Breaking the Fourth Wall/Comic Books: Difference between revisions

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* ''[[Animal Man]]'' from [[DC Comics]]/[[Vertigo Comics]] found out near the end of his [[Grant Morrison]] run in a rare ''completely serious'' fourth wall breach that he was a comic book character. He didn't take it well.

** The Psycho-Pirate has it even worse; he hasn't seen the fourth wall since ''[[Crisis on Infinite Earths]]'', and ''knows'' when attention is focused on him. He even calls the readers "perverts" for watching him. When the remnants of the Infinite Earths start being revived through him, he tries to get the revived characters to break the fourth wall down completely and '''kill everyone who is reading the comic''', so they won't have to be controlled by writers anymore.

*** And it gets worse: when he has faded away almost completely (apparently a side effect of conjuring up all these characters) he remarks that the readers - that's ''us'' - "aren't real either."

**** Actually it makes sense, because the people who read their books are still in-universe. Earth Prime, anyone? The only character that can break '''our''' wall is Superboy-Prime.

* In a notable early example, [[Batman]] sics Robin on some disarmed crooks, and then turns to the kids reading the comic book, saying that criminals are cowards without their weapons and if Robin could take them down, anyone could stand up to them.

* [[The Joker]] breaks the fourth wall occasionally. For example, he has referenced an out-of-continuity [[Batman]]/[[Spider-Man]], addressed the artist of the story, and sometimes seems perfectly aware of his status as a comic book villain. He also displays a certain amount of [[Medium Awareness]], by handling his own speech bubbles, or, in the [[Batman: The Animated Series|animated series]], talking to the camera. This is likely part of the idea his insanity has allowed him to become aware of things other people don't realize.

* One of [[Deadpool]]'s powers seems to be the ability to let him break the fourth wall. In one example, he wonders in a yellow box whether his thoughts still appear in yellow boxes, leading him to say, "I'm good." out loud and to exclaim in another yellow box "Oooh, I've ''missed'' you, little yellow boxes! What ''fun'' we shall have together!"

** In ''[[Cable]] and Deadpool'', he feels the need to help the 'reader' along by every once in a while delivering complicated exposition, aside from the first page. The other characters perceive this as Deadpool being crazy as usual.

* ''[[Infinite Crisis]]'', another serious moment out of [[DC Comics]]. Alexander Luthor, a separate entity from the classic [[Lex Luthor]], is looking for a preferred reality out of uncountable thousands that lay spread before him. He finds it...ours. He turns straight towards the reader, gazing up and out of the comic page and...GRABS FOR THE READER. Alexander's plans are stopped.

* ''Jack of Fables'', a spinoff of ''[[Fables]]'', does this in every single issue to some extent - originally, it tended to just be throwaway gags, such as Jack giving fancifully ludicrous descriptions of what (allegedly, but in reality never) would happen in the next issue, in the little box at the bottom of the last page. However, pick up the "Turning Pages" collection (aka volume 5), and you'll run across a new character, a Literal called "Eliza Wall"... a temporary narrator who addresses the audience directly, deconstructs Jack's crazy fake teaser texts, acknowledges that certain things will happen in say, "seven pages" (acknowledging the medium itself), talks about the story in actual story terms (both blatantly and slyly: "that's why no one really likes [fellow Literal character] Deux Ex Machina"), and even warns the reader that she'll have to step in shortly in order to prevent an unpleasant outcome... on top of having three (identical) brothers who are shown circling her at a picnic and failing to understand "who she's talking to" as she looks over her shoulder at the reader. In short, she's not just a fourth-wall breaker, but is, perhaps true to form, ''the personification of the very '''act''' of breaking the fourth wall''. Talk about your [[Post Modernism]] ...

* In the recent miniseries ''Joker's Asylum'', Joker plays a modern take on the Cryptkeeper. At one point, in Two-Face's issue, he turns to the reader and tells him to find a coin, with such intensity that it probably sent a few comic book fans scrambling for their wallets.

** It wasn't just that point. The implication in several of the stories in ''Joker's Asylum'' is that he is indeed talking and narrating the stories directly to the audience. Cue lots of looking directly at the Fourth Wall.

{{quote|'''Mary''': "Don't you know what is going to happen?"

'''Brooklyn''': "Too much TV, too few history books. You never know when [[Space Whale Aesop|a giant flaming magical time-travelling bird is gonna swallow you whole and spit you out in the tenth century. So hit those books, kids!]]" }}

* [[Amelia Rules]] is narrated by Amelia, who frequently speaks directly to the reader, even when her friends are present:

{{quote|'''Reggie:''' Who are you talking to?}}

** A major plot point in the final book relies on a [[Chekhov's Gun]] that Scott picked up in a previous volume. Just in case readers forgot, Scott's mom calls just at that moment, just so his sister can remind her that he got the item in volume four.

* Done several times in ''[[Quantum and Woody]]'', once to explain using the word "noogie" to replace [[T-Word Euphemism|"the N-Word"]], and a second time at the end of issue #17 when the comic was abruptly canceled.

* In ''[[Fear Itself (Comic Book)|Fear Itself]]: The Worthy'', on the last page of the Hulk story (#5 of the digital release), Hulk is talking to Banner, saying "You'll hate yourself tomorrow. But you don't have to. You can just hate the Hulk." Then he turns to the reader, finishing with "That's why you made me, isn't it?"