannot stress enough the importance of a systematic analysis of images in order to study the production of meaning
in comics. This also (or maybe even, particularly) involves, taking into consideration the narrative structure, wherever it is
relevant.3 Since this is an essential component of any narrative, it should not be excluded from thorough analyses, especially
when the political and ideological aspects are to be considered as important factors.
Analysis of Comics
El Eternauta by Oesterheld and Breccia, and Slot-Barr
Few Argentine comic scriptwriters are as well known as Héctor Germán Oesterheld (1919-1978?), and the same can be said of
his most famous work, El Eternauta. Originally created in 1957 in collaboration with graphic artist Francisco Solano López,
the comic tells the story of an alien invasion and shows us a ravaged and lifeless Buenos Aires. There are some important
plot changes between this first version and the second, drawn by Alberto Breccia. While in the first version there is a global
invasion, Breccia’s version focuses on the invasion of South America, which has been handed over by the “great powers” in
exchange for their salvation. It is clear that the invasion metaphor takes on a new meaning (it almost ceases to be a metaphor);
the scriptwriter is highly engaged in the political aspect of his work which is emphasized by the transformations of one of
the characters: Germán, the scriptwriter to whom Juan Salvo tells his story is, more than ever, Héctor Germán Oesterheld
himself.4 Not only are the two now similar in appearance (in the first version, Germán did not resemble the scriptwriter), on
the first page, in which we get to know the character, there are also specific references to Oesterheld’s work: stuck to the wall
is a Mort Cinder drawing, another character created by Oesterheld and Breccia.
A political reading is required for most of the works by Ricardo Barreiro (1949-1999), given how clearly they illustrate
his stance concerning the political, social and economic structure and situation of the world in general and of Argentina in
particular. Thus, in Bárbara we can easily identify the Adrios – the aliens invading Earth and imposing their culture and language to earthlings (the story unfolds where once Buenos Aires had been) – as the United States.5 The models of the heroes
are also quite clear: the name of the main character’s friend is Ernesto, and Araguev, an anagram of Guevara, is the name of
an important location in the story.6
Despite the fact that one work is more widely known than the other (El Eternauta is Oesterheld’s most famous work;
Slot-Barr was published late in Argentina, after the author’s death and it is not very well-known among the readership), it
is possible to establish a link as they share certain features. Both works appeared at very difficult times, namely Onganía’s
totalitarian government (El Eternauta) and the last military dictatorship (Slot-Barr). During the latter period, Oesterheld was
kidnapped and murdered by the military. Barreiro went into exile for political reasons. Moreover, both works have never been
completed, because of extra-artistic reasons. El Eternauta was hastily finished, under pressure from the publishing house.
The destruction of the original pages of the last twelve episodes of Slot-Barr in a suspicious fire sealed its destiny: it was to
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remain the first part of an unfinished story. The two comics also share plot elements: both narratives show an unevenlymatched clash between a devastating dominant power (Ellos or “Them” in El Eternauta; the Core Confederation in Slot-Barr)
and a group – including the main character – organizing a fairly widespread resistance. Also, both stories allude to the same
‘real’ enemy: the developed nations in general and the United States in particular. Nevertheless, although both works have a
similar political viewpoint, the effectiveness of this “message” turns out to be very different for each comic. An analysis of the
production of meaning will illuminate this.
El Eternauta by Oesterheld and Breccia
The classic hero stands above ordinary mortals, but is, in the end, man. His paradigmatic heroic character resides in his
double nature: he was born of a god or goddess and a human being, at least according to Greco-Roman mythology (Bauzá
1998: 5). He is more than man but not a god; he is close enough to the gods not to be considered an ordinary human being,
and his human side enables him to be viewed as a possible example for emulation. In the broader sense of the term, the hero
has a distinctive feature: he is a model to be followed (especially in moral aspects, although the hero’s extraordinary nature is
usually displayed by his physical strength), without his “superiority” necessarily depending on superhuman origins.
Having always existed in popular imagination, the figure of the hero underwent a transformation in the late 1930s when
the new concept of the “superhero” made its appearance in North American comics.7 The superhero, more than any other
earlier incarnation of the heroic figure, harks back on the model of the Greek demigod, who often served as inspiration
(Steimberg 1996).8 The fact that they belong to a separate class, situated between the human and the divine, is continually
stressed (usually by their superpowers).9 It was not until the 1980s that a new conception of the hero appeared within the
superhero genre. These heroes were drastically different from the traditional model; one example is the widely quotedWatchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons. In the world of fiction, being a superhero is virtually an occupation without moral
requisites. In addition, these ‘new’ heroes do not belong to that intermediate zone of the Greek demigod: they are either all
too human or won’t be human for very much longer, as was the case with the all-powerful Dr. Manhattan. Thus, the comic by
Moore and Gibbons offers us a different kind of hero story, a tale of heroes and superheroes that explores the moral dimension
of the characters in an innovative way, since the traditional hero is a model of good behavior. But one feature that can never
be absent from a superhero comic (especially a “meta” work such as Watchmen), is the emphasis on the hero’s individuality.
In order to find a work with these characteristics, we must focus on comics that play with other genre conventions, such as El
Eternauta, Héctor Germán Oesterheld’s most celebrated work as comics writer.
Oesterheld’s prologue to the first version of El Eternauta, produced in 1957 in collaboration with drawer Francisco Solano
López, has been widely quoted with respect to the conception of the heroic elements of the comic:
The real hero of Eternauta is a collective hero, a group of humans. Thus, it reflects – though without any prior
intention – my intimate conviction: that the only valid hero is the hero “within a group,” And never the individual hero, the solitary hero (Oesterheld 1994).
Indeed, there is very little of this traditional image of the hero as a unique being to be found in El Eternauta. Moreover, individual heroic deeds are mostly performed by the secondary characters (Favalli, Mosca) and not by the main character. Nevertheless, in spite of this difference, the comic largely follows the traditional framework of the science fiction story, as the basic
premise of an alien invasion is one of the genre’s longest-standing traditions. However, there were already clear differences
between this first version of the comic and the same genre in other parts of the world. The “alterophobia” and xenophobia
of much of the North American science fiction of the period could not have been further removed from the humanism of
Oesterheld’s and Solano López’s comic (Andrevon 1976).10 In any case, it was only in the second version, drawn by Alberto
Breccia, that the comic would fulfill its true ground-breaking potential.
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
4
Figure 1. Oesterheld, Héctor Germán and Alberto Breccia (1982) [1969]. El Eternauta (Buenos Aires: Ediciones de la Urraca), p. 21.
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Although it is not our intention to go into the differences between the two versions, we must briefly take it into consideration, since the two comics differ on both essential and coincidental levels, all of which have their effect on the final result.
Among these differences is the medium of publication: the first version of El Eternauta was published in comic book format
in 1957 while the second version was published in 1969, in the magazine of general interest Gente, which did not lend itself,
to put it mildly, to publishing unconventional material (in both the aesthetic and ideological sense). In addition to differences
concerning the political context (the bloodiest dictatorships in Latin America all took place in the 1970s), we can also mention
plot changes and, above all, changes pertaining to the graphics. Although it is useless to elaborate on the almost oppositional
styles of Solano López and Alberto Breccia, we must accentuate the very different ways both artists employed the language of
comics. While the Solano López of 1957 was an artist employing a rather classic form of comics language, the Breccia of 1969
made utmost use of the resources a page had to offer, utilizing all the potentials of layout, sizing and inter-relation between the
frames as an expressive means. Moreover, Breccia’s drawing style is “silent”: there is an absence of onomatopoeia (devices such
as “bangs” accompanying rifle shots are nowhere to be found). This makes his style all the more expressive. The solitude of
the characters (the powerful countries have sold South America to the invaders in exchange for their own security) is further
magnified by the depiction of an ominous landscape.
A single three-page episode (the comic was published in episodes of this length) suffices to show Breccia’s comic rhetoric.
The first page (figure 1) contains six frames. The first frame recurs in the entire comic and marks the beginning of each episode: a human figure is standing – with his back turned – facing a black square, holding a rifle. The image’s externality with
relation to the story is emphasized by the absence of an external border. The following frames take up the action where the
previous episode left off: Juan Salvo, the future Eternauta, runs towards the room where his family is and makes sure that the
window – the only protection against instant death ensuing from contact with the strange flakes falling from the sky – is shut
tight. In the next panel an amplification of images of death begins: we see the “snow” falling on the roofs of the houses and
the carcass of a cat can be spotted on the right. A speech balloon is placed in the center of the image: “What about Ernestina?
And Berta?” A separate caption (containing Juan Salvo´s account), ‘crowned’ by the cat’s carcass, explains: they are the sisters
of his wife Elena. The text continues through a blank square: “I am beginning to realize that a catastrophe has occurred; all
this death is falling down on Buenos Aires.” The presence of death is felt even more in the following panel: while the text lists
dead relatives and others, (“uncles, the government, the police”), the image shows the cat’s carcass in close-up. In the final
frame, there is a cut to the face of Polski, a friend of Juan’s, who says: “The phone is not working. I’m going home.” A brief
interruption of the death-images, in anticipation of the apotheosis.
The next page (figure 2; comprising of four rectangular frames, centered and progressively decreasing in size) tells the story
from an absolutely subjective point of view: the reader now shares Juan Salvo’s perspective. The first panel takes up the whole
width of the page. Polski can be seen in the centre, entering the black hole of the door; to the left, we see a close-up of Salvo’s
hand stretching out as if to stop him; to the right, we can see what presumably are the screams of those inside the house: the
name “Polski” and the individual letters are repeated again and again, one on top of the other. In the next three frames we
witness his death, within a background enveloping him in the stark surrounding contrasts of black and white. In this frame,
a device is employed that has a strong expressive quality: the size of the frame is decreased as the figure of Polski is gradually
shrinking, until he is no more than a white smudge on the floor, surrounded by the falling snowflakes.
On the last page of the episode the structure of six panels per page is repeated (figure 3). In addition, this time they are
divided into two dramatic units of three frames each and there is heavy emphasis on symmetry. In the first three frames a
relative calm is restored; Favalli, the clever physics teacher talks in a reassuring tone that dominates the scene: help from other
countries will arrive in a couple of days, he says, the snowflakes are not radioactive, they have enough supplies... And in the
fourth panel the image of the dead cat reappears. At the top there are two texts: Salvo’s account (“Martita had moved the dial.
Suddenly, the radio came back to life”) and what they can hear on the radio. In the three different parts of the panel, death
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
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Figure 2. Oesterheld, Héctor Germán and Alberto Breccia (1982) [1969]. El Eternauta (Buenos Aires: Ediciones de la Urraca), p. 22.
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and destruction are present: the radio only comes back to life to inform everyone of the magnitude of the disaster: “deadly
snowfall”, “a vast area of Latin America”, “savage alien attack.” The typography marks the difference between the voice on the
radio and the caption text. The syntax of the ‘radio text’ imitates the faltering sound of a poor radio transmission, and, in addition, there is the graphic representation of a hiss; the poor sound quality is represented by letters put on top of one other,
which makes the text difficult to understand. The frameless fifth panel is focused exclusively on the radio voice and is, as far
as graphics are concerned, strikingly nonfigurative. There are crooked lines representing radio waves flowing into the text,
emphasizing the latter’s importance. The revealed information is enlightening and horrific: “The great powers have committed an inconceivable act of betrayal,” “South America handed over to the invaders to secure their salvation ”, “Even if we are
alone and no matter how devastating this first attack has been we will fight back,” “During the emergency, survivors must...”,
“Sacrifice”. The last panel shows the impact of this information. It is almost the same frame as the first (Favalli’s torso takes up
most of the space), the main difference lies in the change of shades: what was white is now a dark and dirty grey. In addition,
the professor’s words are now markedly different: at the beginning he offers a moderately hopeful explanation of the facts, but
now he hesitates (“What did you mean, Fava?” “I don´t know, Juan... There is a huge alien invasion... It seems that we are not
getting any help whatsoever”).
The reader will have noted that each page is taken as a unit in my analysis.11 We have first of all taken into account how the
smallest units of meaning (the frames) were arranged. In other words, page layout is extremely important. In his book Case,
planche, récit (1998: 32-44), Benoît Peeters puts forward a useful typology identifying four different plate configurations: the
conventional, in which the plates have a fixed pattern; the decorative, in which aesthetic considerations prevail; the rhetorical,
in which the size of the individual frame is subordinated to the needs of the story action ; and the productive, in which the size
of the plates seems to govern the story. Thierry Groensteen (op. cit: 108-112) contributes two useful corrections to this model.
Firstly, he points out that these categories are not mutually exclusive (a plate can fulfill more than one criterion simultaneously). Secondly, he maintains that it is the rhetorical and not the conventional page layout that is the statistically dominant.
Accordingly, he changes the term conventional into regular. Groensteen then suggests two basic word pairings for the analysis
of page layout (Ibid: 115-116): regular – irregular and discreet – obtrusive. An obtrusive page layout is immediately identifiable. Of the four possible combinations, it is the irregular and discreet option that corresponds to the classical rhetorical page
layout. Groensteen’s classification allows us to better understand Breccia’s use of comic language. Breccia is inclined to use
an irregular and obtrusive page layout, as the page depicting Polski’s death clearly demonstrates. The singularity of the page
layout gives meaning to every element within it; the blank panel is no longer just an empty space, it establishes a link with the
whiteness of the snowflakes that announce death.
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
8
Figure 3. Oesterheld and Breccia, El Eternauta, p. 23.
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
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On Slot-Barr
A Hero and His World
Prior to the beginning of the actual comic, and following a page containing a timeline listing the major ‘historic’ events of
the story’s universe, the reader of Slot-Barr is presented with the text “Reasons for an Imperial Hegemony,” a text attributed
to “Prasvu Coal, independent historian.” Thus the reader immediately finds himself within the fictional world. This is a summary of the text:
When any human being from the race of the “outside-born” visits the centre planets (or the “core”: Imperia,
Tecnia, Militaria) he cannot help but be amazed at the wealth and luxury that obscenely pass before his eyes.
And I emphasize “obscenely” because such splendor constitutes a cruel provocation to those who live a life
of poverty on the outer planets. Technology, jewelry, garments, cities, everything is infinitely superior on the
planets of the Core. Why? Why are they so rich and we so poor? Our hypothetical tourist will surely wonder.
Although the answer to this question is hidden, it is quite simple: the four hundred confederate planets must
rot in filthy poverty so that Imperia, Tecnia and Militaria can enjoy this lavish overdevelopment. The extremely
high standard of living enjoyed by these three worlds has only been achieved by accumulating what is produced by the rest of the countries that make up the Core Confederation. In short, the rich cannot exist without
the poor. But how do the centre planets plunder the underdeveloped worlds? This is another question that
has a simple answer. None of the four hundred external planets has what might be called a mixed economic
structure. There are planets that produce raw material and there are planets with factories that process this raw
material, but raw material and factories that can produce goods do not co-exist in the same world. Who controls the secret technology of the interstellar voyage? The core planets.” (Barreiro and Solano López 2001: 15)
It is not difficult to find in this passage an allegory of our own world: the “core planets” are the developed countries, which attain their wealth by exploiting the rest of the world. This interpretation is made explicit when the external planets are referred
to as “underdeveloped worlds.” The kind of domination that the core planets impose is clearly suggested by their names: Imperia, Tecnia, Militaria. The second text tells us basically the same but from a different point of view: it is entitled “the Benefits
of a Perfect Regime,” and it is a excerpt from the Abridged Galactic Encyclopedia, in praise of a rigid centralized government. It
also refers to the wars “against the hostile natives who would not accept friendly relations with our race” that “cost us millions
of dead.” We can clearly perceive the echo of other conquests.
Slot-Barr’s opening episode presents us with our hero’s origins. He is the sole survivor of the shipwreck of Orion 4, a “tube
ship,” a primitive type of ship with serious problems of agility, which also explains why it is only used by the underdeveloped
worlds (Ibid.: 19). The opening images show him in a desperate situation: floating in space, with anguish and despair written
all over his face – the curved eyebrows turning downwards, and half open lips with the corners of the mouth turning downwards as well (figure 4). This face is a far cry from the handsome, Apollo-like beauty of other comic heroes; it is an emphatic
and strange face, with eyes of different colors (this feature will develop in a thematic strand). At the height of his despair (a
frame taking up the whole width of the page showing his wide open eyes, with a speech balloon repeating the words “I don’t
want to die”), something happens: a “huazgo,” a brain parasite, enters his brain through his helmet, making such a small hole
that the leaking oxygen seals and freezes it shut (figure 5). It is a very peculiar kind of parasite multiplying the host’s intelligence the moment they both enter into a symbiosis (this happens in situations of extreme stress or excitation). This event
brings about a metamorphosis in Slot, emphasized by the “recitative” (following Groensteen’s terminology, this is the narra-
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
10
Figure 4. Ricardo Barreiro and Francisco Solano López, 2001 [1977-1979]. Slot-Barr (Buenos Aires: Colihue), p. 20.
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
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Figure 5. Barreiro and Solano López, Slot-Barr, p. 22.
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
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tive text that traditionally appears inside the frame’s caption, op. cit.: 79): “Something had changed in his face.” “His blue eye
had a new sparkle to it, and the brown one showed a deep calm: Slot and the “huazgo” were connected.” “Slot had never been
characterized by an excessive intelligence; in fact, he was so incompetent that he had to drift around the universe from one
miserable job to the other.” In the following frame we can read: “But now, the brilliant intelligence of the “huazgo” was also his.
Very quickly, Slot got used to the advantages of his new intellect: ‘As soon as the danger is over I will disconnect from Lim [the
huazgo]; I won’t like returning to normality much’ ” (Barreiro & Solano López op. cit.: 25). In contrast to what he had hoped
for, the separation takes place shortly afterwards. Nevertheless, it does not take Slot long to discover that the symbiosis is not
only caused by fear. During a psychoanalytic session on Ariadno four, the “psycho planet” where he arrives after his accident,
a new fusion with the “huazgo” occurs after being aroused by his beautiful therapist. Slot takes advantage of his increased
intelligence to seduce his female analyst (Ibid: 30-33).
This characterization of the hero figure Slot-Barr is in many respects similar to that of John Difool, a futuristic and rather
mediocre detective created by Jodorowsky and Moebius in 1981.12 The two characters share several characteristics: they are
both average individuals (Slot is not very intelligent, Difool is a dark, immoral and second-rate detective), and they derive
their singularity from an external source inducing a symbiosis with a strange element: Lim, the “huazgo,” in the case of Slot,
and the “Incal,” a quasi-divine entity in the case of Difool. In spite of these shared characteristics, there are some striking
differences between the two: while John Difool’s transformation follows a master plan in accordance with the particular
mysticism that is characteristic of Jodorowsky’s work, Slot’s metamorphosis is the product of sheer coincidence. The role
played by the compulsive drive is also very different in each of the heroes. When overcome by extreme emotion, John Difool
loses balance and one of the four parts of his being (represented by a caricature-like figure that appears beside him) starts to
dominate him, a notion reminiscent of the Hindu and Buddhist concept of the division of the body into chakras. In the case
of Slot, however, this same loss of control triggers moments of super-intelligence, that allow him, for instance, to understand
any language within seconds. The unusual thing about Slot is that it is his weakness that activates his powers; at the same
time, since his self-esteem is pretty low he is grateful to his parasitic guest: “After all, I owe you my life; what’s more, a girl like
Sibyl would never have paid me any attention if it wasn’t for you” (Barreiro- Solano López op. cit.: 38). When he is not connected to Lim, Slot goes back to his life as a unskilled worker and this is what makes him embark on his second adventure,
“The Long Nights of Procer 9,” reacting to an add in the classifieds looking for “humans ‘born outside,’ to perform manual
labour, no previous experience required.” As at the outset of the saga, Slot’s belonging to the most underprivileged class of the
Confederation is the source of his adventures. In fact, the reason why the poor are exploited by the powerful is central to the
second episode; the rich natives of Procer 9 are a race of vampires who have eternal life by sucking the blood of the workers
imported from the poor planets (the metaphor is quite obvious).
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Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
13
Figure 6. Barreiro and Solano López, Slot-Barr, p. 78
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
14
Dissociation between Plot and Story
The first page of episode four contains eight panels. The second frame on the final strip stands out because of its size and
centrality. It shows an old man carrying a sort of musical instrument. The old man starts to sing a song, the tale of “A Planet
Called Rebellion” (which is the name of the episode); Slot’s adventure is a frame story, and the recitatives are the old man’s
words. Following an adventure on a robot-spaceship, Slot lands on planet “Vezpa 2,” and his calmness causes Lim to disconnect. So we have a normal Slot (in other words, the not extremely intelligent Slot) arriving in town bumping into a recruiting
officer of the Confederate Navy, the invading force (figure 6). He is a sort of sandwich board man: his torso is covered by a
huge sign that says: “Volunteers, join the confederate navy.” Screaming at the top of his voice, the officer promotes the virtues
of joining the armed forces: “Join us, citizen!”; “Help to fight evil and crime!”; “Travel to new worlds! Exotic women! Adventures! Pleasure!”; “Join up as a space-transported infantryman in the Confederate Navy!” Slot, who in his normal state does
not think a lot, does not hesitate for a moment and joins the recruits. On the next page, we see Slot making friends with two of
his new partners, who tell him the reasons why they enlisted (“I was unemployed, without so much as a penny in my pocket,
and, after all, someone’s got to punish those murderers from Guewar 2 [the planet they will attack] who commit ritual crimes
with their children”; “I don’t give a damn about the Guewar 2 dictatorship. I’ve always fought in whatever war came along,
that’s my job, I don’t care about reasons or sides” (Ibid: 79). All of this makes Slot wonder about the reality of the facts. Before
they leave, they are given a speech emphasizing the importance of their mission:
Before embarking on your voyage to Guewar 2, you should know that you are fighting for the worthiest of ideals of the Core Confederation and that the rulers of Guewar 2 are a band of murderers that have forced their
people to go to war, for their own vile and selfish interests. These rulers also want to impose their terrorist
totalitarianism on Guewar 3, a free and democratic planet, as any self-respecting member of the Confederation should be.
The narrator (the blind man) offers a counterpoint: “Their spaceships were steeds of roaring steel, and in them, for Guewar
2 did the mercenaries finally leave” (Ibid: 80). The invasion is a complete failure and Slot’s plane crashes (Ibid: 82). The next
page (ten panels split into alternating strips of two and three frames) opens with a black image, and in the following three
frames we can see two haloed silhouettes gradually becoming perceptible (figure 7). We then discover that they are two men
standing underneath two lamps (we are seeing things from Slot’s perspective who is coming round after a fainting spell), but
a positive impression of these characters has been established, by the analogy to the iconography of saints. Although they call
him an invader, the two men, inhabitants of Guewar 2, great him cheerfully and smile. They do not correspond in the slightest to the image of bloodthirsty villains his superiors had pressed on him: “You might have heard that we rebels torture and
interrogate. But don’t worry, we won’t”; “We know that you know absolutely nothing: no ordinary confederate soldier has any
strategic information.” The “guewarians” (we can easily identify who the name refers to) want to show him the truth about
their planet. When Slot meets his guide, a girl called Lemia, he connects with Lim again. Slot – once again intelligent – suggests a plan that will lead the rebels to victory: a reworking of the stratagem of the Trojan Horse.
Literary quotation plays a central role here. Not only is the story sung by an old blind man with an electronic instrument resembling a zither, the man leading the final charge is also called Ulysses. This makes the episode well suited to
illustrate how, in Slot-Barr, certain structural elements weaken the meaning constructed by the plot. Far from being purely
ornamental, the identification of Slot with the heroes of antiquity demonstrates a point that is to be consolidated in the remaining episodes: Slot is a classical hero. That is why the work somehow fails, since it does not succeed in creating what the
plot seemingly calls for: a new type of hero.
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
15
Figure 7. Barreiro and Solano López, Slot-Barr, p. 83.
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
16
The story takes up a revolutionary discourse. However, this conflicts with the paradigm of the hero that is presented: an
individual hero who can save the world because he has “something” making him stand out amongst the common people. Slot
has many and varied virtues. He is not only physically imposing (this is particularly emphasized in the drawings: he is muscular and usually beats his enemies without a need for weapons), but he is also attractive to women. His great mental powers
(when connected to Lim) not only make him intelligent, they also enable him to automatically understand any language and
to avoid telepathic influence (Ibid: 186). Finally, Slot is an ethical and moral example invariably guided by his inner ideals.
Thus, in episode eight, “The Life and Works of Acriz and the People of Lem,” Slot quickly takes sides with Acriz, “he who
wants to be king of the poor and the slaves and turn Lem into a city of workers”: “In the region where I come from there are
also men like Acriz and they are my guides” (figure 8). The coherence of the “message” is adversely affected, above all, by the
function of the hero in the story and by the fact that Slot is the type of lone hero deconstructed by Oesterheld in El Eternauta.
The structure of most of the episodes is that of the heroic deed, with Slot acting as a righter of wrongs. The episodes that are
most conspicuously atypical for a heroic saga are those that have an alternative structure.
In episode five, “Capital Planet”, Slot lands on Imperia, the capital planet of the Confederation. He is looking for some
ancient writings that could help him defend his new cause, namely that of the Guewar 2 rebels. Imperia is an absurdly bureaucratic world fueled by an extreme form of capitalism, and a ferocious and brainless police force. This extremely satirical
episode composed of short scenes, reveals the absurdity of the ruling regime. For instance, on his way to the house of someone who might be able to help him in his quest, Slot is constantly forced to buy things, from maps that show how to use the
transportation network to amphetamines that would help him to endure such a long trip. Episode nine entitled “Astra-Kill,”
does not present us with one of Slot’s heroic deeds either. Instead, it is a reinterpretation of Moby Dick, in which space stands
in for the sea, and Melville’s sperm whales are replaced the so-called “zarkus,” giant interstellar beasts, while Slot plays the role
of Ishmael. Incidentally, in the tenth episode, Slot undergoes a definitive transformation: in order to fight the influence of a
live telepathic planet, Lim modifies its connection to its host and establishes a permanent symbiosis. From then on, Slot will
remain superhumanly intelligent (with all the aforementioned advantages), which means that one of the features making him
a remarkable type of hero (the switching between an inept Slot and a Slot of an intelligence surpassing all human capabilities)
has disappeared.
There are various structural elements in Slot-Barr that are detrimental to the manifest ideological message of the work.13
Baetens asserts that retaining an established form can weaken the desired innovative effect. This is exactly what happens in
many of the works that set out a revolutionary discourse (op. cit: 137). In the case of Slot-Barr, the classic structure of the story
corresponds to another classic trait: namely classic graphics.14
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
17
Figure 8. Barreiro and Solano López, Slot-Barr, p. 151
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
18
pretations
al contexts (the conditions for production) play an important role
ake these contexts into account in any analysis, especially when
in the creation of a work
the work establishes clear
m) to those contexts. Now, the “relating” of a comic, which functio
ns on both the graphic
ed from the level of the story line alone. Moreover, although the
author’s biography (to be
he or she has taken) allows us to shed some light on certain aspects
of his or her work, it
y from this perspective as it would entail disregarding the autono
my of the artistic prodthe scope of analysis. Although this may seem obvious to other fields
of art criticism and
despread notion in comics research, if we can base ourselves on the
sheer countless stream
port of a work by exclusively citing the author’s trajectory.
s claims exhaustiveness) attempts to employ theoretical tools in
order to foreground, in
omics can produce meaning by taking into account the specific
traits of the language of
udes that, although they may seem common enough or sensible on
a mere emotional level,
llacies.
r des groupes de presse et des auteurs qui, d’une part, ont leurs
propres options philosophiques, politiques et
rs et coutumes de leur société. C’est pourquoi leurs œuvres reflètent
des idéologies, c’est-à-dire des croyances et
ze’s definition of movie images as formulated in Cinema 2: The Time-Im
age.
c comic” has recently made its appearance, the narrative aspect is
broadly speaking still predominant.
.
Grasso (1997) point out.
reated for DC Comics by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster in 1938.
mics by William Moulston Marston in 1941, took elements and characte
rs from Greek mythology; for instance,
ecial case, although he is no ordinary man, either: he is a very rich
heir; his crusade against crime would not
t his disposal.
or “Them,” are nothing more than an expression of “cosmic hatred”.
Only by grouping together will it be pos-
quoting the artist François Schuiten among others – that the double
page, since it is a “natural unit” (it is what
is is particularly useful when considering those comics that are intended
for publication in comic books, when
l be like.
cal series that begins with the episode L’Incal noir, “The Black Incal”
ft of the double final chapter, where the hero is a kind of avenging
(Jodorowsky, A. y Moebius 1981).
macho who fighting lesbian amazons, raping
teen, we can define the page layouts as irregular and obtrusive, therefor
e corresponding to the classic “rhetori-
pères idéologiques pour une chronologie de la science-fiction
au cinéma,” Cinéma
Available on-line at: http://www.noosfere.com.
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ogía y semántica de la figura heroica (Buenos Aires: Fondo de Cultur
a Económica).
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
19
Eco, Umberto, 1969 [1964]. Apocalípticos e integrados (Barcelona: Lumen).
Grasso, Francesco, 1997. “Barbara,” at: http://www.delos.fantascienza.com/delos23/.
Groensteen, Thierry, 1999. Système de la bande dessinée (Paris: P.U.F.).
Jodorowsky, Alejandro and Moebius, 1981. L’Incal noir (Genève: Les Humanoïdes Associés).
Moore, Alan and Dave Gibbons, 1987 [1986-1987]. Watchmen (Barcelona: Ediciones Zinco).
Mora Bordel, Javier, 2002. “H G O,” at: http://ww.tebeosfera.com.
Oesterheld, Héctor Germán and Alberto Breccia, 1982 [1969]. El Eternauta (Buenos Aires: Ediciones de la Urraca).
Oesterheld, H. G., 1994 [1957]. “Prologue” to El eternauta (Uno) (Ediciones Record: Buenos Aires).
Peeters, Benoît, 1998. Case, planche, récit (Tournai: Casterman).
Renard, Jean-Bruno, 1978. Clefs pour la bande dessinée (Paris: Seghers).
Sarlo, Beatriz, 1987. “Política, ideología y figuración literaria,” in Ficción y política. La narrativa argentina durante el proceso
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Steimberg, Alejo, 1996. Cómic de superhéroes y mitología clásica: permanencia y transformación de una visión del héroe, lecture delivered at the Symposium on Natiional Classical Studies, University of Catamarca, Argentina.
Vázquez, Laura, 2004. “Elogio de la locura: Ricardo Barreiro,” at: http://ww.tebeosfera.com.
Williams, Raymond, 1978. Marxism and Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press).
Alejo Steimberg
Discourse Beyond Words: the Ideological Analysis of Comics
www.camouflagecomics.com
20