THE PROBLEM WITH SUPERHERO COMICS NOWADAYS

Obs.: The portuguese version of this text is a few posts below.

Look! He died...

"Relaunch". "Reboot". Perhaps these have become the most common words spoken/written in the comic
books market for the past few months.

Before I continue – and I only wanted to give a hint in the first paragraph about the theme to be approached – I want to introduce myself. I’m a Brazilian, 31 years old, and I read comic books since I
was five. My first comic book was Captain America by Jack Kirby, and the cover was Captain crossing a window, shards of glass everywhere. Twenty-six years later, I became a writer, working for the Brazilian audiovisual market since I was 19 years old, with short breaks in between. And the fact that I am a Brazilian citizen shows that American super heroes can also touch hearts all around the globe due to its characteristics, stories, development.

What made me write this text and access an American comic book website was the statement below:

“THE TRUTH IS PEOPLE ARE LEAVING ANYWAY, THEY’RE JUST DOING IT QUIETLY, AND WE HAVE BEEN PAPERING IT OVER WITH INCREASED PRICES...WE DIDN’T WANT TO WAKE UP ONE DAY AND FIND WE HAD A BUNCH OF $20 BOOKS THAT 10,000 PEOPLE ARE BUYING.”
                                    - Dan Didio.

It’s quite obvious why people are not reading books any longer. There are no new stories since God knows when. It’s worthless to create new series, different characters if we keep using the same creative tricks.

Call me naive, but I believe that the decreasing sales of comic books are not really about prices, marketing strategies, or distribution, etc. Of course, each one of these aspects has its influence and destructive power on sales. But I believe there’s something much, much worse and is the main responsible for the sales decrease.

Referring to a few DC sagas and using an old term, the problem is the creativity crisis.

In other words, resources, tricks and artifices used in the stories are the same since zillions of years ago. There’s nothing new. Characters are still the same and it kills a fictional story. One of the main ideas that build up a script is the fact that characters need to change. At the end of a story, they need to learn something, change an opinion, develop knowledge/new abilities, have their lives changed for some dramatic reason. This is a basic introduction for movies, TV, literature, whatever you want. And that’s not the case for, unfortunately, super hero comic books. Let’s see why and which are some of these tricks. I believe that through my comments, many readers are going to say they, creatively, cannot stand it anymore. I think this would be pretty much a public interest, right?

... and soon came back! Nobody believes in death anymore.

:: DEATH
A hero dies. Then he resurrects. Another hero dies. And also resurrects. And then a different hero dies, and guess what happens? He comes back from beyond the grave. And when another hero dies again, do you know what writers do? Yeah, I think you understood what I mean.

The resurrection resource has banalized death in comic books. No one cares anymore. It does not leverage sales like it used to. It has lost all its meaning. This resource is worn out and today readers laugh when a hero dies, considering it could cause any reaction.

Is he dead? Then let him go. It’s that simple. The editor regretted having killed the hero? Find another one to fill in his place and continue the legacy. That’s why The Phantom is the best character ever made. The new Phantom did not work? Kill him, destroy him, whatever, but put him away and create another one to put in his place. Give them a Batman Beyond or Peter Parker/Miles Morales treatment. A new hero, whose characteristics were created after a detailed study about the current public taste. You murdered Peter Parker, not Spider-Man. You murdered Diana, not Wonder Woman. The concept still lives. And with another persona in place, the idea can be updated and remodeled for it to continue fresh, modern, new. Anyway, something that can instigate people’s curiosity. Put an end to Tony Stark era and put someone that can bring a fresh air to Iron Man. A character has used and worn out all possibilities? Renew the character, but not through retcons or reboots. Retelling the origin for the millionth time to place “new elements” does not work anymore.

Why do thing like this...

With a new character to continue the legacy, you define a phase. Look, we have a phase of Bruce Banner as Hulk. Now is the whoever-it-is phase as Hulk. But what Banner did before has a huge impact on the life of this whoever-it-is. The legacy, the concept, lives. The story moves forward.

And this leads me to another subject...

:: RETCONS
Whatever happened to Gwen Stacy stays with Gwen Stacy. It’s gone, she belongs to the past. Make Peter, somehow, move on in an epic story. But get over it. I don’t want to see him as a crying baby. I want to see him as a hero, overcoming obstacles with dignity.

Let the story continue, do not use retcons. Tell new stories. Create new concepts, new approaches for each of them. Make the characters learn new things, but don’t let them forget it. And I say this only because I can’t remember when Cyclops used his rays in an offensive and impressive manner with his notion of spatial geometry, very used ages ago.

Another problem with retcons is that the character’s chronology becomes a patchwork. This will only cause more trouble as time passes by. It is like having 50 eggs in a basket with capacity for 15 and you keep trying to put 70 in it.

Retcon also conflicts with an absolute rule from writers, which is K.I.S.S. – “keep it simple, stupid." But no, there goes another retcon to cause more chronological trouble to those who will keep trying to fix it when they should just write a good story.

... when the last memory of readers about a character
can be something like that?

:: MEGASAGAS
All I’m asking is... – and I imagine that many of you reading this will support me – please, stop publishing mega sagas. Well, at least most of them. Editors publish one mega saga after another. And each title has a mega saga. There is one from Batman, another from Spider-Man, Green Lantern, Avengers, and etc., etc., etc.

When several mega sagas happen at the same time and one subsequently after the other, how can it be “mega”? How can it be special? How can it be relevant?

In books there are stories. Just stories. Create storylines. Tell a story in four issues. Then, tell a story in three issues. Tell another in five issues. Just don’t tell a story divided into several parts. A storyline with too many issues holds the reader. It is economically advantageous to hold the reader for a year or so? I'm sorry, but this does not work anymore.

Tell just a story after another. Simple as that. Then, after three or four years, create a mega saga with that character. And another mega saga must be created only after a few years after the last one published. Let readers anxiously waiting for it.

And this also leads me to another topic...

Crossovers: we really need it 24 for 7?

:: CROSSOVERS
Stop it. Today characters are on every comic book. Why should we purchase Wonder Woman if she also appears on Justice League, Teen Titans, and other two or three mega sagas? When was the last time any character had a phase where stories were just about this one character and its respective supporting characters, adding layers to them? Developing them? Making them better?

With rare and few crossovers, fans will anxiously wait for them to finally meet each other. If this happens, then let it happen for creative necessity.

If a supporting character gets popular, don’t create a monthly magazine. Do the opposite. Make him appear sporadically. Readers will ask for more, and will buy more issues when he appears. Now, if all of them caught the “Wolverine syndrome”, how do you expect for readers to ask for more? One crossover should be like “hell yeah, I really want to see those two together” from readers.

Now imagine mega sagas with crossovers. It sucks, come on! Do you want a mega saga? Then elaborate it with a characters line. Do not choose the entire cast available for the publishing house. Wait for a really epic event to create a mega saga + crossover.

By force, USA forced Japan to open it's ports...

:: ALTERNATIVE REALITIES
This is the ultimate mistake of retcon + mega saga. Are there any cool alternative realities? Yes, but they account for a very reduced minority compared to the number of bad stories created based on this idea. An alternative reality has to be somehow relevant to the character, and not just like some “retcon from the future". In the past or future, the retcon concept previously mentioned stays the same.

Alternative realities also kill the structure of “telling a story after another” approached on mega sagas topic.

:: OTHER WORN OUT TRICKS
As I Said before, these are just a few tricks readers can’t stand anymore and they surely have their list of “worn out tricks”. If I list all of them in this topic, this would look more like an academic thesis, a book.

Based on what was written here, I invite Geoff Johns, Brian Michael Bendis, Mark Millar, Scott Snyder, Kurt Busiek, Peter David and every writer in the Northern American (here we don't reffer to US only as America - America is not only USA) market to, please, review your tricks. Create new ones. Create new ways to tell a story. Create new alternatives, new strategies. It is worthless doing a relaunch or reboot if they're gonna make the same mistakes.

... but do not accept foreigners in their business, as writers
from another countries whose native language is not English,
which could contribute with new visions. 

Years ago, DC was the leader of comic book market. Its heroes were like Gods, mythological figures above ordinary human beings and their adventures used to impress readers. Then Marvel came, with a new and fantastic approach: bring heroes closer to readers. Now they could feel like they could also be super heroes after meeting Peter Parker, Donald Blake, Matt Murdock, and others.

And the comic book world was never the same.

I do believe that the comic book market currently needs another event of similar to the birth of Marvel in the 60’s. And I believe this can happen again if we can find new concepts. Writers, try to understand our world today. It is unnecessary to say that it has changed a lot. But only super heroes remain the same. And, unfortunately, this is killing them faster than Anti-monitor anti-matter wave.

The wheel was created with Superman in 1938. The wheel was reinvented with the rise of Marvel in 1962. We need to reinvent it again.