Posted in: Comics | Tagged: class warfare

Class Warfare In Comic Book Publishing – Britain Speaks Out

Published Tue, 10 Mar 2020 08:30:15 -0500

Bambos Georgiou is one of the longstanding grandees of the British comic book industry. Having used comics to teach himself English, he travelled from Greece to London where he worked as editor, writer, penciller, inker, colourist, whatever was needed for the eighties and nineties British comic book scene, which included a staff job at Marvel UK, and freelance work on Spider-Man, Doctor Who, Rugrats, Penthouse Comix, James Bond Jr, Wallace and Gromit, Transformers, Deadline, Judge Dredd, Sleeze Brothers (where I first saw his name), Anno Dracula, A1, Knights Of Pendragon, Death's Head, Overkill and so much more – as well his creator-owned work such as Alpha Pets. He also founded the digital comics weekly anthology Aces Weekly with David Lloyd. But he is wondering what happened to comic books and why they are all so middle class? Last week posted on Facebook, which set off a litany of comments from the great and the good. Here is a small selection of the splintered thread.. welcome to a little class warfare.

Bambos Georgiou: Comics have become disgustingly middle class now that UK book publishers are involved. The industry I joined back in the 80s was aimed squarely at working class kids and produced by people who considered themselves self trained craftsmen and women (but mostly men). It's no surprise that middle class book publishers feel happier/more comfortable dealing with middle class creators who will in turn produce works aimed at a middle class audience. Of course once a middle class person has produced their single graphic novel they then set themselves up as a teacher – they're middle class of course they would!! The comic shop owner in the Simpsons said that they had turned a mass medium into a cottage industry, years later a comic professional said that creating comics was becoming a hobby. I'm afraid they were right, and who has the financial security to pursue such a hobby – the middle class… The UK comics industry has obviously lost it's way and this is just another manifestation of that ghastly debacle. Comics is a mass medium which should be aimed at the masses.

Back in the day there were a lot of working class creators in the UK, many of them Scottish. I'm not saying all Scots are working class but they were a vital part of our industry. All that's gone now. The US comic industry was created by the children of Immigrants who struggled to find a way out of their impoverished surroundings. Let's face it comics need a bit of an edge to them and you don't get that from people who are comfortable and like the way things are because it's working for them. If comics were selling through the roof I'd shrug my shoulders and say it's not for me but it's obviously working. Unfortunately that's not really happening.

John Freeman (comics, creator, editor and publisher of Down the Tubes comics blog),: There's no question that comics are no longer the mass market product they once were, but there are plenty of economic reasons for that, and creative ones, too; for example, in "Gothic for Girls", Julia Round highlights the fact that a lot of good creators who used to write comics started writing books instead, for the "middle class" publishers you mention, because they got a better rights deal and a share of profits. A lot of comic creators fought for the same kind of deals back when we were in mainstream publishing and those that wrote for Marvel UK US market titles at least got a share of a revenue; Paul Neary and I even ensured an earlier rights deal to creators who'd worked on STRIP was honoured, despite attempts to renege on it, which Paul extended to Lew Stringer, so he owns "Combat Colin".

Comics aren't mainstream because they aren't cheap, apart from, relatively speaking, Beano – oh, and look weekly sales are at 48,000 average, and back from a precipice of just a few scant years ago that the Dandy went over. If comics aren't the price of a chocolate bar, like they used to be, it makes it even harder to compete with free stuff – TV film, pirated TV, film, comics, never mind entertainment stuff consumers still buy – games, for example, who have a massive marketing budget compared with any comic either you or I ever worked on, I imagine. And comics of the 1970s did have a marketing budget – you only need to search for those now grainy ads for 2000AD on YouTube by way of example.

So it's no wonder comics have gone "middle class" – because that's who can afford the things. I may have misread a post, but someone was bemoaning the fact that a new Marvel #1 comic would costs around £7 to buy. £7? That's almost a month's Netflix sub. No contest. So I fully appreciate it, actually, when David Lloyd pushes Aces Weekly, and I'm sure he'll be along in a minute, which you work on, with its ridiculously cheap subscription price, knowing at the same time that as a digital title he faces an uphill battle convincing people to buy stuff when there is so many other legal digital comics out there, never mind the pirated stuff.

If you have some thoughts on how to wave a magic wand and take us back to the 1970s, when the cover price of comics was kept low thanks to the advertising for sweets, sweet cereals and other things comics can no longer take advertising for, if you can get publisher to but their massive Guttenberg presses back that they had to keep running because they were too expensive to stop (now all sold off) so, hey, let's slap a comic on there, then I'd be delighted to hear your solution. I'm not dismissing what you're saying, but it's so easy to oversimplify the challenges comic publishers face trying to reconnect with that mass market, not helped by a news chin that wants you to pay through the nose to stock a title, a distribution system that favours established titles, and a potential audience who are perhaps more conservative than you might think, quite happy to pick up a licensed title because they've seen it on the holiday, rather than the comic an old git like me picked up and laughed their socks off at when he read a strip Nigel Auchterlounie had penned. (I'm happy to say the kid who saw me do this did actually pick up the Beano to see what I was laughing at after I'd moved away, but he didn't buy it – curses!) And yes, I do think about this rather too much, too.

Bambos: But at least you do think about it, John. I wish I did have a magic wand to wave I'd wear my arm out waving it. I would love it if a publisher called my bluff and said – "if you don't like the way we do things, you have a go". I could hardly do a worse job than they are doing at the moment. I often wonder if people think my posts are secret plugs for Aces Weekly, but they're not. I just feel obligated to put down on record that I'm not okay with this. I was a good soldier I did what the publishers asked of me, hit the deadlines, worked on what they told me to etc. Now I just feel it's time to point out they all got it wrong. Everything. Wrong. Proven – wrong. The proof is staring us in the face. No comic industry to speak of. We are the equivalent of the French pop music industry. Think if we had that instead of the British pop music industry. That's what we're missing out on with our comic industry. Good point about Netflix. If comics were still a mass medium comics would be cheaper. But the industry when faced with the decision do we try and get new customers or just charge the old customers more has made the same decision for thirty years. It gets harder to do the longer you put it off. I still think there's masses of money to be made out of comics, you just need a publisher to have a bit of brains and some balls.

John Freeman: I don't think you can argue DC Thomson/ Beano Studios has gone the route of middle class kids only and has worked very hard to keep the title strong and keep the price of the comic down, which is vital. My concerns are that they do have a tendency to sideline the comic on the web site in favour of overall brand – and of course the age old issue of page rates, but that's an issue not confined to that publisher. But they are clearly doing something very right with the Beano and it's paying off in terms of news stand sales and subscriptions. That is something to highlight, because we all know that when a commercial publisher does have a hit on its hands, there will be others seeking to emulate it. As a sector, teenage and children's titles are still second only to puzzle books in terms of sales, not only in this country but worldwide – see https://www.inpublishing.co.uk/…/finding-the…. They can still work.

Bambos: Yes, John, I've read this before. I can't understand why publishers don't put more efforts into this kind of publishing. This is the kind of thing that confuses me, on the one hand publishers do what finances dictate on the other hand they ignore the financial statistics!? From my experience publishers don't go near what they don't understand. They don't know how to do comics so they just don't go there.

BP Johnson (of Blythemporia Art) also had much to add, saying: The thing is, it's not a one way transaction, the publishers send stuff out, see what "works" and keep altering their output, over and over again. The consumers have a lot to do with what gets released, even though, from that vantage point it's hard to see. It's easy to blame the publishers but they are carefully responding to continuous market research. Look at the flack 2000ad gets, a "magazine for middle aged boys", Slaine the horned God rereleased every year with a slightly different cover, but to be fair, Rebellion are going where the money is, they are giving people what they want, if that comes at a cost to casual readers, it's a dwindling readership, sure, but the casual readers have already left.

You have to remember as well that "safe" and "middle class" are often confused, we are still living in a time when parents actually believe that FAIRY TALE ANIMALS ARE TELLING THEIR KIDS TO DO BAD THINGS. There were moral panics, genuine hysteria about the ninja turtles in the late eighties, people believed the ninja turtles were telling kids directly to drop acid and get in sewers. PEOPLE ACTUALLY BELIEVED THAT SPIDERMAN was telling kids to jump out of windows when I was a kid. Modern times are not that different, why do you think that Batman movies and Rik and Morty are aimed at adults? Because it's the only way kids will get to see them. Package the item as a grown up media, but let kids watch it anyway is the only way to get it out there without Mrs Jones from number 89 to not sue you.

Lew Stringer (legendary cartoonist, comics creator and publisher – and of the Blimey British Comics blog) also wanted in, saying: I agree with BP Johnson and John Freeman, who have put their points across more eloquently than I was about to. Here's an anecdote: I still use the same newsagents that I did when I was growing up on the nearby council estate. Back then, 50 years ago, they stocked pretty much every comic and they sold shedloads. These days NO comics sell there. They've tried Beano, Toxic, the Panini Marvels… and no one buys them except me! The decline was gradual and has been taking place for the last few decades. Sometimes a kid might buy an activity mag, but not a comic. As with most corner shops, my newsagent has reduced magazine space so he can sell more booze and groceries because the "working class" for want of a better name aren't buying comics now. That's due to a number of factors, including the high price of comics, but it's understandable why publishers now pursue a more affluent customer by turning to graphic novels. They're reflecting a change in society. I'm thankful that The Beano is still doing ok, and has actually increased sales every year over the past 4 or 5 years, but it's a well known brand and doesn't necessarily mean that a similar new comic would prosper as well. Kudos to Rebellion for having a damn good try though with all the specials they're publishing this year: Action, Smash!, Battle, Buster, Misty, etc. I hope people support them so maybe, just maybe, a new monthly or even quarterly comic could emerge from it.

Bambos: I should mention again that of the approximately five originated comics out there; Beano, Phoenix, 2000AD, Viz, Megazine (half) and Commando (half) – two of them (Beano & Viz) are in the top 10 sellers. How is that not seen as an encouragement to publishers to produce more originated material?

Lew Stringer: I agree other publishers should try too. Sadly some, like Egmont in the UK, only see themselves as magazine / book publishers now. I don't think they have any staff left with comics experience. Again it comes down to "branding" these days and retailers only feeling comfortable with names they recognise such as Beano and Viz. Even then, a Dennis and Gnasher comic from a few years back didn't survive for long. The main success story in recent times is The Phoenix (a very middle class comic IMHO) and that is mainly due to subscriptions rather than the one or two copies that some branches of Smiths agree to stock.

Bring in Dave Elliot, comicspublisher of Warrior, Atomeka, Legion M and more. He wrote: To have a comics industry you have to have success. You need sales. Sales give you a base to build and grow from. Money to experiment on new and different titles supported by a strong spine of solid sellers. The only company I know in this position is Scholastic. Scholastic is a middle class and as PC a company as you could ever hope to find. In the 80s we were on the tail end of reasonably good selling companies doing well and then hitting a wall in the early 90s. I don't think the industry ever recovered after that. Scholastic have charted a new path and is creating new readers. At some point, some of those readers will want something more engaging and perhaps a little less PC that Scholastic isn't ready to publish. Hopefully, they find something else by other publishers that keep them still reading graphic novels.

Bambos: A range of comics, okay some of them of course will be very middle class. It's gone too far here in the UK. The book publishers have just landed us with another conundrum. Plus now there's nothing to read in the UK until suddenly you come to graphic novels for adults. At least Scholastic is building the audience at a younger age. I read Smile and was suitably impressed.

Dave Elliot: DC Comics was very innovative until they couldn't afford to be any longer. When you go from being the research and development arm of a major studio to a self-sustaining publisher you can't be as experimental.

Bambos: Are you going to replace Dan Didio?

Dave Elliot: I'm the last person they'd want in that spot. I would completely want to change everything about them.

When I wrote this, it wasn't what I wanted to do with the companies but it was a way the two majors could start reaching out to a larger base of readers again; https://downthetubes.net/?p=45823

I personally would take DC Comics closer to a Scholastic model as a base and have YA and older lines come out of it.

Bambos: Just read your Creating Comics piece. Let me guess the big two are unwilling to cede shelf space because that might let someone else in to compete with them. They'd rather be number one and two in a dwindling market than three and four in a growing market. The most important thing is a healthy industry. You can't have a healthy company in an ailing industry.

Dave Elliot: Bam, the problem is capitalism, which America runs on. Marvel and DC only care about their money and their IP. They don't consider the industry as a whole. They contributed to the decline in Europe of the comics market in the late 90s and early 00s. They forced publishers to take more titles than they wanted to carry to get the titles they wanted. When they didn't take enough, titles were offered to new publishers looking for a start up. That now meant there were too many titles on the stands. Good home grown magazines went from two facings to one as there wasn't enough room on the racks. In Spain, magazines like CIMOC were pushed off the racks by a glut of poor selling comics that weren't selling. This is the shit they did everywhere. I'm concerned that Scholastic will follow them! In Europe, publishers actually get together and discuss the industry and even occasionally work together to promote events. We had a little of that in the late 80s and early 90s among the independents but that disappeared after the big implosion of the early 90s.

Bambos: Even Hollywood, which I imagine is far more cutthroat, makes sure that the industry is strong. I'm sure they have their own problems but they survived TV, which was supposed to be the death of movies.

Dave Elliott: Hollywood is strong because it adapted and its medium is fluid, its moving images and sound. Comics is struggling because there aren't many things that you can't do equally as well as comics in other media. We used to say that comics is film with impossible budgets, but that's not true any more. Comics have a place in entertainment, we just have to carve out that niche and enjoy it.

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