Great Rock n’ Roll Pauses uses diagrammatic storytelling to tell a story through Alison Blake’s perspective. The story follows the interactions that occur within the Blake family from Alison’s point of view. Throughout the story, Alison tries to analyze and make sense of the actions and behaviors of her family members, Sasha (Mom), Drew (Dad), and Lincoln (Brother). Throughout the slides within the story, we are provided with information that Alison deems important in our understanding of her family dynamic.
The story’s conflict revolves around the relationships between the family members, or the lack thereof. I think that a majority of this conflict is centered around Alison’s father Drew due to the fact that Drew is hardly ever around and when he is home he is very distant and does not show much affection. It is also revealed that when he is home he uses gin to calm his anger which can be said to add to the conflict. In addition, he struggles a lot with connecting with his son Lincoln. I think that this is somewhat balanced out but also adds more conflict with Alison’s mother’s somewhat apparent favoritism towards Lincoln.
The conflict is resolved when Drew asks Alison to go on a walk with him in the desert. During this walk Drew starts a discussion about how he needs to do better with Lincoln. The conflict is therefore being resolved because Drew recognized the problem and is now trying to fix it. As for the change in characters, there is an inward change because nothing is really changing on the outside it is the inside that is being changed for the better with the mending and development of their relationships.
For my diagrammatic storytelling, I want to incorporate the visual aspects seen in Great Rock n’ Roll Pauses. The shapes and the colors help to move and allow the story and keep me engaged. In addition, I think that the placement of the text and the arrows/shapes leading the text made it easier to follow. With the text being so minimal, the visual elements really bring everything together and create a bigger impact on the story you are trying to tell.