Hey everyone, and welcome to something quite different. Okay, maybe it's not so different since I have had talked about comic books many times in previous post, but this one is strictly about comic books, more specially the comic book industry.
For sometime now I've been watching a lot of videos by a YouTuber who goes by the name, Just Some Guy. Basically while he talks about a lot of other stuff in the entertainment industry, what really made me watch more of his videos was the subject of comic books and basically how things aren't getting any better.
I felt even worse when I go on Twitter (insert of your own joke about how Twitter will make you feel that in the comment section) and I see people post videos going to their local Barnes & Noble or whatever book store they go to, and the comic book section is very small. Almost on the verge of being a tiny puddle instead of a kiddie pool.
So I decide to do to give my own thoughts on how the comic book industry get better themselves that way maybe they'll live to see the next 30 years or hopefully longer than that.
Now before we begin let me just say something, I don't think my solutions and only my solutions are the only ones this specific industry should listening too. Hell, I severely doubt "the pros" are going to see this. I'm just throwing my two cents in and that's all. This is more of an opinion piece if anything. Okay, now let's get started.
Step 1. Stop with All of the Excuses!
For the longest time the comic book pros are coming up with all sorts of excuses of why sales are not what they were hoping for. First they called the customers either racist, sexist, or both (and as well all know it's always a good idea to insult the people who give you money), then they blamed the COVID-19 pandemic but that didn't work either because other comics and such were still being bought, and since we live in an era where you can buy something with just a click that excuse doesn't work. Now the latest one came from Erik Larsen (known for being a Spider-Man artist and the creator of the Image Comics series Savage Dragon) says it's piracy.
Yet again, this is an awful excuse for poor sales. Now yes, piracy is definitely not a good thing but, it's a small problem NOT the problem. What really doesn't make this excuse work is because lots of things get pirated and still have lots of success. There are plenty of movies and episodes to popular tv shows that get pirated and yet, movies still make their money back and tv episodes still get the ratings they were hoping for.
It's really time for the comic industry to stop coming up with excuses. Especially since it's only a matter of time when they won't have any left.
Step 2. Treat Your Customers With Respect
There's an old saying out there folks. "Don't bite the hand that feeds you"......well apparently someone forgot to tell the comic pros that because they're not only biting the hand, they're devouring it, spitting it out, stomping on it, and then devouring it again.
For whatever reason the comic pros thought the best way to get more customer was to belittle them. Because if you want to grow your industry the best way to do it is to insult the people who give you their money.
I mean it, over the past couple of years the pros have called fans everything from racist to sexist to homophobic to anything else that ends with an "ist" or "phobic". At this rate I'm surprised they haven't run out of words. And the only reason they've been calling the fans these kinds of things is simply because they criticized the products they've been putting out.
Now yes, there were a couple of a-holes, but they're not the big loud majority group that the industry is trying to make them out to be. Hell, they're trying to shot for diversity, yet the fans that are criticizing their product is very diverse. If the industry wants to keep on living they NEED to stop treating the customers like complete and utter crap!
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| From Milestone Returns #0 |
Step 3. STOP. BEING. POLITICAL!
With a few expectations, over the years comic book writers think the one thing the fans want in their stories is politics or any form of political topics. And surprise to no one, people aren't buying.
The industry of today of clearly forgotten that they are seen as form of escapism, people want to go to a different world and see heroic men stop the bad guys, heroines be both beautiful and powerful, and anti-heroes be pure 100% unapologetic badasses. What they don't want to see is the main hero or heroine talk about their political agenda, what protest they're going to, gender pronouns, and anything else that's going to make the audience roll eyes and throw the comic in the trash. This was especially bad last year when all we wanted was escapism but instead the entertainment industry as a whole decided to put politics over entertainment.
And before you say "There were always politics in comics! Like the X-Men being an allegory for racism and prejudice!" Well yes, that's true, but here's the thing, at the end of the day a lot of those old writers still wanted to tell entertaining stories. If they DID put a political aspect in those stories it was so subtle nobody notice until much, much, much later.
Step 4. Hire People Who Love Your Industry/Know What They're Doing
This step should be common sense, if you hire people who love your business and have a good if not great knowledge about it, chances are things will be great.
Nowadays for reasons I can't understand we companies like Marvel or DC kept hiring people who either never liked comics or have writing credits but not for writing fiction but for writing politics for websites like The New York Times, MSNBC, CNN, and etc. Because of this "brilliant" idea we've been giving a lot of bad comics.
And it's not just the writing that's suffering but it's also the art work. Don't believe me? Well get a load of these, for the record yes, yes a professional comic book company allowed these to be released.
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| From Marvel Voices: Indigenous Voices #1 |
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| From Nubia: Real One |
And the most recent one, Ninjak #1
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| Yes folks, this came from an actually comic. |
From both reading and looking at these comics I just get a feeling no one loves what they're doing. And I even heard stories (don't know if there true or not, so take this with a grain of salt) that sometimes these people just us comics just so they get their tv series or some other project of theirs off the ground. Because of this I don't get a love from these new writers and artist.
So comic book industry, if you want to survive get people who know how to write, get people who know how to draw, and if you're getting people who pull off both, even better.
Step 5. Tone It Down with the Crossover Events
Now, I love a good crossover event, you doesn't? You get to see all of your favorite characters interact and stop whatever threat is putting their world in danger. But, as of recently me along with every other comic fan have grown tired of them.
And we're not stupid, we know why they do it. It's so they can bring sales up, and because of this mind set you get a lot of forgettable crossovers. I mean does anybody even remember DC's Endless Winter? What about Marvel's Empyre? Or maybe King in Black, Event Leviathan, Outlawed, Year of the Villain, or maybe even Absolute Carnage? Ya see what I'm getting at here?
What really made me sick of crossover events is not only are there too many but, they also interrupt a current comics storyline. For instance you could be reading an issue of Superman and then the next issue is the big company crossover event and then the issue after that is the current Superman story you were reading about two issues ago.
So comic book companies, tone it down with these events! If you're gonna make a crossover event don't have a pointless tie-in with other comics and don't make them so frequent. Space them out a bit, make a crossover event ever three months, five months, eight months, I don't know just don't make them such a recurring thing.
Step 6. Lower the Prices
Know I have a grandpa who loves comic books, more specially the golden and silver age because that's just what he grew up with. He use to collect them all the time, whether they were old or new, but he stopped doing it a long time ago because, that's right, the comics just got to pricey.
Comics as of late have be upping the prices to something I think like three dollars. Sure buying one wouldn't be a problem, but if you want a big stack of comics to keep you entertained it is. Maybe if it was for an anniversary or special milestone issue (for example a 100th issue) I guess it would make sense. But consider every issue has a big price people just turn away.
By not only upping the quality of the comic (steps three and four) but also making a very small price, more people will buy your stuff. Simple as that.
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| Variant Cover for Batman Vol.3 #1 |
Step 7. Done It Down with the Variant Covers
I'll keep this one short because it's pretty obvious you know what I mean.
So, whenever a new comic is released there's also a big number of variant covers that come with it. I understand maybe it's just to give fans more options if they don't like the current one, but there is such a thing as too many options.
That Batman cover I'm using for this part of the post is one of twenty-seven, and I wasn't even counting the textless covers. Basically, if you're gonna do a variant cover make it feel special, much like the bigger prices make it for an anniversary or landmark issue.
Step 8. Create New and Original Characters
Ya know, at first I wasn't gonna bother with this part because I figured I would offended someone, but I probably already did that with the image I used for step three, but let's get to the point.
Over the years the comic industry (sometimes DC but mostly Marvel) have been doing an awful job creating "new" characters. Basically two things will happen, scenario 1) Iconic character will give their mantle to someone who did nothing to earn it or scenario 2) Character we've known for years is all of a sudden a different sexuality despite what their long previous history would say or the fact it was never hinted at to begin with.
Typically this "new" character fits in a check box because comic companies all of sudden like tokens now. You'll get the token gay guy, the token lesbian, the token black guy, and so on and so forth. Not only is it lazy, but it's clearly isn't working. There are many people in the comic book fandom that are Black, Asian, Hispanic, etc. and people are bisexual or gay and guess what, they're not buying into this "new" characters.
They know exactly why the industry is doing this, it's the same with every other corporation, they don't ACTUALLY care, they're doing it to virtue signal/get a pat on the back.
And if none of you believe that, here three videos of three black men (Just Some Guy, YoungRippia59, and The Kool Section) ranting about that supposed Black Superman film that's going to be made by Ta-Nehisi Coates and J.J. Abrams.
Note, that was only three. There are a lot more videos like that, and probably a hell of a lot from tweets about this as well.
Step 9. Learn from the Competition
Much like step seven I'm going to keep this brief, mainly cause I can't comment on the qualities of these works.
So, since Marvel and DC aren't really doing well, who is? Well, manga and the indies. Ever since people turned away from the bigger comic book companies, fans are turned to more alternative forms of comics. Those being manga and indies comics that were made possible by either Kickstarter and Indiegogo.
Now, I can't comment of these types of comics, because like I said previously I haven't read any of these or have any real knowledge of them. Either way, these two types of works are doing something right if one is outshining the other. The bigger companies need to study why these two types of comics are doing so well, while they're losing more and more as the years go by.
NOW! THE BEST FOR LAST, THE FINAL STEP THE COMIC INDUSTRY SHOULD MAKE IF THEY WANT TO SURVIVIE IS.......
STEP 10. STOP LISTENING TO PEOPLE WHO DON'T BUY YOUR SHIT!
This is the biggest issue the comic book industry is facing today, for whatever reason the "pros" are always listening to these people, and it makes no sense.
These people (call 'em SJWs, snowflakes, or the wokes whatever they're all the same) go complain about something they found to be racist, sexist, or whatever other word that's lost all meaning, talk about how they finally "won", and never buy the comics themselves. And we know for a fact they're not buying these comics cause they were, sales numbers would be a hell of a lot higher than they are now.
What's also amazing is back in May, Mark Millar (comic writer known for Kick-Ass, Superman: Red Son, Civil War, and The Ultimates) was supposedly told that 95% of the comic book audience isn't on Twitter. If that's true then Marvel, DC, whoever really need to stop listening to the other 5%.
This is all of the steps I have for this subject. Hopefully in due time, the comic book industry will learn from their mistakes, and I really hope they do. Because I couldn't imagine living in a world where DC and Marvel Comics don't exist, so....fingers cross.
Okay, folks, I'm all done here. Due come back on Saturday, Jul 3rd for my review of The Tomorrow War. Until then, enjoy the rest of your day.
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