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Forum - View topicN.American Comic Market Reaches US$870 Million
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Sir Daniel Fortesque
Posts: 236 |
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What's Japan's comic book market worth for comparison's sake?
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lostrune
 Posts: 313 |
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I couldn't find numbers for 2013 but 2012's was 2.88 billion. Though it's a bit unfair to compare, after all the North American numbers also include both comics and manga so it should be lower if you're looking for a more straight comparison 
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Spotlesseden
Posts: 3514 Location: earth |
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The Japanese market is around 6 times more than that. And Japan has a smaller population. Even the France comic Market is bigger than US. Some manga can sell more than 100k a vol in France. |
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mangamuscle
Posts: 2658 Location: Mexico |
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Any estimates of what percentage from those $870 million are from manga sales?
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Rahxephon91
 Posts: 1859 Location: Park Forest IL. |
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Hopefully it gets even bigger and it should. Image and Marvel have been putting out really quality stuff. It's really amazing what cool and unique stuff image is doing these days.
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H. Guderian
Posts: 1255 |
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How much of the increase is inflation?
How many -more- books did they sell, as opposed to a stagnant or lower amount of books at higher price points? |
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Ali07
 Posts: 3333 Location: Victoria, Australia |
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Hmm, on units sold...I think that it is close to (and at times been better than) the last couple of years. As much as people complain about $3.99, not many seem to be dropping off yet.
Though, no one seems to really know what the digital numbers are for some of the companies (mainly Marvel and DC I think). They're keeping those close to their chests. The main disappointment has been that with all these superhero movies coming out, they've not brought in many (if any) new readers.
They can't seem to put a foot wrong. I'm getting more Image stuff than ever, and DC have been the ones to take the hit due to my shifting dollars. Unfortunately, as much hype as there was around DC's "reboot", the numbers have died down to what they were selling (or close to) before Flashpoint. |
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ajr
Posts: 465 |
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Digital makes up more than I thought, and I suspect that proportion will gain as the web publishers prove their stability and/or assuage the content owners that this won't cost them sales due to increased piracy. I like printed book as much as most folks, but the paper used for manga is pretty cheap stuff, and they eventually take up a pretty solid amount of space.
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enurtsol
 Posts: 14886 |
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Here's the last one I recall off the head: 
Although: animenewsnetwork.com/news/2013-11-21/manga-sales-grew-over-6-percent-in-u.s-in-2013-so-far
Well, it did grow a bit:
The Comichron site seems to have more numbers.
It's different stuff like Walking Dead that are. Although Spider-Man did very well. |
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Ali07
Posts: 3333 Location: Victoria, Australia |
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Spider-Man got a massive bump due to another renumbering. They had been going with "Superior Spider-Man" for a couple of years and this year brought back "Amazing Spider-Man" with a new number 1 issue. That is why it got such a massive bump. Along with offering alternate covers that would force a retailer to order a certain amount of copies in order to get the rare cover for the issue. A shift in story also happened, seeing as Peter Parker "returned" after being "gone" for the entire run of "Superior Spider-Man".
The renumbering and alternate covers are just standard gimmicks in American comics, always used to pump up the number of units "sold". Whatever is in sales estimates, in terms of units, is mostly what retailers are ordering and not what is being bought by customers. Whatever doesn't sell just sits there, eventually being sold off for 50c just to make the money back...retailers can't return unsold items. Whatever numbers you see for a series that isn't starting with a new number one or some sort of gimmick cover would be pretty close to what is actually being bought by customers. As there is no added incentive for retailers to order extra copies, aside from maybe keeping a few for walk ins...but the majority of their order would be a number they know will be sold when the issue hits shelves. I think that Archie is the only company that does offer refunds for returns. Marvel and DC definitely don't. I doubt smaller companies like Dark Horse/Dynamite/IDW do...and Image wouldn't. Images model is strange, but I'm pretty sure there is no way for them to refund without taking money from the creators. For as much money Marvel makes through their movies, they're not seeing any numbers shifting over to the comics. I've no idea why, and I don't know if advertising the comics with the movies would help. It's funny to see how well received the recent Captain America movie was, yet I don't see many clamouring for Ed Brubaker's Captain America run...which all would be in collected editions now, seeing as it was around 10 or so years ago he wrote some of the stuff people saw at the movies. Now, if Walking Dead is really bringing in readers, that'd be the only thing getting viewers to do so. Even then, it'd be more for the trade market, rather than the monthly issues...you've got something like 10 years worth of stuff to read before being able to catch up. At the same time, I'd guess that the trade customers would be infrequent, seeing as a trade may cost $15 or so and I doubt many would drop $45 for 3 trades without having actually read anything in the past. The ones that would stick through and end up reading all the trades may just wait for trade collections to come out. Meaning, that once you catch up, you're only buying something Walking Dead around every 6 months or so (I'm unsure how many issues are actually collected in the standard Walking Dead trade). Walking Dead already had a massive following before the show. So, the monthlies (which all series still rely on to survive) had very good numbers for a creator owned comic book series. Added TV money and the great sales of trades keep Kirkman very happy and with more than enough cash to keep the ongoing series...ongoing.
Walking Dead, in trade form, is kind of like what we're currently seeing with AoT. They're up there in the sales charts, with earlier volumes always floating high in ranking due to people still "discovering" the series. |
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Polycell
 Posts: 4623 |
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Isn't the Walking Dead TV series an actual adaptation of the comic's story? Meanwhile superheros tend to just get placed in new stories, which to me seems to lay the groundwork for highly compartmentalized audiences.
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Ali07
Posts: 3333 Location: Victoria, Australia |
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No, Walking Dead isn't a straight adaption of the comics.
http://www.pastemagazine.com/blogs/lists/2013/11/20-big-differences-between-the-walking-dead-tv-show-and-comics.html http://screenrant.com/the-walking-dead-season-comic-book-tv-show-differences/ And, in what medium do superheroes just get placed in new stories? That doesn't happen in Marvel or DC comics. They really have one story arc lead into the next one. The biggest superhero comic outside of Marvel/DC, Kirkman's Invincible, also has one story lead into the next. It's hard to think of a superhero title that would seem episodic, which is what I assume you mean by saying "placed in new stories". So I'm guessing you mean the movies? Even though, there, Marvel's tend to lead into the next. And, it looks like DC may be trying to head in that direction too. Marvel creating a movie universe seems to have done well for them. Some of the connecting between movies is done post/mid-credits. And I still see so many people at the cinemas leave before the scene, which surprises me. The majority of the time I watch a comic book movie at the cinemas, the majority of people leave as soon as the credits start to roll. Also, the movies also tend to be an amalgamation of past story elements. Like my earlier example of Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It borrows various elements from Ed Brubaker's Captain America run. We've kind of got spoiler[Crossbones, Hydra infiltrating SHIELD, and Bucky was considered to be one of the "sacred comic book deaths" like Spider-Man's Uncle Ben and Gwen Stacy...until Brubaker brought him back as the] Winter Soldier. Nothing from CapTWS is from one story arc in Brubaker's run, but various elements from multiple stories. He was writing it for 10 years. And, since the actor that played the Winter Soldier (name escapes me) holds a contract that is longer than Chris Evans' (who isn't looking to add to his current deal, as he wants to move away from acting into directing), I wouldn't be surprised to see another famous Ed Brubaker Cap story adapted to film...though I doubt it would be a straight adaption.
The kind of introduction of one character that I mentioned in that spoiler part of my post, and having the Winter Soldier there, is more than enough set up to head in the direction I think they will head. Which would have elements from Captain America #25 through to Captain America #34 or so. Of course, they may not head down that road at all, or switch to the current Falcon route.
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gloverrandal
Posts: 406 Location: Oita |
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The Walking Dead show is very different from the comics. The first episode alone is a very big departure. For the worse, I'd say.
I disagree. Superhero comics do not transition from one arc to the next usually. Or more accurately one writer to the next. There are a lot of times an arc is ignored and treated like an episodic event or just flat out retconned. It's more noticeable when a new writer takes over and may not acknowledge the work of previous writers. There's also a lot of mini series and maxi series floating around out there. 4 to 12 issue storylines featuring heroeswhich may or may not be in-continuity, and if they are in-continuity it's vague when and where they fit. Then you have cases like Year 1 which re does the origin for a hero, or the Elseworlds series like Kingdom Come, or All Star Batman and All Star Superman. Then the crossover event maxi series like House of M or Countdown. Then you have cases where heroes can have multiple series running at the same time, like Detective Comics and Batman, for example. And then still you have reboots, number re-brandings so issue 1 isn't actually issue 1. Something that happened in the Silver age usually wont have an affect on a present comic. Comics are very episodic, usually written in 6 issue storylines so they can be collected in a trade and sold as stand alone purchases. One of the biggest selling points comics try is telling readers that "now is the perfect jumping on point" which means little or nothing before those issues will be referenced. Comics are very tricky. |
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Ali07
Posts: 3333 Location: Victoria, Australia |
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I agree, especially if you take a long view to it all. Or if you want to include things that are clearly another universe, like Kingdom Come. It also depends on what you read. Everything I'm reading from Marvel and DC (around 20 series, I think) does transition from arc to arc. 6 issues comprise an arc, but they already set up the next story or the following arc references what came before. Writer changes do lead to some disconnect, but that is going to happen when some characters have been around for 70 odd years. Disconnect between writers isn't surprising, a as writer wouldn't want to be totally tied down by what came before. Even though, there are things that they have to be tied down by if they're going to be writing the same character. It's way guys like Uncle Ben and Gwen Stacy don't come walking into Peter's apartment when a new writer starts up. As for retcons, a total retcon of a character is rare. DC seem to do it to their universe every 20 years or so.
The reason I think things have changed over time is because comics aren't seen as a "throw away" medium anymore. Everything is now released in collected editions, while "back in the day" comics would be read once and thrown away. The next issue would just be another adventure and wouldn't touch on what came before. If someone were to sit down, right now, and read through 2 trades, they'll see how the two connect and how one they read references the story arc that came before it. Over the long run, you can say that they are episodic. But, if you were to check out a 3-5 year run on a series with the same writer(s) now, you'll see how all the stories there connect with each other. As for mini/maxi series, the whole reason they're not a story arc in the main series of the character is usually because there is some disconnect with what is currently happening. I say usually, as there are minis like Captain America: Reborn that clearly ties into what was happening in the ongoing Captain America title. |
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TarsTarkas
 Posts: 5930 Location: Virginia, United States |
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Problem with DC and Marvel today, despite the movies, is that there is no long term stability. Every year brings several world or universe changing events, and then there are the reboots. Another problem is there is no long term art/writing team continuity.
It is hard to maintain a readership, when you are constantly changing artists and writers. It might be good for the artists and writers to change around, so they can do new things, but it is not good for the comic. Can't imagine Dragon or Gold Digger being drawn by anyone else. As the years have gone by most of the titles I buy are either new series or old ones still written and draw by the same team or creator. Imagine if Cerebus changed artist and writer every arc. |
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