Crisis in Multiple Formats

The news came at ICV2’s Graphic Novel Conference at NYCC that the graphic novel has finally surpassed the periodical format in terms of revenues generated in the comics market. This comes as no surprise to anyone, but it does come with more than its share of growing pains, only some of which are just now starting to become clear. As periodicals give way to books, how will the vast, rich superhero universes periodicals made possible for Marvel and DC survive the transition?

Sure, many superhero comics have done well in collected editions, though self-contained manga series and one-shot graphic novels like “V for Vendetta” or “300” are the real bookstore powerhouses. But looking at the sales of periodical comics and the analyses and discussion of those sales on the Internet, Marvel and DC are heavily dependent on big events that drive not just an individual title but the entire universe of characters each company has built up. The idea of a universe with continuity and “current” events that affect an entire line of titles is one that works very well in periodical comics. Readers who pick up a handful or more of either company’s comics each week will find they often add up to a larger whole. But universes make much less sense if the audience is instead readers buying each week a single trade paperback for roughly the same price. Those readers expect a more complete and self-contained story for their money are much less likely to pick up a second trade and double their expense for the privilege of connecting the dots between titles to establish a universe. And with a major part of the appeal of trades being their shelf life and the idea that the publisher, retailer can theoretically make more money by keeping titles in print, the kind of continuity that works in periodicals just seems to get in the way in book form.

The point became especially clear as I sat down to read Civil War #1-7 yesterday. Having read as periodicals a number of the tie-in titles and miniseries, I was surprised to find that many of the subtle moments I liked were pretty much completely absent from the “main” series. The details of Peter Parker’s decision to unmask, the inner workings of the Tony Stark and Reed Richards alliance and their Negative Zone prison, Ben Grimm’s decision to ride out the controversy as an American expatriate in Paris, and Speedball’s interrogation and transformation were all told in peripheral titles. The main title, which is what most people will read when it comes out in hardcover and later softcover, was spare and unsatisfying on its own.

The single to collection format works well within self-contained titles like “Walking Dead,” “Powers” or most Vertigo series, and with the likes of TV shows collected on DVD. But you don’t have to buy or rent an episode of “24” to understand what’s happening on “Boston Legal,” and collected comics coming from a universe are in many ways still doing just that. There are a few exceptions that may suggest one solution, such as the four-volume “Complete Age of Apocalypse,” which collects that megaseries chronologically into a single story; DC’s upcoming “Jack Kirby’s Fourth World Omnibus” series will do the same. But the Civil War hardcover is just going to collect those seven issues, with tie ins getting their own collections and readers forced to buy multiple volumes to get the whole story that they then have to piece together on their own.

On the other side of town, DC’s “52” and the upcoming “Countdown” weekly demonstrate quite clearly that serial storytelling and continuity can still bring in an audience. But maintaining that success or spreading it beyond these event titles has proven difficult, as the sales boosts earned by DC’s One Year Later titles have almost without exception been lost within a year.

This will likely emerge as the biggest creative challenge for superhero comics in the next few years: creating books that work for two different audiences – the old-school fans who still follow the periodicals and the new or casual graphic novel reader that wants a complete story in a single package – that have very different expectations. If the creative and commercial requirements of bookstore dominance is that a series of Avengers graphic novels has to be pretty much self-contained, does that mean the serialized comics they come from will have to follow suit? Or will there be a bookstore version and a serialized version of the same story? Or two distinct versions of Avengers, one for periodicals and one for graphic novels? And would a creative emphasis on standalone books be, essentially, another nail in the coffin of the periodical format? And if the periodical is so obviously just a serialized excerpt of an upcoming book (as many already are), what possible reason is there for anyone to buy the periodical? And if universes fade away, aren’t we losing something that made those comics unique and special?

“52” again shows comics can still be successful in the periodical format, even though its format is unique even among major publishers. If today’s TV dramas are any indication, the conventions of serialized comicbook stories are more popular and in synch with pop culture than ever. That raises more questions than ever about format, price point and distribution than content as periodical comics’ real problem. The traditional periodical is unlikely to ever go away completely, but the market for paper publications is — as anyone who works in that industry can tell you — not what it once was and unlikely to ever regain the dominance and profitability it once had. That leaves digital distribution, which holds incredible promise but remains a scary place because it still largely unknown how it will work and how it will generate money.

Digital could be the solution to the distribution problems that have plagued comics for nearly 40 years now, allowing comics to be delivered to a net-savvy audience of all ages in styles, genres, types and lengths of any type imaginable. If superhero comics find a new, large audience this way, then universes could continue to thrive and even grow. But if the periodical format fails to find ways to bolster its audience, it is in serious danger of either continuing to shrink into an increasingly narrow niche or of surrendering to the new reality of the bookstore market, which would be a sad and unnecessary loss of one of comics’ great traditions.