For my research I have looked at pages from the Dennis The Menace, Ivy The Terrible, The Bash Street Kids, Billy The Whiz and Batman comics. I found out that all comics use a set of conventions that readers of comics expect to find in them when they read comics. The conventions that I have found in the comics that I have studied include the following: bright colours that attract a young audience, stereotypes e.g. intelligent people wear glasses, frames to split up sections of the story, different styles of frames for different part of the narrative, bold letters to represent sound and speech bubbles, thought bubbles to show the characters thoughts/emotions, slapstick comedy and Propp's character types. These conventions are used because they attract the target audience, they use the uses and gratification theory to excite, entertain and let the audience escape from their day to day lives.
In my research I also found the following character types:
Anti-heroes
Heroes
Villains
Helpers e.g. Robin
Heroines
Donors
I have found out the target audience for these comics is children between the ages of ten and fifteen, possibly young teenagers because of the type of content found in the comics and because of the simplistic language used in them that most children/teenagers would understand. The comic stories appeal to the target audience because they fulfill the need that the target audience has to be entertained by the media texts that they read. They do this because they provide an escape from reality and relaxes the audience. I have decided that for my comic I will use the theme of terrorism, I have chosen this them because I believe that it is an interesting topic and that this subject is not brought to children's attention enough considering how important it is. The comic that I will be producing will be aimed at children between the ages of ten and fifteen. I will make this comic appeal to my target audience by covering possible scenarios that could involve children and I plan to use obvious types of comedy such as slapstick humour to also appeal to them. I will also make my comic fit the needs of the comic readers to be entertained by the comics, as outlined in the uses and gratification theory. My comic will stick closely to Todorov's theory of narrative because that is what is expected in a comic and the structure that is used in comics that could compete with my comic.
To see if the draft frames of my comic story appeal to my target audience I created a questionnaire to ask my target audience if they liked my story and if there were any improvements to be made. From the results of my questionnaire I have found out that most aspects of my comic are good and only need small improvements to make the comic better so that all the people I asked would buy the comic. Some of the minor improvements that I am going to make when I produce my final comic story include more organised frames, better use of colours and more use of words using onomatopoeia.
My comic story fits in with the market because it fills a gap in the market because there are not many comics aimed at ten to fifteen year olds that tackle a serious issue such as terrorism. It also fills a gap in the market because it also contains humour that adults would understand making it a comic suitable for adults and teenagers which is unlike many others. This would help to market the product because of the USP of the wide target market and unique content. I think an existing newspaper such as a middle market tabloid or a red top tabloid would be a good newspaper to put my comic is because they are more likely to be read by children/teenagers and are more likely to put less serious content in their newspaper.
