Marvel comics panels should be widescreen...

for the most part, the panels could be widescreen. That would be an interesting visual change, like a film. Do you disagree?

I think *page* size rather than *panel* size is more analogous to film's 'wide-screen' format. That is, the invention of the 'scope' camera and projection lenses gave filmmakers a bigger space to work with overall; that film has essentially only one panel per page is a limitation of its medium.

In that light, wasn't Miller's 300 'widescreen'?

As far as changing panel sizes on standard sized pages goes, I can't think of any recent comics off the top of my head that use a regular grid of panels throughout an issue. (I mean, how common is the splash page?) Just flipping through an issue of Amelia Rules here on my desk shows pages with lots of different sized panels: some wide, some skinny, some with borders, some without, and all on the same page. Many newspaper strips show the same variation.

In article

If it was done in *all* Marvel's comics, it'd probably get old fast.

Actually, the biggest 'the-pages-are-turning-by-themselves' feeling I've ever got from a comic - Cerebus and the Roach climbing the Black Tower - was done entirely with skinny panels the height of the page.

They did that in an X-Men annual. You had to read it sideways. Got a bit

Did you see the movie 'Timecode' I really liked it. 4 panels.

Marvel did a bunch of annuals in Widescreen Format, pages were done on the horizontal plane, not the customary vertical. I know X-Men did it, I don't know if the other books did too. I forget.

I might be misunderstanding you but I don't think it's a good idea for comics to take after movies so much. They might have a visual basis in common but they're still different media and have different strengths and disadvantages. When I see a comic that seems like it's trying hard to be 'cinematic' it makes me think that I'd probably be better off just putting on a good dvd. I sometimes think that comics creators - writers, artists, colorists, everybody - need to step back and reassess the things that make comics unique and try to focus on that rather than imitating movies.

yes. The penciler decides how he wants to portray the story. If you want to see widescreen, go to the movies. Let the pencillers be creative.

Joey <a target="_blank" rel="nofollow" href='http://martycubic.itgo.com'>The Official Marty Cubic Site (www.martycubic.itgo.com)</a>