Marvel comics is taking the big step for some of their books in February and is charging $3.99 for standard 32-page comic books. I doubt that this is “price gouging” or a “money grab” like some commentators online have been quick to shout; lower and lower print runs coupled with rising production costs and an inability to cut their basic expenses (they can’t use cheaper paper for a variety of reasons, for example) means that prices are going to have to go up.
The question is this: are $3.99 for basic comics the death rattle of the traditional form of comic?
Traditional comic publishing (the small, stapled pamphlets) has been dying for years: the inability to attract new readers and the shifting focus of the remaining readers to tend more toward TPB has been bleeding them dry. They make far more money in licensing the characters than they do in making comics about them. DC comics recently confirmed that keeping a comic going has more to do with how it sells in book stores than how it sells in comic shops (Didio’s interview where he mentions the cancellation of Blue Beetle).
Will at least one of the big two stop publishing comics in the pamphlet form by the end of 2009?
Magazines have been $5 for a while now and I don’t think cost is what’s killing them, it’s the immediacy of the internet. I see no reason why Comics can’t survive at that price since there hasn’t really been a dramatically better way to get the content. There’s a argument to be made that the serial format is going to dwindle in favor of the graphic novel format or that a electronic version or subscription mail service could surpass it, but in both cases I think it’s not price that’s at issue.
Comics don’t have to be that price. They can use cheaper paper and printing techniques to get the cost down (look at the paper and printing of a 1980s comic and compare it to a recent one to see what I mean). I’d also doubt that either Marvel or DC will cancel single issue comics before the end of the decade, because they’re still making money on at least some of those books, and they do have ways of lowering costs and prices.
I agree that American comic books are near dead as a noticeable industry, but I think they have a several years left.
My understanding from discussions by publishers is that they cannot switch the paper or printing techniques. First and foremost, the presses like what was used in the 1980’s simply don’t exist any more. Or more specifically they exist but in such limited quantities and under such specialized controls that they cannot go back to the cheap paper that defined the format. Second, they believe that readers will not accept non-glossy paper and the reduced coloring. I’m not sure I agree with the idea that given the choice between a 33% price increase or a decrease in the art quality that readers will choose the price increase, but they’ve been through the transition once.
Omniscient, magazines offer more than 22 pages of content and comic fans have been angrily muttering about $2.99 being too much price for too little content.
As noted there’s a lot of problems that have snowballed to cause comics publishing to be in decline and I definitely think that a price increase right now is just going to hurt them more. I’m wondering if this will be a trigger point that finally pushes the industry away from that format.
Good grief. I’m not a comics collector any more (though still a comics reader-- like may others, I’ve pretty much shifted to trade paperbacks and graphic novels), so I was unaware single-issue prices had increased to that point. For $3.99, I’d expect something closer in size to a real magazine. I’m surprised that these prices haven’t pushed the industry into following the manga approach-- magazine-to-phone-book-sized anthologies. A larger format would allow for more advertising support (which, frankly, is where most of the bulk comes from in normal magazines anyway) to offset costs.
I’d pay $4, even $8, for an American comics magazine that rivalled the Americanized Shonen Jump in terms of bang for one’s buck. (Then again, DC tried that ages ago with Action Comics Weekly, which went over like a lead balloon…)
As a potential customer to the industry, the price is peanuts compared to the fact that the output of the industry appeals to me far less than, say, the output of Japan’s manga industry. When come back, bring diversity and quality.
In my totally uninformed outsider’s opinion, I think the practical duopoly that dominates the American comic industry is a structural barrier to any significant change or growth. Perhaps the industry needs to “die” to grow back again from the ground up.
For a while, I’ve been of the opinion that the monthly pamphlet form needs to be nothing more than a cheap, disposable ad for the trade, black and white if need be, and that the trade should be where you get the eye-popping coloring jobs and high-quality paper.
I do fully agree, though, that fans would never stand for it. It’d probably mean the death of comic-book shops too, because without the pamphlet sales, they don’t offer much that the local Borders can’t, save for knowledge of product and, unfortunately, people aren’t willing to pay for that so much. I think it’s just going to be a matter of watching it die out by degrees. 2009 is probably too soon, though.
Yep, and Didio specifically said with Blue Beetle it was the lack of TPB sales that killed it. It’s also the reason for Manhunter’s publication history.
Which brings me back to my master plan to save the industry: comic magazines. Take 3-4 of those comic books you are trying to foist on the public for $3.99. Bundle them up and throw in some advertising. Package the whole thing a la Vogue, Esquire, or Rolling Stone. Put a bitching cover on and get them on the magazine racks. Sell that (an hour or so of reading) for $4.99 and see what happens.
Won’t work. American comics fans just won’t buy anthology titles. They won’t pay for two titles they aren’t interested in to get two titles that they are. (Unless it’s a crossover event, I mean, but that’s something different)
Even Manga doesn’t sell that well in the US in anthology form. It’s the trades that are the key.
I agree that the pamphlet comic is on the way out. Efforts like DC’s weekly titles can’t hold off the inevitable.
This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, nor is it really brought about by any creative bankruptcy of American comics. It’s simply a reflection of the fact that comics are no longer disposable entertainment for kids (or GIs, as they were in the 1940’s). Adult comic fans demand higher quality product (in terms of paper and presentation, I mean, not necessarily content). They also want longer stories, which also favors the trade paperback/ graphic novel form.
It could be that comic books will go (or have gone) the way of pulp magazines or wargames or RPGs. They had their golden age when they were widely popular but then they shrunk down to a small niche market. There’s a small core of permanent fans but very few new customers are entering the genre.
“Have gone”. The iconic characters of the comic-book industry are almost universally known, which is more than can be said for the pulps or D&D, I suppose, but comics themselves are a niche hobby now and getting steadily smaller. As long as the licensing brings in enough money to keep the publishing divisions afloat, I expect that we’ll still see comics coming out as monthlies, but I don’t think it can keep going indefinitely.
As much as I love American comics, the fact that there’s manga for both boys **and **girls proves him right.
Of course, American comics are much more diverse than people give them credit for. Superheroes are the most favored subject, but not, by any means, the only one. Look beyond Marvel and DC.
For me cost is part of it. 5 dollars is just too steep a price for me for a magazine. Not enough interesting content for the price or IOW not enough ROI.
Comics, specifically the 32-pg pamphlet, aren’t dying and haven’t been. The medium has become more and more successful in both terms of number of units printed and revenue over the last decade. Comics fans like to think the form is dying, but it hasn’t been. That said, this doesn’t mean comics won’t die, and soon. But if they do, it’s because we could be entering the worst economic climate since the Great Depression, and comics are a luxury item.
As for the price increase, this exact thread (down to complaints about paper quality, suggestions of anthologies, and contrasts to manga) could have been, and has been, posted several times over the lat several years, whenever the price has gone up. When it broke the two-dollar mark, when it went from $2.25 to $2.50, when premiere titles went up to three bucks, when low-circulation titles followed suit, etc. In none of those cases did comics circulation drop – in every case it increased in the medium and long term. Again, this increase might well be the death of the comic as pamphlet, but if so, it’s because of the larger economic environment.
This doesn’t surprise me at all. Last month I picked up a Batman to see what he’s been up to lately, and I had no idea what was going on. There was literally no Batman anywhere in the book, and I had a hard time even figuring out which character was supposed to be Bruce Wayne. It’s hard for me to imagine how a first-time reader is going to get into this.
But the medium was born during the Great Depression. If it dies during a recession it’s not because comics can’t be successful in hard times, but because they have a poor business model. Count me among those who think comics should go back to being cheap fare aimed at kids.
I don’t follow Batman, but he’s supposedly dead right now. Or something.
But you’ve reminded me of why I dropped JSA a couple years ago. I read it for a year or so, and after 12+ issues I still didn’t know who was who, and wasn’t at all clear on what their various powers were.
