Book Review: Reinventing Comics by Scott McCloud

This is part two of my Scott McCloud book reviews. The earlier review focussed on his book, Understanding Comics. This will focus on Reinventing Comics.

Where Understanding Comics looked at the magic and the mechanics of comics, Reinventing Comics, as expected from the title, looks at some of the history of the comic along with where comics are/can be going. It also provides McCloud's ideas as to how creators and readers can maximize the potential for comics.

The first section of the book hits on a lot of history. There's a great deal of information regarding the birth of modern comics, the periods throughout history where comics experienced highs and lows. There is also a great deal of focus on Fredric Wertham, M.D. and his book Seduction of the Innocent, the resulting censorship, and the Comic Code Authority which greatly limited what was deemed publishable. Little violence. Restricted language. Most importantly, absolutely no zombies. All that was left was a lot of funny, talking animal comics.

Looking to the future, McCloud points out several events that need to take place before comics can really reach their potential. The general theme here is that comics need to reach more people. In order to reach more people, they need to appeal to more people. In order to appeal to more people, they need to grow more diverse. In order to be more diverse, they need creators that are more diverse.

The bigger question is this: how to get more diversity? If you walk into you average comic shop, the majority of it is dedicated to mainstream comics. That is, superhero comics published by a handful of publishers. These are the biggest sellers, so these are what shops, all subject to limited shelf space, stock. That makes sense. It's kind of a Catch-22 in that shops have to stock what people buy...but people won't buy what isn't stocked. McCloud gives a good timeline/sequence of events for this phenomena:

1. Comic shop opens and they give comics A-Z equal shelf space.
2. People come in and buy comics. They buy a lot of comics A, B, and C.
3. Comic shops start stocking more of A, B, and C. This eliminates some of the shelf space for D-Z.
4. People come in and continue to buy A, B, and C as that's what appears to be popular.
5. Eventually, the entire shop is A, B, and C and D-Z have all but disappeared.

At this stage, I doubt people just "wander into" a comic shop. I'm thinking the average buyer is something that makes a weekly Wednesday trip to the shop to pick up superhero books. I know that's a broad generalization but, let's face it, if someone is looking for a really good Crime Drama story, they probably aren't heading down to the comic shop.

Does that mean the biggest opportunities for comic book innovation aren't in the local comic shop? Well, I don't know. What does seem apparent is that the web offers amazing opportunity. This is where it really started to hit home for me because of my interest in web comics. McCloud provides another series of events, outlining the career of a "successful" comic creator:

1. Creator folds a 8.5 x 11 paper into fourths. They use each section as a panel and they draw a cartoon. It's for their own benefit and they do it because they enjoy drawing, creating, and their time at the drawing table. They have complete control over what they create.
2. Creator shows their comic to a friend. The friend likes it and encourages the Creator. Creator sells the comic to their friend for $.25. Viola! They've made their first sale!
3. Creator's friend shows the comic to their friends. They like it and also want to buy $.25 copies. Creator busts his bottom to hand-create comics. They still retain complete control of the work.
4. Popularity grows and Creator can't keep up. They start selling photocopies. They still retain full control but now they suffer three things: a) the degradation of quality via the copy process, b) the cost of making the copies which cuts into their profits, and c) time spent in the copy shop instead of at the drawing table (which is where they'd rather be, anyway).
5. You can probably see where this is going. The creator prospers and the comic's popularity continues to grow even outside the local area. To keep up with demand, the creator now spends a lot of time boxing and shipping books, handling payments, and filling out paperwork. This means even less time at the drawing table.
6. Finally, the creator farms out some of the responsibility for printing, shipping, marketing, etc. This buys them more time but the increased number of middle-men cut more into profits. Even worse, more people are trying to tell the creator what to do.
7. In the end, what was once done for pure enjoyment and art is reduced to business.

I know it's probably overly cynical but I'm not sure it's that far off. There's good news, though! with modern technology, there's a way to not only maximize the art and the enjoyment of the creation but also maximize distribution. Here are the things that struck me as major benefits to online comics (from both the creator and the reader standpoint).

1. Very little overhead. With software advancements and cheap internet hosting, the publishing of online comics is surprisingly easy and affordable.
2. The creator retains all creative control. No one telling them what to do, how to run the business, or how to be more marketable.
3. Assuming the comic is strictly online, the delivery charge amounts to nothing other than web traffic. What you deliver is entirely digital...no paper, no ink, etc. That translates to even fewer costs and fewer middle-men.
4. The degree of separation between the artist and the online comic book reader is (or can be) exactly one.
5. With all of this, we're right back at the beginning of the above scenario where the creator sells a folded 8.5 x 11 to a friend and they retain complete control over subject and quality.
6. Honestly, the web offers a lot of creative potential, too. The standard comic is typically confined to a certain, standard size for print and delivery. The web page is virtually endless. The potential for creative use of that space is incredible.
   

Now, there's some work involved in making money at it. McCloud is a big fan of what's called micropayments. I admit I haven't investigated the concept extensively but, at it's core, the creator would be able to accept very small online payments (i.e. the aforementioned $.25) in return for an online comic. It's something but it's still small enough that a buyer unsure of whether they'll enjoy a comic won't be discouraged.

Reinventing Comics was published several years ago so you'd think that, as far as technology goes, it would already be somewhat dated. Fortunately, the book sticks to broad concepts that don't really go out of date. If anything, the improvements in software and hardware have made McCloud's statements even more valid. Some might argue online publishing is getting too easy as it floods the web with, well, junk.

Do I think print comics are on their way out? No. At least, I certainly hope not. I still love the feel of the comic book in my hand. I like to flip through the pages repeatedly and I enjoy the tactile side of it. Though I don't make the weekly trip to the comic shop anymore, I still actively read graphic novels and I don't see that stopping anytime soon.

So, I actually found the book really encouraging to my efforts. McCloud has a newer book titled Making Comics. I haven't read it yet but it has definitely been added to the list.