Comics as a Medium?
Y'know, I hear a lot of talk about comic books being a storytelling medium, and I guess it is. I mean, certainly in a technical sense it is, but practically? I.....really don't think so. Granted, you can certainly use it to tell any kind of story you want. It'll be cheap (compared to the cost of doing a movie or a television show, at least), and it'll come with pretty much NO limitations, not in censorship or in the sense of budgetary concerns. You'll never be told "you can't do that; its too expensive" in comics. (Not unless you're going to slap a REAL gold cover onto your comic, at least....)
However, as many creators have noticed, unless you're doing superheroes, you're probably not going to be that successful in comics. Most people claim that's because people are just used to reading superheroes and don't want to change their habits, and that's true, but--let me offer another reason: Its because superheroes really only reach their full potential inside of comic books.
I know that's a ridiculous statement considering the early 90's Batman show, and this decade's Batman Begins and The Dark Knight (does anyone notice a trend there...), but its the truth. The superhero genre loses so much of what makes it fun when it leaves the printed page. I could of course, spend all day listing reasons that are both obvious and generic (the stories get neutered, the transition from comic to cartoon or movie can often look stupid, Hollywood never seems to know what to DO with most characters and mostly makes a good movie by dumb luck), but I'll just point out the two major reasons:
1.) Inevitability of Quick Cancellation - In the movie industry, after three films most people hear about a new entry and go, "Why won't they let that series DIE already?" Cartoons get 52 episodes--65 if they're REALLY popular and then they're canceled, as its more profitable to create a new series and launch a toyline for that than to continue the currently running one. Neither of these prove themselves very useful when adapting characters that often have ongoing comic book series numbering in the 300s, one of the largest being Action Comics, which will have run 870 issues this Wednesday.
Of course, don't get me wrong. Some of those 870 should never, EVER have been published. The same goes for any superhero. That said, nearly EVERY superhero worth his weight has an iconic run--one that exemplifies everything about that character, from its villains, to its supporting cast, to showing why that character is even important in that comic universe. And nearly ALL of those runs are longer than 52 issues.
Take Peter David's run on Hulk, for instance. A more psychological take on the character, revealing that the existence of the Hulk is linked to trauma Bruce Banner suffered as a child from his abusive parent, and even going so far as to get rid of the Savage "Hulk SMASH!" persona entirely and replacing him with a "Merged Hulk" that possessed the strength of Savage Hulk, the cunning of the Gray "Mister Fixit" Hulk, and the intelligence of Bruce Banner. Lasted over 100 issues.
Or try Mark Waid's Flash run (pun not intended), one of the first times the character experienced intense popularity, and in which we got to learn exactly where the character got his powers from (the Speed Force), and what the hell the Speed Force WAS. Lasted nearly 100 issues, and was followed by Geoff Johns' run on the the character which showed fans exactly why Flash's Rogues Gallery was cool. Another 60 issues.
Speaking of Geoff Johns, he is currently creating an epic take on the character Green Lantern. Sure the initial story about one GL's redepemption after his fall from grace, his battle against his greatest enemy Sinestro as he wages war on the universe, and his eventual battle against what appears to be death itself is only 60+ issues...but he uses over 40 years of Green Lantern continuity to tell his tale, which even if you stripped out all the useless/stupid shit would STILL be about 150+ issues worth of material.
Hell, even ROBIN has managed an iconic 100 issues of interesting storytelling. ROBIN, folks. Batman's fucking sidekick. Even if it WAS after he got out of the fairy boots and fishscale underwear, he's STILL Robin. If he can do it, for fuck's sake any superhero can--they just haven't had the right writer to give a shit about them yet. And I could go on to list other characters (Impulse, the Teen Titans, the Legion of Super-Heroes, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Avengers, Captain America and many more), but I think I've hammered my point home.
(By the way....even Aquaman. Yes, the one that talks to the fishies, has gotten 47 issues--and probably would've gotten longer had it not been for editorial problems.)
And none of this--NONE of this--factors into the equation the likelihood of someone coming on to the same character and giving them ANOTHER iconic run. There's a reason these characters have lasted so damn long, and they're never going to shine in an industry as fickle as movies, or in one where it doesn't matter how many people watch but how many people buy Day-Glo Batman.
2.) The Shared Universe - Last year my friend and I went to see Spider-Man 3, opening weekend. When it got to the big, climactic fight at the end, my friend leaned over to me and said: "Where the hell is the Fantastic Four? Or at least Daredevil! They ARE fighting in Hell's Kitchen."
And THAT was from a normal person, people. Not like me, who reads comics every week and checks comics news sites daily. The fact is, what makes superhero comics shine are the fact that they all take place in one wide universe where you can see anyone team-up with anyone. Not just one time team-ups either. There are entire story arcs done with team-ups, which you may see in a cartoon (see Spider-Man: TAS' two-part team up with the X-Men) but up until just recently was simply NOT GOING TO HAPPEN in a movie.
Nevermind the giant summer event crossovers they do where you see pretty nearly everyone. Yeah, fans SAY they don't like it, but that's a joke. They bitch and bitch about it on forums but when the new one comes out they sell like gangbusters and make the Top Ten in sales consistently.
Neither cartoons nor movies really have the freedom comics possess to adapt these two factors, and that's why comics continue to sell even though you have movies and cartoons which can bring voices and music and big explosions and all those things comic books can't do. Are comics a medium? Yeah, but they're a medium that's basically adapted to tell superhero stories.
...Or, you know, stories LIKE superhero stories. One of the greatest experiments in indy comics of recent memory, I feel, was CrossGen comics. They seemed to be set up much like a superhero universe would--with ongoing tales told with a number of characters, set in the same universe (though on different worlds, during different times, and with different genre). And though we never got to read it, it was implied that eventually all the characters would come together in a big crossover. Of course the CrossGen experiment eventually failed, but near as I can tell, sales were less of a reason than distribution problems.
One can only wonder if another universe designed in the way superhero universes are, but done without superheroes, would perform.
However, as many creators have noticed, unless you're doing superheroes, you're probably not going to be that successful in comics. Most people claim that's because people are just used to reading superheroes and don't want to change their habits, and that's true, but--let me offer another reason: Its because superheroes really only reach their full potential inside of comic books.
I know that's a ridiculous statement considering the early 90's Batman show, and this decade's Batman Begins and The Dark Knight (does anyone notice a trend there...), but its the truth. The superhero genre loses so much of what makes it fun when it leaves the printed page. I could of course, spend all day listing reasons that are both obvious and generic (the stories get neutered, the transition from comic to cartoon or movie can often look stupid, Hollywood never seems to know what to DO with most characters and mostly makes a good movie by dumb luck), but I'll just point out the two major reasons:
1.) Inevitability of Quick Cancellation - In the movie industry, after three films most people hear about a new entry and go, "Why won't they let that series DIE already?" Cartoons get 52 episodes--65 if they're REALLY popular and then they're canceled, as its more profitable to create a new series and launch a toyline for that than to continue the currently running one. Neither of these prove themselves very useful when adapting characters that often have ongoing comic book series numbering in the 300s, one of the largest being Action Comics, which will have run 870 issues this Wednesday.
Of course, don't get me wrong. Some of those 870 should never, EVER have been published. The same goes for any superhero. That said, nearly EVERY superhero worth his weight has an iconic run--one that exemplifies everything about that character, from its villains, to its supporting cast, to showing why that character is even important in that comic universe. And nearly ALL of those runs are longer than 52 issues.
Take Peter David's run on Hulk, for instance. A more psychological take on the character, revealing that the existence of the Hulk is linked to trauma Bruce Banner suffered as a child from his abusive parent, and even going so far as to get rid of the Savage "Hulk SMASH!" persona entirely and replacing him with a "Merged Hulk" that possessed the strength of Savage Hulk, the cunning of the Gray "Mister Fixit" Hulk, and the intelligence of Bruce Banner. Lasted over 100 issues.
Or try Mark Waid's Flash run (pun not intended), one of the first times the character experienced intense popularity, and in which we got to learn exactly where the character got his powers from (the Speed Force), and what the hell the Speed Force WAS. Lasted nearly 100 issues, and was followed by Geoff Johns' run on the the character which showed fans exactly why Flash's Rogues Gallery was cool. Another 60 issues.
Speaking of Geoff Johns, he is currently creating an epic take on the character Green Lantern. Sure the initial story about one GL's redepemption after his fall from grace, his battle against his greatest enemy Sinestro as he wages war on the universe, and his eventual battle against what appears to be death itself is only 60+ issues...but he uses over 40 years of Green Lantern continuity to tell his tale, which even if you stripped out all the useless/stupid shit would STILL be about 150+ issues worth of material.
Hell, even ROBIN has managed an iconic 100 issues of interesting storytelling. ROBIN, folks. Batman's fucking sidekick. Even if it WAS after he got out of the fairy boots and fishscale underwear, he's STILL Robin. If he can do it, for fuck's sake any superhero can--they just haven't had the right writer to give a shit about them yet. And I could go on to list other characters (Impulse, the Teen Titans, the Legion of Super-Heroes, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Avengers, Captain America and many more), but I think I've hammered my point home.
(By the way....even Aquaman. Yes, the one that talks to the fishies, has gotten 47 issues--and probably would've gotten longer had it not been for editorial problems.)
And none of this--NONE of this--factors into the equation the likelihood of someone coming on to the same character and giving them ANOTHER iconic run. There's a reason these characters have lasted so damn long, and they're never going to shine in an industry as fickle as movies, or in one where it doesn't matter how many people watch but how many people buy Day-Glo Batman.
2.) The Shared Universe - Last year my friend and I went to see Spider-Man 3, opening weekend. When it got to the big, climactic fight at the end, my friend leaned over to me and said: "Where the hell is the Fantastic Four? Or at least Daredevil! They ARE fighting in Hell's Kitchen."
And THAT was from a normal person, people. Not like me, who reads comics every week and checks comics news sites daily. The fact is, what makes superhero comics shine are the fact that they all take place in one wide universe where you can see anyone team-up with anyone. Not just one time team-ups either. There are entire story arcs done with team-ups, which you may see in a cartoon (see Spider-Man: TAS' two-part team up with the X-Men) but up until just recently was simply NOT GOING TO HAPPEN in a movie.
Nevermind the giant summer event crossovers they do where you see pretty nearly everyone. Yeah, fans SAY they don't like it, but that's a joke. They bitch and bitch about it on forums but when the new one comes out they sell like gangbusters and make the Top Ten in sales consistently.
Neither cartoons nor movies really have the freedom comics possess to adapt these two factors, and that's why comics continue to sell even though you have movies and cartoons which can bring voices and music and big explosions and all those things comic books can't do. Are comics a medium? Yeah, but they're a medium that's basically adapted to tell superhero stories.
...Or, you know, stories LIKE superhero stories. One of the greatest experiments in indy comics of recent memory, I feel, was CrossGen comics. They seemed to be set up much like a superhero universe would--with ongoing tales told with a number of characters, set in the same universe (though on different worlds, during different times, and with different genre). And though we never got to read it, it was implied that eventually all the characters would come together in a big crossover. Of course the CrossGen experiment eventually failed, but near as I can tell, sales were less of a reason than distribution problems.
One can only wonder if another universe designed in the way superhero universes are, but done without superheroes, would perform.
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