Blue Man Group

I think it was about four years ago that The Wife and I visited Chicago. While we were there, we saw a performance by the Blue Man Group for the first time and I was quite thrilled to partake in the truely multi-sensory experience. What struck me in particular was the incredible blending of entertainment with social commentary. They were adept, I thought, at providing an enjoyable experience through their performance while simultaneously giving things for the audience to think about. Further, the audience was bombarded with so much information during the performance itself that one couldn't help but reflect on it afterwards -- you didn't have time during the show. What that does is allow people to think about the subject more than if they had simply provided some sort of straightforward message.

For example, if I told you that we, as human beings, have a dizzying array of information at our disposal and that it's too the point where it's impossible to realistically filter in all of, but only, the portions you want, you'd take that idea, think about it briefly, and either start to process my next statement or start formulating a counter-opinion. In the show, however, the BMG are ostensibly giving a performance so your attention is focused on what they're doing. You are able to catch the messages that are in the show, but only just. They fly by so quickly in relation to their performance itself that you don't have time to even process the idea, much less store or counter it. Consequently, you're predisposed to thinking about it later at such time when you can mentally devote yourself to the thought.

Now, I bring this all up here because this is a small group of people who A) have something to say, and B) know how to say it to great impact. Further, they do it in a very iconographic and visual way -- with their uniform, asexual, and simplistic appearance. So I'm wondering if they've considered tackling comic books as a medium for their messages, or if a publisher has ever approached them to publish a Blue Man Group comic?

Now, there certainly would be some challenges with such an endeavor. By its nature, a comic book reader has much more control over the speed of information than a person attending a Blue Man Group performance. The Blue Man Group, while they do work in storytelling into their shows, tend NOT to have a cohesive over-arching storyline in a traditional sense. While not mandatory for comic books, it is certainly the norm and probably what a majority of readers expect.

But I think it should be obvious that they do a visual that would lend itself to comic books, and I don't think it would be difficult to adapt some of their ideas to the form. Hey, if you're a comic book editor reading (though I have no reason to believe any right-minded editor would!) why not give them a buzz and see if there's any interest?

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