I see marvels demise as a good thing, the characters, the good ones, will
get picked up by someone else, and maybe even handled better. And the
industry may finally be forced to deal with a little reality.
Book stores, the successful ones, NEVER let themselves become totally
reliant on one kind of genre or publisher. At the most you find shops that
only sell fantasy, but even there you have a dozen deferent branches,
dragons and knights, science fiction, urbane fantasy, vampires and monsters,
Kabala and zombies and on and on. If a shop owner is foolish enough to run
his business solely on the profit and failing of one publishers goods than
they have no one but them selves to blame if the source of their well drys
up. they weren't in business, they were indulging in a hobby or profiteering
on a trend.
The market and the art form are being held back by the convenience and
safety of the direct market system (a model every other medium as
abandoned). The publishing industry is hurting in general but the comics
medium would probably be healthier in the real world than as a niche market
medium simply because there would be that many more potential readers and
that much more exposure. the good work and the well marketed would survive,
the well intended but un refined would continue to be the underground -
finding there own way to readers through the admittedly small network of
alterative shops, and if they are smart? some new venues. For the commercial
market it would be the beast thing and would allow for a massive broadening
of the kind of stories being told. for the indie seen, it will have to learn
all the same kinds of tricks to stay alive as the indie music and
independent presses have had to.
It’s time for the medium to grow up and leave home and make a go of it in
the big bad world, and i for one am VERY hopeful for the fate of the medium,
the future of comics. And i don’t think marvels existence, or the lack of,
will mater.
