Staying in the Comics Industry

Chris Eliopoulis wrote a brilliant piece on staying in the comics business on his blog that got picked-up by a lot of blogs and people on social networks today. I agree with everything he says and that's why I haven't pursued a job in the business more ardently:

I'm not exactly a newbie. I've met a lot of guys going back to when I was a kid in highschool and had my work reviewed by many of them. I learned a lot of things along the way and one of those things was that Dave Sim was right all along.

No one in the comics industry likes hearing that. At all.

Still, it's true: Cartoonists are a curmudgeonly lot and writers are known for their opinions and willingness to share them. It can be difficult to work with them and the industry itself, but one of the most frustrating aspects of the comic book business is that it's still run like the magazine industry.

Granted, comics are magazines; they are periodicals. The magazine industry is well established and it works (kinda, these days). But I don't believe that comics should be treated like magazines. For example, I don't put magazines in bags with boards, and I don't leave comic books on my coffee table. So, seeing as how comics are treated differently by their very nature, I don't feel the business behind them should be the same as, say, the TV industry, or Hollywood... or the magazine industry.

Professionals don't like to hear that. At all.

And that's where the whole thing comes full-circle:

Whether you are new to the business or you've been around a while, take a look around you. The Internet has changed the world and the way everyone, except the comic book industry, does business and handles customers. People everywhere are sick of being force-fed the old system and are finally rising up against it (and, despite what Frank Miller says, this is a good thing). And if the old hands won't listen to us "young bucks" (I'm not very young), then the industry deserves to go the way of the do-do bird.

People don't want the same thing repackaged; in the entertainment field, people don't know what they want until they get it. We didn't know we wanted a Richard Pryor until we got one. We didn't know we wanted hip-hop or jazz or heavy metal until we heard it. And, until recently, something would come along every few years that set the industry on its head for a little while. Then, predictably and inevitably, everyone would rush to imitate it until it burned-out and something newer came along.

Now, everything is just rehashed horseshit. Remakes, repackaging, and reality TV and the same thing over and over again. And guess what? People don't want it.

And the industry doesn't like to hear that. Not at all.

© C Harris Lynn, 2011