A Glimpse Into The Future

In the debut of his new column with the Pulse, Warren Ellis touches on the relationship between alternative and mainstream comics.

The tools and effects found in the alternative side of the medium work their way into the mainstream. While everyone in the commercial medium was looking at the way Alan Moore used the page as a stanza and cut at the end of the page, Alan Moore was looking at Jaime Hernandez and the way he cut scenes in the middle of the page. You can guarantee that right now there are a hundred people poring over Chris Ware pages and wondering how to translate that pacing into their work. . . . Go and look at the future.

As part of illustrating his point, Ellis offered up the recent Ignatz line of books from Fantagraphics. A series of one-shots that focus attention on a collection of international comic book talents. The newest offerings include Ganges,Chimera, and Interiorae.