Comic Book Publishers, Faced With Flagging Sales, Look To Streaming (nytimes.com) 249
Comic book publishers are facing a growing crisis: Flagging interest from readers and competition from digital entertainment are dragging down sales. Hoping to reverse the trend, publishers are creating their own digital platforms to directly connect with readers and encourage more engagement from fans. From a report: One of the biggest direct-to-consumer efforts is DC Universe, a platform from DC Entertainment and Warner Bros. Digital Studios that will offer streaming content, including original and classic TV series. DC Universe is "a huge opportunity" that offers "ultimate creative control," said Jim Lee, a co-publisher of DC Entertainment. "It allows you to look at wider adaptations of the source material."
[...] The Walt Disney Company, which owns Marvel Entertainment, said last year that it would create a streaming platform that would include Marvel movies like "The Avengers" and "Guardians of the Galaxy." Smaller comic book publishers are testing their own direct-to-consumer platforms. Image Comics, the publisher of popular titles like The Walking Dead and Saga, started a direct-to-consumer platform in 2015 to sell comic book subscriptions and apparel.
[...] The Walt Disney Company, which owns Marvel Entertainment, said last year that it would create a streaming platform that would include Marvel movies like "The Avengers" and "Guardians of the Galaxy." Smaller comic book publishers are testing their own direct-to-consumer platforms. Image Comics, the publisher of popular titles like The Walking Dead and Saga, started a direct-to-consumer platform in 2015 to sell comic book subscriptions and apparel.
How about remove SJW crap (Score:3, Insightful)
Hrm, seems like they could just stop pumping it full of SJW propaganda and sales would come back
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Unlikely. It's much harder to build an audience than to lose it.
Now that they have the reputation, they're likely fucked for a generation. They'll have to learn to live on the movie profits.
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Problem being, that you only need a handful of writers for the film, which means most people doing the comics are either going to have to be subsidized, or they will have to be fired.
That's the point I'm making. They will literally have to learn how to live on movie money instead of direct sales income. This will require a paradigm shift within comics companies. Either a lot of people doing comics will have to fired and they have to throw most of the effort at movies instead, or they will have to subsidise
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The comic store near me is thriving, but mostly because of the large adult section.
Less than 25% is in the "Tank Girl-takeoff" style.
But if you're both shopping there at the same time, I totally hope she laughs at you.
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You are forgetting Stupid Juvenile Whiners tactics Rule #4.
4. Never take responsibility
Even worse is the SJW comic bookstore owners insulting customers when they ask if they carry a certain line of comics. /Oblg. #GetWokeGoBroke
Re:OUTED (Score:5, Insightful)
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Shut the fuck up you white racists, Superman is now a proud black transsexual and you all can fucking eat it.
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Shut the fuck up you white racists, Superman is now a proud black transsexual and you all can fucking eat it.
Superman was already a proud black man. Bizarro is his opposite, and he's pasty white. Therefore Superman is black.
Re:OUTED (Score:5, Insightful)
Let us say that a group of people want 21st century politics brought into say, Star Wars movies or comic books.
Let's say that want character's sexual identity to be a focus, perhaps more female and less male characters, Okay, so after discussions, the creators of the movies put people in place that will promote your agenda. This will be a radical shift, and will dismiss what the traditional audience wishes to see, which in these cases is obviously escapist entertainment with a good story line.
So here is the most important part - if people with a political agenda succeed in turning away the traditional customers, then the people with that political agenda must become the new customers. Which is what I believe ITRambo is saying.
We saw a huge fan revolt with Star Wars - Solo. And the weird Disney response was it was the fault of White males. https://www.tigerdroppings.com... [tigerdroppings.com] Original article was on Forbes - they provide link but Forbes won't let me in.
Aside from the blatant racism (white) and Sexism (males) it was failure to see the forest for the agenda.
Point is - if you want your comic books and sci-fi movies to be politically correct, sensitive to who the characters like to have sex with - and display it - and socially inclusive, making these films about otherworld characters reflect 21st century shortcomings........
You have to go to the movies and You have to buy the comic books, and You have to buy the action figures that the people You kicked off the train used to do. You own it now - so spend that money or you won't own it long.
And seriously, if you feel you have to mark this little bit of good advice as troll, it only indicates that you can't take telling. Support your causes, not just complain.
Re:OUTED (Score:4, Interesting)
But that was the one that was about a straight white male... Surely if diversity was the problem then the other three new-era films would have flopped and Solo would have been a huge success.
Maybe it's just not a very good film, or we have reached Star Wars saturation point.
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But that was the one that was about a straight white male... Surely if diversity was the problem then the other three new-era films would have flopped and Solo would have been a huge success.
Maybe it's just not a very good film, or we have reached Star Wars saturation point.
No, the sequence of events was that after Rogue one, there was some murmering among the fans regarding the direction the franchise was taking. That was the time that Kennedy told the world that she wasn't there to serve men.
Next up, the Last Jedi was simply a lame film. Yes, there were some social Justice aspects, but also some awful plot lines, and some simply ridiculous parts of the movie. Think Princess Leia's Mary Poppins debacle. Now there have been some not so good Star Wars films in the past, but
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But that was the one that was about a straight white male... Surely if diversity was the problem then the other three new-era films would have flopped and Solo would have been a huge success.
Maybe it's just not a very good film, or we have reached Star Wars saturation point.
Maybe it was because it was right after two other big block busters? Many of the shared fans went to see Infinity War and Deadpool multiple times. Solo landed at the wrong time. I like going to the movies, but no to the point of going to them every Friday for a month. While that probably wasn't all the issue, I bet that it didn't help at all.
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The trailers for Solo looked really bad.
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Shut the fuck up you nlgger Nazi Trump loving GOP INCEL faggot retard kike!
Wow, women want you, men want to be like you. Please, tell us more!
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Yeah they did. They just don't like hearing about how they come across.
That's pretty sad. Not knowing one's self never works out well.
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I think the whole "millions of dollars" thing is a disingenuous attempt to make it look like you're punching up. It's pretty clear you'd feel exactly the same way if he got paid nothing at all.
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I read the whole Sandman series. Bought the issues as they were coming out, from #17 onward. That series wasn't like a lot of the stupid regular comics, though. Most mainstream comics, i.e. the 'Super Hero' ones, are tedious and two dimensional. Why anybody would read more than one or two issues is beyond me.
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Iron Man is a black teenage girl? So is the new Buffy.
https://www.polygon.com/tv/201... [polygon.com]
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Nothing wrong with that; it fits the established canon.
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The original idea with Buffy was to subvert the "dumb blond who dies in the first 5 minutes" trope. We have kinda moved past that since the 90s, thanks in part to characters like Buffy. So now the equivalent is the "token black character who dies in the first 5 minutes" trope.
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On the one hand, I can't think of anything wrong or stupid about a story involving a black female teenager in a mech suit. Mech suits are cool, no matter who is in them.
With good writers, one could spin compelling stories with any character, regardless of race, etc.
But, on the other hand, the only reason that this specific combination was chosen was to contrast it against the white male original character. And this isn't the only story in which this has happened. There is, in fact, a huge push to replace
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Okay, let's have some good old fashioned Internet fun. Who's the better Wonder Woman - Gal Gadot or Linda Carter?
My vote is for Linda Carter, who fit the Amazon Woman look better. My wife does too, and she's way too harsh on Gal Gadot. Says that Gadot isn't big enough, and even says Gadot isn't very attractive. I mean she certainly isn't as beautiful as Linda, but she's not that bad.
Anyhow, Linda or Gal? 2 for
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You just hate Jews, my dude.
Gal Gadot is a fucking Goddess... And she killed Muslims while in the IDF. That paired with her tits and ass makes her a one in a billion woman.
I had no idea she was Jewish. That's nice. Anyhow - good internet rage.
Linda Carter 2, Gal Gadot 1
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I think I would read the hell out of an Athena comic. That sounds awesome!
Strong women are pretty damn central interest of mine. My favorite works of fiction are Sunstone (comic book) and the Kushiel series (fantasy novels).
That probably won't count for your typical REEEEEEing person of overwhelming opinion (just to avoid the term SJW), as there is sexuality involved in those and since I am an animalistic male, obviously my interests cannot go beyond that.
For the non brain-damaged among us: I'd say it's pre
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The answer is obvious. The goal is transparent. The push is to replace characters we have loved with more politically correct equivalents.....not to write badass stories with compelling plots.
Precisely.
Analogous in another area: Boy Scouts. Did they build an alternate scouting organization that was compelling enough to thrive? No, they did a basically hostile takeover of the existing one. Because "see, we own it now, ha ha lulz". That's the actual point of it.
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You should see what they did with Heathers.
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I wish these these Stupid Juvenile Whiners would stop hijacking OTHER people's characters and go make their own.
Re:How about remove SJW crap (Score:5, Interesting)
You sound entirely reasonable, but I disagree with your point on not reading. The fact of the matter is we've seen very self-righteous and pervasive commentaries claiming that not reading/watching IS a sign of bigotry. Remember all the stuff written about choosing to not go see Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Wrinkle in Time, and others.
Preceding that you may recall there was a huge mass of articles released in tandem claiming that it was time to do away with the identity of "gamer." I think there is at least some credence to the idea there is a systemic and concerted attack on a lot of geek culture. It might actually be an interesting thing to investigate. It'd take a strong constitution to deal with the filth that populates both extremes of the debate though.
Re:How about remove SJW crap (Score:4, Insightful)
Remember all the stuff written about choosing to not go see Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Wrinkle in Time, and others.
No. I've never even heard "Wrinkle in Time", let alone read any commentary on it. Ghostbusters, I seem to recall got very lukewarm reviews, though I did see it.
I think there is at least some credence to the idea there is a systemic and concerted attack on a lot of geek culture.
Welcome to the big leagues, boyo!
Here's the thing: it's not a systematic attack. Previously geek culture was basically a rather niche things, which means no one outside the niche cared about it, or had any desire to comment on it. Now it's about the most mainstream of mainstream culture.
This means you have the full weight of all of the critics (and others) bearing down on it. And it will continue ot do so just like more or less everything else in the main stream. It is not a systematic attack, it's part of the burden of being popular. Critics tend to exist in the mainstream, subcultures tend to be pretty much critic free.
Not all of the criticism will be fair, not all of it you will agree with. Some of it you might strongly dislike (but kind of know it is true anyway).
But this is life in the mainstream. Deal with it.
Re:How about remove SJW crap (Score:5, Insightful)
As for gamer culture, it's pretty clear the real gamers have already won. Steam announced [polygon.com] that they're no longer going to try to police content and no amount of SJW screeching will put that genie back in the bottle.
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Oh so you do care what other people think aof you and say about you. Otherwise you wouldn't be using what you clearly think of as insults.
The term SJW is an insult to you? Ok, but I'm just using the term to describe people who try to force their morals on everyone else. I would use "moralist" instead, but their morals are very different from conservative Christians. I can also say "third-wave feminist", but that's awfully long and it's not entirely clear that all of them are actually feminists.
Your psycho-analysis is completely off mark, as is your ability to quote things properly. What I call them has no bearing on whether I care what the
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> Ghostbusters, I seem to recall got very lukewarm reviews, though I did see it.
Too bad you already wasted your time with that shit movie.
RedLetterMedia does a fantastic job explaining WHY it was a crap movie WITHOUT even discussing ANY "gender" issues.
* Mr. Plinkett's Ghostbusters (2016) Review [youtube.com] and
* Half in the Bag Episode 112: Ghostbusters (2016) [youtube.com]
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Yes I saw it. A great stride for gender equality because it shows that women are every bit as good as men at making mediocre, pointless reboots. And that was the problem really, it had no point.
I didn't hate it, and it had it's moments, but far too few because it basically was stunningly mediocre. Very much a 2* film (there are much much worse films deserving of 1*). Would not watch again.
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No there is no systematic attack, this is simply the result of ongoing public scrutiny.
As for gamers, it turns out that public scrutiny looks down on the kind of shit that Anita Sarkeesian had to endure, especially as critics don't generally like it when people try to silence one of them. I can't imagine why!
As for that link: the forum has no credibility so nothing there can be taken as correct or even likely without full scrutiny. That means I would essential have to do research to validate your point, whi
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Remember all the stuff written about choosing to not go see Star Wars, Ghostbusters, Wrinkle in Time, and others.
No, I don't. Can you provide a link?
I can provide some counter points though. Check the IMDB user reviews of Black Panther and Wonder Woman, both great movies and commercially successful. Lots of people with suspiciously similar reviews claiming those movies are racist/sexist respectively.
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Reminds me of that meme with all the near identical brooding white dudes from video games. It's a good point, they are all the same two dimensional angst ridden violence machines, but the moment anyone actually tries to do anything different they get slammed for pandering to diversity and SJWs.
Re:How about remove SJW crap (Score:5, Insightful)
No, it wasn't a spinoff. Riri Williams, the young black teenage girl in question, literally replaced Tony Stark (whom they "killed" off) for years before they finally brought Stark back. The problems wasn't that they put Riri in the suit. The problem was that Riri was/is a TERRIBLE character. A terrible character that was part of Marvel's purposeful attempt to replace all of the classic characters with "diverse" characters, regardless of whether it made sense, was well written, or anything else that matters in fiction. The only thing that mattered were the characters' surface traits. I remember, back in the day, when Rhodey replaced Tony as Iron Man. It was a well written arc. It made complete sense based on what came before it. And Rhodey was/is a great character that had been built up over time. This had absolutely none of those things. So, while a certain loud group of people have shouted down (or tried) anyone who took issue with the direction Marvel took as being Nazis, fascists, homophobes, sexists, and racists, that characterization is without merit. Are there some of those people peppered in? Certainly. Because there are some of those people peppered into all groups. But there was/is a real, non-discriminatory criticism of Marvel's direction. And yeah, no one is forcing anyone to buy anything. Which is exactly why so many have stopped doing so. Thus, this article. And the swing and a miss by the industry to try to explain why sales are flagging.
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So I think it is fair to say you don't like Riri. I didn't read the series, so I can't say whether she was a good character or not.But I know there are a lot of diverse characters that are incredible that you are ignoring. The fact she was female and black is all you see (and may or may not be the reason she was as the replacement) but that in no way means she has to be a bad character because of that.
Ms. Marvel is arguable a replacement for Captain Marvel (even though she still exists) and is one of the be
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So I think it is fair to say you don't like Riri. I didn't read the series, so I can't say whether she was a good character or not.But I know there are a lot of diverse characters that are incredible that you are ignoring. The fact she was female and black is all you see (and may or may not be the reason she was as the replacement) but that in no way means she has to be a bad character because of that.
Can you point our exactly where she said she was a bad character because of her skin pigmentation or her sex?
There is racism here, there is sexism here - And it just so happens to be you.
There is no reason the replacement has to always be a white, straight male.
Ah, racism and sexism again. Here's the thing - many characters have been changed. Long before you decided that it was important to get rid of those straight white males you rail on about.
What happens when who the character wants to have sex with gets gratuitously thrown into the story, or 21st century American social po
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So far the more diverse Star Wars have done well at the box office, it's the one about a white guy that flopped.
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So far the more diverse Star Wars have done well at the box office, it's the one about a white guy that flopped.
Or was it the annoying android?
A lot of Star Wars fans we not pleased with the direction that the movies were taking. And it wasn't merely the social justice aspect. It was that the story lines were getting rather bad, and plot holes, and a few things that made no sense. Taking a new Jedi and turning this new into a Mary Sue character, or Marty Stu if you please just annoys people - In addition, the people involved with producing the movies were pretty dismissive of any criticism. As Kathleen Sullivan
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When you replace an existing white male character with a black woman for no other purpose than getting rid of the white male character that is both sexist and racist.
But I guess that's alight because, you know, white men deserve it.
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My anger is reserved for those who have so little confidence in their own ability to create minority characters with their own interesting back story and character development that they feel the only way minority characters can prosper is to steal the reputation and readership of established white male characters.
Compare:
Black Panther a Marvel character with a long history of his own. His well made movie was a blockbuster.
Wonder Woman a DC character with a long history of her own. Her well made movie was th
Price, content (Score:5, Insightful)
Content, thin mags where much content is hmmm to ugh.
DC's aware of this (Score:2)
I think the killer is the nerd economy just keeps getting worse. I see more and more people here on work visas and less opportunity for nerds. A lot of the nerds I know still making OK money are working 60-80 hours a week to do it. You don't have time for comic collecting when you're pulling those kinds of hours.
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Of course you have time for collecting them. Now reading, that's another thing.
But look on the bright side - if they haven't been read they'll be worth more when you're sacked for being over 40.
Re:Price, content (Score:5, Interesting)
In 2018, the cover price of a DC comic (regular, plain old, non-special edition) is $3.99 and minimum wage is $7.25 per hour (less than 2 comics per hour). They are absurdly expensive today.
Not to mention that I can buy an AAA video game a couple of year old on steam for the price of a few comics and get a heck of a lot more entertainment value for it. Comics today are about the worst rip-off possible in the entertainment industry.
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While most things have gotten much cheaper in real dollars since the 1960's, comics are al
SJW Mafia Tactics (Score:2, Interesting)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Something that readers clearly want is being denied to them by the SJW cancer in the industry.
Comic book publishers are facing a growing crisis: Flagging interest from readers and competition from digital entertainment are dragging down sales.
What a surprise that you'd deliberately ignore the elephant in the room.
Um... by your own admission the indiegogo (Score:3, Insightful)
What you're referring to seems to stem from an article Buzz Feed ran here [buzzfeednews.com] complaining that people who pushed for more diversity in comics were being trolled, harassed and threatened. Because everyone in the media likes to boil stuff down to a controversy they called the phenomenon "comicsgate".
Pushes for diversity in comics have been going on since the mid-90s boom times. You can't pin the drop in sales on that because it's a nearly 25 year old movement
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You've managed to point out the lunacy of the SJW movement and its lack of necessity all in the same post, attempting to disprove either. You are absolutely correct in that comics have been diverse (actually, it goes back WAY past the 90s). The problem is that SJWs saw and see the medium as wildly homogeneous and lacking any diversity. So they felt the had to do something about it. What they did was replace classic characters Iron Man (to a black, female teenager), Hulk (to a young asian guy), Thor (to a fe
It's not really a movement (Score:5, Insightful)
Even in as much as there's anyone seriously advocating for diversity they're doing it purely for economic reasons, usually either to reach new audiences for media they're selling or trying to bring in more workers to their businesses to drive down wages (re: silicon valley).
Always, always, always follow the money.
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it's a small group of women running out of community colleges. It's blown out of proportion by right wing media out to make a boogie man (boogie woman?) to distract you from economic issues like wages declining as productivity raises.
My career was at one of the biggest Universities in the US, and while blown out of proportion to some extent, it isn't as much as you might think.
The females who stayed could look forward to what we called the yearly promotion plan, and the rule was that anything that any woman considered sexual harassment was officially sexual harassment.
Universities are run by their football departments and Gender studies departments. The Football because it brings in money, and the Gender studies department because
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Universities are run by their football departments and Gender studies departments.
Universities being run by the small department with no money! That's one of the most charming things I've heard on slashdot today.
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You expand a market by bringing in new people. NOT by kicking your existing market out and trying to replace it with a market that doesn't yet exist. Comics tried the latter. It's failing miserably.
And how! This is what happens when entertainment industries take their marching orders from people who have ideology that can't handle anything but their own narrow views. It never works. And in this case, is tantmount to suicide.
I have an idea. Maybe if we worked from a expansion outlook. There are a lot of popular female characters from a long time ago. I don't know of any gay characters, although there were rumors about Robin and Batman. We don't have to have a gay Green Lantern, or a Female Superman.
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I was checking out the new Captian Marvel storyline. The character was interesting, it had a lot of that young person not fitting in X-men sort of vibe. The strange thing was how she kept turning into this white blonde pre-existing character. Which actually brings up a whole other set of issues. Eh I liked it. Maybe they eventually make her into her own character without calling her Captian Marvel. Of course in the movies it'll be Calptain Marvel classic. They only really changed Nick Fury there and le
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Yes, girls are a very desirable demographic. But the problem they faced, and failed to address, was how to attract that demographic while not alienating the existing audience in the process. They achieved exactly the opposite, they did not pull in new readers while at the same time making existing ones turn away.
It's not an economic problem. Comics were pretty much inflation-adjusted stable until the 1970s when the price started to rise already, and there was no problem. Inflation-adjusted prices doubled fr
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After an extremely successful IndieGogo campaign, leftist comic book stores colluded to refuse carrying Jawbreakers, and to intimidate the publisher into pulling out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com] Something that readers clearly want is being denied to them by the SJW cancer in the industry.
Comic book publishers are facing a growing crisis: Flagging interest from readers and competition from digital entertainment are dragging down sales.
What a surprise that you'd deliberately ignore the elephant in the room.
Well, They are sayingStar Wars Solo Flopped because it had a while male lead. Far left political activists are just as racist, sexist, and can dredge up their own self validating excuses as well as the far right wingnuts can do.
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Really, that 'white male lead is the problem' meme started as fucking joke in progressive circles. I was there, I saw the first appearance of it, and I had to chuckle, as I just knew the screams of rage that would cause from the knuckle-dragging basement dwellers.
As you just went on to prove. Thank you.
Re:SJW Mafia Tactics (Score:4, Interesting)
Really, that 'white male lead is the problem' meme started as fucking joke in progressive circles. I was there, I saw the first appearance of it, and I had to chuckle, as I just knew the screams of rage that would cause from the knuckle-dragging basement dwellers.
As you just went on to prove. Thank you.
Problem is, every time the far left gets caught in some racist and sexist moment. it automagically becomes a joke
But allow this knuckle dragger to go on here.
We live in an age where one's commentary lives forever once on the internet.
It is not remotely difficult to find examples of people claiming that white men are the problem a simple DDG search or Google search will provide examples - try it
Huff Post White Men Of Academia Have An ‘Objectivity’ Problem https://www.huffingtonpost.com... [huffingtonpost.com]
White males are a problem population, according to Saida Grundy of Boston U. https://www.thenewamerican.com... [thenewamerican.com]
https://www.damemagazine.com/2... [damemagazine.com]
Here's one that is an interesting read https://www.huffingtonpost.com... [huffingtonpost.com] Authored by a woman of African descent, it is both racist and has a kernal of truth in it.
I'm bored now - you want any more do the work yourself.
Are there people that are considered "white" who are obvious racists? Oh hell yes. And history is littered with their crimes.
But yes Virginia, there are people of all races and creeds and political affiliations that are racist. "white" is considered a race. Men are considered a sex. Unless you are referring to medical issues that might affect one group over another like the issues fair skinned people have in tropical sunny environments to issues faced by people with dark pigmentation face with Vitamin D shortage in northern environments, referring to angry white men is the same as referring to angry black men.
And y'all can deny you are racist just as well as the guy who likes to dress in bedsheets and burn crosses on the lawns of people they have identified by race.
tl;dr version: The far left shouldn't make jokes that look and read exactly how they feel. If you make a "joke" that reads exactly how people who are serious racists write, you'll have to forgive people who look at your "joke" and believe you mean the same.
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Funny. Every time a kerfluffle about sexism starts online it's you manbabies crying "bitches can't take a joke"
Take your projection, and stuff it up your arse, you bigoted wanker.
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Funny. Every time a kerfluffle about sexism starts online it's you manbabies crying "bitches can't take a joke"
Take your projection, and stuff it up your arse, you bigoted wanker.
Do tell us more - Also consider posting as an AC - I do understand that you are racist and sexist - I am firmly in the middle, and you left wing kooks merely serve to entertain me. As do the Right Wingnuts, it's especially fun to see you at each other's throats.
Sorry, but from a not idelogical perspective you are teh same thing as those you coonsider your enemies - A racist sexist bigot. Now get back to making me laugh sparky - it's raining here, and I'm stuck at the computer with the need to piss someo
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Who are "they"? Do you have a link to them saying this?
All the reviews I have read say it flopped because it was not a very good movie.
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Who are "they"? Do you have a link to them saying this?
All the reviews I have read say it flopped because it was not a very good movie.
I'm curious - is serviscope_minor a sock puppet of yours? Just noticed after I ignore that one's posts, you pop up. And there are some similarities, except he's much ruder, and fun to ignore.
But I've seen a litany of reasons. But only a few touched on fan revolt.
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After an extremely successful IndieGogo campaign,
That's great! They're successful independents. They got enough money to do the thing they wanted to do.
eftist comic book stores colluded to refuse carrying Jawbreaker
Sounds like you're saying "I got money you have to like me now!!!"
Those "leftist" comic book stores can carry whatever they like.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... https://www.youtube.com/watch [youtube.com]?...
Oh good grief youtbe links. No thanks. I've sat through far too many videos by the sort of people wh
Here's an idea that just might work (Score:5, Insightful)
Produce what sells and not what some loudmouths that never bought comic books (and never will) demand.
Yes, it is actually that easy.
3 Top Reasons (Score:2)
1: They keep pissing off their established fan bases with needless changes, reboots, and retcons to appease the Butthurt Brigade.
2: Comics are just too freakin' expensive per issue for the amount and quality of content you get.
3: The barrier to entry is so low now that previously ignored but still decent talent can punch their own meal ticket. Unfortunately, that allows for a lot more total and utter shit to flood the pool. But that is less important than the ability to go it your own.
Re:3 Top Reasons (Score:4, Interesting)
1: They keep pissing off their established fan bases with needless changes, reboots, and retcons to appease the Butthurt Brigade.
Continuity is a mess at the best of times, crossovers universally suck, and having to understand a byzantine layer of backstory doesn't draw in new readers. Ignoring that constant growing readership (which is what the big two's shareholders are undoubtedly demanding) is a fool's game, established fanbases die. Either literally or they drift off. New readers are a necessity to keep comics alive, never mind thriving. The movies and TV shows are immensely popular, but not turning into monthly readers despite people loving the characters.
Endless crises on infinite earths are eyerolling and infuriating, I totally agree. Trying to manage literally decades of continuity is also untenable. Long-term serialization is both awesome and slowly rotting away comics' strongest characters. I doubt there's a good solution available at all.
2: Comics are just too freakin' expensive per issue for the amount and quality of content you get.
Agreed. Personally I think getting rid of Diamond would help. Not directly or immediately, but ditching that fucking cancerous system would help out retailers and make publishers more immediately responsible to their customers which in turn would, at least, bring back realistic capitalist supply-and-demand. That's just a pet wish of mine, though.
3: The barrier to entry is so low now that previously ignored but still decent talent can punch their own meal ticket. Unfortunately, that allows for a lot more total and utter shit to flood the pool. But that is less important than the ability to go it your own.
Is this a strike against it? You honestly seem to be arguing both ways here. Lower barrier to entry means more opportunities for new blood. Yeah, there'll be dreck, but let's not pretend that lots of established players aren't shit or that there's no absolutely exquisite new talent on the scene. New writers and artists mean new stories and new readers. All that matters then is getting the best stories into everybody's hands.
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That third one was in favor of the lower barrier to entry, with the caveat that it has the drawback of generating a bigger cesspool to sift through. But that freedom to go it your own more than makes up for it.
In other words, "You take the good; you take the bad; you take them both...etc." :)
What happened to Female Thor and Girlverine sales? (Score:2)
Out of idle curiosity?
The natural cycle (Score:2)
I think this is just the natural cycle of the comics industry. What we are seeing is the end of the Bronze Age. The older generation of readers are dying off or moving on, all the mainstay writers and artists started in the 80's and 90's and they were new and interesting in the 80's and 90's, now they are old and stale. Just look at the state of comics in the mid 50's just prior to the Silver Age and then again in the mid 70's just prior to the Bronze Age. Comics in those time periods were lackluster and un
For me, price (Score:2)
Long ago. My ex and I bought loads of comics back in the 70’s when we first got married. Hitting 7/11 mostly I think. I still have them, some 9 long boxes of them. But as the 80’s rolled in, comics were getting to be too costly so we basically walked away. My local game store tried carrying them recently and stopped after 6 months or so, not because they weren’t selling but because the distributor wanted him to buy a lot more than his clientele were actually buying. Personally the comics w
Re:For me, price (Score:4, Interesting)
Yeah, I quit collecting comics (mostly Marvel) around 1992. They were too expensive for the value you got, and there were too many forced, artificial ways of driving sales without adding value (crossover stories that went on for dozens of issues, but went nowhere). When you're selling a product designed for kiddies and a professional thinks they're too expensive, you're doing something wrong.
I miss comics, but everything I've seen and read about the industry since then makes me glad I quit.
Ask your fans (Score:2)
Find out what they want and give them the plots and mythology, timeline, universe the customers want.
Streaming? (Score:2)
Comic Book Publishers, Faced With Flagging Sales, Look To Streaming
So, like still images on Netflix or something?
Or the frames will be album covers on Spotify?
Methinks something unusual is being meant by "streaming", "comic books", or both here ..
How to do a comic (Score:2)
2. Create existing comic plots for them using the plots and characters they will pay for.
3. Look who could be sold a comic with new plots.
4. Create vampire, pirate (ship and treasure), billionaire, medicine comics for readers who want a different, modern plot style.
That keeps existing plots. Decades of readers who buy comics enjoy a happy ending in the fictional universe they enjoy.
Readers can find a new comic style with varied modern plots with their
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What if they don't know how to write new plots, and when they hire professional writers to write plots, they hate them really bad and don't want to publish it?
It almost seems as if most of them need to go out of business for a few years, so that it can re-grow as a green field that lets in ideas with a market.
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Why the need to totally change what was selling and not invest in totally new content?
I'm sorry to put out ... (Score:5, Insightful)
... a bit of an anti-US rant but could you guys across the pond FINALLY PLEASE stop equating your frigging super-hero-comic-trash for "comics in general"? It is very annoying and it doesn't help that your keep repeating it.
Franco Belgian / European comics - and Japanese / Asian comics - are doing excellent and the market for high quality grown up stuff is ever growing with small publishers popping up left, right and center all the time. I have to actively limit my time at the comic store these days lest I leave all my income there. In the last 3 decades the quality of available material has grown way beyond anything available in the US at measurable scale and it's safe to conclude that anyone living in the US probably has a very very limited view of what comics and grafic novels are and can be. ... So once again:
Super hero comics are not comics in general. They are a very small fraction of comic genres in general and the quality of the material and the ever repetitive shite pulp publishers like Marvel and DC put out is bound to lead people getting fed up. This is no big surprise to anyone with a non-US perspective on comics. That US superhero trash doesn't sell anymore is actually a healthy reaction.
Wrong. (Score:4, Interesting)
don't worry... the SJW thought police will come after Japanese and European comics soon.
No they won't. Because unlike marvel/DC pulp Eurocomics are so diverse it will make even the most progressive social issue proponents head spin. In fact, if there is any media genre that is proactively progressive it's Eurocomics and perhaps some modern high quality manga. Female heroes in abundance. And unlike prude USians teen sex, sex in general, naked people, handycapped heroes and other stuff too, without *anybody* doing wee-wee in their panties because of it. ... OMG you have so little of an idea it would blow your mind. Gung Ho has sexual and power abuse as a friggin sideplot!
Minor nitpick (Score:2)
I just want to say that "The Avengers" are John Steed and Emma Peel. ("The New Avengers" John Steed and Tara King.)
Marvel's superhero team is just "Avengers", without the definite article.
Comic book shops are actually part of the problem (Score:2)
The reality is that to protect comic book shops, publishers don't sell individual titles or subscriptions to some comics. Yes, I'm su
Image Comics does another thing right (Score:2)
While the article mentioned Image Direct where you can subscribe to physical issues of their comics via mail, I'm actually more a fan of the fact that they will also sell DRM-free, high-res PDF, ePub, CBZ and CBR copies of their releases directly via their site, which for me is a much better offer than physical copies - I live in Europe so shipping would be killer, and since my fucking upstairs ex-neighbor managed to flood my home and especially the room I kept my books, comics, DVDs and CDs in twice I've g
Re: (Score:2)
Just because you call some chick thor, or some chick iron man, or some chick hulk...
Hey! Don't go dragging Miss Walters into this, at least the Byrne and earlier era She Hulks, or me SMASH puny Human. :)
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Yeah, She-Hulk dates back to the late 70s, and was an attempt to make a new and interesting character based on the Hulk, not some SJW nonsense.
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And she did 4th wall long before Deadpool. :D
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The difference is that it became a regular schtick with her.
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I figured she was likely an attempt to get more girls reading super hero comics. Probably multiple reasons though. Doesn't have to be just one or the other.
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She Hulk was a riff on the "Ms. Male Character" trope that was common in comics around then. The most obvious examples are characters like Supergirl and Batgirl. For some reason Marvel has less of them.
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It's funny, no one had an issue when a white guy replaced a white guy. When Bucky became Cap, no one was screaming. But when Sam Wilson does (the guy who actually makes the most sense) suddenly it is because of diversity. When white guy after white guy became Batman, no one complained. When white guy after white guy became the Flash, no one cared. When another white guy became Ant Man, no one cared. When Venom went from white guy to white guy, no one cared. But the minute it is someone other than another wh
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Because the story was not about a white guy replacing a white guy. It was still superhero goes to save the day against evildoer in funny costume.
The problem isn't that the superhero is now a black lesbian woman, the problem is that the story revolves around her being a black lesbian woman.
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Wow you don't actually understand what any of those words mean do you?
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I think this could be the first time I've ever seen a genuine "SJW" in the wild. Someone who makes spurious accusations of racism and bigotry and is easily offended.
Unless... You are not being serious. I can't tell. May be a skilful troll.
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I think this could be the first time I've ever seen a genuine "SJW" in the wild. Someone who makes spurious accusations of racism and bigotry and is easily offended.
Unless... You are not being serious. I can't tell. May be a skilful troll.
90 percent troll. But when you want to tell if a person is racist - review their comments and replace white with black, and men with women and review. If the new statement is racist or sexist - the original one is too. That isn't spurious unless you support racism and sexism against white males - and just don't recognize it.
And I'm actually pretty hard to offend - but I don't at all mind offending others - especially if the purposeful offending statement carries the truth. Otherwise, I am happy to sit a
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Don't you think that there might be some historic context though?