At first I thought I was just
looking at a series of random images, but as it zoomed out on the picture of
the family, The Arrival by Shaun Tan
started making sense to me. The story slowly progressed through series of
images closely related, such as one showing the family of the main character,
then the next picture is zoomed out more revealing that it is actually a framed
picture of the family, and then after that it shows the main character wrapping
the picture in a cloth. It continues to follow this pattern throughout the
story. The characters expressions and gestures also influence the mood of each
scene. Flashbacks are represented in a different way. When the story goes into
a flashback, I noticed that the pictures get darker and grayer, possibly
representing how the past events were dark and depressing times. The darkness connecting with the past events is
shown in the one picture where the giants with vacuum machines are sucking up
the townsfolk and their faces are covered in shadows. The sky around the town
is dark, and the city is blanketed in darkness in the wake of the giants. The
darker images also seem to represent negative moments, such as when the main
character is on the boat, alone, without his family. When he gets off the boat,
the images start to get lighter again.
Some events are repeated in the
story, such as him arriving to the city in a flying box, and then later his
family arrives in a similar box. At one point it shows the main character
gesturing someone to look at a map so he can get directions, then at the end of
the story, a woman is gesturing to a map, and the main characters daughter
gives her directions, so I though that was an interesting way to tie up the
story. I also noticed that each chapter separated the days that each event
occurred. One thing that I am unsure of was the period of time between each
chapter. I am not sure if each chapter happens months apart, or if the main
characters family meets back up with him only a week after the first chapter.
