cultshock

The main reason that I haven't bought a floppy in 30 years is because I'm not paying that much money for something I can read in 10 minutes. When I was a kid/teenager I bought stacks of comics for 25 cents to $1.00 each, I was good with that price, I felt like I was getting value for my money. But I'm not paying current prices when I can find other stuff to read for less money. When my generation stops buying comics every month (most of which for whom it's just a habit at this point) that market will surely die.

Red Hood

It will be hard for that market to die cause that's the collector's market. It still strong and it keeps going on speculation and beautiful artwork.

Another thing that both Marvel and DC need to do is include comics with the toys they sell at Target, Walmart and Amazon. They can include a physical copy, which would be neat or a digital copy or maybe even both. And that's another issue I've seen. Up until recently Marvel and DC had been making toys that catered to collector's and not kids 4-10. Yes, both Marvel and DC had toys for toddlers but once they got to the age of action figures, the options were scarce. Marvel missed the boat years ago with their Marvel Universe toy line by Hasbro that started in 2009 and was discontinued in 2017. That toy line had a incredible variety of characters from the entire Marvel Universe, had great sculpts, were 3 3/4 inch for most of the figures and they were ridiculously priced at $12.99-$14.99 and not heavily promoted at stores. The high price and lack of playset lure collectors more than kids and many of these figures ended on discount bins for $5 or less, which is what they should have been priced from the get go.

DC has now filled the shelves with similar sized toys made by Spin Masters, but wiith the pandemic and a lack of promotion, they are still sitting there untouched for the most part. They are priced at an affordable $7.99, so it's pretty similar as to how Toy Biz introduced their Marvel toy lines back in the 90's.

The big 2 need to go back and do cartoons that are actually good and do figure tie-ins. Marvel is doing a little of that with their Spider-Man toys but that TV show is pretty mediocre so it's not catching the attention that for example, the movie figures bring.

big e

One thing I’ve noticed for the last decade or so, is the near absence of ads. If you look at books pre-2000s, there were ads all through them and they were pretty cheap. Just glancing at a Spider-Man book from last year, the only ads I saw were Universal Resorts, something for Netflix, Party City, and a couple ads for Marvel’s own stuff. And that’s it; six or so ads. And the cover price is $3.99. Maybe a few more ads could get that price bumped down?

Red Hood

That’s not going to happen because getting ads for print media is almost impossible. Is the reason why newspapers and magazines are dying. What you are mostly going to see today as ads in comic books are in-house ads and every now and then a cross promotion witha product that has a superhero theme to it. For example, you will see movie ads for the latest superhero movie. You will see ads for superhero themed apparel like Sketchers or Hot Topic. In general, most companies have moved marketing and advertising to digital or TV media.

fujishig

Right, it's not that they want to keep the ads down, it's nobody wants to pay for ads, especially with the limited circulation (and demographics) that comics have. You had seen for decades magazine subscriptions being dirt cheap because they want as high a subscriber base as possible to sell ads (and a lot of those thick magazines are mostly ads).

And there have been cheaper superhero toys for kids, especially for movie tie ins. They are largely ignored by the collector market because they are limited in sculpt and articulation. Now they are mainly cartoon/movie tie ins and not comic based because, well, kids don't read comics. So you'll see toys for like Spiderverse and Shazam, or for Superhero Girls or whatever. But you have a similar problem there: kids don't play with toys/action figures after a certain age. Kids weren't buying those Marvel Universe (and the crappy DC equivalent) smaller figures, collectors were. And then toys have the other problem that comics have, prices are crazy (over 20 bucks for a figure in the collectors line). So I'm not sure toys are really how you want to get kids into comics (those Marvel Universe toys did give away comics, I think they and Transformers were the last toylines to do so).

If you really want to get comics to appeal to kids, the other thing you need to do is to basically remove continuity, or keep it very very loose. Have an easy to follow sequence of books that anyone can pick up from the beginning, and which tells a complete story. I think collected editions are getting closer to this but there are so many reboots, crossovers, and changes that it's just impenetrable.

big e

Removing continuity doesn't sound like a good idea and could have problems of it's own. That could turn off longtime readers. I do agree a big hurdle with modern comics is the reading order, which isn't made simple, due to the constant renumbering and crossovers. But, I think you can have an easy to follow reading order without forgoing continuity. They did it fine in the 70s and 80s (at least IMO), without resorting to renumbering. I can really only speak for what I saw in Marvel books (never read a whole lot of DC, so I can't comment on them), but the writers would structure the storytelling in a way that you could pick up a random issue and know what was going on in the story, without having to go back to prior issues. And, the writers seemed to be able to fit more story in a single issue back then, than they do now.

cultshock

Whenever I go to Japan, I still see stacks of reasonably priced manga in variety stores and newsstands, and see many people reading them on trains, in restaurants, etc. even these days. Japanese publishers are doing something right that American publishers are totally doing wrong. Honestly, Marvel and DC are lucky they can coast with their characters in movies, TV shows, video games and cartoons, otherwise they would have been gone some time ago.

Josh-da-man

Yeah, you don't see ads in comic books these days because 1) companies aren't interested in advertising in print media, and 2) comic books are printed in such low numbers these days that they don't want to even bother with them even though it's a targetable demographic.

And that's another reason why getting comic books back on the newsstands is a pipe dream. The magazine industry itself is dying a slow death, and putting a spinner racks in 7-11s isn't going to suddenly save the industry.

fujishig

You'd need to have a separate line of books, basically, for introducing readers to the mythos. Something like this, for instance:

Doesn't tie in with 50 issues, doesn't even place this specifically in any continuity. By the way, I knew this book existed and didn't remember the name and it took me 8 pages of browsing Wonder Woman books before I even found this on amazon.

The 70s and 80s are exactly what I would call loose continuity. Everything was connected and Marvel made it a point to have these blurbs about "check out issue 32 of wonder man for more info about this person" to make it seem like this gigantic universe, but you rarely if ever had to crossover to different books or have company-wide crossovers or know the history of this obscure character to understand or enjoy what was going on. And like you said, many stories are standalone. I'm sure a lot of people my age picked up what basically amounted to random older issues collected in digest form at the supermarket checkout as the introduction to a lot of characters. You can't just pick up random issues of modern comics.

If you look at the most popular graphic novels, they are largely out of continuity or alternate universe stories that can stand alone. Watchmen. The Dark Knight Returns. All Star Superman. Kingdom Come. Even the Dark Phoenix Saga. Sandman. Hush. The Long Halloween. Infinity Gauntlet (I dunno, I'm just pulling stuff out now).

We've talked about manga before, but there are a few things that are more than just cultural differences about whether manga is acceptable in society:
Geography: much easier and cheaper to ship. A lot of the cost of comics is in the distribution model and shipping.
Commuting: lots of people read while commuting.
Price: Manga is mainly in black and white. The first point of sale is usually in an anthology on super cheap paper, which goes against every fiber of an American comic book collector in that it's disposable. You're supposed to read it and throw it away and if you like it enough, buy the collected tankoubans. Also, honestly most of the time the creators are treated like cattle.
Variety: There is a lot of variety in American comics but the vast majority of sales are a single genre, superhero.

And of course what we were just talking about: If you want to read One Piece, you can go from volume 1 to 96, in order. No other writers, no other artist, no reboots.

dvdjunkie32

Bummed to see Amazon revise their May omnibus release dates to November 2020.

Red Hood

The continuity thing is where Marvel fucked up again in a big way. They started a new continuity back in 2000 and it was designed to bring in new readers, including kids. Most of you have heard about it. It was the Ultimate Comics line and it started in an incredible way with Spider-Man. And then the line of Ultimate books was completely fucked by Bill Jemas, Mark Millar and given a funeral by Jeph Loeb. The Ultimate Spider-Man book was perfect. New continuity, using known characters but not restricted to the 616 characterization. And then bam! Ultimates gets released and is targeted to a more mature audience. By the 5th issue we see the incest relationship between Pietro and Wanda. More mature themes follow on Ultimate X-Men and the subsequent Ultimate series and then Loeb does Ultimatum and kills half of the characters. By 2005 no one cared for the Ultimate Universe anymore and the only thing that revived the interest in that line of books was the creation of Miles Morales. Then the line was killed on Secret Wars and Miles and other characters merged with the 616 world.

That was the big opportunity to launch a new world and Marvel fucked it up. I feel that Bendis is trying to do something similar at DC now with Young Justice and Naomi but the corporate chaos at DC has held back that idea. I mean, Naomi was white hot last year and since the last issue of that series we have barely seen the character anywhere else. That's incredibly stupid on everybody's part.

TheDude

Agreed. I haven't seen any real ads (for movies, candy, etc.) in comic books since the 200X's.

morriscroy

The first time I came across "crossover hell" was back in the mid 1980s with "Crisis on Infinite Earths" and "Secret Wars 2". This is what led to me exiting the comic collecting hobby back in the day.

I can sort of understand Crisis on Infinite Earths having a gazillion crossovers. Not so much for Secret Wars 2.

(In contrast, Secret Wars 1 was more of a self-contained story in a limited series).

fujishig

Well, Secret Wars 2, IIRC, was about the Beyonder coming to Earth and interacting with different heroes so conceptually it made sense. I'm actually ok with the occasional event, and even those were fairly self contained in that you could probably read just the series you were collecting and you'd see how the event impacted them. Ideally you'd keep them as one shots but of course they want the crossover sales so they are in the actual regular sequence of issues. To me it's more the X-men style of crossover where you have to read sequential parts across multiple books: every once in a while is ok but man collecting that stuff and following along is a nightmare unless they carefully curate the trades the right way.

And don't get me wrong, I love the old school X-men crossovers, but back then there were like only three or four books crossing over at a time.

PhantomStranger

Most kids got into comics back in the day to follow one character and they would naturally develop other favorites. When I was a kid, I wanted to read and collect all Flash appearances. So that usually meant getting his monthly book and Justice League America. If you want to keep up with a character like Batman today, you need to buy practically a dozen books each month.

Marvel and DC have both abused their biggest brand characters, overexposing them. It sells in the short run but has disastrous long-term consequences. Just because the market supports eight Batman and Spider-Man books a month, doesn't mean you should as a company. It's about brand management.

brayzie

I remember Ultimate Spider-man being a big hit, but I thought that Ultimate X-Men and the other line was popular too, initially.
I do remember older fans mocking the "mature themes" like The Blob being a cannibal and that last page scene of him and The Wasp. So Mark Millar was no good for the Ultimate line? I always thought he was considered a great superhero writer.


I missed out on COIE but I remember getting Secret Wars 2 when I started getting into comics and thought it was great. It was the first time I saw all the Marvel characters interact with each other for a big event. Infinity Gauntlet was the second cross over I got interested in, as it felt like it was the end of the Marvel Universe to a gullible young reader like myself. I kind of got into Zero Hour, as that was my first DC crossover event.

I think crossover events work well for the first time reader, but they quickly wear out their welcome. I remember getting back into comics with Jim Lee's Batman run and then DC seemed to be in a never ending Crisis cross over event: Identity Crisis>Infinite Crisis>52>One Year Later>Countdown to Final Crisis>Final Crisis. I didn't buy any of those comics.

Red Hood

Millar is great when writing his original stuff, like Secret Service and Kick-Ass. His brief career at the big 2 is a mixed bag. The stuff that is alternate universes (like What if storylines) were good. Perfect example was Superman: Red Son and Old Man Logan. Everything that was done in continuity was heavily controversial and somewhat mediocre, like his run on the Ultimates and Civil War. I mean, both of those series sold and have good concepts, but the whole incest relationship and mature themes on the Ultimates and the Spider-Man secret identity reveal and complete mis-characterization of Punisher was bad. Civil War in particular was supposed to actually divide fans into taking sides in the registration issue. The execution of the storyline made the pro-registration the clear cut bad guys and the anti-registration the guys readers root for. The ending of the series in particular was really bad and it served as a jump off point for many readers after that last issue came out.

Again, the purpose of the the Ultimate line was to bring new readers, especially kids. How can any parent justify buying the Ultimates for their kid? The line went off the rails pretty soon the moment it catered to the adult crowd instead of the Ultimate Spider-Man crowd, which at that time was the best selling book every single month.

brayzie

I forgot about Red Son. That was great. Kick-Ass was good too, but I only read a an issue or two. Same with Old Man Logan.

He wrote Spider-man's secret identity reveal? That didn't even make sense in the context of the MU. I wonder if he or Marvel felt pressure just to write it that way in order to make headlines in mainstream newspapers and get the casuals to take notice?
And that's interesting it was supposed to divide fans. I also thought Tony Stark and the rest were acting like villains.

I never looked it at like that. I thought the Ultimate line was just a much more successful Earth 2 for Marvel, and maybe even an eventual replacement for the regular Marvel Universe. But yeah, it was supposed to be a line that was more friendly to the new reader without all the baggage of 60 years worth of continuity. But those new readers would skew to the younger side, so why make it incesty and cannibalistic?

majorjoe23

Mark Miller’s very best writing for either of the big 2 was his Superman Adventures animated comics.

DWilson

Wasn't Millar the one who wrote "The Wolverine" for a while, and turned the character into a mass murderer. I remember a storyline where Logan was off on missions killing pretty much anyone who got in his way, and as he was a hero (and they had made so much of him killing one collateral character in "The Savage Land") and it bothered me somewhat.

fujishig

The Ultimates (at least the Millar version, the Loeb version was almost universally reviled) was really really popular for a long time, mainly because of the edginess, but that either hasn't aged well or has gone out of style. I'm not going to lie and say I didn't enjoy Ultimates at the time.

The Ultimate Universe was basically to reboot the classic Marvel characters without the chains of continuity, which is exactly what I was advocating earlier. Spider-man was a teenaged geek again, the Avengers and X-men were just being formed, etc.

It started with Bendis on Ultimate Spider-man exactly with that concept: a spidey reboot where he wasn't married and was starting fresh. Millar came on with Ultimate X-men soon after and they were basically as contrasting as you could get: Spidey was clearly an all-ages type of title (part of the reason it aged a lot better) and Ultimate X-men, and later Ultimates, clearly were not, it was mainly edgy superhero deconstruction. And I think it worked ok (I think one of the points was to craft a universe that was more in line with a cinematic, more grounded universe, and of course the cinematic universe took some cues from the Ultimates in that regard, the most obvious being Sam Jackson as Fury). But as more issues came out, more continuity built up, and more fanservice was put in to appease older fans. It quickly became a game of "spot that Easter Egg" that I'm sure couldn't have been fun for a new reader to read. So they actually needed to reboot/refresh the reboot and did a terrible job of it with the almost universally reviled Ultimatum which included the classic Blob eating the Wasp scene and the death of 30 some odd characters in decidedly unkid-friendly ways. Somehow ultimate Spider-man, driven by Bendis, kept the course but besides that book, this was no longer a universe safe for kids or new readers.

And this will always happen. Reboot, appeal to new readers, slowly build up continuity and/or reintroduce all the old concepts for the old fans, collapse under the weight of continuity, start again. It happened with the original Crisis, with 2099, with Zero Hour (which rebooted the Legion), with the new 52, with Rebirth, etc. Ultimates at least kept a separate universe but some say that just led to confusion and it still did the exact same thing anyway. But I do think if you want to do this successfully you do it as a separate imprint, leave the normal universe for the aging fans and bring out some other books that are more new reader/kid friendly that have looser continuity (so that you're not tempted to try to make it appeal to aging fans), but I don't know, I'm just a parent trying to get his kids hooked on comics even though I know in my heart it's not really the most sensible thing to do.

big e

The Ultimate Universe was an interesting idea when it started out, but, yea, it seemed to go downhill pretty fast. Admittedly, I didn't read a lot from it, other than a few of the early Spider-Man books, but they weren't enough to hold my interest. My brother and uncle read a couple books, Spider-Man, Ultimates (or whatever their version of the Avengers was), and FF. I think they also read the Captain America book, but I don't think either one liked it. Other than some crossovers with the 616 universe (which didn't improve my opinion any), I pretty much ignored the line. To me, the Ultimate Universe seemed like a more screwed up version of the Marvel Universe. Everyone seemed to have problems, characters (even major ones) wereindiscriminately killed off, then some were replaced with characters kinda like the original but a little different, characters histories were drastically changed (Red Skull being an illegitimate son of Steve Rogers ). The whole thing sounds like it ended up being a big cluster and I'm glad I didn't involve any more time in it than I did.

Comic books will probably always have a messy continuity, unless the company does a complete reboot every 15 or 20 years. Otherwise, you'll have characters staring in books in 2020 who are the same characters that were in books 40 or 50 years ago. And they may reference something that happened in a story arc from 40 years ago. I just finished the "Hunted" storyline from last year, that was published in Amazing Spider-Man. That story heavily reference Kraven's Last Hunt, which was published over 30 years ago. Now, reading Kraven's Last Hunt wasn't necessary to know what was going on, but there were a few references you wouldn't understand without having read it first. However, if a new reader read "Hunted", then went back and read Kraven's Last Hunt, that reader would be presented with a drastically different book in tone and pacing, yet it has the exact same characters he saw in this new story.

B5Erik

Less is more. Always leave them wanting more.

The cliches really apply here. Having 6 Spider-Man titles diluted all of them. It diluted the focus, it diluted the talent, and it diluted how special each title was every time another one was started.

There should NEVER have been a 4th Spider-Man title, let alone anything after that.

Batman? Detective Comics and Batman, plus The Brave and the Bold. Plenty. Superman? Action and Superman.

Kids couldn't keep up, and I doubt many tried after a few months. Adults did until they just got fed up.

The decline of the comics industry has been discussed to death, but this was one key factor that led to it's downfall. And it really hurt the quality of the product being put out.

I wish they could come up with a solution to fix it, but with the current disaster for comic distribution the industry is just fighting to survive.

I sure hope that Diamond can get back to sending out product soon - I've got several Marvel Masterworks on pre-order that I definitely don't want to miss at the non aftermarket price.

Red Hood

Rod Reis’s brother has died from Coronavirus

TheBang

Let’s not forget Marvel’s earlier efforts at launching continuity-free or continuity-lite lines like New Universe, Marvel 2099, and Marvel MC2.

These days, Adventures type comics seem to be the most accessible route for younger children. Easily digestible stories, no heavy continuity. But I see no gateway for transitioning from those types of titles to being a monthly reader of the “mainstream” superhero books.