Another Comic Business Post

Starting to re-think that last post and I may post a follow up eventually. After all, who am I to crap on anyone's dream? Even if it is to walk into Marvel Comics and just be handed the reins to Spider-Man.

But on another comic related topic, Terry Moore recently made an appeal for people to pick up Rachel Rising periodicals as the numbers are getting to the point where it may not be worth it to keep going. Two things seem to be factors. One, people are buying trades and with the current comic business set up it's periodicals that keep a comic going (unless it gets to Walking Dead/Fables level and the trades sell like crazy). Moore makes more money on periodicals. If the periodical sale isn't there it never gets collected into trades. Second, sales have been okay but it's getting to the point where the buzz isn't there anymore. The book started with the usual Terry Moore crowd. Reviewers raved about it and it picked up some readers as the buzz grew. But now Moore says people aren't really buzzing anymore. People (reviewers/bloggers) aren't saying much because it's the same thing with each issue: "Another great issue", "You should be reading this series", etc. And since it gets old repeating yourself and these people are looking to bring in readers themselves with new stuff, people sort of stop talking about it.

Other creators have noticed this with their books too. They get a few issues in, there's a buzz created, sales go up as people check it out, but eventually sales plateau and people just stop talking about this excellent series that's still going on.

So what happens? Well, if you're Marvel or DC you make an event. You change the creative team. You say the universe will never be the same. You kill a character or bring one back from the dead. Or you shove the villain into the heroes body, essentially killing off the hero. People bitch. People complain. But people talk and people buy.

Or, you limit your series. You follow Y the Last Man, DMZ, Scalped, Sandman, and countless others and you bring your story to a close to move on to other stuff.

Or, we (meaning someone other than me) figure out how to make the comic business work. We have periodicals, we have trades, we have digital. The methods are all there to get a comic creators work out to their audience and people have shown a willingness to pay so what is the problem here?

Either way, I do hope things work out for Terry Moore and Rachel Rising is a great series that you should be reading.