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Underground > Comic Books >

What is Mainstream?

  
 
PatrickMM
19:20 / 10.07.03
Think about the ratio of superhero/scifi/fantasy/crime comics to non-superhero/scifi/fantasy/crime comics in any given store.

That's taken from the thread about Marvel potentially shutting down their comics publication, and was in reference to the fact that comic shops almost exclusively support those four genres, presenting the implication that those genres would not appeal to mainstream America, which if frankly bullshit.

I'm not saying that the average person wants to read the typical superhero books being published, but I think they're much more likely to want to read Ultimate Spiderman than read Jimmy Corrigan.

The biggest successes in the film world last year, and this year were on the whole Sci-fi and fantasy movies. Four of the top 5 movies last year, and 6 of the top 10 were sci-fi/fantasy movies, including the superhero movie, Spider Man. As for crime, almost every show on TV could be classified as a crime show, from the two CSIs to Law and Order, and so on. Other than comedy, which ironically isn't being done that much in comics today, scifi/fantasy/crime is dominating mass storytelling today.

So, if those genres are dominating both movies and television, why do people think that comics are going to be saved if everyone starts reading Jimmy Corrigan, Ghost World, or Berlin? I personally loved those books, but I don't think they'd go over with your average anywhere near the way something like Preacher would.

The Ghost World film was a critical success, but most people I've talked to who have seen it said that it was too much talking, and didn't really have any point. Whereas most people loved the Spider Man movie (which I personally disliked).

I will concede that the fact that most people think comics are only superheroes is awful for the medium, but I don't think the presence of scifi/fantasy/crime stories in comics hurting it at all, and I think that if comics were to return to mainstream success, it's going to be on the strength of those genres.
 
 
Matthew Fluxington
19:44 / 10.07.03
You've missed my point entirely.

The key word in that sentence is ratio. It's the wildly disproportionate ratio of genre representation in most comic books stores that make them off-putting. Obviously, superheroes and fantasy and sci-fi and crime are all genres that are pretty popular, and all you'd need to do is check movie grosses and tv ratings to verify that. The problem has more to do with representing other genres and styles in a way that is closer to the ratio of genres at a video store, a book shop, or on a television set.

Judging by the decoration and presentation of the overwhelming majority of comic book shops, there isn't the greatest indication that they may be a lot of non-genre material for non-comics readers to find there, and in many cases, that judgement would be absolutely correct.

As for the more highbrow material, there is indeed a large audience for that material in terms of the audience for new literature in general. They aren't necessarily a mainstream audience, but I think that it can be argued that in many ways the type of adult reader who is inclined to purchase a Fantagraphics or Drawn & Quarterly book may have a taste that is more mainstream than an adult reader who purchases The Teen Titans every month.
 
 
Matthew Fluxington
19:50 / 10.07.03
It is also worth noting that at this lowest of industry lows, comic books are a loooooooooooooooooooooooong way from being a truly mainstream medium. Basically, we're dealing with three or four kinds of people who are willing to read comics - fanboys, assorted dweebs, hipsters, and a small handful of lit snobs.

If there is hope for the industry to grow, I think it may be better to court the hipster and lit snob audiences, because I think they have more cultural respect and influence, and they may be the better bridge to a larger audience than catering to a rapidly disappearing fanboy base readership.
 
 
Matthew Fluxington
20:00 / 10.07.03
It's also a major folly to diminish the importance of major critical successes of non-superhero comics, because the overwhelming majority of people aren't aware of diversity of comics being published. When Daniel Clowes, Chris Ware, Adrian Tomine, R Crumb, Harvey Pekar, etc get attention in widely read publications like the New York Times, Entertainment Weekly, the Village Voice etc, there are enormous chunks of those publications readerships who are finding out about those books for the first time just then and there. There is a massive untapped audience of people who may really like those books out there, but they don't know about them because they aren't fully aware of the fact that there are comic books that can compete intellectually and artistically with major works of literary fiction.

So, it really doesn't matter if your aunt would have no interest in Ghost World, and it doesn't matter if some of your pals thought it had too much talking in it. The fact is, there are enormous numbers of people who probably WOULD really love the comic, who would really connect with it (lots and lots of female readers in the instance of Ghost World...), but are just not informed about it. This goes for lots and lots and lots of comics.

Most people just don't know about them. You can't assume that people who don't know about something don't want it.
 
 
Yotsuba & Benjamin!
20:30 / 10.07.03
"The biggest successes in the film world last year, and this year were on the whole Sci-fi and fantasy movies."

All of which has nothing to do with the success or failure of comic book stories, which are read and not watched. If comic book companies try to compete against visual media, they will always fail. Thus, trends in one should have little bearing on trends in the other. If comics really want to be "mainstream," they have to be mainstream in terms of print media. A completely different animal. Think about the fact that comic book movies do well on enormous scales and comics do not. I believe strongly that everyone who sees, say, Spider-Man, has at one point or another had an opportunity to extend their enjoyment of the film into the reading of Spider-Man comics. Nearly all of them (yes, statistically it's pretty much true) did not.

Because reading is different than watching, even when you get pictures with the words.

So, are all moviegoers illiterate? Of course not. I'm sure they read plenty. So, why aren't they reading comics? Why aren't comics "mainstream" the way Ready Made or Wired or The Corrections is/are?

Well, put four items on a table in the middle of Times Square.

The Corrections. Jimmy Corrigan. A Spider-Man TPB. A Spider-Man DVD.

Which would get picked last?

Well, the DVD would definitely go first. Movies are a medium made perfectly for carrying the stories of strong and easily identifiable protagonists. A few seconds worth of shots of Spider-Man soaring through NYC show an audience the visceral excitement of his concept more effectively than a thousand issues of a comic book could.

Then someone who, you know, is pretty intelligent reader comes along picks up The Corrections. He or she has heard of it. It's got some heft to it. Not bad for 25 bucks. Sold.

Next up, The Jimmy Corrigan book has a nice appeal. It's undeniably stylish. There's some great self-deprication on the softcover edition that ought to hook The Daily Show crowd. It's also priced in proportion to what it has to offer.

Then we're left with a poorly designed, flimsy book that certainly doesn't feel like it's worth fourteen bucks. I think someone pointed out next door that all comics in bookstores look shitty because everyone reads them in the store. Not surprising, especially when it comes to paperbacks. The only paperbacks I ever buy are the more literary ones because you buy things to add to your personal library. They're books I want to go back to. I want to see how a particular panel was handled or a snippet of dialogue. Super-Hero comics, by and large, don't cater to the kind of mentality. Trade paperbacks are just reference materials for storylines and, with the internet, who needs those?

It's sad, because there are a good deal of comics being made right now that do cater to that mentality. X-Force, Daredevil, New X-Men, these are comics that have moments that can be returned to, that are worth owning, not just flipping through.

If comics want to be "mainstream" they have to make a decision. They need to create complete packages that are worth spending money on and owning and keeping. That are well designed and feature top drawer storytelling and artwork that is undeniably appealing.

Or they need to be completely disposable in every way. Which is why Manga is popular. Duh.

I buy a large amount of comics every week. I sit down on Wednesday evenings and read them, and inevitably they fall into two categories. There's books I'm keeping up with. That I read and then put away. Keep for no reason other than a desire to not throw things away that I paid money for. Then there are those that I know I'll read again. I'll read them again when they're collected. I'll read them again when I'm waiting for them to be collected. They work, not just as a part of an ongoing narrative that's entertaining in and of itself, but as quality creative works.

The key here, though, are the hugely differing expectations between reading and watching. Think about school, for instance. Think about your reactions to a) assigned reading b) watching a movie in class. Both are mandated by a teacher, but we all know what a class' reactions are to the two of them.

But everyone reads newspapers. Because they're cheap. The main reason that comics are not mainstream is because you need a very large amount of disposable income to read comics the way I described above. And is that kind of investment worth it for most people? Not really. It's much more likely that someone is going to spend that kind of money on something that will last in the minds. That they'll want to return to. Comics are designed like magazines but promoted like books. That just will never ever work on a large scale.
 
  
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