Comics to the People: Right On?

Since comics is something only a few people care about, I sorta feel like I should warn people when I'm going to start talking about it. So face front, true believers--it's time to talk about comics again. (The rest of you philistines can go watch CSI or something.)

Nick Barrucci, head of Dynamic Forces, a company that makes comics-related collectibles (busts, statues, autographed comic books, foil-enhanced "special edition" comic books with fancy covers), recently issued a "call to arms" to the industry in which he outlines steps he feels will advance the medium, and the business, of comics. There are three installments, which can be found here, here, and here, at comics news site Newsarama. It's the buzz of the biz right now.

Parts of it are pretty smart. The world of comics fandom is famously insular, and despite the high awareness levels in the general population of Hollywoodized characters like the Hulk, the X-Men, Spider-Man, Batman, Superman, etc., very few fans of these movie characters actually buy their comics, either in their monthly pamphlet form or in collected edition paperbacks (though that last bit is changing a little). Comics DOES need to advertise, then, to get people aware and interested in the medium. Barrucci proposes a fund for paying for the ads, and a slogan along the lines of "Got Milk?" Good ideas both.

But the slogan cannot, must not be "Comics Are Cool." The very fact that you need to say they're cool will be perceived, correctly, as a sign that they aren't. It reminds me of when Long Island modern/altrock radio station 92.7 WDRE, in an effort to survive during the mid-90s corporate-alternative-radio explosion (during which NYC area stations Z-100, KROCK, WNEW and Q104.3 were all playing some brand of alt-heavy radio), began calling itself "The Underground Network," and referring to itself as such about 20 times per hour. "How underground could they be?" I thought, and changed the channel. That's what people will do if "Comics Are Cool" is plastered all over the place, and I don't care how many pictures of Samuel L. Jackson or Ben Affleck or even J.Lo reading the latest issue of The Ultimates you put up on bus stops.

Aside from running ads before comics-derived or inspired films, which seems like a) a no-brainer and b) something that's within the realm of possibility for the comics companies to finagle, the right-in-front-of-you-all-along obvious place for comics ads is college newspapers. The clothing-company lifestyle publication for which I am a freelance editor has used ads in college papers to great success, at a fraction of the cost and with an exponentially more appropriate demographic as the hugely expensive and probably ineffectual ads we occasionally run in big fashion magazines. If a company like Marvel put a few thousand dollars aside every month to advertise the latest Daredevil, X-Men, X-Force/X-Statix collection in The Yale Daily News, allowing for a place in the ad where local comics stores could put their address, they'd increase sales dramatically, I guarantee you. And that's for superhero stuff, which in its comics form might be seen as geeky. When Fantagraphics pulls itself out of its financial doldrums, perhaps they might consider plugging their brilliant, sophisticated books in college papers (if they don't already do so). Kim, Gary, Eric, Dirk et al, believe me: people will go and buy them.

Article Author: Sean T. Collins

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