Forbes Article: Surprising New Data Shows Comic Readers Are Leaving Superheroes

[DigiCom]

There's also the problem of the way the direct market is set up. capandkirby spoke about his daughter and their pull lists, but how many people outside of existing fans even know what a pull list IS, and how they can set one up? Every other form of entertainment, you wait until it comes out, and if it sells out before you get to the store, you can order a copy.

But with comics, you have to know what you want 2 months in advance, and either hope your local store ordered enough copies, or get them to order one for you... assuming they don't drive you away for liking something that isn't the owner's style.

[Huntsman Spider]

There's also the problem of the way the direct market is set up. capandkirby spoke about his daughter and their pull lists, but how many people outside of existing fans even know what a pull list IS, and how they can set one up? Every other form of entertainment, you wait until it comes out, and if it sells out before you get to the store, you can order a copy.

But with comics, you have to know what you want 2 months in advance, and either hope your local store ordered enough copies, or get them to order one for you... assuming they don't drive you away for liking something that isn't the owner's style.

That last one is a very good point you raise. "Gatekeepers" who feel it's their prerogative to bar others from comics just for liking stuff that they themselves don't like or wouldn't prefer have done a lot to push away would-be new fans/readers, so there is that to consider. It's hard to draw people into reading and/or buying comics if the people who are supposed to be guiding them into the hobby are too busy looking down their noses at them or even harassing/abusing them for what comics they show interest in.

[WebLurker]

And dc has jumped on the young readers bandwagon! They are jumping all in!


https://www.bleedingcool.com/2019/11...-gretel-lusky/



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Another young adult title announced! With the lumberjanes creator!

https://www.bleedingcool.com/2019/11...-goldie-vance/



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Will marvel follow next? Maybe bring back misty, millie the model or patsy walker? Wally the wizard more like harry potter? Top dog comic to compete with dogman?

Read a couple of those DC YA graphic novels. Liked them in general, would be onboard with Marvel doing the same.

Now if Coats & Simon take issue with piracy-where is their rage for the following?

Half Price Books
Ebay
Vintage Trading Post

Those are legal way to buy books. Piracy is not. (And, as pointed out before, the creators already were reimbursed for that used book before it was resold.)

[Lukmendes]

Superhero books have nothing new to say. When you have someone trying new things, like Tom King with Batman or Dan Slott with Spider-man, the irascible old guard shows up in their mewling multitudes to complain and troll until everything's back as it was. Superhero Comics have one of the most regressive and self-destructive fandoms out there, and I'm glad the kids are 'nope-ing' out of it.

To be fair, you shouldn't use Slott or King as examples of fanbases getting pissed off at changes, specially since King had this whole wedding that people were hyped for, and then Batman#50 happened, and fans were pissed at the bait and switch, so that was a case of staying in the status quo and fans hating it.

Plus, it's not just a problem with fans, look at that trainwreck that was X-Men Gold, it was all about dumb nostalgia, and that was the writter's choice, so both fans getting too nostalgic and writters/editors not having enough balls for change are the problem.

[capandkirby]

Generally agree with that last part, though I can also see the point some have raised here about the entrenched older fans/readers (and possibly some creators) feeling entitled to have the stories and characters be exactly the same as they were when they were young (or younger) and chasing away younger or newer fans/readers (and possible comics creators), which the market does need to sustain itself in the long run, with their virulent animosity toward anyone that doesn't echo that sentiment or dares to like what they almost uniformly despise.

Yes. I know exactly the group you are referring to. If you ever have a spare moment, you should check out Gail Simone's twitter feed, it's very entertaining watching her tear into that particular crowd, she eats them for breakfast. But I'd be hesitant to define the entire superhero comic reading community by CGs. I don't think they have the impact on sales that they think they do. I wouldn't give them that win.

[capandkirby]

There's also the problem of the way the direct market is set up. capandkirby spoke about his daughter and their pull lists, but how many people outside of existing fans even know what a pull list IS, and how they can set one up? Every other form of entertainment, you wait until it comes out, and if it sells out before you get to the store, you can order a copy.

But with comics, you have to know what you want 2 months in advance, and either hope your local store ordered enough copies, or get them to order one for you... assuming they don't drive you away for liking something that isn't the owner's style.

I have read that certain shop owners have been less than welcoming with their business practices. It's horrible. I've been lucky in that regard, the two shops I frequent most are fantastic and overall every experience I've had in every shop in my city (San Diego) has been great. But yeah, I've seen fans detail their CBS horror stories on Twitter, particularly female fans, and it's... not good. Read one account where a CBS employee threatened to call the cops on a family because their little kid was touching a toy they had for sale in the shop.

The direct market sure is... something.

[cranger]

I kind of feel like things are veering away from topic. Nostalgic readers, 'CGers' and retail horror stories are not really relevant to superhero graphic novel sales through book stores. It is a completely different market.

[capandkirby]

I kind of feel like things are veering away from topic. Nostalgic readers, 'CGers' and retail horror stories are not really relevant to superhero graphic novel sales through book stores. It is a completely different market.

On the contrary, CGers, rude store owners, nostalgic readers, all of these things fall under the header of one term: gatekeeping. And if readers, in ANY form of sales, including bookstores, are "leaving superheroes behind" gatekeeping among the superhero fanbase could be a major contributing factor. As I've stated before, it's not as if the public isn't interested in superheroes as a genre. Avengers Endgame is the biggest box office grossing film of all-time. Marvel has had 8 films that crossed the billion dollar mark. Obviously there is a market for superheroes that exists. In most cases, when a film is released based on a written source material, the source material in question will experience a spike in sales. A recent example of this would be Margaret Atwood's Handmaid's Tale, in which sales of the book increased by 200% when the television series was released.

https://www.npr.org/2017/02/07/51395...estseller-list

But that's not happening with superhero comics, if anything sales are only getting worse (though both 2018 and 2019 have improved over the major collapse that was the 2017 comics market). And Marvel and DC need to examine why that is and fix it.

[DigiCom]

I have read that certain shop owners have been less than welcoming with their business practices. It's horrible. I've been lucky in that regard, the two shops I frequent most are fantastic and overall every experience I've had in every shop in my city (San Diego) has been great. But yeah, I've seen fans detail their CBS horror stories on Twitter, particularly female fans, and it's... not good. Read one account where a CBS employee threatened to call the cops on a family because their little kid was touching a toy they had for sale in the shop.

The direct market sure is... something.

Sadly, I have seen such things for myself. And this is still the primary market for the superhero "floppy"

I kind of feel like things are veering away from topic. Nostalgic readers, 'CGers' and retail horror stories are not really relevant to superhero graphic novel sales through book stores. It is a completely different market.

The thing is, the way the superhero comic-book industry is set up, a title needs to be first successful in single issues before it even has a chance of getting collected. So the LCS horror stories are a direct influence on what's available in the bookstore market... unless the publisher bypasses the direct market by either going straight to the bookstores with self-contained individual products (which DC seems to be trying) or making a deal with Scholastic.

[DigiCom]

But that's not happening with superhero comics, if anything sales are only getting worse (though both 2018 and 2019 have improved over the major collapse that was the 2017 comics market). And Marvel and DC need to examine why that is and fix it.

At a guess? It's the storytelling. In pretty much ANY other fandom, the tie-in media is at best canonical to (and at worst consistent with) the "official" product. See Star Wars, Doctor Who, My Hero Academia, etc.

But in comics, if a bright young fan wants to read more stories about the hero or heroine they just saw on screen, the best they can get are stories about a character with the same name and a similar background. And, more often than not, said character is entangled in some sort of crossover that requires the reader to purchase (at a fairly high cost) multiple issues of a character they really don't care about, when all they really want is to see Captain Marvel/Spider-Man/Black Panther kick a$$.

[dkrook]

Two words....Black Panther, look at the care that was given to him in placing him right along the old guard MCU Avengers so that now he could believably carry the franchise into the next few years without Cap, Iron Man or even Thor. Comics writers and editors don't have the courage and/or creativity to do this. Now they are left with always having to juggle the same few characters as the most important while the rest of the character catalog suffers low interest and readership.

[cranger]

The thing is, the way the superhero comic-book industry is set up, a title needs to be first successful in single issues before it even has a chance of getting collected. So the LCS horror stories are a direct influence on what's available in the bookstore market... unless the publisher bypasses the direct market by either going straight to the bookstores with self-contained individual products (which DC seems to be trying) or making a deal with Scholastic.

But the superhero books that would be the most recognizable, whether it is Avengers or Spider-Man or Batman, are what are being looked at here and they are not affected by cancelation due to low sales. The article is basically saying that as the book store comic genre sees growth, those characters are not seeing any growth. That has nothing to do with <pet peeve comic book fan> or <sells better in the trade character>. The people buying books at the book store are able to make these purchases without any influence of a retailer who does not like infants treating valuable collectors items as toys. Someone browsing the graphic novel section after seeing Endgame has never heard a rant from <angry comic book youtuber> or gotten into a Twitter argument with a creator or other customer. None of that is relevant to what people are buying in book stores. That kind of stuff is so small in scale and focusing on it at all misses the real issue, and that is given the choices of complete, self contained stories that have a clear entry point and single story teller, why would anyone try to figure out which of the hundred Avengers graphic novels they should try out after watching the movie (when we all know the answer is none of them probably make good reads for someone who liked the movie), but if someone was telling me about Dragon Ball or I saw an episode on TV, I know just where to start and what I am getting is going to meet my expectations.

[WebLurker]

At a guess? It's the storytelling. In pretty much ANY other fandom, the tie-in media is at best canonical to (and at worst consistent with) the "official" product. See Star Wars, Doctor Who, My Hero Academia, etc.

But in comics, if a bright young fan wants to read more stories about the hero or heroine they just saw on screen, the best they can get are stories about a character with the same name and a similar background. And, more often than not, said character is entangled in some sort of crossover that requires the reader to purchase (at a fairly high cost) multiple issues of a character they really don't care about, when all they really want is to see Captain Marvel/Spider-Man/Black Panther kick a$$.

I can kinda relate. While I don't mind some differences between the comics and whatever adaptation that got me interested in them, I do find it annoying when the differences are extreme. There's a reason I prefer Ultimate Spider-Man to the 616 take and it's not just because I think Bendis did a really good writing job.

[Huntsman Spider]

Yes. I know exactly the group you are referring to. If you ever have a spare moment, you should check out Gail Simone's twitter feed, it's very entertaining watching her tear into that particular crowd, she eats them for breakfast. But I'd be hesitant to define the entire superhero comic reading community by CGs. I don't think they have the impact on sales that they think they do. I wouldn't give them that win.

Thanks for the recommendation, and I was speaking more generally, though I wouldn't define any group or community by its worst elements, either, no matter how vocal or virulent those elements might be.

[Gaastra]

Someone posted this on another forum and i'll repost it here.

Here are the list of top selling graphic novels in America. Also I will post a chart of last months as it has a dc book that just slipped out of the top 15 this month.

So looking at the chart it's easy to see what is king here! 99% of the books are young reader! Guts knocked strange planet out of first taking the spot back! (guts is in the all books top as well! Not just comics but she has been in the same list as Stephen king and other big writers! Guts has destroyed batman and Spider-Man in sales and has stepped on both like bugs! Shocked they have not made a movie yet!

The main manga is our hero who has two books here. One piece and sword art and attack on titan has had good sales in the past as well but hero is the lone manga this month.

No marvel at all however they have had ms marvel, sg, and moon girl as well as the infinity gauntlet trade (thanks to the film) in the past.

DC gets one but had two! The first is a rare time a show impacts comic sales plus it's a 80s classic! That's right watchmen thanks to the show! (the witcher games have also jumped up in sales thanks to the show!)

The other dc book is dc inks raven! Looks like raven struck a cord with teens and is a hit for dc beating out all batman, superman, and wonder woman trades!

So once again young reader books win out but dc gets two wins over marvel this last month. (now only one but raven still is a hit!) Will swamp kid and lois lane be a hit? Don't know yet.

New list.

https://www.nytimes.com/books/best-s...oks-and-manga/

Last months with raven.

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