One Last Goodbye to Bags and Boards

Well, it's been two months now since I said fuck you to my LCS and decided to stop buying single issue comics every week. And how does it feel? It feels fucking great! Do I miss getting regular issues of The Boys, The Sword, Savage Dragon, Glamourpuss, or RASL (when it decides to hit the shelves every three months or so)? Of course I do. Did I feel left out when the masses discovered that Dr. Simon Hurt was actually The Devil, proving once and for all that Grant Morrison's Batman run really is just a steaming pile of overhyped bat-shit-crazyness? Well, my sarcasm gives the answer to that one away (unless you're immune to sarcasm, in which case I am so sorry for you).

By my very nature, I am a collector. And the thought of having each and every issue of a new series like The Sword that I can collect right from the beginning is very appealing to the completist in me. The truth is though, that I'd rather have a complete, numbered set of trade paperbacks (ie: graphic novels, yo!) than have to hunt for missing issues due to late shipments, unreliable salespersons, or any other way that I might manage to miss a single issue, thereby leaving a gaping hole in my quaint collection. I'm not alone: the annual sales records of trade paperbacks versus those of single issue comics speak for themselves.

So where does that leave the comics industry? When you can go to any major bookseller or local comic shop and purchase an imported Manga volume, with a length of roughly 150 pages, for around $10-15, why should anyone other than the hopelessly devoted buy a 22-page comic for 3.99? Manga sales have seemed to plateau lately, as opposed to their meteoric rise a few years ago, but they're still more popular with kids and adults alike than the comics being made by Marvel or DC/Vertigo, and smaller indie publishers such as Image, Devil's Due, IDW, Radical, and Dynamite. Vertigo, Image, and to a lesser extent IDW, have all managed to distinguish themselves from The Big Two in various ways. This, I believe, is what will keep these publishers from going bankrupt, if and when the superhero genre is either laid to rest, or turned into something more similar to stereotypical Manga. And with both Batman and the X-Men being made already making their appearances in officially-licensed Manga, I think it's safe to say that this transition of formats from traditional North American superhero comics into Manga-styled comics is already happening.

Independent publishers such as Drawn & Quarterly and Fantagraphics Books have showcased, with popular and unique anthology collections like Mome!, America's Best Comics, or The Acme Novelty Library, that people looking for more overtly intellectual, artistic, or alternative comics will pay a premium for what they perceive as a higher quality product. Personally, I have a harder time paying money for these Anthologies, if only because I'm not likely to reread them as often as I feel like I should if I'm paying a high price for them. Which is why, for a budget conscious consumer like myself, trade paperbacks and Manga are great! When I can buy every volume of The Walking Dead or Invincible for roughly $10.00 each, why would I ever want to go back to paying 3.99 or 2.99 per issue? Financially, there is just no good reason to buy single issue comics.

I've probably already touched on more topics in this post than I intended to, making this a lot less coherent in the process, but I'd like to take the time to say thank you to Comic Readers, my former local comic shop, for setting me free from the tyranny of buying single issues. I'm much happier with my library-loaned trade paperback volumes of Y: The Last Man and Fables, than I ever could be with an incomplete set of issues.

Que sera, sera.