Do Not Siege Walled Cities - 244
From the bottom of California
GREETINGS FROM SAN DIEGO
In town for the weekend. Done with recording. Mentally delaying my trip to the frigid east coast, so I dropped into one of my favorite cities. I’m done with recording for now, but am still stretched a bit thin. So, apologies here. We’ll go brief for one more week. And, in some respects, playing the hits. Because comics journalism is beating their usual drum, which is always just slightly off-rhythm. And for whatever reason, I feel compelled to metronome it from my own viewpoint.
DEFINE HEALTHY
There’s been a number of items in comics press about the market lately. End of year sorta stuff. There’s some debate on what’s helpful and what’s not, and I advise you to take it all with a grain of salt. Not because comics journalists are necessarily bad actors, but because all things you don’t see with your own eyes are open to scrutiny.
SKTCHD collected some thoughts from retailers and on first glance it’s a mixed bag. Some stores say they’re doing ok, but X. Other stores say they’re doing bad, but Y. Some wanna talk about the challenges, others think it’s bad juju to air any negativity. Some have got their grievances with distribution. All got their complaints about the publishers. It’s what you’d expect, in many regards. But here’s the part that I imagine many people didn’t register:
“I kept saying the direct market could lose 70% of the single-issue publishers and most customers wouldn’t notice, but now I am convinced that I’m being too optimistic, and this market would do fine with seven or eight single issue publishers, tops,” Batista said.
Holy fucking shit, man.
And this is a sentiment I hear repeated by retailers all the time. It makes me sick. And not in the judgmental “these guys are dicks” way. Rather, in the “watching your grandma enter hospice” sorta way.
Here’s as plainly as I can say a thing:
No small publishers = no new talent.
No new talent = same old bullshit.
Same old bullshit = continued attrition.
This whole “we need the Big Two to consolidate down to 30 titles and focus on the HITS” is so short-sighted it beggars belief. And before any retailer gets angry here, lemme say I understand the rationale. Things are lean. You go back to basics. I get it. But this is the climate change of our industry. You can fob it off as hysteria or say we’ve got more pressing matters, but the implication is simple: if there’s no future, what’s the point?
You want Marvel to hire another wrestler to write comics? Want them to resurrect some retiree? Or maybe you just want another mid book from the same old suspects? Because even if you reduce the small publishers to ‘farm team’ status, without that farm team your pool is aging and/or unfit. It’s stupefying that you’d allow this, never mind encourage it. Reminder: THE STATUS QUO IS NOT WORKING. And the number of comics is ancillary to the fact that the usual suspects are not delivering.
Every small publisher sale is an engagement with the future. And at least right now, every Big Two sale is a backwards-looking exercise in futility. Dramatic? Yeah, but it’s not hyperbole. Those small publisher sales that require so much retailer sweat are an investment in the health of the industry. Contraction closes the door to new talent. Life-support isn’t a goal.
IN RELATED NEWS
While comics journalism has landed on retailers as a the sole arbiters of industry health, there’s a whole other metric I see completely ignored. That is the ability of creators to buy food staples to survive.
Again, the short-sightedness is impressive. While it’s true retailer health feels bellwether, if the creators can’t eat then the retailers are a lagging indicator. Here’s a quiz with a prep-question.
What amount of money is success?
This comic creator feels that $126k US is rich.
I do not agree. But if you do agree, what number would you say represents the financial stability a skilled profession should come with?
I ask because whatever number you provide, if it’s over 60k, most creators are below your measure. Think about that. Let’s not call it starving, but we can be honest about the fact it’s not sustainable. And not remotely attractive for the most talented creators. Because, I hope I don’t need to say this, things change for people when they have families. And that change tends to happen JUST AS YOU ARE BECOMING GOOD AT SOMETHING.
Let’s say you’re 34. You’ve been struggling at a thing for ten years. You sucked. Now you are coming into your own. It’s a chance for you to make your name on work you’re proud of.
But you or your partner is pregnant.
Your great work is less important than your family. A practical person would not have made it this far. But even a dreamer is subject to their family’s needs. If we cannot pay creators, we’ll be left with people who are happy with nothing or people who don’t need the money. And neither will make great comics.
We have to treat this like a competitive business if we want competitive work. This should not be a part-time career. This should not be boutique. We make pop-culture.
The health of the merchant is crucial. But no more important than the health of the labor.
I’VE GOT SO MUCH TO SAY
Colleen Doran on a career in comics. Brandon Graham on The Brett Easton Ellis Podcast. She-Hulk’s conflicted feelings on abortion. There’s a lot to talk about. But I’m without a place to sit and type, so it will wait until next week. Hope you have a good week. Stay positive. Do for self.