Wednesday, March 9, 2011

V for Vendetta

Alan Moore's "V for Vendetta" presents to it's readers an opportunity to make our own decisions regarding the morality of certain actions. The main character, V, seems to be a force of resistance and rebellion against the established order. He blows up the House of Parliament and the Statue of Justice, and targets high-profile individuals. This kind of society seems to be oppressive and keeps a watch on the people at all times, signified by the government having "eyes, nose, and ears." At times, V's actions are questionable because he is a terrorist and a murderer, traits that do not exactly constitute a hero.  But at the same time, when we learn of his personal past and enduring a concentration camp, we somewhat start to accept his actions. When he kidnaps the voice of "Fate", the computer that the people venerate as God, he does not kill him. He burns the dolls which he adores above all else, but we do not despise V for that action considering burning porcelain is not nearly as devastating as burning human beings. Also, when he goes to kill the doctor from the concentration camp, he does so in a humane way. He injected her while she was in her sleep, and let's her die as peacefully as possible. Thus we are torn between deciding if V is an honorable character or not. His actions seem to be geared towards both personal and social gain, but the fact that he kills people and uses Evey to help him kill is highly questionable.

This novel's use of graphics is extremely helpful. There are several times where the graphics made the dialogues more engaging and draws the reader in by helping to visualize the situation. One particular moment was when V burned the dolls, and he says "Yet it's odd isn't it? How you can show so much concern for porcelain and plastic and show so little for flesh and blood." The graphics show a whole army of dolls that have blank, staring faces and are thrown into a fire. The doll owner's face was also completely devastated by this action, and it is really effective that we are able to visualize this situation. Another moment where the graphics were helpful was in the scene with the female doctor. We see that several frames of a man walking with fire in the background, and we get the feeling that she constantly looks back at that event and is devastated. Then V says "I killed you ten minutes ago while you were asleep." We see a picture of V holding a needle, and so we can safely assume that he injected poison into her while she was sleeping. If that picture were not there, we would be wondering how he killed her in her sleep. This adds to the drama of the moment and draws us into the moment. The use of graphics in this novel is very effective and helps us put our mind in the book.

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