One of the reasons why I really won’t like the Five Years Later era will be what I call The Grid: a rigid structure for the panels, assembled in a 9-panel grid where all panels have the same size.
Technically speaking Keith Giffen introduces it to the series earlier than that, on Legion of Super-Heroes v3 #60. Which is why I’m bringing it up now.
It sporadically appears earlier than that, but it’s in the last four issues of Volume 3 that Giffen begins using it consistently.
There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with the grid, but it’s the way Giffen uses it that drives me insane.
Watchmen is often taken as the example for the grid, which it DOES use but in a completely different way.
And to explain the difference, we have to distinguish a Perfect Grid from an Imperfect Grid.
To give a concrete example: this is the first page of Watchmen #1, which clearly follows the format but it’s an Imperfect Grid because the last three panels are fused into a single one.
That makes THIS the structure of the first page.
The second page is also an Imperfect Grid, but in a different way: the first two panels of the first row are fused.
In fact, we have to wait for page 5 before we get a Perfect Grid.
In total, Watchmen #1 consists of 32 pages, of which:
28% (9 pages) are Perfect Grid
53% (17 pages) are Imperfect Grid
19% (6 pages) are in prose
There are no splash pages
It’s subtle and you don’t really notice it consciously, but this REALLY breaks up the monotony. Especially because, of those 9 pages with a Perfect Grid, you know how many are followed up by a second Perfect Grid in a row?
TWO.
All the other ones are followed by an Imperfect Grid.
Which means the layout is changing quite often. Again, it’s subtle and you don’t really notice it unless you’ve been exposed to too many Perfect Grids in a row.
To close any discussion about Watchmen being an example of The Grid, I did what no sane person would do in this situation.
I took notes on how many times Watchmen uses the grid.
On every single page.
On all twelve issues.
The Perfect Grid is more than half the issue just ONCE.
Notice that, splash pages aside, only 2 pages in Watchmen #7 are classified as not having a grid… and that’s just because they follow a different grid… which is ALSO not perfect.
Also there are NO splash pages until the last issue, where I guess they’re added to compensate the fact it’s the only issue which doesn’t end with text pages.
It also results in the last issue being the one with the lowest number of pages with a Perfect Grid (just four pages). And they’re not back-to-back.
It’s definitely a coincidence, but the ONLY issue where more than half of the pages have the claustrophobic Perfect Grid is issue 6… the one focusing on Rorschach, where the claustrophobic use of the grid does make thematic sense.
To make things simpler:
Where am I going with this and why does it matter?
THIS is how much Giffen uses The Grid in the last four issues of Volume 3.
That’s already WAY higher than what Watchmen does: there is NO BREAK FROM THE PERFECT GRID except for the splash pages, which are just at the beginning and the end of the story and therefore don’t interrupt the monotony.
Once we hit Volume 4, The Grid reigns supreme.
Which, to simplify again, means that the ONLY break we get from The Grid are the occasional splash page and the pages of text at the end, which I don’t think should even be considered part of the comic book. They’re just a bonus.
I don’t dislike the use of The Grid in general… and I think its use in the main plot of Volum 4 issue 4 works nicely, for example… but it’s so UTTERLY RELENTLESS that it restricts creativity and makes it even more depressing than the story already is.
I’m sure it’s not a problem for everyone, but for me? Flipping through pages and pages and pages of the SAME. FREAKING. LAYOUT just kills my will to keep reading.