Vertigo! Waiting for the Trade! Jonah Hex! Image United! Swamp Thing! And more! (38:56)
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6 thoughts on “The Daily Rios 12.21.12: Feedback Friday”
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Since getting out of buying comics per say in the early 2000s due to finances after university, I gave up on comics for about four years due to my job taking me overnights , new kids, etc. My only real follow up was through sneaking a copy of Wizard off the shelf while working and reading it cover to cover. This kept me in the loop for several years. Then I got into listening to podcast’s. It was Comic Geek Speak that actually got me back into reading books full time. I have read faithfully and heavily again since 2008.
So my tastes of acquiring them changed as well.Trades became my way of catching up. Then through other nefarious means I caught up on EVERYTHING I missed and now I am back in action. I have aborted floppies altogether. Now I read everything I can get and will actually buy trades of issue arcs or best of that I love!
Simply put, with the digital age and many new means (Some legal and some shady) of reading books my money goes to trades. Although believe it or not the new Archie magazine format comic had me almost plank down cash for them but I have yet to be convinced but I love the new style.
Cool! CGS was responsible for bringing back many “lapsed” readers over the years. I truly believe those early years of comics podcasting was a good thing for comics and comic fandom.
First I’m not claiming you do this Peter but I do get a little upset with people who go on about it being our job to keep things like Vertigo in profit. I am a public school teacher and a single father and I do not feel one bit of financal responsibility towards any one other than my son. I don’t like that Vertigo is going through hard times but to be honest they only have one book I enjoy reading, American Vampire, and I am not going to buy a book I don’t want to read just to help keep Vertigo in business. I enjoy writing and have taken a few screenplay writing classes and had the chance to hear a some good and successful writers talk and one thing that many of them say is “to make it you have to be so good they can’t ignore you.” I believe this is true for comics as well in the late 80s and 90s Vertigo could not be ignored they had titles people had to buy, but sadly in the past few years Vertigo had been easy to ignore.
Scott! It’s not wrong to say that Vertigo was in a bit of decline even before the whole DC Entertainment restructuring. Fables and Y the Last Man (and a few others) certainly held the line up, but they needed more support from the rest of the output. Not that Vertigo was tanking, but perhaps this could be a nice injection of new thought behind the line for the future. Time will tell.
To your first point – I’m all for readers who just want to buy some comics, read them and move on. Awesome. Most likely there are more of those types of readers than we think. I’ve met tons of them on the convention circuit and they are just happy to be reading during a time of great comics from all kinds of publishers. For me, when it goes further, such as in the argument I presented in this episode, it’s the readers that say they only want to read comics, but then yell whenever a title is canceled or a line is discontinued and somehow want to place the blame somewhere – a publisher, superhero readers, etc. That’s when I put my hand in their face and say “Hold it, loudmouth. What did YOU do to help or hurt the situation?”.
It’s the same with blogs/podcasts/etc – that dump press release after press release for the next big crossover or variant covers or sell outs or that complain about mainstream comics that they aren’t reading anyway – but then write scathing articles on why indie title A failed or why readers are ignoring title B. Well – how about using some of that space you took up with hit-baiting crap to tell people what you’re actually enjoying!
I like holding a mirror up to those kind of comic critics. Then they can see what kind of fog they release. haha
I hope you can hear this, because I’m applauding you right now, good sir. Good stuff! Keep on being awesome, my friend!
Thanks Dirk!