Congrats to ADDTF for one solid year of reading comics naked.

Also, welcome back ADD and In Sequence.

Did I miss anyone?

 
Resolution

I've spent a portion of my vacation reflecting upon my views of the comic book industry and how I see the commentary of others on the various topics that encompass that topic. I started writing what I thought would be a small rant about the "comic blogosphere's" irrational obsession with Marvel and DC, but after the post became too large, rambling and cumbersome, I decided to take a break and check on something I wrote previously on the same subject on a comic book message board, in the days before this blog. Once again proving that I'm getting dumber as the years go on, here is a slightly edited version of what I wrote.



One of my fondest memories from the Comics forum was when a poster I can't identify popped their head into an X-Men thread and said something along the lines of "Why is Grant Morrison bothering with this super-hero stuff?" It was one of those things that sits uncomfortably among all the other posts that take for granted that the X-men are worth reading and talking about.

Over on the Warren Ellis Forum there's one of those Kudzu-like threads that has grown to about 700 posts in 24 hours. I doubt very many of you want to wade through it, so I'll take a crack at encapsulation. Apologies to Warren Ellis if I'm missing the point, but he's being very obtuse.

Essentially, Ellis has been trying to push creator-owned titles over compnay-owned titles. Those who follow this practice say that it encourages diversity in the retailers' shops by showing the owners that these comics are economically viable. A variety of titles will bring in people who would only ever associate comics with superheroes, and have the side benefit of helping to pay the creators' bills in a more long-term method then work-for-hire. There are other reasons they state for doing this, but they are too many to list.

The current debate is over the fact that many of the posters are still buying company-owned titles. The pro-creator side is arguing that by buying company titles, these posters are not only spending their money where it will only line the corporations' pockets, but it will also encourage retailers to choose between one camp or the other. Creators who need to pay the bills will spend less work on their own personal comic stories, and more on disposable work-for-hire.

The people still buying work-for-hire are up in arms, saying that they do support creator-owned work, and if they buy corporate-owned stories for entertainment's sake, who's gettig hurt? Adding to the confusion, many of the pro-creators are equating corporate-owned work with superheroes, even though there are corporate-owned non-superhero comics, and creator-owned superhero titles. I still don't get that part.

I have cited just a few of the many sides in the debate. There are people that think that the entire medium is beyond repair, and must be destroyed and built anew. There are people who are insistent that the periodical is through, and that the only way forward is by placing original graphic novels in bookstores. Then there are the majority, who really couldn't give a shit about choosing comics based on something other then their content. And, of course, there are many others.

This whole thing reminded me of Dave Sim's crusade for self-published comics in the mid-90s, yet another side of the issue. It's pure coincidence that I recently started rereading Sim's Guide to Self-Publishing at the time this came up. He basically says that there is almost no reason why someone would not choose self-publishing. Simply having a creator-owned comic isn't enough, because you don't necessarily have creator-control. Since someone else is handling the business end, you only have a limited ability to control volume, distribution, etc. Sim states that everything that a publisher could do for him is handled by his bookkeeper, and she only takes a very small part of the profits, as a salary, not a percentage. And she's usually done work before noon.

Now, I'm not critizing anyone's buying habits here. I'm just pointing out a few of the sides that one can choose to take. Obviously, many of you are just casual readers, like I'm a very casual music fan, and you couldn't care less about such things. But for those of you who do care, have you given any thought about it? If you have, what are you doing about it, if anything. The reason I'm reading the Sim Guide is because I'm questioning my own purchasing habits. Comics mean alot to me, as a customer, historian and a potential creator. For me, an ethical overview is certainly in order.

I don't think it is at all necessary for each and every reader of comics to pick sides. Once a year or so I purchase a CD, but I usually can't tell the specifics of the business end of that artist, not should I. But, as someone who has a vested interest in comics, and thinks about them far too often to be healthy, I'd like to take it to the next level. That level would be using my money to send a clear message as to how I would like to see the industry evolve. I don't want to demand that creators step off of corporate-owned properties, especially if that's what they wish. There are plenty of people who will support them, people who I have no problem with. But, I want to spend my money in a way that will ensure that titles I enjoy, and their creators, have an oppurtunity to thrive in a marketplace that's stuck in a rut unlike any other medium.

The purpose of my question was to help me get a grip on my own personal spending habits, and how they can change to suit my outlook. This isn't a call to arms. There has never been an underlying comic purchasing philosophy here. You aren't collectively tainted by the rhetoric of other boards. However, I think it's always an interesting exercise to question your beliefs, especially if they aren't something you ever consider. While "I buy what I want" is an adequate response, why not take it deeper and ask yourself what that means to not just you, but to the perception of the retailer, the marketplace and even the world at large.

Practically all the anti-trademark servicing advocates have admitted that it makes good financial sense to do work-for-hire, and that this is something that they have done in the past. Hey, even Sim admits it. The coporate structure is the one paying the bills. What they see as a problem is that creators given a chance to move beyond this stage will often stay within it, and customers who talk the talk won't walk the walk. To the best of my knowledge, almost no one here has talked the talk, so there's no need to ask you to walk it. If this message board did have a kind of comic purchasing philosophy, it would be for comics that raise the bar and try new things, no matter who or where they came from.

This isn't about direct change at a retailer, creator or publisher level. With few exceptions, none of us have much of a say in those matters, other then what we buy and where we buy it, which is what this discussion should be about. Many creators need to do corporate work to survive. Corporate work takes away from the time a creator can spend on personal work. I think a person switching from work-for-hire to creator-owned might (emphasis MIGHT) put more care into the product. Yes, non-corporate books can and will suck. However, if you take, let's say, Scott Lobdell and compare his work on either side, which is better? Depends on if you like Scott Lobdell, I suppose. The switch from one to another isn't about the content of the work itself. It's about retaining control of the financial and creative side of the thing. Everything else is highly subjective.

Corporate work will not be around forever. Within five years see the New Marvel fall in ruins, just like it always does. It's already started, with the whole George Clooney/Nick Fury flap. The only thing in the corporate structure that is not expendable is the trademark. Unlike creator owned material, creators have no say in their future on corporate owned material. As an example, Frank Miller submitted a Daredevil story when he was working at Marvel. He had taken a book nobody cared for and had made it a bestseller and a critical darling. When his editor returned his script, he was stunned to find out that his story was "not like a Frank Miller script" and had to be redone. Innovations don't last forever. Editors change positions. No one's job is safe. Sure the creators can move onto other projects, but nobody is going to kick Lapham off of Stray Bullets.

I agree wholeheartedly that creatively we are experiencing a new Golden Age in comics. There is more good work out there now then ever before, and it doesn't look likely to end soon. The amount of creator owned projects achieving modest success is astounding. In fact, it's welcoming. The diversity in the market is incredible. But now we've reached this crossroads where these comics can either grow, or they just become the farm team for the corporate giants.

On other matters, coming from someone who used to work at a bookstore, let me just say that having even one-half of the staff know where the graphic novels section is probably being very charitable. Having to oversee 100,000 titles on the shelf, not to mention having even the barest knowledge of the other 3 million books available in print, does not allow for much in the way of effective retailing. Especially when bookstore employees have the most amount of space to cover per person of any retail environment. In short, one shelf of graphic novels gets lost pretty easily in a big, ol' store. And changing the categorization of anything is a chore. In order to change the subject heading of any book I always had to wade through the bureaucracy at least three times to be acknowledged. Having comics in bookstores is reasonable. Depending on the store to get the right ones in and shelve them correctly is a nightmare.

About this idea that comics and superheroes go together better then any other combo malarkey, tell that to the Europeans and the Japanese, both of which sell many times the comics of the US (and one presumes UK) market, and without the superheroes. Even in the US, the most widely read comics are, have been and always will be non-superhero newspaper strips. Garfield will sell more books then the X-men, from now until the day we die. Yes, we were talking about the business of comic "books", but this aspect of the discussion is about the medium, which doesn't see such boundries as books or strips. On the flip side, in which comics are the ideal medium for superhero adventures, even if this were true in the past, I think the Spider-man movie might shake that idea up a bit. I'm surprised that so many people who have this superheroes = comics view aren't shitting their pants at the prospect that Hollywood is finally catching up. Oh, and dependent on your definition of superheroes, I'd say that Buffy and Star Wars certainly fall into that category. In other words, the success of superhero comic books in the US market is the exception when compared to the entire medium, stateside or worldwide, and not the rule.

Printing comics on newsprint at a lower price won't work. In fact, it will make things worse, especially for newstands. Given the choice to carry a comic that will net them pennies, or using that space for greeting cards that will net them dimes, you can bet that the stores will pick the latter. If you were to produce comics like that, a better way to go about it would be to go the Japanese way, with really big comics on newsprint (say 100+ pages) that cost the same or slightly higher then what is currently on the stands. The retailer gets a higher price point and the customer gets more bang for his buck. Sim even did something like this with his Cerebus campaign comic. It reprinted three issues that hadn't been collected in trade, and it cost the same amount of money as one of his regular issues. It was probably a loss leader, but it no doubt increased the visibilty of his comic.

I'd really like to see the industry try the loss leader as a regular thing. Instead of across an the board decrease in price, why not produce a small line of really cheap stand alone comics for kids, with their most popular characters, similar to Spidey Super-Stories. It might lose them money, but it will encourage comics reading and expose kids to their concepts and characters, as well as encourage parents to go to the store without having to worry about emptying their wallets. I wouldn't doubt it if many creators wouldn't be willing to take a crack at writing and drawing a kid's comic, just for the challenge, and to advance a medium they love.

The idea was put forward that there isn't as much good genre material out there to snag the non-superhero audience. While I certainly wouldn't agree that this is the case, in comparison to other mediums I'd say that's true. But compare now to just five years ago. The number of good genre titles is increasing dramatically. In another few years, if creators aren't forced financially into spending all their time on corporate work, you won't be able to make this argument. This problem is the result of the corporate dominance, not the reason for it. The creators, and the medium, want to diversify, but it's a tough fight.

It's true that most comics fans don't care, and really, why should they? Most of them have no idea that the way things are currently set-up, the comic industry could suffer a crippling blow tomorrow, destroying many of their favourite titles. Don't believe me? Every so often I imagine that I'll click on the internet to see an announcement saying that Diamond or Marvel has folded, and watch the domino effect over the weeks as the industry crumbles to the ground. It's all connected, and it all starts with your wallet.

It isn't working under the corporate structure that's the problem, it's not having a creative and financial stake in the equation, and holding back from diversifying the market. I agree that most people enter the medium through corporate work. I am not calling for the abolishment of corporate work. I do wish that the Big Two would do something more to draw in new readers, but I long ago stopped expecting it from them. I think there's a goldmine out there, a rich untapped market that Marvel and DC are foolish to ignore. It would take time and money, but it would be worth it in the long run. Those comics that used to draw people into the medium? They're gone, and they and the means to get them to people have been for years.

I'm not really keen on talking genre and content too much, because it's really subjective. I mean, I do think there is enough good genre material to satisfy people's needs. If more creators were given more money and incentive to develop non-superhero comics, then I think the situation would get better, which is really what this is all about. Comics don't necessarily do superheroes well. Comic creators who need the cash will do superheroes, so the talent is squeezed into this one little area. Given the freedom to do what they want, if they dare to leave the cage, many of these same terrific creators will go on to make something just as masterful (or as garbage, depending) in other genres.

I think a large part of the problem is something I expressed in the conversation a few weeks back and have been meaning to get back into. I find the work in comics to be far more compelling then TV, Movies or Books. Objectively, I don't think that this is the case. I think that I read comics with more ease, and therefore have the ability to read more into them, then I do with those other narrative mediums. Most people do not. So, it stands to reason that I would think the non-superhero material is close to the standard of those other mediums.

Just an opinion.



The original thread, with responses, can be read here, though the message board sometimes denies non-members. Next week I'll revisit these thoughts, and how they've changed or been informed by my experience blogging.

posted by Steven at 11:00 PM