This article by Steven Grant is a couple of weeks old, but it makes a point that I want to reinforce. Grant says:
It’s not uncommon to hear some, even among top talents in the industry, talking about how comics are just comics, will always just be comics, should always just be comics, and anyone in comics thinking otherwise is a pompous self-loather trying to rise above their station. And they’re wrong.
The American comics industry has lived for a long time on its own relatively isolated little island, where things have developed under fairly unique circumstances. But the medium’s no longer an island; only the business is. And now only if we choose to be. Because comics are mainstream now, as mainstream as anything. They’re acceptable. They’re accepted.
Comics have been in the literary ghetto for a long time. I remember a quote that I think was by Warren Ellis maybe? I can’t find it now, but whoever it was who said it was actually quoting a Japanese director and talking about how when no one’s paying attention to your stuff, you have a lot of room to be bold and take big risks.
Unfortunately, for a lot of creators, having no one around to read your books just meant that you could be lazy and put out crap. I know because as a comics reviewer, I’ve read a lot of it. I’ve even bought some of it because I was wanting something new to read and there just weren’t a lot of choices available. But there are choices now and that means that everyone’s got to bring their best to the marketplace.
As Grant says:
Just “making comics” isn’t good enough anymore. Used to be – and a lot of creators and would-be creators still operate like this – that to “make comics” all you’d need is some rough idea and somebody to draw pictures about it, and because it was in comics format and the market was predisposed to be sympathetic, it was easy to pass that off as a story. The comics industry was considered to be working under special circumstances, and special dispensation was handed out like Halloween candy.
If you haven’t noticed, even on our little island sympathy is a scarce commodity these days. There are still plenty of books flooded out there that are incoherently written, or have art that doesn’t mesh with the subject matter, or are seemingly plotted via dart board, or lack noticeable structure or hooks, or are predicated on ideas that are utterly unoriginal or uninteresting. There are also a lot of comics that don’t sell to save their souls, though the two things never quite hit a one-to-one correlation. It’s pretty obvious that at a lot of companies the title “editor” is sort of an honorific handed out and a lot of people claiming the title have no editorial training and an infirm grasp of what exactly an editor is supposed to do.
There was a time when all of that was good enough, when the industry and the market may not have considered any of that good, exactly, but it was considered good enough.
Now it’s just not good enough. It’s time to reimagine what constitutes a “good” comics story, and how this applies to the growing graphic novel market.
I’m finding that’s true in my own comics buying. I’m less and less willing to shell out three bucks for a crap – or even mediocre – comic. I want Awesome. And I finally have enough choices that I think I can get Awesome.
But the real message for me here is that if I’m going to write comics, I’ve also got to deliver Awesome.
I had a hard time picking one image from the Hollywood Animation Archive’s huge collection of paintings from Swedish Christmas annual, Bland Tomtar Och Troll. This one’s by John Bauer and I found it here, but really you need to browse at least here, here, and here as well. Carson of Venus
I don’t always agree with Valerie D’Orazio’s opinions and conclusions about the comics industry or anything else, but dang does she know how to find cool YouTube videos.
Dance, Logan, Dance!
Tom Cruise is Crazy
I’m sort of in love with sweetafton23. Ah, the Internet.
Pepsiwoman
See? Superheroes could be a lot weirder.
Asian Walken
Personally, I thought Balls of Fury was hilarious and I don’t think Christopher Walken was playing an Asian guy. That doesn’t make this rebuttal any less funny. But then, people imitating Walken are always funny.
Greg Pak is some kind of genius. He takes these unbelievably improbable concepts like “Hulk in Space” and “Hercules ongoing series” and turns them into fascinating comics that I love.
Actually, now that I read that again, those aren’t improbable concepts at all. They’re concepts that by all rights should be Awesome, but I wouldn’t have believed anyone could realize their potential. “Hulk’s Son in Space” is just like those and I’ve learned to trust Pak now.
Okay, Marvel’s Secret Invasion event? Really don’t care. But the Runaways and Young Avengers are two of my favorite superteams and I’ll always check out a new adventure.
Secret Invasion: Who Do You Trust?
And that goes triple for Agents of Atlas and anything with Jeff Parker’s name on it.
Young Avengers Presents #6
Speaking of Young Avengers, my favorite member of that team is Kate Bishop, the new Hawkeye. Give her a solo issue and it’s all mine. Have Matt Fraction write it and you get a hug. C’mere, Marvel.
