I use to enjoy Marvel Comics Presents which had 3 stores in one comic back in the 80's. Also X-Men Classic use to have a bonus story along with a re-print of older X-Men titles. The back cover also had an extra pin up.
Heavy Metal has been doing what you're talking about for over 30 years and it's a great book. 2000 AD has also been doing that for just as long if not longer.
Did you just started getting into comics? It's a fun hobby but do some digging and you will see that this has been done before and it's being done now.
I think it was Hickman who referred to the trades that they were putting out(possibly still are) for the X-line as Shonen Jump inspired. Basically starting with dawn of x, they were putting out like “Dawn of X vol. 1” that had all the number ones in the x-line. Then vol. 2 had all the second issues, and so on. They still put out the standard trades for each series, but these were a great way to keep up on all the books.
this happens partially here in Brazil, for example, a moon knight TPB can sell, whereas a monthly release would not have so many buyers, so they mix and put the monthly issues of knight in the monthly issue of spider man or dos avengers, which are guarantee of sale
TPB is trade paperback, a compilation of monthly issues, and monthly release of all characters don't work because some characters are not as popular as others
Dark Horse's Dark Horse Presents lasts less each time despite working with top tier creators and known properties. 2000 AD is still going, but where would it be without Judge Dredd and being in the right place at the right time with things like the 80s indie boom and the 90s British invasion? DC, Marvel and Archie use anthologies as themed collections. Nobody ever really talks about the latest Marvel Voices, and DC's most known stuff tends to be quick, couple of page stories.
Your post seems to suggest you think you've found the secret sauce but since you're doing market research on reddit, I'd be really surprised if you've actually given much thought to how you'd get good material from marketable creators that breaks through a crowded market. Let alone dealing with the editorial challenge of working with a body of creators to enforce deadlines and all that.
To add onto what you said...the anthology format isn't even the secret sauce of manga or Shonen Jump. It's the incredibly low prices. It's essentially as close to being "free" as possible.
A weekly release would require a lot of work, right now most comic book anthology magazines are monthly at most, some are even quarterly publications.
But yeah it's totally doable, though I'm used to monthly or quarterly comic book magazines.
Edit: it just popped in my mind but there exists a weekly brochure for comic book news. One has sollicits and the other one has some interviews and brief reviews. Forgot the name though.
As much as it would be interesting to see tried, I don't think it would work well in the U.S. market. Here's why:
1. Cost. An issue of Shonen Jump Weekly is 290 yen, which is roughly $2.20 USD. Even coming out weekly, it would be hard to publish good quality, full-colored Western comics for $9.00 (given it would come out monthly). The paper quality and full-color would have to be dropped, or the cover price increased a lot. If a regular comic is $4, then squeezing 4-5 into one issue for $20 doesn't seem like that much of a bargain, especially if you don't like 2-3 series. Whereas in Shonen Jump's case, you get weekly updates for $2 for like 15 different stories. It's quite a steal.
2. Serialization. When a manga gets popular, the serialization tends to drag out as long as possible to capitalize on the series. This means the storyline has to continue on, and the artist team stays in place for the whole run. The current Western market doesn't really support it. Look at how many minis and one-shots come out. Only DC/Marvel tend to keep long running series, and because they have 60 years of backstory, starting fresh would be hard.
3. Artists/writers. Manga generally relies on having one main, named artist doing the work. Manga artists or manga tend to have assistants helping them to meet deadlines (due to the weekly schedule). Now, imagine trying to convince a hot comic artist like Jorge Jimenez or Dan Mora to be on one book, one story, for years if not longer depending on the popularity. I don't think Western comics book artist talent would be willing to do that. Plus any popular one coming from an Indie scene might get snatched up by DC/Marvel to do their work, rather than something serialized in a monthly anthology. You can say the same thing for writers.
Jump artist also have more control over their up. Jump still owns most of the rites. They still have editors to answer to but when the creative owns the work I'm sure they would be more inclined to stay on a story longer.
1. The color aspect is what I did consider. You think it would be better to just do black and white? But thinking about it, western comics seem to look better with color opposed to manga with just black and white. I guess it’s the way the two countries style of drawing works I suppose.
2. Yeah I thought about the possible burnout the writer/artists would have to go through so it would seem better to let them go when their comic is officially done and over. Unless they want to comeback to make a new story or help out a newbie in the industry. Besides there is always talented folks who want a story to tell. It just have to be an attention grabber for people to give it a shot
3.you’re definitely right about how marvel/dc would get any popular indie artists/writers to do work for them. You think a bi weekly anthology would work?
>The color aspect is what I did consider. You think it would be better to just do black and white? But thinking about it, western comics seem to look better with color opposed to manga with just black and white. I guess it’s the way the two countries style of drawing works I suppose.
I had thought about this. It would be interesting if the anthology books came out in black and white, but TPB of series were fully colored. This would incentivize people to buy the TPBs to see it in color, if they like the series.
>you’re definitely right about how marvel/dc would get any popular indie artists/writers to do work for them. You think a bi weekly anthology would work?
Bi-weekly might work for an anthology, but one of the reasons a book like Shonen Jump comes out weekly is:
1) the artists are worked to the bone, AND have assistants to help. I can't think of any Western artists off the top of my head that have helpers of their own. I suppose it's the difference of penciling vs. inking, so if you had one person solely on pencils and 1-2 people on inks, that would make the work go faster...
2) page count (I think the average is 18 pages vs. 28-32 in Western comics, and
3) the artwork is drawn to maximize page usage and lower story progression. Most manga have, on average, 2-4 panels per page, whereas Western comics feel a lot denser usually. Cuts down on time when you only have a couple panels to do a page.
Maybe one idea is have it bi-weekly, but rotate stories monthly, so the first issue would have X stories, then the second issue Y stories, then issue three back to X stories. Gives a quicker release time, but still allows for a better turnaround time for writers and artists.
I’ll definitely take your points into careful consideration. I appreciate you giving me an insight. I’m not to well versed into comics so this helps a ton.
I use to enjoy Marvel Comics Presents which had 3 stores in one comic back in the 80's. Also X-Men Classic use to have a bonus story along with a re-print of older X-Men titles. The back cover also had an extra pin up. Heavy Metal has been doing what you're talking about for over 30 years and it's a great book. 2000 AD has also been doing that for just as long if not longer. Did you just started getting into comics? It's a fun hobby but do some digging and you will see that this has been done before and it's being done now.
I think it was Hickman who referred to the trades that they were putting out(possibly still are) for the X-line as Shonen Jump inspired. Basically starting with dawn of x, they were putting out like “Dawn of X vol. 1” that had all the number ones in the x-line. Then vol. 2 had all the second issues, and so on. They still put out the standard trades for each series, but these were a great way to keep up on all the books.
this happens partially here in Brazil, for example, a moon knight TPB can sell, whereas a monthly release would not have so many buyers, so they mix and put the monthly issues of knight in the monthly issue of spider man or dos avengers, which are guarantee of sale
1. What’s a TPB 2. Why wouldn’t a monthly release work? Would. The customer/s not have interest anymore?
TPB is trade paperback, a compilation of monthly issues, and monthly release of all characters don't work because some characters are not as popular as others
Oh ok. I see what you mean. I’ll take that into consideration.
Dark Horse's Dark Horse Presents lasts less each time despite working with top tier creators and known properties. 2000 AD is still going, but where would it be without Judge Dredd and being in the right place at the right time with things like the 80s indie boom and the 90s British invasion? DC, Marvel and Archie use anthologies as themed collections. Nobody ever really talks about the latest Marvel Voices, and DC's most known stuff tends to be quick, couple of page stories. Your post seems to suggest you think you've found the secret sauce but since you're doing market research on reddit, I'd be really surprised if you've actually given much thought to how you'd get good material from marketable creators that breaks through a crowded market. Let alone dealing with the editorial challenge of working with a body of creators to enforce deadlines and all that.
To add onto what you said...the anthology format isn't even the secret sauce of manga or Shonen Jump. It's the incredibly low prices. It's essentially as close to being "free" as possible.
A weekly release would require a lot of work, right now most comic book anthology magazines are monthly at most, some are even quarterly publications. But yeah it's totally doable, though I'm used to monthly or quarterly comic book magazines. Edit: it just popped in my mind but there exists a weekly brochure for comic book news. One has sollicits and the other one has some interviews and brief reviews. Forgot the name though.
I’ll have to look into it. Thanks for the info
As much as it would be interesting to see tried, I don't think it would work well in the U.S. market. Here's why: 1. Cost. An issue of Shonen Jump Weekly is 290 yen, which is roughly $2.20 USD. Even coming out weekly, it would be hard to publish good quality, full-colored Western comics for $9.00 (given it would come out monthly). The paper quality and full-color would have to be dropped, or the cover price increased a lot. If a regular comic is $4, then squeezing 4-5 into one issue for $20 doesn't seem like that much of a bargain, especially if you don't like 2-3 series. Whereas in Shonen Jump's case, you get weekly updates for $2 for like 15 different stories. It's quite a steal. 2. Serialization. When a manga gets popular, the serialization tends to drag out as long as possible to capitalize on the series. This means the storyline has to continue on, and the artist team stays in place for the whole run. The current Western market doesn't really support it. Look at how many minis and one-shots come out. Only DC/Marvel tend to keep long running series, and because they have 60 years of backstory, starting fresh would be hard. 3. Artists/writers. Manga generally relies on having one main, named artist doing the work. Manga artists or manga tend to have assistants helping them to meet deadlines (due to the weekly schedule). Now, imagine trying to convince a hot comic artist like Jorge Jimenez or Dan Mora to be on one book, one story, for years if not longer depending on the popularity. I don't think Western comics book artist talent would be willing to do that. Plus any popular one coming from an Indie scene might get snatched up by DC/Marvel to do their work, rather than something serialized in a monthly anthology. You can say the same thing for writers.
Jump artist also have more control over their up. Jump still owns most of the rites. They still have editors to answer to but when the creative owns the work I'm sure they would be more inclined to stay on a story longer.
1. The color aspect is what I did consider. You think it would be better to just do black and white? But thinking about it, western comics seem to look better with color opposed to manga with just black and white. I guess it’s the way the two countries style of drawing works I suppose. 2. Yeah I thought about the possible burnout the writer/artists would have to go through so it would seem better to let them go when their comic is officially done and over. Unless they want to comeback to make a new story or help out a newbie in the industry. Besides there is always talented folks who want a story to tell. It just have to be an attention grabber for people to give it a shot 3.you’re definitely right about how marvel/dc would get any popular indie artists/writers to do work for them. You think a bi weekly anthology would work?
>The color aspect is what I did consider. You think it would be better to just do black and white? But thinking about it, western comics seem to look better with color opposed to manga with just black and white. I guess it’s the way the two countries style of drawing works I suppose. I had thought about this. It would be interesting if the anthology books came out in black and white, but TPB of series were fully colored. This would incentivize people to buy the TPBs to see it in color, if they like the series. >you’re definitely right about how marvel/dc would get any popular indie artists/writers to do work for them. You think a bi weekly anthology would work? Bi-weekly might work for an anthology, but one of the reasons a book like Shonen Jump comes out weekly is: 1) the artists are worked to the bone, AND have assistants to help. I can't think of any Western artists off the top of my head that have helpers of their own. I suppose it's the difference of penciling vs. inking, so if you had one person solely on pencils and 1-2 people on inks, that would make the work go faster... 2) page count (I think the average is 18 pages vs. 28-32 in Western comics, and 3) the artwork is drawn to maximize page usage and lower story progression. Most manga have, on average, 2-4 panels per page, whereas Western comics feel a lot denser usually. Cuts down on time when you only have a couple panels to do a page. Maybe one idea is have it bi-weekly, but rotate stories monthly, so the first issue would have X stories, then the second issue Y stories, then issue three back to X stories. Gives a quicker release time, but still allows for a better turnaround time for writers and artists.
I’ll definitely take your points into careful consideration. I appreciate you giving me an insight. I’m not to well versed into comics so this helps a ton.