Is comics a dying trade?

[chongjasmine]

With the new generation into manga and anime and movies, is comics becoming a dying trade?
Sales of comics seem to be dropping and online piracy seems to be rampant.
What do you think?

[Trey Strain]

With the new generation into manga and anime and movies, is comics becoming a dying trade?
Sales of comics seem to be dropping and online piracy seems to be rampant.
What do you think?

Marvel comics are in decline, thanks largely to what have been called its "SJW" policies. The other companies seem to be faring better.

But if I ran a comics company and visited comics web sites, the topics I saw people talking about would not encourage me. Comics readership seems clearly to be an exclusive and aging club. No industry wants to be stuck with a market like that.

[The Dying Detective]

Marvel comics are in decline, thanks largely to what have been called its "SJW" policies. The other companies seem to be faring better.

But if I ran a comics company and visited comics web sites, the topics I saw people talking about would not encourage me. Comics readership seems clearly to be an exclusive and aging club. No industry wants to be stuck with a market like that.

So why not try and drum up some business for your company because why start something only give up half way? The old crowd of Marvel and DC sometimes do not even know what to do as they can't even accept or review unsolicited proposals heck if the front door was more wide open to new talent they could have something to talk about.

[skyvolt2000]

Marvel comics are in decline, thanks largely to what have been called its "SJW" policies. The other companies seem to be faring better.

Translated-"Folks take issue with who is on the cover if it's not a certain demographic."

Funny those SJW book have no trouble selling well as trades.
Funny when you remove the entitlement crowd-no one takes issues with who is on the cover. You actually get folks who READ the books.

The reason DC fares better is because those fans do take time to READ the books. So you are getting legit opinions from folks who read those books. Same with many of the indy books.
Most of the readers of those SJW Marvel books are confused on the claims because they don't see it. Because they read the books instead of taking issue with who is on the cover.

Sales of comics seem to be dropping and online piracy seems to be rampant.

No different ways to get that comic CHEAPER has popped up.

Ebay anyone? Lets see go to comic book store and get All Star Batman's 1-12 run for $75 or $20 on Ebay?
Or half the price or lower at Half Price Books (a used book store)? Where I have seen new books there 2-3 days of release.
Midtown comics with FLASH sales of 35-60% off and those books tend to be the socalled classic books.

But if I ran a comics company and visited comics web sites, the topics I saw people talking about would not encourage me. Comics readership seems clearly to be an exclusive and aging club. No industry wants to be stuck with a market like that.

Message boards do not speak for everyone.

Why would I listen to ANYONE who throws fits about books that they never going to read?
Who will scream for a certain book and yet will find EXCUSES to not buy it. As we saw with Hal Jordan book. Where are all his fans at? They got what they wanted. John Stewart in the background and his fans GONE. Yet at times Jessica & Simon, many Marvel SJW books & New Age books out sold him.
We saw HATE for Duke Thomas-yet I saw his book sell out at many stores and it was decently received.

Yeah it's complaint fest online but in many cases- REALITY shows a different story.

[Carabas]

With the new generation into manga and anime and movies, is comics becoming a dying trade?
Sales of comics seem to be dropping and online piracy seems to be rampant.
What do you think?

If they were really dying nobody would bother to pirate them.

[dancj]

With the new generation into manga and anime and movies, is comics becoming a dying trade?
Sales of comics seem to be dropping and online piracy seems to be rampant.
What do you think?

Manga is a subset of comics, so as long as Manga does well, comics can't die.

I think it's possible that floppies or superheroes could die, but comics as a whole have got plenty of life left in them.

[jb681131]

With the new generation into manga and anime and movies, is comics becoming a dying trade?
Sales of comics seem to be dropping and online piracy seems to be rampant.
What do you think?

Superhero movies are working so well, I don't think comics will die soon.
But I agree that the quality of comics is in a low period now.
And that there's too much superhero stuff.

[kjn]

Comics as an art form or source of entertainment isn't going anywhere. But the forms of distribution are changing, just as they've done before. The floppies might become less important, and the classic comic book stores are likely going away in most places, but the comics themselves will still be around. Just witness the rise and popularity of webcomics.

Superhero comics may become less relevant, but I believe the main issue is the breakdown of the old distribution chains. Main issue is probably to solve the problem of discovery for kids, with the floppies disappearing in favour of digital distribution and trades.

[Trey Strain]

Comics as an art form or source of entertainment isn't going anywhere. But the forms of distribution are changing, just as they've done before. The floppies might become less important, and the classic comic book stores are likely going away in most places, but the comics themselves will still be around. Just witness the rise and popularity of webcomics.

Superhero comics may become less relevant, but I believe the main issue is the breakdown of the old distribution chains. Main issue is probably to solve the problem of discovery for kids, with the floppies disappearing in favour of digital distribution and trades.

Kids can't afford to buy comics. For that matter, they're too expensive for adults to buy too.

Almost everything that's said on a comics message board drips with, "We're old."

[kjn]

Kids can't afford to buy comics. For that matter, they're too expensive for adults to buy too.

Almost everything that's said on a comics message board drips with, "We're old."

Too expensive, that's part of the breakdown of the old distribution chains. When comics were available everywhere, you could depend on selling cheap comics with lots of people buying an issue a month (or every two weeks). With the breakdown of them (which has been a long and on-going process, and started even before the rise of mainstream Internet; at least it did for the book market which I'm more familiar with, but I doubt comics is that different here[1]), publishers rather became dependant on selling more expensive comics to the small group of people buying several issues each month.

[1] The rise of the trade market for comics is part of this, and mirrors what has happened on the book market with a delay of a few years.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

One of many reasons why people don't buy comics is because of the prices. Comics used to cost 10 cents in the 1940's. Then prices soar eventually through later years. Now the usual price is $3.99

Would any newcomers want to spend $3.99 dollars on 24 pages of artwork? Manga are cheaper than US comics. An average manga with about 200 pages costs $13 dollars. Manga has about eight US comic books for only three times the price of a US comic book.

Mangas are usually black and white on cheap paper and they generally have a less complicated art production.

[Duskman]

One of many reasons why people don't buy comics is because of the prices. Comics used to cost 10 cents in the 1940's. Then prices soar eventually through later years. Now the usual price is $3.99

Would any newcomers want to spend $3.99 dollars on 24 pages of artwork? Manga are cheaper than US comics. An average manga with about 200 pages costs $13 dollars. Manga has about eight US comic books for only three times the price of a US comic book.

Following this, so little actually happens in each individual issue. Decompression has gone beyond writing for the trade, its just meandering most of the time. In the late 80s, you maybe paid a dollar, and youd get a whole adventure, or at least a very active chapter in a multipart adventure. You just dont get nearly as much bang for your buck these days.

[Powerboy]

One of many reasons why people don't buy comics is because of the prices. Comics used to cost 10 cents in the 1940's. Then prices soar eventually through later years. Now the usual price is $3.99

Would any newcomers want to spend $3.99 dollars on 24 pages of artwork? Manga are cheaper than US comics. An average manga with about 200 pages costs $13 dollars. Manga has about eight US comic books for only three times the price of a US comic book.

This is the biggest factor. If comic books were 10 or 15 cents plus inflation, they wouldn't be a niche market. But distribution has changed. Just to add to the "old market", someone referred to the "classic comic book stores" but those are themselves something that are new in my mind having not come in until the 1980s to my memory. There was an NPR review of comics where the guy concluded that it comes down to spending about eight bucks for two comics that won't even give you an hour's worth of entertainment or that same money on a novel that will be good for two weeks.

[Jackmando7]

One of many reasons why people don't buy comics is because of the prices. Comics used to cost 10 cents in the 1940's. Then prices soar eventually through later years. Now the usual price is $3.99

Yup, 3.99 plus tax. If I am buying a comic and hand the guy a 5 dollar bill and I know all I get back is change, it's sometimes pretty hard to justify it.

[mrbrklyn]

Too expensive, that's part of the breakdown of the old distribution chains. When comics were available everywhere, you could depend on selling cheap comics with lots of people buying an issue a month (or every two weeks). With the breakdown of them (which has been a long and on-going process, and started even before the rise of mainstream Internet; at least it did for the book market which I'm more familiar with, but I doubt comics is that different here[1]), publishers rather became dependant on selling more expensive comics to the small group of people buying several issues each month.

[1] The rise of the trade market for comics is part of this, and mirrors what has happened on the book market with a delay of a few years.

Comic Books was an offshoot of the News Paper business. Newspaper stands are almost all gone now, and so the end point distribution access local for retail Comic Books is gone. That leaves us with Comic Books, books stores and retail store racks (like Wallgreens) for magazines alone to try to sell Comic Books and that is tough. Impulse buys are gone. The sales pitch for comics used to be eyes on the cover to sell a potential buyer. You went from access to 100's of millions, to access to a few 100 thousand dedicated readers.

Until they fix this, the Comics Books trade is going to remain in decline.

In response to this we now have glossy paper, big art focused, super hyped books seemlingly on steroids. As a promoter of social movements, comics was a leader and now it is largely dead. You can talk about the Movies, but the movies are all off of very old storylines. Without the "day in day out" process that comic writers and producers were able to depend on, it is hard to develope real following. If even the sales of a single non-descript golden-age issue was to hit the market today, it would be a megahit making lead stories on the 6 oclock news.