The comic book industry, in particular, has fallen into a rut, with every story in every title having to fit into the rigidly-defined four-part, or the rare six-part, "arc" (I hate that word) so they make for convenient trade paperback (TPB) reprints. I've told you before that a story "arc" is simply a storyline -- that is, a plot. In a typical, self-contained, story -- which is, basically, every story told in every medium outside of serialized fiction (a movie, a novel, a song, et.al.) -- you have one, maybe two, main plots, often complicated by several sub-plots; in serialized fiction, you can have many major plots, each with its own web of sub-plots. In fact, serialized fiction demands several plots at once to keep it going, and sub-plots are often expanded into main plots at one point or another.
One of the reasons people grew tired of serialized fiction is that serialized fiction grew tired: Jean Grey can only come back to life 30 or 40 times before readers quit giving a flying fuck (someone remind me to put that in a letter to Marvel). This is, easily, the reason for many of the soaps' demise. Yes, there are more women in the workplace today and, yes, this is a factor, but all the originality went out of soap operas when I was a kid, and that was 20+ years ago! Granted, you could argue there was little creativity there to begin with, but I'll remind you that soap operas are serials, thus the story has to keep going, and they are TV shows, thus whatever gets the most ratings is destined to be repeated, ad nauseam, so -- as is far too usual -- creativity is not as important a commodity as it should be.
Professional rasslin (I know, it's "wrestling" to some of you, but it'll always be rasslin to me) is one of the best examples of serialized fiction today -- that's one of the reasons we used to cover it, and still do from time to time, though we now tend to cover only the IRL stuff and not the fictitious world of characters which comprise it. Video games are another, but to a far lesser extent. Ironically, movies themselves are becoming slightly more serialized, with every idea that makes it to the silver screen being dragged-out into a trilogy and forced into spawning a "franchise." However, few movie franchises contain the single device which all serial fiction installments require: the cliffhanger.
Now, to be fair, serials don't lend themselves well to the pick-up audience -- irregular readers/viewers/listeners. Obviously, with so much backstory, it can be difficult for serials to pick-up new audience members. In days past, comic book characters got a short blurb declaring their powers and origin, or (more insipidly) would have some reason to repeat this information in thought or dialogue balloon, every issue. These days, that blurb is even shorter (see recent Uncanny X-Men by Fraction, whose efficiency is alarmingly effective), and/or the whole thing is handled at the front of each issue in a "Previously..." page.
All of the industries like to push the "jumping-on" points, but new audience members expect to be somewhat lost until they get a few episodes under their belts, and the way to handle this is to focus on one major plot in each, and every, episode -- thereby giving the pick-up reader (comic books) something to follow -- while forwarding others only slightly. The next issue then presents a different storyline, but forwards the previous episode's storyline in some way, thus drawing the pick-up reader into the new issue's plot, as well. After a handful of installments, the new audience member has a pretty good idea as to what's happening. Again, audience members don't expect to know everything by the end of the first installment they experience -- that's part of the fun!
I realize the industries are largely to blame for the disappearance of the serial, which is ironic, since serials are the most lucrative form -- whether it's called a "franchise," "property," "series," or some other synonym. The audience has also been weaned-off of it, as there are so many options today that too few are willing to invest in them -- especially since they realize it may be canceled in short order (TV), they may be forced to buy a slew of other installments to know what's going on (comics), etc. -- and the industries have responded by turning serials into "arcs" and self-contained installments, in an attempt to please everyone. But there is something else, and that is that far too few writers today know how to write serialized fiction.
For the form to not only survive, but flourish, the industries have to do the one thing they fear most: take the hit. In today's world of too many options, a whole lot of products have built a substantial audience of their own by simply doing what they do; they call it "niche," and it's as good a name as any. Time and again, Marvel Comics has been able to hang on by a thread, thanks to the "niche" audience of die-hard readers and collectors, yet they continue to thank that audience by hanging them out to dry whenever the market is on an upswing.
Products that go out of their way to be unique face the same problem as those which continue dumbing-down to appeal to a larger audience: no one can relate to them. If collectibility is the only incentive to subscribing to a title or buying an issue, as opposed to waiting for the TPB, it's a small one, at best -- especially with second- and third- printings. And continually raising the price to boot? The only thing we can count on Marvel to do is kill the market; that's it's only consistent trait.
Drop the constant crossover "events," write a series as a serial, learn from your mistakes, and quit repeating them!
© C Harris Lynn, 2010
1 comment:
Sorry this published now instead of 2010 when it was first published, I don't know why it did that. I'm cleaning-up old posts and apologize to any and all RSS subscribers for the mix-up.
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