Long Way Down
Jason Reynolds wrote the story for A Long Way Down in collaboration with Danica Navgorodoff’s Illustrations, an emotional graphic novel with few artistic boundaries. The story that Reynolds developed is told from the perspective of a teenage boy, Will, as he recounts his vivid memory of an elevator ride from his room on the 8th floor to the first level of his building, where he plans to avenge the very recent death of his brother, Shawn, by killing the gang member who he assumes is responsible. The artwork is mostly done in a water color style, which Navgorodoff uses to her advantage to represent illusions fading later in the story; but ultimately I think the bleeding colors are extremely fitting to the poetic nature of the story.
Here is an example of how she uses the watercolor in a unique way to separate this full-page panel into loosely defined segments which get smaller, this is representative of how Will felt when his brother was shot in front of him, presumably detached from reality and moving in slow motion. Another impressive addition to this page (11) I must mention is the separation of the o in “opened”, there are so many poetic demonstrations and symbols in this book that the authors refuse to let go over the reader’s head; in this example the word “definitely” is split in the middle to make room for the characters foot, but that space opened up in the next line is not filled with anything. Navgorodoff also uses strictly a navy blue color on a white page to clearly distinguish past memories, she does this throughout the entire novel but I wanted to add another beautiful image from page 42 where certain relevant memories are displayed by polaroid pictures in this same “flashback” color scheme.
The very first line on the first page reads, “ Don’t nobody believe nothing these days, which is why I haven’t told nobody the story I’m about to tell you. You probably ain’t gon’ believe it either, gon’ think I’m lying, or I’m losing it, but I’m telling you…”, and in this statement, Will is referring to the elevator ride where he experiences some unbelievable things; however, the exposition to this story is so captivating that 12 pages in, I had personally delegated that statement to the backstory. Where Will lives shootings aren’t uncommon, and they aren’t commonly resolved by the police either; a 4 page spread is used to highlight in sequence, the 3 rules that Will has been taught from his brother, who was taught by his father, they are as follows:
Will explains that, “The Rules weren’t meant to be broken. They were meant for the broken to follow,” (19). This large spread starts on page 17 where each rule has a full-page panel, except the last rule which gets two. The moons going through phases illustrated as the rules progress is a reference to earlier in the exposition when Will describes that the moon wasn’t visible the night Shawn was shot, he says “Somebody told me once a month the moon blacks out and becomes new,” (15). The Rules have been preached to Will religiously, so once he had located his brother’s gun the next step wasn’t a question. Will was sure that a so-called friend of his brother, Riggs, was the one who killed him, on page 26 we are provided with Will’s mental map, intertwined with a physical map of his neighborhood that shows his reasons for believing so. My favorite part of this map is the compass at the bottom which reads “Get down with some body or get beat down by some body.”
At this point Will has devised his plan to kill Riggs in broad daylight in front of his building, he has also made it clear that he has never held a gun; the unbelievable part begins once he’s on the elevator with the weapon stashed in the back of his pants. While descending, the elevator stops on each floor to let on someone that Will has lost to a shooting throughout his life. In the elevator, Navgorodoff gives us the time in a small portion of the page to show how much is happening in such little real time. Everyone who steps on forces Will to reevaluate his situation, the second ghost introduced is that of a friend, Dani, who had grown up past recognition; on page 44 the intimate conversation Will has with her is illustrated in full color with a complete scene, and on 45 Dani is seen fading away with the watercolors but the perspective here seems to be detached, this shows me that Will is experiencing this but still knows that if anyone else were on the elevator, they wouldn’t be.
Another person who gets on the elevator is Will’s father who passed away when he was 3, he admits that he had killed the wrong person in a pursuit to avenge his own brother. The same abstract art style is used in the 73rd page, this time to demonstrate Will’s confusion for missing someone he has practically never met.
He is torn up over mistaking the image of his father, on page 72 he says, “spent my whole damn life missing a misser.” At this point his father’s apparition takes the gun from his pocket and points it at him; it’s clear to me now that Will’s internal conflict is manifesting itself externally because that’s the only way he was made to know conflict, rule no. 1 is no crying. More people hop on the elevator and the story that lead to Shawn’s death unfolds, before reaching the first floor he’s made to question if Riggs was even the shooter. Will has mentioned how long the way down has felt a few times, and on this page (93) another full page is used to dramatically clarify that, he refers to the elevator as a “vertical coffin”, but Navgorodoff provides us with the time to prove that it hasn’t even been 60 seconds.
The last person to get on the elevator is Shawn, however he is still visibly wounded, sobbing, and refuses to speak to Will. The last panels I would like to analyze are pages 100 and 101, two equally sized frames show the second the elevator doors open. One of them shows Will and Shawn turning to the ding, as if unexpected, the characters are all holding their cigarettes however they are not clearly lit. In the second representation, the elevator is filled with much more smoke and all of the cigarettes are glowing red, Will is eager to step off and Shawn is bleeding, bent over in pain.
In my eyes, these differing images represent the “reality” of the situation opposed to the extreme version that Will is perceiving. Although, we know that all of these people are dead so there is no reality of the situation, Will is on the elevator alone and ready to get off; so this can translate to the meaning of the experience, where Will is petrified and clearly demonstrating post traumatic stress in the second picture, the calamity of the situation is high, he is about to kill someone which will most likely result in him being killed based on what he has just learned, but in the first picture the tone is much more casual, Will is fearful but he is in complete control of the situation; he is alone in the elevator and is not obligated to kill anybody, he has seen his brother cry and he is unsure if Riggs is even to blame, he can just press the 8 button and head back upstairs.
The artwork involved in this comic did wonders for conveying emotion, which arguably isn’t necessary for understanding the tone. I’m going to throw in one last picture from the 9th page that was by far my favorite, it made my heart skip a beat and there’s something sort of menacing in having to flip the page yourself.
