| Resumo: | Transmedia storytelling is often presented as a product of the new millennium, though it has been around ever since people communicate their “narrative[s] through a multitude of integrated media channels” (Kalinov & Markova, 2016). A straightforward example could be the case of cinema (in whatever genre) that combines a multitude of semantic channels merging into one single event, as Jenkins (2007) puts it: “multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a unified and coordinated entertainment experience”. But we need not restrict these examples to the 20th century or its whereabouts: medieval jugglers or jesters were performers who blended oral skills for reciting poetry, telling stories and humouring noblemen and the royalty with those of dancing, music-playing and singing. The bottom-line resides in the enjoyable experience, conveyed either by reading or by listening to stories, that has become nowadays commodified, not only since the invention of the printing press and its dissemination in generally available books, but also, and, more recently, by means of the internet as the disseminator par excellence of stories from all corners of the world. This brings us to the issue of the multiple platforms where nowadays readers can access stories latu sensu, ranging from blogs and websites to podcasts, YouTube or comics on the web, the latter also known as webcomics, digital comics or the Korean term webtoons. According to Cho (2016), the webtoon “is a complex system created by the distinctive combination of two media (comics and the digital)”. Methodologically speaking, we aim to apply a textual analysis approach so as to pinpoint the differences between traditional comics (on paper) and current comics on the web, examine the mainstream platforms that make this transmedia storytelling mode available and reflect upon the extent to which storytelling has become a commodity for present time users.
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