Diamond Comic Distributors No Longer Taking In New Comics (Link)

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Most of the the MCU films are barely The Hero's Journey, that narrative model is so vaguely defined I've seen it applied to any narrative you can name. The real secret of their success was combining the action film forumula with a strong dose of comedy.

Later directors started to raid other films not comics, Winter Soldier borrows from 70s paranoid thrillers, Redford's casting is a direct tip of the hat to the genre. Antman is really a heist film moreso than a superhero movie or a 'Hero's Journey.'
 
*Shrug* I'm out of touch with what kids are into these days. I'm sure there are more modern equivalents - someone whose kids are in that age group doubtless knows.
No offense, but that's very clear.

Well, given it got to three trades, clearly somebody was buying it.

It's just not for you. Which is fine. It's not for me either. Hopefully whoever it's for finds it.

whoever did the covers was clearly a white wolf fan


That doesn't mean anything, anymore. So they made three copies of the same book and tried to sell them. They shipped them to stores, sure, and had THEM buy it, but have they actually sold to customers? My sources say that they had them sitting on shelves for months. And now that Image is offering returns, (unlike the rest of the book market, comics have always resisted that, making the store shoulder all the costs for badly selling books) they're trying to have most of their unsalable Image stock returnable. Which is A LOT of the current run of books.

And given that Marvel has been rebooting all their lines with the same authors for several years now... More on that below.

Well, that, and them being so accessible - easy to get hold of, cheap and easy to follow. They also had the benefit of hindsight and knowing which stories were good and well-thought-of, and which were just filler to get an issue out that month - they're a character's "greatest hits" - as well as Marvel's experience in bringing different series together over time..

They're also blockbuster action movies that tell a good story - replace the Avengers with Jeff Gearhead, Jane Shootygirl, Ken Rageyman, Leonard Freedom, Martin Pointystick and Nathan Sparkson and I suspect they'd do just as well.

You'd be wrong. I don't think you know what actual impact this stuff has had, even just peripherally. Most people know who Spider-Man or Batman is, even without ever having read a comic, they know their origins, they know some of their villains. And by extension, they also know of other names, like Superman and Lex Luthor. In fact, DC's mythology of heroes was so ingrained in the public consciousness that they were able to get several beloved cartoon series on television during the 90's. Marvel got the X-Men and Spider-Man. That's how pervasive and impactful these things managed to get.

Then they need to adapt to the market they're in. If you can see that your current business model isn't working, then you change it or you go out of business. Complaining that the market doesn't work the way you want it to is rather like politely asking the tide not to come in; say it all you want, but if you're standing on the beach you're gonna get wet feet.
Do you honestly believe that comics and stories did NOT change from the 40s? That they didn't change in the 50's? They stayed the same in the 60-70's? What, the Iron Age didn't happen in the 80s and 90s?

To continue by statement about 'rebooting', if anything, Modern Marvel is NOT changing. Sina Grace's Gay Ice Man run got TWO tries, from the same author, the aforementioned Sina Grace. Normally, they'd have fired him and got a whole new team on the book if they start again. But Marvel has been redoing books with the same authors over and over again, even though it's clear they're failing.

Captain Marvel has had about 12-15 rebooted series since at least 2012. Modern Marvel comics have a hard time reaching the 12 month mark for runs, often selling under 25k for the entire run. When back in the 90's, with the edgy edgelord stuff, X-Men for example would sell in the quarter millions. 250,000 copies a month, and not for No. 1s, which always spike upwards, but for middle of story arc issues.

And that's the big problem, Marvel is NOT changing to suit the market, because most of the people writing aren't working class people, they're rich elites, who don't need money so they can keep using comics to make their pitches to Hollywood and Netflix via comics. The New Warriors writer, Daniel Kibblesmith was on a show called 'Who Wants To Marry A Millionaire', so it's clear he's not hurting for funds...

DC has a different problem, they had Dan Didio. He hated how DC operated and want it to become 90's Marvel, but he has no idea what the difference between the two comic companies are, so unlike Marvel, he's had to reboot the entire universe several times in the past 15 years, New 52, Convergence, Rebirth, I may have missed a few of them in between. He also dislikes 'happy heroes', so nixed several marriages, which were popular, and some of their spinoff books, like Super Sons, a fan favourite dealing with Superman's and Batman's sons and the adventures they got into.

Unfortunately, his firing from DC may be too little too late to save the comic side of it. AT&T does not care about the legacy these characters had. Not making money? Gone.

Most of the the MCU films are barely The Hero's Journey, that narrative model is so vaguely defined I've seen it applied to any narrative you can name. The real secret of their success was combining the action film forumula with a strong dose of comedy.

Later directors started to raid other films not comics, Winter Soldier borrows from 70s paranoid thrillers, Redford's casting is a direct tip of the hat to the genre. Antman is really a heist film moreso than a superhero movie or a 'Hero's Journey.'
That's just surface detail. Winter Soldier was based off an Ed Brubaker run. And I forget who did the Scott Lang story, but it's based off of that.

And I'm not entirely sure you understand the 'Hero's Journey'. It's about change one self, not just from powerless to powered, but also to be a better person. Scott wanted to change, but he didn't know how, all he knew was how to be a thief. By the end of the movie, he uses his skills to be a hero. That's growth, change, the Hero's Journey.

The Winter Soldier is a little more subtle, but it's still there. And it's also more that the Hero affected the Change on the World, so yeah, maybe not entirely the Hero's Journey, but it's still in there.
 
No offense, but that's very clear.



That doesn't mean anything, anymore. So they made three copies of the same book and tried to sell them. They shipped them to stores, sure, and had THEM buy it, but have they actually sold to customers? My sources say that they had them sitting on shelves for months. And now that Image is offering returns, (unlike the rest of the book market, comics have always resisted that, making the store shoulder all the costs for badly selling books) they're trying to have most of their unsalable Image stock returnable. Which is A LOT of the current run of books.

And given that Marvel has been rebooting all their lines with the same authors for several years now... More on that below.



You'd be wrong. I don't think you know what actual impact this stuff has had, even just peripherally. Most people know who Spider-Man or Batman is, even without ever having read a comic, they know their origins, they know some of their villains. And by extension, they also know of other names, like Superman and Lex Luthor. In fact, DC's mythology of heroes was so ingrained in the public consciousness that they were able to get several beloved cartoon series on television during the 90's. Marvel got the X-Men and Spider-Man. That's how pervasive and impactful these things managed to get.


Do you honestly believe that comics and stories did NOT change from the 40s? That they didn't change in the 50's? They stayed the same in the 60-70's? What, the Iron Age didn't happen in the 80s and 90s?

To continue by statement about 'rebooting', if anything, Modern Marvel is NOT changing. Sina Grace's Gay Ice Man run got TWO tries, from the same author, the aforementioned Sina Grace. Normally, they'd have fired him and got a whole new team on the book if they start again. But Marvel has been redoing books with the same authors over and over again, even though it's clear they're failing.

Captain Marvel has had about 12-15 rebooted series since at least 2012. Modern Marvel comics have a hard time reaching the 12 month mark for runs, often selling under 25k for the entire run. When back in the 90's, with the edgy edgelord stuff, X-Men for example would sell in the quarter millions. 250,000 copies a month, and not for No. 1s, which always spike upwards, but for middle of story arc issues.

And that's the big problem, Marvel is NOT changing to suit the market, because most of the people writing aren't working class people, they're rich elites, who don't need money so they can keep using comics to make their pitches to Hollywood and Netflix via comics. The New Warriors writer, Daniel Kibblesmith was on a show called 'Who Wants To Marry A Millionaire', so it's clear he's not hurting for funds...

DC has a different problem, they had Dan Didio. He hated how DC operated and want it to become 90's Marvel, but he has no idea what the difference between the two comic companies are, so unlike Marvel, he's had to reboot the entire universe several times in the past 15 years, New 52, Convergence, Rebirth, I may have missed a few of them in between. He also dislikes 'happy heroes', so nixed several marriages, which were popular, and some of their spinoff books, like Super Sons, a fan favourite dealing with Superman's and Batman's sons and the adventures they got into.

Unfortunately, his firing from DC may be too little too late to save the comic side of it. AT&T does not care about the legacy these characters had. Not making money? Gone.


That's just surface detail. Winter Soldier was based off an Ed Brubaker run. And I forget who did the Scott Lang story, but it's based off of that.

And I'm not entirely sure you understand the 'Hero's Journey'. It's about change one self, not just from powerless to powered, but also to be a better person. Scott wanted to change, but he didn't know how, all he knew was how to be a thief. By the end of the movie, he uses his skills to be a hero. That's growth, change, the Hero's Journey.

The Winter Soldier is a little more subtle, but it's still there. And it's also more that the Hero affected the Change on the World, so yeah, maybe not entirely the Hero's Journey, but it's still in there.

Dude I read Joseph Campbell as a young nerd before the Star Wars cult got their hands on him. Then I read some Jung and realized it was mostly just Jung warmed-over.

The Hero's Journey was also drilled into our heads by a particularly fanatical prof in the Film Department for 4 years. Syd Field's advocating for it was such a blight in Film Schools that Charlie Kaufman brilliantly evicerates him and it in Adaptation.

It is a narrative theory so vague that like Marxism, Freudism, Jungism and other all-knowing systems it can be used to explain everything and nothing. It is not some amazing, brilliant idea, at this point due to its fanatical over application is a huge bore.

If Campbell was around to see how his ideas have been distorted to attack ambiguity and adult narratives, promote anti-intellectualism and the very opposite of imagination he would be horrified.
 
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Jungism and other all-knowing systems .

i-do-not-think-that-word-means-what-you-think-17572771.png
 
This thread is getting a little snippy. Maybe for purposes of talking about the “industry” and how it might be affected, we should zero in on the direct market and comic book shops.
 
I don't honestly think there's anything left to discuss. The Direct Market is probably done. Diamond was an effective monopoly, and it's now gone, and there's no other distributor to replace it. More comic shops are closing faster now that the product chain is broken.

The numbers are in, the industry has finally gave up the ghost. It wasn't going to last more than 3-4 more years anyway.
 
If I could go the rest of my life without seeing another shittily-drawn self-masturbatory "biography" comic so dripping with pretension it makes 90s White Wolf look like Pollyanna, I'll be overjoyed. But that's another rant for a different discussion.
OH MY GOD there are so many of those in shops here in Quebec (especially Montreal and Quebec city).

It's kind of a cliché: smaller sized, over-priced, with boring, crappy black and white art about some mid-20s to mid-30s guy with glasses and a five o'clock shadow pondering about life and relationships.

VOMIT
 
OH MY GOD there are so many of those in shops here in Quebec (especially Montreal and Quebec city).

It's kind of a cliché: smaller sized, over-priced, with boring, crappy black and white art about some mid-20s to mid-30s guy with glasses and a five o'clock shadow pondering about life and relationships.

VOMIT

The biography comics are overdone, like confessional or short lyric poetry but when done well, like Julie Doucet, Joe Matt, mid-period Chester Brown and Jason Thompson's Blankets, it is can still be great.

I think a lot of what you see these days are poor imitators of those cartoonists. Fante Bukowski by Noah Van Sciver is a terrific satire of both the biographical and confessional style in both fiction and comics.
 
And in more sobering news, Brian Hibbs, who wrote those excellent columns which I posted one of earlier, has just posted his sobering thoughts on the situation and how hard it's going to be for the shops and the longer systemic problems right now.

 
And in more sobering news, Brian Hibbs, who wrote those excellent columns which I posted one of earlier, has just posted his sobering thoughts on the situation and how hard it's going to be for the shops and the longer systemic problems right now.

And we need to remember, San Fransisco is a rich town, so if Mr. Hibbs is having problems, imagine what it's like in smaller places. It's not good, peeps. I wish it was as I LOVE comics, I have no idea why I adore this medium so much, but I do and it's breaking my heart to see it in such dire straits. Even though it's mostly self-inflicted since 2009.
 
And we need to remember, San Fransisco is a rich town, so if Mr. Hibbs is having problems, imagine what it's like in smaller places. It's not good, peeps. I wish it was as I LOVE comics, I have no idea why I adore this medium so much, but I do and it's breaking my heart to see it in such dire straits. Even though it's mostly self-inflicted since 2009.

I think it goes much farther back than 2009. I don’t think the publishers really learned their lessons from the 1990s crash and burn of the market.
 
I think it goes much farther back than 2009. I don’t think the publishers really learned their lessons from the 1990s crash and burn of the market.
The current, ah... Push in 'comic story telling' did start about 20 years ago, but if it wasn't for Mark Millar getting Wanted in 2008. Remember, even back 10 years ago, they would cancel bad comics (and by bad I mean low selling. I'm not making a judgement on the stories), but now, at least Marvel will reboot failing comics over and over, with the same authors that sank the books in the first place. Simply because sales don't matter to them.

And it's KILLING me.
 
Let's hope it works for them. Other than some bad decisions (Tom King) they've been focusing on trying to sell stuff, rather than be some sort of script farm for Hollywood, although there is a bit of that in DC as well.
 
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