THE SAFEST PLACE IN THE AVENGING WORLD DITKO LOOKED UP; Mar '98
by Blake Bell
Reading Ditko's ''The Avenging World'' from Witzend #6
('69) and ''The Safest Place'' ('93 - Dark Horse), both seem to underline the
same themes, yet one conveys the story and issues more effectively.
''The Avenging World'' seeks to make its point as a
diatribe; something I believe turns most Ditko fans off.
Most Ditko fans discovered Ditko due to their
love of story-telling conveyed in comics. A decent portion
of Ditko's morality tales seem to take the form of essays
with pictures; ''The Avenging World'' story being prime
among them. There is VERY little narrative to speak of
here, save the inclusion of the working man/loafer addition
near the end. The spoken word becomes Ditko's main weapon
of communication. I think that everytime he does this, he
sells his ideas short. The reason people love good writing
or quality music is that it has the ability to convey ideas
in a "show-me" form, rather than a "tell-me" one. A story
is built around the main idea/moral. The better the story,
the more evocative the idea/moral is able to come across.
''The Safest Place'' comic does a FAR better job of
illustrating Ditko's moral philosophies. The strong narrative
works in cohesion with, as opposed to ''over'' or ''victimized by'',
Ditko's issues of right and wrong so prevalent in most of
his own work.
What makes it even more of an effective narrative is that
we see the development of the leading character, Mina, as
she comes out of her "innocence" and accepts her moral
place and responsibility in the world. We see the price paid
by indifference (death - her husband; a life under dictatorial
rule - the janitor; physical punishment - her incarcaration)
and the rewards gained by acting on behalf of the moral good.
"Acting" is the key word here as the husband, Kona, perishes
even though he teaches pure and logical thinking, but it is
his wife, Mina, who realizes his dream of freedom for humans
over their oppressors by taking the risk of doing her part to
bring the oppressors down (consecrated in the act of her sneaking the film
across the border). All those who work to their own ends, or who alter
their actions based on the shifting circumstances, end up with
the opposite of what they illicitedly dreamed of reaping - they end up
dead.
Ditko manages to find a balance between the "tell" and "show"
philosophy of storytelling in ''The Safest Place''. The story is
hardly text-free, but is balanced by the strong narrative which
works to evoke his ideas far better than the over-dose of
verbiage found in ''The Avenging World'' tale. This just reinforces
the notion that the COMIC CRUSADER STORYBOOK, Mr. A. tale, is one
of his most significant works in portraying his basic theories.
Wordless, the reader is forced to rely on the narrative and pictures
to learn the message Ditko is trying to convey - exactly what
comics are meant to do in the first place.