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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2016 16:28:37 GMT -5
I don't think it's in the interest of any business to try and appease an unyielding minority, especially when that minority wasn't saving their asses before the relaunch. Better to cut their losses and go after new readers. The problem with that though, is that they don't seem to actually be acquiring (or at least retaining) new users. The sales, all across the DC line are abysmal. Marvel's aren't exactly brilliant, but DC's are disastrous. |
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Post by crazyoldhermit on Mar 7, 2016 16:44:48 GMT -5
I don't think it's in the interest of any business to try and appease an unyielding minority, especially when that minority wasn't saving their asses before the relaunch. Better to cut their losses and go after new readers. The problem with that though, is that they don't seem to actually be acquiring (or at least retaining) new users. The sales, all across the DC line are abysmal. Marvel's aren't exactly brilliant, but DC's are disastrous. Well that comes down to the other half of what I'm saying, which is that they've taken the wrong approach. Potential readers are out there. They aren't going to sell comics to every single person who buys a ticket for BvS or watches Arrow, but there are new reader hiding in those groups. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2016 23:27:02 GMT -5
The problem is not the content, the problem is format. A 20 page pamphlet for $3-4 is not going to sell to a mass audience in today's marketplace-nor will the digital equivalent at that price. It is a 20th century product that doesn't work in the 21st century marketplace. Also, brick and mortar destination shops are a dying breed in the current marketplace, so you are not going to get new customers to go to a destination store like a comic shop to buy a product, especially not a dinosaur product like a monthly periodical that doesn't provide much bang for the buck.
Jumping on points content-wise won't work when you have a product that is unattractive in terms of bang for the buck to a mass audience sold only in a place where the mass audience is not going to go.
To move to a wider audience they need to rethink the packaging of the product and the accessibility of the product, not just the content. Movies are as popular as ever, but no one is clinging to sell them on VHS only in video stores these days. If that were the only way to get movies for home use, the home movie market would be in just as much trouble as the comic book direct market is today. The product and retail outlets for comics have not evolved with the times, which is a bigger obstacle to their growth than anything content or continuity wise.
-M
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Post by tingramretro on Mar 8, 2016 1:52:23 GMT -5
It sounds as though you think comics are pretty much doomed.
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Post by tingramretro on Mar 8, 2016 1:58:00 GMT -5
Wow, thanks so much for that. Of course, why should they bother with people like me? I only gave them a sizeable chunk of my disposable income, even when it wasn't all that disposable, for over a quarter of a century. They clearly owe people like me nothing. You're right, they owe you nothing. They don't owe anybody anything. You've said that you're already done with DC and it comes down to a "Post-Crisis or nothing" stance, which I believe to be a stance held by a minority demographic. So why go to the lengths indulge that stubborn and unyielding minority at the cost of progress? Post-Crisis continuity was a mess. It was inaccessible, confusing and carried piles of baggage from several prior reboots going all the way back to the early 60s. Going back to that would be a mistake, and doing so just to target the small group of people who only want Post-Crisis, and aren't interested in any other incarnations of the characters (no matter the quality of the stories), would be a massive mistake. I don't think it's in the interest of any business to try and appease an unyielding minority, especially when that minority wasn't saving their asses before the relaunch. Better to cut their losses and go after new readers. It wasn't inaccessible or confusing, as far as I'm concerned. Unless you've conducted some sort of comprehensive poll of potential readers, this is just personal opinion presented as objective fact. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 8, 2016 4:41:04 GMT -5
It sounds as though you think comics are pretty much doomed. No I think the characters are more popular now than they ever were and comics in formats other than the 22 page monthly pamphlet are selling better now than at any other time in history. The artform and the stories are doing quite well, the monthly market for 22 page pamphlets is a dinosaur that needs to evolve with the market it is trying to survive in. Comics won't go away. The characters won't go away. The 22 page monthly format might. The direct market might, but those aren't comics, they are a phase of comics development. Comics didn't start as 22 page monthly pamphlets sold in comic shops, and if that format and outlet go away, comics won't be gone, they'll just have changed formats/outlets...AGAIN. -M |
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Post by dupersuper on Mar 8, 2016 5:12:55 GMT -5
I know, but DC's attempts to assuage them while also targeting new readers just ends up alienating everybody. Ultimately, DC's stable fanbase is there because they like reading good stories. They bitch and moan about continuity changes but in the end they accepted the good parts of the New 52 and ignored the bad parts, regardless of continuity. I think that if DC made the bold move (and really, at this point the only move they haven't tried) and went back to basics it would work out IF the stories were up to par. So I don't think the whole "just go back to post-Crisis" crowd is really that militant about it, I am. In 2011 I was buying about two thirds of DC's output every month, and had been since the early 1980s. I'd been a DC fan for over 35 years. That ended in september 2011. Since they rebooted, I've bought pretty much nothing they've published, except Batman '66, a couple of Vertigo books (now both ended) and the Convergence titles. I have no interest in emotionally engaging with new versions of characters I'd followed for most of my life, at the age of 46. I still get my Superman fix every week, but admit the reboot hit me hard. I'd followed pre-Flashpoint Superman since I was a kid, so I don't have the emotional investment in this continuity that I had in that one, obviously. It really made me feel for the fans of pre-Crisis DC who complained about post-Crisis changes in the letters pages of my old books... |
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Post by Roquefort Raider on Mar 8, 2016 15:35:36 GMT -5
It sounds as though you think comics are pretty much doomed. No I think the characters are more popular now than they ever were and comics in formats other than the 22 page monthly pamphlet are selling better now than at any other time in history. The artform and the stories are doing quite well, the monthly market for 22 page pamphlets is a dinosaur that needs to evolve with the market it is trying to survive in. Comics won't go away. The characters won't go away. The 22 page monthly format might. The direct market might, but those aren't comics, they are a phase of comics development. Comics didn't start as 22 page monthly pamphlets sold in comic shops, and if that format and outlet go away, comics won't be gone, they'll just have changed formats/outlets...AGAIN. I haven't bought a new floppy since 2001, but sibce that time I have bought plenty of new trade paperbacks and big new hardbacks. I also mostly bought them from Amazon, not from a LCS (of which there is none within a 200 km radius). As you say, different outlet and different format, but the market is still there. The thing about American comics is that they were created as a form of easily available and inexpensive entertainment. They are now not so easily available and pretty darn expensive. The business model has to reinvent itself if it wants to outlive the aging crowd of nostalgia buffs. I don't really know what the best solution would be. The European model, in which comics are sold in regular bookstores and are on average of higher quality and far more diversified, can be an inspiration. The bundling of a lot of material under two covers, as is being done with the Essentials or Complete epic lines, is also promising. Offering more than unending superhero soap operas would no doubt also open the door to a new readership. What does not strike me as a sensible plan is to rely on yearly "event" crossovers with variant covers in which everything changes... again. |
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Post by crazyoldhermit on Mar 13, 2016 18:47:55 GMT -5
You're right, they owe you nothing. They don't owe anybody anything. You've said that you're already done with DC and it comes down to a "Post-Crisis or nothing" stance, which I believe to be a stance held by a minority demographic. So why go to the lengths indulge that stubborn and unyielding minority at the cost of progress? Post-Crisis continuity was a mess. It was inaccessible, confusing and carried piles of baggage from several prior reboots going all the way back to the early 60s. Going back to that would be a mistake, and doing so just to target the small group of people who only want Post-Crisis, and aren't interested in any other incarnations of the characters (no matter the quality of the stories), would be a massive mistake. I don't think it's in the interest of any business to try and appease an unyielding minority, especially when that minority wasn't saving their asses before the relaunch. Better to cut their losses and go after new readers. It wasn't inaccessible or confusing, as far as I'm concerned. Unless you've conducted some sort of comprehensive poll of potential readers, this is just personal opinion presented as objective fact. It was inaccessible and confusing. Heres an example in the form of a question: If you want to read Batmann from the beginning where do you start? There is no starting point because the story was told outside of chronological order. Theres Year One as an origin story but right after Year One continuity jumped ahead 10 years to Jason Todd's origin, bypassing the Dick Grayson era entirely. Dick Grayson doesn't even get an origin until Year Three a few years later, and even then it's only flashbacks. Dick's entire tenure as Robin still existed in continuity but it only appeared in pre-Crisis stories. And Dick is just one example of that. As a whole Crisis kept Batman in the same place chronologically and just changed the detailed of what happened prior. So it's impossible to read in a straight line through Batman's career without looping back into the previous continuity to read select stories. Batman's Post-Crisis continuity is a total mess and very opaque for new readers. And you can say "Well you don't have to read that, you can just jump in!" and thats true, but people don't want to do that. They don't want to start watching Game of Thrones on season 6 and just figure it out as they go, they go back and start from the beginning. It's not like the old days (when superheroes were most popular) when you'd just tune in whenever and catch an episode of Little Orphan Annie or Flash Gordon. People have different expectations for their media today, they want the entire story available so they can start from the beginning and take it in as a whole. And Post-Crisis just can't provide that. This is just one problem comics are facing, and one that needs to be fixed before the industry can ever experience growth. |
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Post by tingramretro on Mar 13, 2016 18:58:22 GMT -5
It wasn't inaccessible or confusing, as far as I'm concerned. Unless you've conducted some sort of comprehensive poll of potential readers, this is just personal opinion presented as objective fact. It was inaccessible and confusing. Heres an example in the form of a question: If you want to read Batmann from the beginning where do you start? There is no starting point because the story was told outside of chronological order. Theres Year One as an origin story but right after Year One continuity jumped ahead 10 years to Jason Todd's origin, bypassing the Dick Grayson era entirely. Dick Grayson doesn't even get an origin until Year Three a few years later, and even then it's only flashbacks. Dick's entire tenure as Robin still existed in continuity but it only appeared in pre-Crisis stories. And Dick is just one example of that. As a whole Crisis kept Batman in the same place chronologically and just changed the detailed of what happened prior. So it's impossible to read in a straight line through Batman's career without looping back into the previous continuity to read select stories. Batman's Post-Crisis continuity is a total mess and very opaque for new readers. And you can say "Well you don't have to read that, you can just jump in!" and thats true, but people don't want to do that. They don't want to start watching Game of Thrones on season 6 and just figure it out as they go, they go back and start from the beginning. It's not like the old days (when superheroes were most popular) when you'd just tune in whenever and catch an episode of Little Orphan Annie or Flash Gordon. People have different expectations for their media today, they want the entire story available so they can start from the beginning and take it in as a whole. And Post-Crisis just can't provide that. This is just one problem comics are facing, and one that needs to be fixed before the industry can ever experience growth. Sorry, "people don't want to do that"? "People have different expectations"? What people are these? So, you have conducted an exhaustive poll? You found it confusing. Tbat's all you can really say, here. And as for "looping back into the previous continuity", whoever stated that post-Crisis continuity was intended to be totally new? Your Game of Thrones analogy makes little sense; we're talking about 1986, here, and I'd be willing to bet that most of those reading in 1986 were also reading in 1984. By your logic, they should have been rebooting every year... |
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Post by crazyoldhermit on Mar 13, 2016 19:24:20 GMT -5
Sorry, "people don't want to do that"? "People have different expectations"? What people are these? So, you have conducted an exhaustive poll? You found it confusing. Tbat's all you can really say, here. And as for "looping back into the previous continuity", whoever stated that post-Crisis continuity was intended to be totally new? Those people are people who are interested in reading superhero comics but don't. I encounter them everywhere, and the most common complaint is the inability to start from square one like they can do with pretty much every other form of media, and even with other comics (like The Walking Dead, or manga). Post-Crisis is a mess. That is not opinion, that is fact. To what extent that mess impedes readability and enjoyment, that is subjective. I understand it and can navigate it, so I'm merely frustrated by it rather than confused, but to a new reader? It's a complete mess. And I know Crisis wasn't designed to be totally new. Thats my entire point. It should have been, because by not doing so it just made an even bigger mess. Prior to Crisis history was mostly linear. There was the Earth 2 split but continuity was so loose that it doesn't really matter. You could (if you were insane) start at Detective Comics #27 and read right up through to 'Tec #566 and Batman #400 and have it be a mostly straight story. You see the progression of Batman from vigilante to hero, see the evolution of Robin from young sidekick to teenaged partner to adult hero, see the organic growth of the rogue's gallery and Batman's first encounter with most of his iconic. Even though it spans over 40 years and some dramatic stylistic changes it's still a clear thing. Crisis ruined that by introducing massive retcons intended to make DC accessible to new readers while still holding on to old stories for the sake of the old. It was a half measure that turned out to be a horribly destructive compromise, and it only became worse as the years went on and more and more retcons were made (there are no less than three post-Crisis Superman origin stories, for instance). |
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Post by tingramretro on Mar 13, 2016 19:35:43 GMT -5
Sorry, "people don't want to do that"? "People have different expectations"? What people are these? So, you have conducted an exhaustive poll? You found it confusing. Tbat's all you can really say, here. And as for "looping back into the previous continuity", whoever stated that post-Crisis continuity was intended to be totally new? Those people are people who are interested in reading superhero comics but don't. I encounter them everywhere, and the most common complaint is the inability to start from square one like they can do with pretty much every other form of media, and even with other comics (like The Walking Dead, or manga). Post-Crisis is a mess. That is not opinion, that is fact. To what extent that mess impedes readability and enjoyment, that is subjective. I understand it and can navigate it, so I'm merely frustrated by it rather than confused, but to a new reader? It's a complete mess. And I know Crisis wasn't designed to be totally new. Thats my entire point. It should have been, because by not doing so it just made an even bigger mess. Prior to Crisis history was mostly linear. There was the Earth 2 split but continuity was so loose that it doesn't really matter. You could (if you were insane) start at Detective Comics #27 and read right up through to 'Tec #566 and Batman #400 and have it be a mostly straight story. You see the progression of Batman from vigilante to hero, see the evolution of Robin from young sidekick to teenaged partner to adult hero, see the organic growth of the rogue's gallery and Batman's first encounter with most of his iconic. Even though it spans over 40 years and some dramatic stylistic changes it's still a clear thing. Crisis ruined that by introducing massive retcons intended to make DC accessible to new readers while still holding on to old stories for the sake of the old. It was a half measure that turned out to be a horribly destructive compromise, and it only became worse as the years went on and more and more retcons were made (there are no less than three post-Crisis Superman origin stories, for instance). It's not a fact, it's still an opinion. Purely subjective. And I disagree completely. You obviously have a very clear idea of what was needed, and it wasn't what they did. I, on the other hand, was and am pretty happy with it. There was no need to throw everything out for the sake of some hypothetical confused new readers at the expense of the existing readership. I'm glad they didn't. It's a shame the executives of 2011 didn't follow their example. |
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Post by crazyoldhermit on Mar 13, 2016 20:41:21 GMT -5
Those people are people who are interested in reading superhero comics but don't. I encounter them everywhere, and the most common complaint is the inability to start from square one like they can do with pretty much every other form of media, and even with other comics (like The Walking Dead, or manga). Post-Crisis is a mess. That is not opinion, that is fact. To what extent that mess impedes readability and enjoyment, that is subjective. I understand it and can navigate it, so I'm merely frustrated by it rather than confused, but to a new reader? It's a complete mess. And I know Crisis wasn't designed to be totally new. Thats my entire point. It should have been, because by not doing so it just made an even bigger mess. Prior to Crisis history was mostly linear. There was the Earth 2 split but continuity was so loose that it doesn't really matter. You could (if you were insane) start at Detective Comics #27 and read right up through to 'Tec #566 and Batman #400 and have it be a mostly straight story. You see the progression of Batman from vigilante to hero, see the evolution of Robin from young sidekick to teenaged partner to adult hero, see the organic growth of the rogue's gallery and Batman's first encounter with most of his iconic. Even though it spans over 40 years and some dramatic stylistic changes it's still a clear thing. Crisis ruined that by introducing massive retcons intended to make DC accessible to new readers while still holding on to old stories for the sake of the old. It was a half measure that turned out to be a horribly destructive compromise, and it only became worse as the years went on and more and more retcons were made (there are no less than three post-Crisis Superman origin stories, for instance). It's not a fact, it's still an opinion. Purely subjective. And I disagree completely. You obviously have a very clear idea of what was needed, and it wasn't what they did. I, on the other hand, was and am pretty happy with it. There was no need to throw everything out for the sake of some hypothetical confused new readers at the expense of the existing readership. I'm glad they didn't. It's a shame the executives of 2011 didn't follow their example. It is not an opinion, it is a fact. Opinions on the mess do not change the fact that it is a mess. If it was an opinion and I was just making an argument to express my personal belief on the matter then you would be able to make a counter argument about why it's not a mess instead of just saying "I like it." |
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Post by tingramretro on Mar 14, 2016 2:01:06 GMT -5
It's not a fact, it's still an opinion. Purely subjective. And I disagree completely. You obviously have a very clear idea of what was needed, and it wasn't what they did. I, on the other hand, was and am pretty happy with it. There was no need to throw everything out for the sake of some hypothetical confused new readers at the expense of the existing readership. I'm glad they didn't. It's a shame the executives of 2011 didn't follow their example. It is not an opinion, it is a fact. Opinions on the mess do not change the fact that it is a mess. If it was an opinion and I was just making an argument to express my personal belief on the matter then you would be able to make a counter argument about why it's not a mess instead of just saying "I like it." No, it is your opinion that it was a mess. You appear to be confusing your own opinions with objective fact. It is my opinion that, while by no means a seamless and perfectly realized structure (which it never could have been) the post Crisis DCU was in the main pretty successful and not what I would have called "a mess". And I believe my opinion to be as valid as yours. |
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Post by Ish Kabbible on Mar 14, 2016 2:25:11 GMT -5
It is not an opinion, it is a fact. Opinions on the mess do not change the fact that it is a mess. If it was an opinion and I was just making an argument to express my personal belief on the matter then you would be able to make a counter argument about why it's not a mess instead of just saying "I like it." No, it is your opinion that it was a mess. You appear to be confusing your own opinions with objective fact. It is my opinion that, while by no means a seamless and perfectly realized structure (which it never could have been) the post Crisis DCU was in the main pretty successful and not what I would have called "a mess". And I believe my opinion to be as valid as yours. Depends on the character involved methinks. Hawkman, All Star Squadron, Legion Of Super-Heroes...a total chaotic mess!!! |
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