How will the success of Ultimate Spider-Man (2024) impact the franchise?

[Daibhidh]

The problem for the Big Two is that they switched in the early nineties from newsagents to specialist shops. It made them a lot of money in the short term, but it's meant that casual readers just don't come across the comics if they don't go looking for them. But then placing short-term gain over long-term viability is capitalism for you.

[Spider-Tiger]

The problem for the Big Two is that they switched in the early nineties from newsagents to specialist shops. It made them a lot of money in the short term, but it's meant that casual readers just don't come across the comics if they don't go looking for them. But then placing short-term gain over long-term viability is capitalism for you.

Yeah, the move to specialty shops was likely the catalyst to the industry becoming niche. Since a customer that actively seeks you out is likely an entirely different profile than a casual window-shopper. And then leadership of the big two started repeatedly throwing the baby out with the bath water in hopes of attracting those casual readers and that likely hasn't helped either. Readers aren't encouraged to stick around long term when nothing matters. There's a lot of strategy that seems aimed to maximize short term profits at the expense of long term health. (Which is ironic considering that some people argue that marriage... something that was never a hindrance to sales... should be off the table for the sake of longevity. )

[Lee]

The problem for the Big Two is that they switched in the early nineties from newsagents to specialist shops. It made them a lot of money in the short term, but it's meant that casual readers just don't come across the comics if they don't go looking for them. But then placing short-term gain over long-term viability is capitalism for you.

That's not what happened.

The direct market (comic book specialist shops) had been around since the 1970s. The direct market grew over the '70s and '80s while newsstand demand for comics shrank. DC and Marvel didn't remove their comics from the newsstands, the newsstands didn't want them anymore.

[Garlador]

That's not what happened.

The direct market (comic book specialist shops) had been around since the 1970s. The direct market grew over the '70s and '80s while newsstand demand for comics shrank. DC and Marvel didn't remove their comics from the newsstands, the newsstands didn't want them anymore.

I think we’re ignoring the fact the speculator bubble burst. The ramifications of that shortsighted decision to go all-in on countless #1 relaunches, a revolving door of costume changes, shock value storylines and cheap deaths, gimmicky variant covers, and regressive editorial mandates that pissed off longstanding readers took years to recover from.


… sure am glad they never did THAT again, eh?

[Tuck]

That's not what happened.

The direct market (comic book specialist shops) had been around since the 1970s. The direct market grew over the '70s and '80s while newsstand demand for comics shrank. DC and Marvel didn't remove their comics from the newsstands, the newsstands didn't want them anymore.

Eh, at least some of that is the industry's preference for the direct market being non-returnable.

They were losing ground at news stands anyway, sure. But selling through news stands costs more and carries more risk than the direct market.

[GeorgiaDawg]

The problem for the Big Two is that they switched in the early nineties from newsagents to specialist shops. It made them a lot of money in the short term, but it's meant that casual readers just don't come across the comics if they don't go looking for them. But then placing short-term gain over long-term viability is capitalism for you.

Not to derail the topic but… that is what some companies do. It’s a defining feature of humans not capitalism.

[Lee]

I think we’re ignoring the fact the speculator bubble burst. The ramifications of that shortsighted decision to go all-in on countless #1 relaunches, a revolving door of costume changes, shock value storylines and cheap deaths, gimmicky variant covers, and regressive editorial mandates that pissed off longstanding readers took years to recover from.


… sure am glad they never did THAT again, eh?

I didn't forget the speculator bubble. The speculator bubble wasn't relevant to my cliff notes summary of why the the primary outlet for comics in North America shifted from the newsstand to the direct market.

[Toonstrack]

The entire comic book reading market has dwindled. ASM is doing well proportionally but proportional to a slowly sinking ship. "Illusion of change" and sticking to the "status quo" and attempting to synergize to attract new readers isn't unique to ASM as you yourself pointed out. It's a common strategy across the industry with all major characters. Look at the current x-men line. I'm saying that perhaps this strategy.. a strategy that has been commonplace for the at least the last 20 or so years...isn't a winning one for growing the readership or at least preventing further attrition.

Casuals clearly aren't the majority picking up these books. If they are, then they aren't interested enough to stick around long term per industry-wide trends.

Marvel just saw a massive decade long boon within the film industry and yet that growth is not reflected within the comics division? That, to me, is a very clear indication of mismanagement.

I wouldn't go that far. Movies have always been a wider audience than comics. Always. No comic was doing batman movie numbers even in 1989 when his movies started.

Its folly to expect there to be that level of overlap; because it just doesn't work that way. Some people just aren't into comics, or reading and a character appearing in that that gonna change it for them. Theres people who love spider man conceptual but don't play video games and so they won't play the ps4 game.

But what marvel wants is for when one of these folks DO show up and pick up a comic book that they recognize the character in it pretty closely.

[Toonstrack]

The problem for the Big Two is that they switched in the early nineties from newsagents to specialist shops. It made them a lot of money in the short term, but it's meant that casual readers just don't come across the comics if they don't go looking for them. But then placing short-term gain over long-term viability is capitalism for you.

I mean expanding has been attempted a few times though poorly.

Im younger than most here but im old enough to remember spinner racks in grocery stores before those went. And yea I bought comics off them as a kid.

Getting them in regular storss would take a nuanced approach and I have to assume the logistics don't like up or it doesn't seem lucrative enough to try.

Id love to see it happen though. Heck book stores should be getting some, but that doesn't happen either.

[Lee]

And as Kurt Busiek has mentioned a couple of times, the spinner racks themselves were a downgrade for comics' presence in the newsstand market: https://www.comicsbeat.com/steve-gep...o-buy-diamond/

(Partial extract from the Comments section):

"But yes, comics publishers were thriving during the war years, when most magazines had that same ten-cent cover price. Comics weren’t “cheap,” they were priced like other magazines, sold like other magazines, racked with other magazines and made the same kind of profit for retailers as other magazines.

After the war, they chose to cut pages rather than maintain price parity with other magazines (which were raising prices), and the result was that comics became less economically competitive with other magazines. So retailers didn’t want them on the same rack space any more, where they we’re taking up space that could go to more profitable-per-copy units.

So comics got ghettoized to the spinner racks, and then later, the spinner racks started to get junked in favor of video games, and comics had to be rescued by the direct market. When instead, they could have stayed competitive in price with other magazines, as comics did in France and Japan, where they continued to thrive.

Ah, missed opportunities.

And the newsstand market collapsed anyway, for magazines in general, so that would have been a problem too. But not as soon — and we wouldn’t be saddled now with a primary format that has never been economically competitive."

[Spider-Tiger]

I wouldn't go that far. Movies have always been a wider audience than comics. Always. No comic was doing batman movie numbers even in 1989 when his movies started.

Its folly to expect there to be that level of overlap; because it just doesn't work that way. Some people just aren't into comics, or reading and a character appearing in that that gonna change it for them. Theres people who love spider man conceptual but don't play video games and so they won't play the ps4 game.

But what marvel wants is for when one of these folks DO show up and pick up a comic book that they recognize the character in it pretty closely.

You're missing my point. I wouldn't expect comics to become a multi-billion dollar industry like the film franchises. But I also wouldn't expect a continued downward trajectory of American comics when these exact characters are thriving in other media to the point of dominating pop culture. Industry trends are perhaps a sign that business shouldn't just continue as usual. That they shouldn't just continue using the same tactics expecting a different result (Definition of insanity and all.)

[D.Z]

More adaptations of married Spider-Man, while OMD still never getting undone.

[WebLurker]

But what marvel wants is for when one of these folks DO show up and pick up a comic book that they recognize the character in it pretty closely.

And yet the OMD retcon is still a thing despite how anti-band it is. At the end of the day, if the editors want to keep making OMD comics as the "main" form of Spider-Man in printed media they have the legal right to do so, but it's really funny how it's the sole exception to how things get remolded to fit the movies.