It's a special privilege to see the
entirety of a CCS student's thesis package, as I noted when I
reviewed Dan Nott's comics. CCS students are taught to emphasize
format and presentation alongside content. In terms of the former,
Rainer Kannenstine's thesis was a one of a kind. It's not unheard of
for a thesis to be presented in a handmade box. However, gluing
nearly forth teeth to the side of said box, which has been
criss-crossed with electrical tape, is something I've never seen
before. It made it feel as though I was about to peer into a
forbidden tome of some kind, literature that's dangerous.
The actual contents were much
friendlier than that, showing off a variety of different styles in a
bunch of narratively unconnected but thematically similar minicomics.
Kannenstine's future as a cartoonist lies in humor, as the best of
these comics were the funny ones. That said, the supernatural/sci-fi
aspects of many of these comics showed that he was fluent in a number
of different genres and cross-genres. His character design is strong
and no-nonsense, giving the reader an immediate sense of what each
character is about. There's also an immediacy to his work that
indicates an admirable level of spontaneity. His line is lively and
fluid. However, the trade-off there is that his work has many more
textual errors than I would expect in a final project. There were
times where I wasn't sure if this was part of a specific dialect
choice or if they were indeed errors, which took me out of the work.
Kannenstine clearly needed other eyes to proofread his comics.
This Sucks is a slightly revised
version of a comic that he did earlier, and it's still one of his
best. It involves a stressed-out young woman being chosen by a cosmic
being to help decide if her universe lives or dies. Kannenstine's use
of a thin line to establish the woman and her general ennui is then
subverted by sticking her in space, that line swallowed up by the
black void of space. The cosmic being is almost formless, other than
his cruel mouth and tuxedo. It's a nice, absurd touch. The end of the
story is both funny and horrible, yet entirely fitting—especially
since the woman is not actually rewarded for doing what she did.
Zapadoodle 1 and 2 are sketch
and process minicomics. The first one emphasizes linework, and one
can see him employing different line weights with the same material
as a way of generating different effects. Kannenstine's blobby
characters have a cartoonish charm that works well, like a pair of
cacti in a desert, a huge brute and a smaller creature considering
helping him, or his own self-caricature. He's also good at using
greyscale shading to interesting effect, but I think his future as a
cartoonist lies in further developing that loose, casual use of
shapes in creating figures. The Life of Ded makes that clear,
although the heavy line weight here is too dense in telling this
funny store about a ghost who reluctantly goes to a party. His
authorial voice is bold in that comic, however, and it further shows
his strengths in writing funny comics.
Nidhog is perhaps the
best-looking of his comics here. Kannenstine uses bold black and
white contrasts in telling the story of a woman and a demon, mixing
around time and perspective to get at their relationship. His
linework here is excellent, as he found a delicate balance between
using a thinner line weight without sacrificing the overall boldness
of the visuals. As the story goes on and the reader begins to
understand that the power dynamic between the two of them was not
what it appeared to be at first, the ending is all that much more
effective.
To My Dearest Johan is
indicative that Kannenstine used his thesis not so much to show that
he was a finished product as a cartoonist, but rather to demonstrate
a number of different kinds of storytelling approaches. This is a
strong drawing display about a child devouring himself, talking the
reader through how and why. It's whimsical and weird, much like most
of his output. Finally, Snakes is Kannenstine's most focused
and sustained narrative. It's about a spaceship containing the eggs
of the last remaining race in the universe not devoured by “the
Snakes”, and the relationship between the caretaker of the eggs and
his friend the robot. Kannenstine uses the slightly ragged line of
This Sucks, the sharp black and white contrasts of some of the
other comics, and a sweet sincerity that's not really present in his
other work. What kind of cartoonist is Kannenstine going to become?
Hopefully, it will be one who can draw on gleeful nihilism as well as
a genuine attempt at creating empathy for his characters. He's
clearly most comfortable with subverting genre work in frequently
humorous fashion, especially with regard to how he varies line
weights. Between Snakes, This Sucks and Nidhog, there's
a formula there for a longer work with memorable characters, funny
twists and a commitment to working within a genre to create emotional
content and surprises.
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