Eggs And Chickens: Image Publisher Eric Stephenson On Licensed Comics

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image_comics_logoComicsPRO, a meeting of comic book direct market retailers (you know, like the owner of my local comic store, where they know me by name and ask me to understand that they know better than to attend ComicsPRO and thus leave the store undefended against my feeble burglary attempts) is occurring right now in Atlanta. And yesterday, Image Comics Publisher Eric Stephenson gave a speech to the attendees.

This speech is the kind of thing that keynote speakers give to make the owners feel proud, strong, and less likely to be plowed under by ComiXology the way your local record store, where they knew you were irritating and asked you to understand that vinyl sounds warmer than digital or get the fuck out, was decimated by iTunes. And it certainly did that, with references to how graphic novels are the one type of paper-printed book that is apparently in a growth mode, and how in a world seemingly enamored by comics, it is still the local comic store that is the best place to obtain a wide variety of books.

This is a good message. I like this message. I think I’ve established over the years that I don’t like trying to navigate comics even on a tablet, and that I like my paper comics, and that about the best part of my week is on Wednesday nights at the store, shooting the shit with the other regulars and the owner, who knows me by name and asks me not to threaten to fire feces in front of the paying clientele. We picked the location of the Crisis On Infinite Midlives Home Office in no small part based on its proximity to the comic book store. That and its proximity to dive bars that accept questionable behavior, but that’s not the point.

The point is that Stephenson also used his speech to shit on Star Wars, Transformers and G.I.-Joe comics. Which has a lot of fans whipped into a screeching hate frenzy.

And I am kind of one of them

The entirety of Stephenson’s speech is at Bleeding Cool, and you should check it out, but here’s where shit gets crazy:

Like I said, THE WALKING DEAD comic book was selling great before it was a television show.

Now it sells even better.

And that’s because the show made people aware of the comic – and those people came to your stores to get that comic.

Because they want the real thing.

TRANSFORMERS comics will never be the real thing.

GI JOE comics will never be the real thing.

STAR WARS comics will never be the real thing.

Those comics are for fans that love the real thing so much, they want more – but there’s the important thing to understand:

They don’t want more comics – they just want more of the thing they love.

Those comics are accessories to an existing interest, an add-on, an upsell, easy surplus for the parent products – icing on the cake.

That is a bold statement to a group of people who are the public face of an industry that might have died in 1977 if Roy Thomas hadn’t bought the rights to print Star Wars comics. And it’s a statement that had the effect on the people who publish licensed comics like Star Wars and Transformers that, well, anyone would expect:

Okay, here’s my issue with Stephenson’s logic: while there is no denying that The Walking Dead is a good comic (and might be great again if they ever resolve the fucking Rick / Negan storyline. Hey Robert Kirkman: remember how people complained that the crew spent too much time on Herschel’s farm in season two? That was less than 13 weeks. We have spent nearly two years fucking around with Negan. Let Carl put a bullet in his face, already! But I digress), which made a good TV show which drove more people to the comic store, the logic here seems a little circular to me.

So… it’s okay for a TV show of a comic to drive someone to the comic store for the first time to get the comic version… but it’s not okay for a Star Wars fan to do the same thing? Because Star Wars wasn’t originally a comic book? Yeah, I don’t get it.

I feel pretty safe in saying that if someone is not already a comic book fan, they are only walking into a comic store for one of three reasons: to use the bathroom, to rob the place, or because they are looking for one, single thing. No one just wakes up and decides they want to read comic books, they wake up and decide they want a comic version of something they saw somewhere else. No one has discovered the medium by just idly picking up a comic book since the direct market wiped out drug store spinner racks by the mid 80s, and the days of people browsing the graphic novel section of Borders died with Borders.

It seems to me the goal is to get them in the door for that one thing, hook them with the best possible version of that one thing as possible, and then get them to explore other similar things, to get them to fall in love with the medium and its storytelling possibilities.

And if that’s the goal, who gives a shit what one, single thing brought them in the door? If, before the Walking Dead TV show, some horror nut who heard that Dynamite Comics was doing Army of Darkness comics, and who happened to notice on the way to the register that there was a zombie comic that looked kinda cool, would you have turned away their $2.99 as being impure, somehow? Of course not. Just like I’m sure no one failed to cash checks from people who wandered into a comic store looking for Spawn books after seeing the movie back in the 90s, even though I think we can all agree that that flick was a pile of shit.

Now, I get that part of Stephenson’s argument is that there should be good, original books of every genre available in the comic store, and I totally agree with him on that. Comics can be about anything, and as much as I am a superhero fan myself, I also am a big fan of crime and horror fiction. Which is why I pick up Fatale and Criminal whenever I see them… and it’s also why I pick up all IDW’s adaptations of Richard Stark’s Parker novels. And if you try to tell me that Darwyn Cooke’s work on those adaptations isn’t “The real thing,” we might have to fight.

But this effort to shame comic store owners for carrying adaptations and a mostly superhero inventory over more original books is wishful thinking and a non-started, if you want the truth. Look: I fucking love Saga, Justin Jordan’s Luther Strode books, and a lot of the original stuff that Image is putting out. These are good books. The world needs more good comic books. But comic retailers will continue to carry a huge superhero inventory over even large indie books of other genres by major publishers.

Why? Well, let’s do the math: The Walking Dead is considered a huge success for the industry. This is because it is the largest-rated program. On paid cable television. In North America. Helping AMC to reach a total revenue – total – of $382 million in all of 2013.

Meanwhile in 2012, The Avengers made $207,438,708. In three fucking days. Worldwide. Not counting merchandising that appeals to demographics from adult geeks who like t-shirts to four-year-olds who want Captain America to fight Spider-Man in their backyards.

Look, I will never argue that publishers shouldn’t strive to make better creator-owned books of all genres. I want to read those books. But to try and shame people trying to make a living into not carrying licensed books or superhero books featuring characters that people who currently don’t read comics might want to try is shortsighted and self-serving. Because a guy who likes Star Wars might let the guy at the counter convince him to give Saga a try. A fan of Buffy The Vampire Slayer who heard that Joss Whedon-supervised “seasons” of Buffy are coming out monthly from Dark Horse could be talked into grabbing a copy of Pretty Deadly. The same way a dude who liked The Dark Knight Rises might grab a copy of Batman / Spawn with Frank Miller’s name on it, and maybe an issue or two of Spawn on top of it.

But without those books? The odds are that, if a new face wanders in, the owners of local comic stores will be praying that they just want to use the bathroom, as they tighten their grip on the .44 under the counter.

Categories: Comic Book News Editorial Tags:
March 1, 2014 by Rob
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