Blog post by Harrison Todd

I was particularly struck by Evan’s question directed to Dan Archer. The question touched on the media’s gravitation to visual aids in the news, and how this potentially compromises the journalistic integrity behind the story. It was something that I had never explicitly thought about before, and made me question the media outlets with which I keep myself updated. Moreover, it made me look at the short-subject nature of Borderland in an entirely new light, especially compounded by the new information that Archer had a page limitation on the project.

Upon my initial reading, I was taken aback by how abruptly the stories ended, and how little time Archer spent with the victims of the stories. It made for the escalation of events surrounding the human trafficking seem that much more violent and powerful. After hearing that Archer had a limitation, however, it makes one wonder how different the structure of Borderland would be with the free reign that it sounds like Archer didn’t have. Would he have shown the victims more before or after the events, or would he have shown more brutality? In any case, the discomforting effect that Archer reaches in telling these stories in barely over five pages is palpable, truly instilling in the reader the exact feeling that he wanted.

Now, back to Evan’s question. Did Archer compromise any sort of journalistic integrity in visually powered creation? I don’t think so. My answer is related to what I previously stated about the hurried nature of the vignettes. What I associate with other media outlets that use visuals as their primary sources of news are images of disaster and heartbreak on the front page; pictures of anguish from a genocide or hurricane are some examples that come to mind. In Borderland, Archer largely deals in understatement, something that is used to great effect. The image of the girl getting physically assaulted in the orphanage is a striking example of this. In a series of panels, the girl goes from serene sleep to deep anguish as a man’s hand covers her mouth. That’s it, that’s all that Archer has to show to make his point. In creating Borderland, Archer enhances the statistics that are easy to lose track of by adding real, tangible anguish to them. Furthermore, those statistics are given on the page before each of the vignettes, allowing for the two disparate types of information to be given, and for their effect to be reached, on their own and to work together.