Japanese manga vs American comics?

[thecrystalrook]

The American comic book industry is very much still alive, and it's certainly not overtaken by manga. Check out your local comic book shops - mom & pop shops in particular - they are primarily selling American style comics, and have a small, if any, section dedicated to manga and anime. I've had local shops turn down my consignment offers simply because they refuse to sell manga.

[HGohwell]

So, this is purely from a where I am standpoints, but all those types of shops that try to pop up in my area, and there have been quite a few, end up closing within a year, 2 at most because they're struggling for business. And we're not a small city. The few that have survived have downscaled their comics section more and more and either become cafes or shifted to focus on table top gaming or "nerd culture" in general. Meanwhile manga is sold in all the big bookstores where I am, and a decent range not just the big names, which I think goes back to this perception (and maybe that's why it feels like American style comics are slowing whether they actually are or not) that manga is just everywhere and easier to get access to.

[powerplantanimations]

Big Marvel and DC reader here. Will give my thoughts.

I do contribute it to weak/baity writing also on the American side. I remember the plotline where Joker being pregnant storyline (yes that's real) made people uncomfortable.

I mean I love comics a lot but a lot of the editorial are shooting themselves in the foot with WEIRD decisions. Also they're a bit unsubtle to the point where it's comical. There's a Captain America comic where Red Skull outright makes Jordan Peterson videos. I probably hate Jordan Peterson more than everyone else (I hold the Guinness World Record), but... this callout stuff isn't healthy. I get it. It's ingrained in Marvel... Hitler was punched by Captain America yadda yadda.... but this is the type of stuff I see when I scroll down Twitter. It's not new. It's not innovative. Shake things up for Christ's sake.

Take the Spider-Man situation for example. Just. Let. Peter. Marry. Mary Jane. They constantly retcon that. It's gotten so bad that when they did a panel, the entire crowd CHEERED when they briefly mentioned it. But they don't think their audience is ready for that despite Spider-Verse being THE BEST THING EVER. It's so annoying seeing him suffer. He's literally Marvel Jesus. He must suffer for our entertainment. Who wants to bet that Black Cat is going to be MCU's wife?

Also... as a fellow trademark ayaiyaiyai Mexican... what the Hell is this?

And the whole racism issue with staff. People got mad at Miles Thor for how racist he was lmao.

Finally, it's clear now that the status quo is film, tv shows, and video games now. Even the MCU doesn't seem to acknowledge 616. They call THEMSELVES 616. Also yeah... the everything is canon rule is stupid. I prefer DC a little more since they reboot their universe.

I personally like manga now because I appreciate the lengths Japanese people go through to researching topics to an ungodly degree. Americans have this habit of being like "YEAH WE'RE THE FIRST ONES TO SAY STUFF THAT PEOPLE HAVE BEEN SAYING FOR A LONG TIME! LOOK HOW BIG OUR HIGH HORSES ARE."

It needs to DIE.

Sorry for the little rant. As much as I love American comics, these are my gripes.

BTW QUICK EDIT! I do see hope with James Gunn leading the DC Universe now. He seems to be obsessed with variety.

[aqua03]

Honestly, I've always found the biggest leg up Manga has over comics is accessibility. Manga volumes tend to offer more "Bang for your buck" in terms of content plus tend to have a relatively straightforward and contained narrative compared to how labyrinthine a lot of big Western comics are and how it seems like there's little to no ending in sight for said comics as well.

At least that's my thoughts on the subject as a fan of both mediums.

[Kelheor]

Well, maybe actually creating something new instead of milking the same 10 characters from the 60's could help.

[powerplantanimations]

[thepenmonster]

the same 10 characters from the 60's

Whippersnappers! Real superheroes are from the Great Depression!

[NickRowler]

I remember the plotline where Joker being pregnant storyline (yes that's real) made people uncomfortable.

I watched a video of someone talking about this. The whole thing was suppose to be a silly comedy. Even the guy who wrote it seemed like his motivation to write it was apolitical and he just wanted to write a dark comedy. It's stupid that people turned such a goofy story into some huge political thing which is was never trying to be. I guess that is why American comics struggle to evolve because everything they do gets picked apart into whatever hashtag outrage is trending on social media.

[BoomerZ]

There is so much with wrong with american comics right now its hard to begin.
1: The storytelling is trash. I'm not talking about the story themes or genre, I'm talking about the technical side of it. They don't allow quiet time of panels. I single splash page might look good but the reader seriously looks at for 10 seconds and moves on. Meanwhile that takes up 1/11th of the total page count of the average book. Manga is not afraid to have character just react to something.
2. American comics have a lot of tell don't show. Dialogue boxes telling me Spider-man is swinging across New York.
3. Marvel and DC trying to redo older characters to fit a story instead of making a new character for it. No one cares about the new wolverine, Logan is wolverine. No one cares about Miles. No one cares about most of the reskinned characters and their sells reflect that.
4. Having writers that want to make people uncomfortable is a sure way to fail. The above Red Skull or joker getting pregnant only does one thing, piss off paying costumers. They leave and don't come back
5. Not making the movies tie into the movies. Auqaman makes literally a billion dollars. The comic gets cancelled after 4 months. Tony was dead in the comics during his movie run. So little Johnny love RDJ and wants to read about him in more adventures. Nope, you can read about Iron Heart. Johnny doesn't care and moves on.

The only thing saving DC comics and Marvel is their parent company doesn't care about them in the slightest. The comic sales are a rounding error to disney or warner. The IPs are worth money, the actual books are not.

[darthmongoose]

The "Is Manga going to take over American Comics!?" argument is already outdated.

They're both losing to webcomics now.

Which doesn't mean either is going to go completely out of business, cease to be or get devoured by webcomics... It's just like... yeah, manga didn't completely overtake American comics in the early 00s like some people said it would, prompting Marvel to make the hilariously awful "Mangaverse", it just became a more popular format for comics with an audience that felt like American comics weren't really catering to them, and it was also more affordable. Now the only bar for entry on webcomics is "do you have a phone", and due to how they're made, webcomics are a lot more able to feel genuinely up-to-date with culture, they've attracted a big audience that just feel like both American comics and a lot of manga have become impenetrably insular, irrelevent to young people due to too much adherence to established tropes and archetypes that are popular with existing audiences, and expensive.

Currently, if you're not a super well-known creator already, most pro comics people in the English speaking world agree that the money in print comics is in children's graphic novels; it's the only area of print comics that's actually growing in places like the US and UK, largely because you can't easily monetise kids digital comics due to various regulations (they can't have a user profile, they can't be advertised to, they can't pay for microtransactions...).

So we have DC and Marvel dipping their toes in both the webcomics waters and making books aimed at a younger audience, and we also have experiments with manga made in a webcomic format, or the Shounen Jump App (I love the shounen jump app, it's a genius way to beat scanslation, by releasing a better, higher quality translation on a convenient app the day of the Japanese release for just £2 a month. Hell yeah I'll pay for that!). It's not going to replace floppies and trades, or weekly jump and tankobon completely, but I think in most parts of the world, we're going to see the same trend as in parts of Asia, where the "biggest comic publisher" is Webtoon.

[powerplantanimations]

Who said it had anything to do with politics? My problem with it is it made general audiences uncomfortable. Who cares if it's supposed to be a comedy when the masses didn't find it funny? It came across as if the people in charge were just scraping at the bottom of the barrel when coming up with ways for people to read their comics (I've seen some titles being thrown around in circles where people go "Are you kidding me?"). I generally don't know where you came across the political hashtag thing. If someone did do that then that's obviously the least of DC's worries since they'll be more concerned with the people I mentioned.

[Archetype_Moon]

What is even sadder is that most people have not even read a single issue and are only basing their opinion on other media.

[Freemints30]

made general audiences uncomfortable. Who cares if it's supposed to be a comedy when the masses didn't find it funny? It came across as if the people in charge were just scraping at the bottom of the barrel when coming up with ways for people to read their comics

Uuuuh I wonder who mostly cus Ive never heard of it other an its weird by people offline. Buuut pregant guy plots are actually VERY suprisingly common in comdy really. Any 90's cartoon has the plot where the guy gets pregnant and now is daddy some how. Range from funny to just weird. Fairy Odd parents was funny mostly given context of the creator claiming "christian values in that show"

Personally I feel the indie comic scene of America, at least that style is flourishing and growing as more and more creators make new and different projects and characters people want rather than just super heroes. Pretty much broadening their audience and appeal.

DC and Marvel still seen as boyish thing in the states which is shame cus they lose out on a very lucrative demographic. But that's their lose. I do wish for more adult horror comics thou (Comics code murdered those comics in the 60's as well as romance... F them ), most of the ones Ive got into are either manga or online. With few exceptions

[NickRowler]

Who said it had anything to do with politics? My problem with it is it made general audiences uncomfortable. Who cares if it's supposed to be a comedy when the masses didn't find it funny? It came across as if the people in charge were just scraping at the bottom of the barrel when coming up with ways for people to read their comics (I've seen some titles being thrown around in circles where people go "Are you kidding me?"). I generally don't know where you came across the political hashtag thing. If someone did do that then that's obviously the least of DC's worries since they'll be more concerned with the people I mentioned.

A lot of content creators were using the one panel of him being pregnant and making 10 - 20 min videos ranting about how DC was trying to push a "woke agenda". The writer said he had no deep meaning or political reason for creating it, so seeing TV news broadcasters cover it sort of confused him. He said he was inspired by Silver Age comics which tended to be more campy. I feel like social media created an echo chamber that people needed to be shocked or outraged about it.

I do agree there is a deeper issue with DC, but I think it's because they don't want to change or evolve. They hire people on to write stories to the teens of today, but instead of just letting the writer create their own stuff, it seems like it's more "how can you shoehorn this into the DC/Marvel universe?". They have the resources to create their own Heartstopper but don't because they are way too concerned with sticking super heroes in everything.

[TAMAnnoying]

A.... Modest proposal?

[powerplantanimations]

.......

I had an aneurism when you mentioned the writer being inspired by silver age. This guy probably doesn't do his research just like the people who made those videos or those news networks (coming from a guy who's obsessed with silver age media). That might sound harsh but like... I get silver age is goofy and I get this particular story is supposed to be "dark" but... I've seen people do better. This is low-hanging fruit. Leave that stuff for the Harley Quinn's.

Anyway, I don't agree with your second statement either since DC's been giving the writers nothing but freedom like the Vertigo label or the Black label or the Webtoons comics. Marvel's the one that's been lagging behind with that bit.

Regarding the Heartstopper bit. They did do that multiple times like with the Gotham High story or "I'm Not Starfire" graphic novel... I think you can guess the outcome of those two stories.

[darryljoll14]

In my opinion, Manga is better than American Comics.

[NickRowler]

Regarding the Heartstopper bit. They did do that multiple times like with the Gotham High story or "I'm Not Starfire" graphic novel... I think you can guess the outcome of those two stories.

I'm not sure if you read what I wrote...

They hire people on to write stories to the teens of today, but instead of just letting the writer create their own stuff, it seems like it's more "how can you shoehorn this into the DC/Marvel universe?". They have the resources to create their own Heartstopper but don't because they are way too concerned with sticking super heroes in everything.

As in, let people freakin write stuff that isn't another superhero story. Both of the example you gave are just riding off of IPs, with the Starfire one being a superhero story. The reason why I gave Heartstopper as an example is because it is currently the top selling graphic novel. It's not about superheros, it's a teen romance drama that talks about topics teens care about.

DC/Marvel biggest issue is they don't want to adapt to the idea of having a larger diversity in genres, which is why young adult readers tend to prefer manga and webcomics.

[powerplantanimations]

And I'm saying DC's been doing what with DMZ, Sweet Tooth, and Sandman. That's what the Vertigo and Black labels are for. They've also been doing teen romances as well. Marvel seems to be a little too chained to their IP's.

[system]

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