I actually did a double take when I saw this article and made sure it was not the 1st of April...cause this seems like a bad joke. They are talking about killing a major character every quarter cause it bumps up sales on titles.,,nice creative vision JQ.
All I can see this doing if they actually go with it is driving real readers away on droves and leaving these event issues to be snatched up by speculators who have no interest in the characters from month to month...which is going to kill sales on the books that they are trying to boost.
A Death event every now and then is an interesting gimmick if the story is told well. Barry Allen, and Colossus were tales that meant something to the characters and their universes at the time. The other thing is that there will then be a slew of resurrections to go along with the deaths.
What is your thought on this development?
[ February 15, 2011, 08:28 PM: Message edited by: Dev Em ]
From: Turn around... | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Well I can't speak for whatever goes on at Marvel, but I can definitely tell you that the wholesale slaughter of DC heroes and villains over the last few years has made me lose all respect for that company's editors and writers, and has made me the least invested I've ever been in their characters or universe since I began buying comics 20 years ago.
For example, I used to buy everything with the name 'Titans' on it - and have way too many crappy 90s comics to prove it. But when every Titans storyline began to revolve around a member dying, just because Geoff Johns' graphic slaughter of three of them in Infinite Crisis had gotten everyone talking, I just thought "What's the point in caring about these characters when all they are is cannon fodder for the next 'event', or whenever they need to pick up sales?" So I dropped the franchise completely and have never looked back.
Similarly, I have ZERO respect for any writer who lacks the ability to tell a dramatic story without feeling the need to kill off a DC hero or villain just to try and make their story more 'important' than it would have been without it. Exhibit A - James Robinson and his whole pathetic return to DC. Talk about tarnishing a legacy. That guy must have killed off about 25 good characters since he came back to the company. And I would choose about 20 of those characters over any character he has ever created for DC (yes, that includes Jack Knight) any day!
I kinda doubt Marvel will actually do what that article says they will though. Assuming their plan to kill off a character ever quarter only includes big-name characters (because really, how many people are going to by an issue just because Stingray, for example, died in it) then that means in only three years they'll have killed 12 major characters! In 10 years there will be practically no one left in the Marvel Universe!
Even though it will never get that far, I actually kinda hope Marvel does go ahead with this plan. Nothing will make the fans more sick of death in comics than the oversaturation that this plan would provide. And then, when the companies realise how well and truly sick of the practice we are, maybe they'll hold back on deaths in comics until they actually become somehthing worth being interested in a story for again.
From: Australia | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
Ah, death as a sales gimmick! What, you mean blowing up a world (Titan) wasn't enough?
The comics industry doesn't learn from its own history. The article linked to above does shows how sales spikes from gimmicky events such as deaths are temporary and often don't even last a full month. Yet Marvel and DC seek short-term sales to the detriment of the long-term health of their titles and long-term interest of their readers.
I can't imagine such gimmicks building or sustaining good will among readers. But it's much harder to write good stories that don't involve death and cheap sales gimmicks.
The author of the article (I didn't see a byline) offers an interesting alternative: Rotate creators in and out of titles every three or four months so they can tell one good, tight story and then move on, letting the next team do the same. A radical concept? Yes, but I'm all in favor of better stories -- something that gets lost in today's story decompression and trade mentality.
There is one flaw in the author's plan. Rotating creators would not get a lot of media attention, as deaths of major characters do -- and it seems to be this media attention that Marvel and DC are truly after. This year's FF death is a previous year's Death of Captain America, which was a previous decade's Death of Superman. These events get media coverage and Joe Average gets psyched up about the character in question -- for all of about two seconds. Joe remembers reading the character as a kid and goes to check out what he thinks will be the character's final appearance. Joe probably doesn't stick around for the arc that follows, when all the supporting characters mourn the hero's passing. And he certainly isn't around for the character's return the following year.
All of these dead characters will return, of course. So even if, as Blacula suggests, Marvel kills off each of its 12 major character, in ten years some of them will have been brought back to start the cycle all over again.
-------------------- The Semi-Great Gildersleeve - writing, super-heroes, and this 'n' that
From: The Stasis Zone | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Actually I think it is pretty standard now for any character that has been killed will eventually be brought back. Has there been any character who has died who hasn't come back? The only one I can think of is Chemical King (and he kind of came back in the reboot as "C") Oh and Monstress. I expect that we will be seeing Human Torch and Nightcrawler coming back in the future.
Does any comic book reader really gets worked up and worried when a major character "dies"? Even speculators will stop buying into death issues if the market becomes saturated with them. I think that has already happened with number 1 issues.
-------------------- Five billion years from now the Sun will go nova and obliterate the Earth. Don't sweat the small stuff!
From: Boston | Registered: Aug 2003
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Set
There's not a word yet, for old friends who've just met.
posted
quote:Originally posted by He Who LSHes: The author of the article (I didn't see a byline) offers an interesting alternative: Rotate creators in and out of titles every three or four months so they can tell one good, tight story and then move on, letting the next team do the same. A radical concept? Yes, but I'm all in favor of better stories -- something that gets lost in today's story decompression and trade mentality.
I would much prefer this. I find that few creative teams seem to have more than two years worth of fresh ideas for a particular group of characters (and sometimes much less). After that, they seem to tread water.
I think I'd rather read six to twelve issue runs of stories about any specific character or team, than a five year run by a single author, with a new creative team and even, possibly, a new continuity.
The less said about the 'kill someone every quarter' approach, the better. That's just killing the goose for a few extra eggs now.
Registered: Aug 2006
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cleome46
or you can do the confusion 'til your head falls off
posted
I would add to Blacula's excellent points that it would make much more sense to charge creative teams with revitalizing obscure or even mid-range-popular characters-- rather than killing them off in droves.
It's the sense of wastefulness, more than anything else, that bothers me about death-o-rama in most comics. Yeah, a cataclysmic story like the Death of Titan can have a great deal of power and meaning-- but NOT if every single week brings a brand new cataclysm on the same damn scale.
-------------------- Hey, Kids! My "Cranky and Kitschy" collage art is now viewable on flickr. Drop by and tell me that I sent you.
From: Vanity, OR | Registered: Dec 2008
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posted
Both death and resurrections have become meaningless in the DCU and Marvel U. They had been that way for awhile but the last 10 years took this to a new level. I honestly just don't take it seriously anymore (which subsequently makes me care less about the continuity of the universes than I ever did before). For example, I haven't mustered up any emotion over Nightcrawler's death simply because I don't believe it. On the flip side, I really don't care one way or another about Barry Allen returning. I'm numb to both things.
As Blacula mentions, the 'wholesale slaughter' of heroes is extreme, worst of the worst method used to make these 'events' so meaningless.
I also think the speculators (which, lets be honest, hardly exist) have realized death in comics is worthless. Like Quis correctly mentions, it's clear that people no longer see #1 issues as being something substantially special--especially when it's very likely the series will either (A) be cancelled in two years or (B) is just the relaunch of an older, pre-existing series that will return to its old numbering at some point. #1 issues, like death in comic books, is a gimmick that went to the well too many times.
From: If you don't want my peaches, honey... | Registered: Sep 2003
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posted
Thomas and Martha Wayne are about the only characters that presumably won't come back to life. Even Uncle Ben, Jor-El and Lara are fair game.
I gave up in the 80s expecting company-owned characters to stay dead. Creator-owned characters, maybe; just maybe.
We are fans of a medium still tethered to print, yet we ourselves interact electronically. Print comics are in a state where gimmicks keep the raft afloat. The author in Dev's link says good stories will sell, and he is partially right. But this ain't films; committees (editors, publishers) need to take a step back and let creators tell good stories. And fans need to support creators over companies/characters. Otherwise, we get what we pay for.
From: Vancouver, BC, Canada | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
There also seems to be a growing trand in comics with the Event books and tie ins. The latest DC one being Flashpoint with something like 14 three issue mini's attached to it, plus all the other books it'll cross into.
Time to expand the scope of this thread...
Do comics need events, whether it be death issues, Reborn mini's or massive companywide events like Civil War and Blackest Night to survive?
From: Turn around... | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
I don't know whether comics need company-wide events to survive, but one of the reasons I have not bought comics regularly since 2005 is because of such events.
Few crossovers result in meaningful stories or long-term consequences for the characters. And, after so many years of meta-cataclysmic events that need EVERY hero in universe to participate, they lose their bite after awhile.
The only company-wide crossover that really stands out in my memory was from neither Marvel nor DC. It was Valiant's "Unity" (1992). The Valiant universe was still brand new, so anything could happen; also, Jim Shooter was (whatever his alleged faults as a human being) a masterful story teller, and he assembled a wonderful crew to work on his books and develop the storyline from the perspective of each series' protagonists. Even his villains (an abused woman and her teenaged son) were unconventional for the time.
For all that, Valiant shot itself in the foot by withholding the conclusion from anyone who did not buy all previous chapters in each series. If you simply didn't care for Rai or Magnus Robot Fighter, for example, and did not shell out twelve bucks for two issues each (priced, then, at $2.99), you were not allowed to buy the finale -- a marketing blunder made even worse by Shooter's firing soon after.
So, even the *best* company-wide event was not worth the effort.
-------------------- The Semi-Great Gildersleeve - writing, super-heroes, and this 'n' that
From: The Stasis Zone | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
I tend to agree HWW, but the fact remains that these things do sell...and sell pretty well. They boosted the sales of several floundering titles during Blackest Night, and the issues of Adventure sold more than double of what it is selling now.
Death issues also sell well, as seen by the spikes given to all the major heroes that have died since Crisis pretty much.
New creative teams can bump up sales...but not generally like these things do.
The ring promotion from Blackest Night was, in my opinion, pretty cool, and in the case of my local shop, quite a boon for sales of those comics tied into the giveaway.
From: Turn around... | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
If company-wide crossovers sell, then more power to them.
They just won't be selling to me.
-------------------- The Semi-Great Gildersleeve - writing, super-heroes, and this 'n' that
From: The Stasis Zone | Registered: Jul 2003
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quote:Originally posted by He Who LSHes: For all that, Valiant shot itself in the foot by withholding the conclusion from anyone who did not buy all previous chapters in each series. If you simply didn't care for Rai or Magnus Robot Fighter, for example, and did not shell out twelve bucks for two issues each (priced, then, at $2.99), you were not allowed to buy the finale -- a marketing blunder made even worse by Shooter's firing soon after.
I don't get how that worked. So if I wanted to buy the finale, was there some security guard in the shop going through my receipts ready to snatch the issue out of my hand for not buying Rai (for example)?
What a strange, counter-productive system anyway. It's almost comics marketing by way of fascism.
From: Australia | Registered: Dec 2003
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posted
An example of how crossovers/promotions boost sales. Here's the # 19 through # 30 selling comics from November 2009.
19 82.81 BOOSTER GOLD #26 $3.99 DC 57,122
20 81.49 DARK REIGN LIST AMAZING SPIDER-MAN ONE-SHOT $3.99 MAR 56,214
21 79.96 INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #20 $3.99 MAR 55,160
22 78.85 DETECTIVE COMICS #859 $3.99 DC 54,392
23 78.23 X-FORCE #21 $2.99 MAR 53,967
24 77.91 DOOM PATROL #4 $3.99 DC 53,748
25 77.65 THOR GIANT SIZE FINALE (BY JMS) #1 $3.99 MAR 53,566
26 76.33 HULK #17 $3.99 MAR 52,653
27 75.96 JUSTICE LEAGUE CRY FOR JUSTICE #5 $3.99 DC 52,400
28 75.95 DARK WOLVERINE #80 $2.99 MAR 52,394
29 75.59 SUPERMAN BATMAN #66 $2.99 DC 52,143
30 74.08 REBELS #10 $3.99 DC 51,100
REBELS and DOOM PATROL-- now cancelled-- benefitted massively, as did the currently hanging-in-there BOOSTER GOLD. I actually enjoyed the zombie-themed BLACKEST NIGHT titles. However, FLASHPOINT holds no interest for me.
cleome46
or you can do the confusion 'til your head falls off
posted
quote:Originally posted by He Who LSHes: If company-wide crossovers sell, then more power to them.
They just won't be selling to me.
Yup.
I get LASH's point about sales, but those presumably are all sales amongst readers that are already fans. How many potential new readers are lost to the genre because that's not how they care to jump into it-- buying a dozen different books to get a full story instead of just one book?
It's true that books are often serial, but even a brand-new full-price paperback in a series is a better out-of-pocket bargain in terms of money. You'll get a lot more story for your bucks than you will from three or four modern superhero books.
-------------------- Hey, Kids! My "Cranky and Kitschy" collage art is now viewable on flickr. Drop by and tell me that I sent you.
From: Vanity, OR | Registered: Dec 2008
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So if I wanted to buy the finale, was there some security guard in the shop going through my receipts ready to snatch the issue out of my hand for not buying Rai (for example)? 
