Alright,
now I know that I talked about this in class, but seriously, who is that kid on
page 26 whose head is covered on page 27?! If you don’t know who I mean, I’m
talking about the boy on the bottom of page 26, whose thought-bubble has a
skull in it as he looks at Taji. His face is covered over in the next page as
Marji and her grandmother talk about how the family had been poor.
I don’t
know why this boy’s presence bothers me. I suppose it’s just because everyone
else whose appearance seemed bizarre had been explained at one point or
another, but this boy’s story just goes completely untold. Is he dead? Did he
kill himself? Did he kill his brother or try to kill Taji? Is he stuck in an
asylum somewhere? Did he leave and go to Europe? Or do they not even know what
happened to him? Could it be possible that Marji had planned to write about him
later on in the book but simply forgot to or had disregarded him, forgetting
that there was already a picture of this uncle in the book? Come to think of
it, I don’t think the other uncle was ever mentioned either.
The
story feels very incomplete without knowing what happened to him, and I don’t
think I’ll ever completely like the story until I know what happened, if
anything happened at all.
Haha, I love tiny details like this in pictures, film, or literature that do not make sense. In many movies I will notice a person or line that stands out and has nothing to do with the rest of the storyline. This boy is almost like a secret subliminal message to her audience. I am interested to discover who this boy is, or if it was just a random and meaningless detail.
ReplyDeleteI believe the boy is Marji's uncle, or more specifically Marji's mother's brother. This story is a flashback told by the grandmother speaking of her life with her daughter (Marji's mom) and her two sons. However I do not know what ever came of him as you pointed out, his story is not told. I do agree that little details such as these that are left for the reader to pick up are what make graphic novels truley amazing and fun to read. While we may never know what happened to Marji's uncle, from the subliminal messages we can assume that he did not survive. But, quite possibly this could be a sheer coincidence. The boys thought bubble of a skull is referncing the fact that they are poor and have very little to eat.(as the grandmother is currently boiling water to appeare like she is cooking) As for the convieniently placed thumb on the picture on page 27, that could simply be a coincidence. However, even though we may never know, It is interesting that such a slight detail can lead to so many questions.
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