Highway 62

deseretnews.com | Comics industry is here to stay

This needs to be examined. Hopefully this afternoon.

EDIT - By "this afternoon" I certainly meant "Saturday evening or Sunday before the kids get up."

Okay, got a little time to spend on this, so let's take a look. And when I'm talking comics industry here, I'm talking about Marvel and DC. There's some argument that things are considerably rosier for people who are putting out non-superhero genre books (in terms of being able to approach new book publishers, as opposed to monthly pamphlet publishers.)

It opens up with the intimation that the comics industry is dying, which DiDio immediately deflects by saying it's "transforming". Well, I suppose you could say that, but what exactly is it "transforming" into? Right now, you could argue that it's further turning towards franchise maintainence with attempts to update marquee characters and playing to a shrinking fanbase. When I look at sales charts, I see that big event books keep the other stuff afloat. That's quite possibly a jaundiced view, but it's my view nonetheless. Now, profits might be up in other places, like selling the toys based on the comics, and whatever money comes in from film versions of the characters, but I don't know all the numbers.

Point is, the big two are still trying to sell old characters in monthly comic books by way of a limited amount of retailers. I know a bunch of retailers, and they're all going out of their way to get readers wherever they can (the good ones, that is.) Even so, there's just not that many outlets for the bulk of comics sold. Yeah, that's gotten better with the success of graphic novels in bookstores (for which I'm thankful), but that itself has some effects on the Direct Market, just look up retailers who are competing with online sellers (and deep discounts). That'll become even more of a critical issue once publishers come to depend more on backlist sales (and even now, with the creation of instant backlist items once a miniseries or story arc has concluded.)

Next, DiDio goes on to say that collectability drives the market and makes single issues more viable in the long term than say, newspapers. If by "collectablility" he means, "motivation of the established fanbase" then he's probably on to something. Goodness knows that neither DC nor Marvel are really interested in bringing new readers into their mainstream lines. Superhero books (with some noble exceptions) are largely impervious to new readership, being a super-tuned product aimed at a very particular readership. This is a readership that can *afford* comics, knows *where* to get them, and is primed to *consume* them. But there doesn't seem to be much interest in a sustainable market in the monthly arena. Nor does there seem to be a ton of interest in making stuff that's accessable to new readers (the kids' lines of both the Big Two make some attempts at this, however, and that's to be commended -- now, get those digests in grocery stores and drugstores and skateboard shops and maybe we'd be talking.)

Then, DiDio "talks about COUNTDOWN." I suppose I should actually read it, but frankly, the world being laid out in 52 and the way in which it was being done just didn't do anything for me. I see no reason to hope for improvement in the second iteration. And of course "we're counting down to SOMETHING" gets slipped in. See, this has been the problem with most of the events from the Big Two, is that the SOMETHING is always being built up to but never delivered. Hard to make that stick when the whole point of superhero books is about the establishment and protection of a status quo. Again, exceptions apply, but by and large...they don't.

He also notes the importance of working ahead. Well yeah, editorial has to keep all them writers in line, right? But as smarter guys than me have pointed out, periods of heavyhanded editorial control always peter out and things swing back to a time of greater creative freedom. Eventually.

Oh yes, the joys of the Crying Superman. Because if Superman is crying, then you know that THINGS ARE PRETTY GODDAMN BAD, aren't they? Revel in superpowered schadenfreude. Their tears sustain the fans! CRY SUPERMAN, CRY! His tears are golden eggs from the goose that never needs die again (after all, that's been done.)

And DiDio also admits that sales are down, but he expects them to pick up. Has any maxi-series ever experienced such a sales trend? Maybe when some stuff actually *happens*, people will flock to it, but I seriously don't expect any new readers to be won because of the bold, new characterizations being undertaken in COUNTDOWN. But then I'm a notorius crank when it comes to these sorts of things.

Hmm. Somehow I expected to be more savage about this. Maybe next time...