Comic book publishers are always looking for ways to bring in new readers. The artform has at last gained legitimacy, thanks to the incredible popularity of superhero movies, but comics themselves haven't benefited much from this surge.
Where are all the readers? We believe something's holding them back, and we think we know what it is.
To get to the answer, we asked ourselves... Aside from ever-increasing prices, what's the number one stumbling block that keeps new readers from picking up comic books?
The Problem
After boiling down the various issues, the answer became obvious: Continuity. New readers are intimidated by years and years -- in some cases, decades -- of unending, ongoing stories. There's simply too much history built into most of the major comic book characters for new readers to feel like they can get a handle on it.
But maybe we can take our answer a step further. Might there be a symbol of this overwhelming continuity and history? A single point of focus on the cover of a comic book that's a lighthouse beacon, calling attention to just how far behind you are and how you will never, ever get caught up. What is this monolith that causes a prospective new reader's enthusiasm to evaporate in an instant?
Numbering.
It's those blasted issue numbers. This basic convention of comic books has existed since comics began. It's how publishers let readers know the sequence in which the story is being told. We take comic book numbering for granted today, much like chapters in a book or tracks on an album. It's just part of the medium and its culture.
"Numbering is often a barrier for new readers," said Benn Ray, co-owner of Baltimore's popular Atomic Books comic store. When we asked Ray about this issue, he verified our suspicions based on his experiences. "When you want to pick up a comic and start reading, you just have to dive right in. But that's not how most people want to follow episodic stories. They want to start from the beginning because they don't want to miss anything."
The problem is, the higher the issue number, the more intimidating it is to new readers and the less likely they are to purchase it. This is why Marvel and DC are constantly renumbering comics, starting over with new #1s. It works. It comes down to business issues — for more than just the publishers.
"Comics have to be ordered so many months in advance," Ray explained. "I place orders for issues #2 and #3 before #1 even arrives in stores. So traditionally, the decreases begin with #2 because you know more people will buy #1s. If the series is good or popular, it should regain its footing by the fourth issue. If not, it'll continue to slide."
Renumbering can carry a comic only so far — and it's only good for a single series. It doesn't do much to combat falling sales figures across the board.
DC and Marvel both have been so eager to boost sales over the last five years or so, they've engaged in endless restarts and reboots, trying everything they can to get new readers on board. How many times have we heard, "Jump on board here! This is it!" or "This is the perfect place to start! Right here!" They're utterly desperate to knock down the walls that keep readers out.
And the thing is... Reboots kinda work. When DC restarted its entire universe in 2011 with "The New 52," its sales for the month of October jumped year-over-year from a 32% portion of industry sales up to 42%. When Marvel launched its "Marvel NOW!" initiative in late 2012, the publisher saw a modest increase in sales of about 6% market share. Last year, Marvel did the similar "Avengers NOW!" which saw a boost of around 5%. DC has just kicked off its "DC YOU" promotion, obviously hoping for another sales increase.1
Event comics get similar results. Look back through the monthly sales figures of the last five to ten years, and you'll find that it's always the big events that top the charts. The reasons for this, again, are obvious. Comics publishers now use events to establish the new status quo, and even casual readers don't want to fall so far behind that they have no idea what's going on.
In principle, renumbering or rebooting aren't terrible ideas. You can't argue with the results. #1s will always sell more copies than #538s. But it's a bandaid trying to patch a beheading. It doesn't take the idea nearly far enough.
"Most new readers want to start at #1, so the reboots make economic sense," Ray told us. "But it's a short-sighted, short-term economic gain. It's like the comics companies just need a cash infusion to make their quarterly numbers. It sends the same signal as a Groupon — the business is in need of a quick and gimmicky economic fix."
The Solution
So here's the ten million dollar, elephant-in-the-room question: How do we solve this problem?
What we need is a system that's more inviting to noobs, while still letting us know a story's proper sequence of events. It's time to reimagine comic book numbering from the ground-up. The old model just doesn't work anymore.
For inspiration, we looked at how other mediums approach this same issue.
| • Movies usually give sequels numbers. Iron Man 2, for example. Other times they use subtitles, such as Captain America: The Winter Soldier. • Books that are told in sequence never use numbers, on the other hand. Examples: Harry Potter, Hunger Games, etc. • TV shows that tell serialized stories generally separate story arcs by seasons. |
All valid options, but none of them are inclusive enough to address all of the identifiers that comic books need. Ray suggests that annual volumes might hold the answer.
"On the cover, comics move to a volume/number system," he suggested. "And each year the comics numbering resets and the volume number goes up. On the inside indicia, publishers would include that numbering as well as the regular sequential numbering, like #735 [or whatever]. Magazines do this often. Comics rarely do."
Magazines might indeed hold the best solution, since monthly magazines are the closest sibling that exists for comics.
Mark Millar's original run on The Ultimates used a method similar to this. Millar's first arc followed the typical numbering pattern, but the second arc got a whole new title: The Ultimates 2, which started over at #1. It was a brilliant idea that made perfect sense. (It made so much sense, some of us found ourselves wondering why no one had ever done it before.)
But it might be hard to get away with this method of "numbered seasons" on long-running titles. Can you imagine picking up a comic called The Amazing Spider-Man 75 #1? Neither can we. It veers right back into the same cumbersome territory that got us into this mess to begin with.
Look at how Hellboy has done it. Instead of focusing on numbering, Mike Mignola chooses to release his comics as a chain of miniseries. Usually these minis are interconnected, moving the overall plot forward, but sometimes they're standalones. If you want to know where a single issue falls in the grand scheme, you can find that inside. But the numbers on the cover rarely top 5, because the focus is on the story arc and its subtitle.
No matter how you look at it, it's the story arc that matters most. Or maybe a specific writer's run on a title. We want to know if the comic we're picking up is the beginning of a story arc or a certain writer's first issue, or how many back issues we need to seek out to find that starting point. Traditional numbering doesn't convey this.
Let's take a little something from everybody and try to come up with a solution that works all of the time. It's never possible to please every kind of reader, but maybe we can come close.
How about, instead of numbering as part of a book's title or numbering subtitled miniseries, the industry were to adopt a single format that communicates where an issue falls in sequence, while at the same time letting consumers know at-a-glance how far out they are from the start of a story arc? Something clean and simple that conveys a lot in a small amount of real estate.
Here's a rough idea of what we're picturing, using an issue of Batman as an example.
You've got the issue number nice and big, and beside it you have the volume number and publication date. Underneath, you have the title of the story arc/volume, along with dates for when it started and when it's expected to end.
The design itself isn't important. The placement of the different parts, is the font, even the colors — these things don't really matter. What matters is communicating exactly which story arc this is, and which chapter of that story — in a concise, simple format that's at-a-glance friendly, that's just as legible up close as it is from farther away.
What do you think, comics publishers? Marvel, DC, Image, Dark Horse, IDW and all the rest: Can we abandon these reboots and renumberings and focus on the actual problem? Let's throw out the old rulebook and come up with a system that works for longtime fans and newcomers alike.
1. Sales data originally published at comichron.com.
Special thanks to Benn Ray and Atomic Books.
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