Rating: 
Summary: Not just comics but ART
Review: The benefits this book brings to understanding the comic artform is innumerable as aready stated in multiple reviews. What I want to emphasize is that it brings about a whole new appreciation of the visual arts in general. I was particularly reminded by the comic book high art of Roy Lichtenstein. But this book has helped provide me with new apprication of Modern Art which I previously looked at with confusion or disdain.
Rating: 
Summary: In need of serious editing
Review: I got the feeling reading this book that the editors didn't work too hard on this book, maybe figuring that since the first book was so popular they shouldn't mess with it. Big mistake in my opinion. The book is too long, repetitive, and yet never makes any definative statements. Here's my summary of the whole book: "What is the future of comics? I don't know and I'm not even gonna guess." No where near the usefulness of the first book, which I re-read all the time.
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Summary: Don't Be Taken In Too Easily...
Review: It is a simple matter to discern when a Golden Age has ended by the sort of heavy analysis which immediately ensues; heavy, as in "by-the-boatload," not in terms of enlightening consequence. With no more real wheat to delight in, academics and born-too-late types busy themselves with the chaff of review and dissection. Citizen Kane was a single movie which, in the sequel of sixty years, has produced a horde of 500-some books, doctoral theses, and other various forms of minute analysis. Yet Mr. Welles' film remains unaltered by said avalanche, merely peering back through the ages at its commentators with a smile that says, "you may chatter about me as ceaselessly as you please-but you could never create me!"The Great Days of the cartoon-including animated shorts, comic books, political cartoons and newspaper strips-are generally accounted to have occupied the first half of the 20th Century, after which television did its steamroller bit on radio, movies, weekly magazines and the cartoon alike. Folks these days may not be able to write and draw great cartoons anymore, but we sure can jabber about them. It's fun to be a self-appointed authority, and it's far easier than the painful baby steps of learning to draw well, or training the mind to think up arresting visual continuities and involving plot-lines. Hence Scott McCloud's fairly-recent offering into this field of texts which, as the old saw goes, "fill a much-needed void." The title of Mr. McCloud's book is humorous in that the comics are a medium understood intrinsically by practically any person aged four years and up. The supposition behind his book, of course, is that this is only because the art form never left its infancy; that the potential of the comic medium is more untapped than otherwise. The error here is that attempts of late to force the comic to "grow up" and "expand" have been, to use a popular phrase of the day, "style over substance"; four-letter words, teeth-gnashing rage, self-indulgent angst, glib posturing, freewheeling sex, and most of all, lots and lots and LOTS of hack drawing, amateur plotting & scripting, and pyrotechnic continuity which cannot be clearly followed. That these childish squalls were ignored by the once comics-loving public is testament to the unappealing deficiencies which bind lesser talents. The works of Mr. McCloud's contemporaries have been, in mass, slicked-up nothings-tramps in $2,000 suits-and his own efforts (ZOT!) have never risen above mediocrity despite the vast "understanding" which he has contrived from whole cloth and placed herein. There is no true profundity in the book, which automatically dictates that scads of critics will suggest it is there in spades. The author brings home his seemingly-obvious points with sledgehammer force, as though with each passing "revelation" we are to strike the forehead with the palm, eyes widened. Like most such volumes, Mr. McCloud has inflated his superfluous notions with an esoteric padding, sure to rake in the eggheaded suckers, and ready to repel the charge of "Yeah, so what?" with: "Well, if you don't like it, then you must not understand it." Yet if this volume makes clear any point whatever, it is that Mr. McCloud himself understands very little about comics-or at any rate, their appeal. The probity of good cartooning has always been and will always be a good story, well-drawn and simply-told. The trick is to work within those conventions rather than peremptorily dismissing them as ancient. The kind of ivory-tower imaginings which infest this and other identical books of analysis will never replace the hard work and ingenuity which were the hallmarks of the masters of the art. Citing the possibilities of a lump of clay makes a sculptor of no one, nor will anything but diligent and concentrated effort. For Scott McCloud to suggest that comics can be so much more than they have been is all well and good, but people have had more leisure time for examination, reflection and training since the 1950s than ever before-so where are the great comics? It is talk. The ignorance of the learned. Hal Foster of "Tarzan" and "Prince Valiant" fame claimed never to have dissected his art or storytelling technique. Yet he is certainly one of the ten greatest newspaper strip cartoonists of all time. How on Earth did he manage it without the guiding hands of Gilbert Seldes, Will Eisner or Scott McCloud? The much-revered art instructor Kimon Nicolaides, who died in 1938, said: "I have had students who seemed to be more interested in 'being artists' than in drawing. They were enthralled by a train of mental ideas rather than the feeling of responding on paper to a vivid experience of the senses. Such students are likely to be found, not sitting in front of the model, but sitting over a cup of coffee in a neighboring café, talking about art. The student who really learns to draw will be the one who draws. As Leonardo said, the supreme misfortune is when theory outstrips performance." I mention this quote because the greatest of cartoonists were first and foremost ARTISTS-they later became cartoonists, and trained themselves individually to do so by trial and error. In this way, numberless styles, yarns and deathless creations flooded the field. There was no time for pontification or self-analysis-those men just kept cranking and kept improving. They had deadlines. We have theory. They had talent. We have their reprint books. And so, I suggest that if you plan to spend $18.00 in your efforts to "understand comics," you do it on the reprinted works of Messrs. McCay, Outcault, Crane, Foster, Caniff, Sickles, McManus, Opper, Segar, Sterrett, Herriman, et al. Their cartooning legacies are all the education-and more importantly, all the enjoyment-that you need ever hope for from a wonderful but long-deceased art form.
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Summary: Not just for Comic Book lovers!
Review: Understanding Comics is one of the most thought provoking prose about the art of comics, but it doesn't stop there. The lessons about telling a story in sequential form can be (and often are) applied to filmmaking, writing, advertising, and animation. At once profound and simple, Understanding Comics will help you grasp the concept of storytelling in our pop culture society. Highly recommended.
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Summary: So here's the story...
Review: ...that we all know: comics are for geeks, nerds and spazzes; for eighth-grade boys until they're elevated to high school, at which point comics aren't "cool" anymore; for freaks with power fantasies and pathetic realities. And no wonder -- many of the comics us Americans have been exposed to are brightly colored travesties. For that, you can thank DC and Marvel, Archie and Disney, and your Sunday newspaper. In "Understanding Comics," Scott McCloud shows that people with an adverse reaction to comics ("Eew! Comics! Creepy!") are often "shooting the messenger for the message." That is, they're instantly dismissing comics without actually seeing what a comic can DO. Just as there are those memorable moments and beautiful scenes that only a painting, movie or poem can pull off in a way unique to their mediums, so too with comics. Nearly every medium of artistic expression -- literature, fine art, television and film, dance and more -- has academics and critics to laud, deplore, and explore the deeper meanings of their content. Except comics. Until now. This book is a start, and is your primer. Get it.
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Summary: a neglected topic
Review: McCloud sketchily reviews comics history, dissects the anatomy of comics, and meditates on human thought and visual perception. There's something here for lots of people.
His analyses of, say, the components of the creative process, might be debated -- but he invites discussion. Comics readers will learn a thing or two. Comics disparagers or ignorers would be enlightened if someone kindly left this book where they'd scan it.
Rating:
Summary: out of left field!
Review: I am not a comic artist (or even a reader) but rather an information visualization scientist. McCloud touches on some incredibly subtle issues around the composition and presentation of information visually, which I find unparalleled in any other work. He addresses the duality of content and style (style as content?) and the issues of time and causality clearly and effectively. I can't wait for REINVENTING COMICS.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Book
Review: If you want to really understand comics, there are three books you simply must own. 'Understanding Comics' by Scott McCloud, 'Comics and Sequential Art' by Will Eisner, and 'How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way' by Stan Lee. In that order.
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Summary: Can't wait
Review: I simply loved every moment reading this one. I had read the Eisner book on comics, which is a must read and an excellent source for information for sure, but I really liked this one better. The book simply takes you into the world of comics in one big swoop and won't let you go until the last page. All I can complain is the huge craving for more. I was on the verge of leaving the book out when making an order as I was able to borrow it but finally made the call to get one of my very own. The book doesn't just cover comics in technique but gives the reader a general insight on how comics are placed in the field of arts among other arts. It also gives a great view on how the first timer enthusiast becomes one of the pros. Whether you desire to make comics or not you should take a look at this one; it's worth every cent. I can't wait to read it again.
Rating:
Summary: excelente y muy entendible
Review: este libro, que trata sobre las posiblidades de los dibuijos y los disenos de diferentes formas, es muy entretenido ya que nos lleva por un mundo de dibujos donde el propio escritor es uno de ellos que nos guia e instruye a traves del libro de una manera amena. me gusto la forma en que esta escrito, si hubisese sido un mero libro sobre dibujo en el que abundara la teoria,no me hubiera interesado, pero el libro es atrayente desde la portada, ya que parece un libro de comics. muy bueno,, no solo para los estudiantes de los comics sino para todo aquel que le interese aprender de manera divertida.. LUIS MENDEZ
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