Atomic-Robo.com

So, do you think that regular comics are an outmoded format? From what I’ve seen at my shop, we have quite a few core people that buy lots of comics and next to no trades, random teenagers whom have decided that comics are trendy this week and go rooting through back issues looking for #1′s or anything with Venom on it, and the casual people who buy only trades. It makes for interesting profiling, from our point of view. The floppy people are mostly into the superhero stuff, whereas the trade people like Vertigo and slighly more offbeat stuff. Not truly indy, but established not-superhero stuff, like Preacher and Mouse Guard.

Although I love my individual issues, I can’t help but think that the format is pretty much a dying one. So few new people are getting into comics, and trades/harcovers are so much more attractive that floppies. You don’t need specialized equipment to store them, and most of the time, the story you want is available whenever you want it, as opposed to hitting back issue bins. Trades are superior in every way, barring collectability.

I consider myself relatively new to the comics world, having really only actively read them over the past couple years, so I’m no expert on the subject. But I find both the monthlies and the TPB’s alluring, just in different ways. During last year’s stretch of BPRD comics I found I looked forward to each issue’s (timely) release more than anything. I couldn’t wait to see what happened next and treasured that one day when I could open the next issue and immerse myself all over again. It was like a sub-holiday of sorts. Now of course, it all depends on the title and if, over that span of time, that comic truly rewards you for your waiting. (It did.)

Don’t get me wrong, I love TPBs too. You get to experience the whole of a series as one big movie, conveniently bound in one slick and beautiful package. No months of waiting. It’s all right there. I know though, that a part of me likes to savor things, space them out so they last. So even though I like the TPBs for certain aspects, I feel like they lose a bit of magic in the quick read. I may be drawn to the journey of the monthly issues. Kind of like a television show, you can watch it over time on cable, or wait and rent/buy the series as a whole. Or you could do both. Regardless of being a mainstream or independent comic, it all comes down to the strength of the title.

And also your wallet.

@Josh: It’s a half-secret at the moment, but I started working at a local comic shop to help pay off my debts from Robo vol 1 not so long ago. The buying habits I’ve witnessed largely mirror your observations.

The vast majority of sales come from a core of regulars. These are the guys who come in every Wednesday. These guys can buy anywhere between $10 – $100 in nothing but monthlies (granted, the higher end of that spectrum tends to represent a full month’s worth of comics picked up at once, but whatever).

I get the distinct feeling that the monthly format benefits only (or at least mostly) the local shop at the risk of the publisher. Marvel and DC can afford to off-set this risk, but independents most certainly cannot. It’s a method to get customers coming into the shop once a week to pick up regular goods and maybe a couple extras while they’re waiting out their lunch hour. Meanwhile, independent publishers are pretty much forced to do monthlies so they can build up any kind of on-going buzz about their product so people will be jazzed enough to pick up the trade when that comes out. After all, it’s easier to convince someone to drop $3 on an untested product than $20. In that sense, the monthly is beneficial to indie publishers, but when that benefit comes at the very likely risk of bankruptcy I’m not so sure it balances out. I mean, Red 5 has never missed a beat with paying its creators and printers, but when Hero by Night’s publication is canceled, I have to wonder if that’s merely mismanagement of funds or a symptom of the industry as a whole.

On the other side of the coin, we are seeing more independent publishers now than we’ve seen in decades. So, maybe I’m completely wrong.

I want to turn to the speculation craze for a minute. Comics were seen as valuable investments for a number of ludicrous reasons, but at the core was the issue of archivability. The essence of speculation was driven by a desire to have access to the material (for whatever reason). Since monthlies are “disposable”, they’re supposed to become more valuable over time. Of course, now that everyone (roughly) saves their comics forever (roughly), there’s no opportunity for the financial value of the monthly to rise due to its rarity. So, what makes a comic worth having now? I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we’ve seen a dramatic rise in, first, trade paperback collections and, now, hardcover and “Absolute” collections. These are worth their price not due to rarity but due to archivability. These kinds of collections are not seen as “disposable.” No one buys them only to seal them in plastic and put them in a box in a corner of the closet to never read again. These are put on bookshelves, read as often as any other book, and shared.

It just strikes me as part of a general shift away from the monthly format.

@Lauren: What’s so difficult about the monthly format is getting people into it. It’s difficult to steer customers toward an on-going series because, at any particular time, whatever kind of title/character they may be into will be in the middle of a story that won’t make any sense unless they read some back issues which may or may not be available. Trades don’t negate this problem, but at least they provide some structure to the overwhelming chaos that is the American comics output at first glance. I find it rather telling that the monthlies you got into was BPRD as opposed to, say, X-Men. would you even know where to start with X-Men? I sure as hell don’t!

I guess I just find myself wondering if monthlies serve any purpose other than to act as advertisement for the trade. It’s perfectly routine now for series to be plotted “for the trade”. People will flip through monthlies or read reviews of them in anticipation of the trade. It makes me wonder if the “place” for monthlies is on the shelves or online, for free, as advertisements for the trade collection. It’s a model that works incredibly well for webcomics for years and I fear that traditional publishers ignore this trend at their own peril.

The example of Hero’s By Night shares many similarities with other comic companies that aren’t DC, Marvel, Image or Dark Horse. There were creators working for the Dabel Brothers that took a great deal of time to get paid, and several others. I frequent Lying in the Gutters on CBR, and there seems to be a constant stream of creators being screwed out of money. Sometimes, the people running the company are genuine douche bags (i.e. Pat Lee of Dreamwave), but I believe that it happens too often for it to always be the fault shady dealings. I guess that most of the time, books that publishers thought would be a hit just don’t penetrate the market like was speculated, and the entire operation falls flat. I find it difficult not to blame that on Diamond. Their archaic ordering system is a pain in the ass for everybody. I can see comics being incredibly daunting to a newcomer. Occasionally, being thrown into the middle of a story adds excitement to the experience. My first comic was Batman somewhere in the Knightfall storyline. Bruce was crippled, this blond guy was wearing the suit and carving the bat symbol into bad guy’s chests… it was crazy, but that made me want it all the more. With your example of X-Men however… I would consider myself pretty well versed in X-Men lore, but I couldn’t tell you the names of most of the characters I see on the covers of the X books nowadays. I thought there were barely any mutants after House of M.

The idea of comics being free online and then collected into trade format is something I’m hoping will pick up. Warren Ellis’s Freakangels at Avatar is doing that very thing, and it’s a great series. They’ve already got my money. With any luck, the model will succeed and larger companies will start to take notice.