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Minimilk Posts: 8
1/21/2019
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Which brand do you think is better? Vote!
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hearse101011 Posts: 4
2/6/2020
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Marvel 100%
People that are heroes will be infinitely more entertaining to me than Heroes who pretend not to be.
Superman pretends to be Clark Kent
Batman pretends to be Bruce Wayne
Wonder Woman tries to be Diana
Peter Parker tries his best to do good.
Steve Rogers must uphold his moral code no matter what.
Tony Stark is selfish.
The last three are much easier to find parts of yourself in. (I know I am very guilty of over simplifying)
edited by hearse101011 on 2/6/2020
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solarno Posts: 166
2/6/2020
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I struggle with this. When it comes to comics I really want to like Marvel characters. I think it's their humanity that draws me to them, but outside of Cap, rarely do they keep my interest for long. I felt terrible when I recently dropped Cap after issue 18 of the current run, like I betrayed Steve. Over my 35 years of reading/collecting I've tried considerably more Marvel titles than DC ones, but I find that the characters I have the longest runs with tend to be DC. Yet I'm not sure I could tell you definitively why that is.
Now with the movies, give me Marvel over DC. All. Day. Long.
Go figure.
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Defiant1 Posts: 720
2/9/2020
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rixmaxx wrote:
Defiant1 wrote:
I only care about Marvel characters, but all modern comics suck. For that reason, I'm not picking a favorite.
Way to live up to your name! 
I've quit collecting comics. So, yes. You are probably correct.
I've stood on my soapbox and described precisely what I don't like about modern comics and
what types of expectations I have as a consumer. I've challenged people in the industry to make a product that appeals to me.
Creators nod and understand, but they go back and make the exact same comics I detest.
It's not like I woke up one day and decided I didn't like modern comics.
The industry changed and the knowledge of the ages on how to make comics fun, engaging, thought provoking, and interesting is being lost.
I was attending local comic shows and the back issues I want to collect were appearing less and less. The condition of the stuff they did have was in lower grade than ever. The prices are higher than ever.
Finally a dealer confessed that he can't restock on the types of stuff I ask for. He says the market has dried up on supply and he just can't get the stuff anymore.
For that reason, I quit collecting entirely.
I have probably comics 10,000 including Amazing Fantasy #15, FF #1, Hulk #1, X-Men #1 (2 copies), Strange Tales #110 (3 copies), Hulk #181 (2 copies).
I'm not getting rid of anything people want because I don't need the money and I still like the comics.
I could sell off the junk I don't care about, but it isn't worth my time. I can make all the overtime I want at work and selling comics doesn't earn me money at the same hourly overtime rate.
Modern comics are essentially a money pit unless you spend hours monitoring price fluctuations and capitalize on a steady flow of quick flips. I still make more money at my regular job.
For the sake of reading, I have thousands of old comics I have never read. I bought them in bulk for about a dime a piece when stores were closing left and right in the 90's. I get more enjoyment reading a 10 cent comic with more story content than a $4 or $6 modern comic.
I attempted to stay connected to the hobby by researching old comics and making online cover galleries. Published historians know about my discoveries and we've shared info in the past. I just scanned a piece of original art I own and donated some of my research information to an upcoming fanzine. I've asked the publisher to not give me credit, but they will likely do so anyway.
I've decided to quit all that also. The web is changing and free web hosts have been randomly deleting my sites because I don't convert to their pay model and let them up-sell me to something I don't need. I'm donating content to their site, so I feel that gives their domain relevance where it had none. I'm not going to pay for hosting. I was already giving away my time on the research.
I guess the real question is... why am I here? Because my comics still have value and this site is a price guide. It's no different than buying stock and checking the newspaper periodically to see how it's doing.
Take care...
Defiant1
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Defiant1 Posts: 720
12/10/2020
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fdaz89 wrote:
Defiant1, I agree with you 100% (about your assessment of the comics industry, not about you being a negative person). Having corporations like Disney own so much of it doesn't help. One thing I noticed is that all the ads are missing in comics, reading the ads added to the appeal of comics for me in my youth. Ad revenue would (or should) lower the price of comics, but so would going back to newsprint. Making superstars out of people who couldn't tell a story (like Rob Liefeld), I think negatively affected the hobby. I think the speculation market doesn't help, either. All the things that provide a barrier to new people from picking up the collecting bug should be examined and eliminated where possible.
In the 90's a lot of the comics switched to higher quality paper because the advertisers wanted their ads to look good and the cheap paper wouldn't reproduce the colors and details they wanted to use.
Advertisers quit buying ads in comics. There wasn't enough bang for the buck. I agree they should at least try to sell ads. Speculation helps the publishers immensely because it allows them to print more. If they can print more, the cost to print each comic comes down. Most of what you are paying for when you buy a comic is the production costs and setup costs for printing.
If you print a million copies of something, the cost per unit is pocket change. If you print 100 of something, it costs paper money.
Think of it like this.
If I pay an artist $100 to produce one page of art and make 5 photocopies. I'd have to sell the 5 copies for about $20.02 each to break even on production costs. I haven't even paid myself a dime. That's just to break even on what i paid the artist and what I paid for the paper.
If I print 10,000 photocopies of that art I only need to sell them all for 3 cents each to break even. The catch is, i have to sell all 10,000.
As volume increases, the publisher makes more profit on each comic sold.
That's why they produce all the variant covers. If they can sell a significantly larger number of interior pages just by swapping out a cover, it helps them break even on production costs faster.
The problem is, it runs off "collectors" over time because they can't keep up. They don't get a sense of satisfaction by owning 5 versions of the same comic. It dissuades customer loyalty.
Defiant1
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Oxbladder Posts: 487
3/12/2021
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fdaz89 wrote:
Defiant1, I agree with you 100% (about your assessment of the comics industry, not about you being a negative person). Having corporations like Disney own so much of it doesn't help. One thing I noticed is that all the ads are missing in comics, reading the ads added to the appeal of comics for me in my youth. Ad revenue would (or should) lower the price of comics, but so would going back to newsprint. Making superstars out of people who couldn't tell a story (like Rob Liefeld), I think negatively affected the hobby. I think the speculation market doesn't help, either. All the things that provide a barrier to new people from picking up the collecting bug should be examined and eliminated where possible.
Newsprint is more expensive. It would only make books lighter not cheaper.
Making super-stars out of talent isn't a problem BUT it did increase costs dramatically because now, instead of paying everyone a pittance out of a pool creators have contracts and are paid a hell of a lot more than they were back in the day. That model was never going to be sustainable and it has dramatically changed the industry. \
Now the other thing is that companies don't make someone popular. They publish their stories, sure, but readers/collectors decide who is and who isn't super-stars.
There are super-stars for writing there are super-stars for art but there are few that can do both. Very few. Jack Kirby great artist, not so good a writer. Stan Lee, good for ideas and writing but was always better when he had an equally good artist and idea man along side him. Stand alone Stan and and Jack stuff are lackluster team them up and you had something special. John Byrne a good artist from the 70's to the 90's but don't give him the writing duties because his writing sucks and now his art is nothing special. Rob Liefeld, the guy should never write or draw, however, some of his ideas and creations are not bad. Todd McFarlane, decent artist but his writing leaves a lot to be desired, he would be better to co-write than do it alone. So no super-stars don't hurt but it can hurt if we make them believe that they are so great that they can do no wrong. Always second doubt any star that say only he or she knows how to present a character. Chances are far better that they are going to bomb out than bring revolution.
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