Quest Narrative

In my comments for this response, I will focus on two aspects of the reading: the first is on the narrative, independent of the form presented, and the second is a critique of the visual aspect using Aaron Kashtan’s suggested guide. For the narrative, I found the story to be quite interesting and much more complex than I had anticipated. Other than the graphic novel adaptations of Shakespeare that I read for a previous class, this is the most complex storyline that I have come across so far done in a comics/graphic narrative format. There is some character development as the story progresses and the reader learns more about the relationships among the various characters, particularly how they relate to the central character, Army Shanks, the Arctic

The Epilogue provides closure on the action (as well as many of the characters who perish on the island), but the most revealing information comes in chapter IX where the genesis of the search for Far Arden is explained. The search fits into a typical quest narrative, but the mythological aspects of Far Arden would be worth investigation on their own. The choice of the name for the boat “Areopagitica” also begs a more detailed discussion than I have time for here, but it calls to mind the original by John Milton and its defense of the right to freedom of speech and expression and how that applies in this instance. I did not realize that the Canadian High Arctic is a real place, with real islands (see https://www.canadiangeographic.ca/article/chars-canadas-arctic-research-hub). The Royal Canadian Arctic Navy is actually the Royal Canadian Navy with ships in the Arctic Archipelago. What is more telling though are the comments relating to environmental issues that are relevant to that part of the world. And, in spite of the fact that it is in the far North where the environment is somewhat hostile to humans, greed, graft, and bad human behavior all around can be found there as