Hit Restart – Hilary Goldstein

DC’s Game of 52 Pickup

It’s no secret that the comic-book industry is hurting. Gone are the glory days of a fever-pitched fandom lining up to buy a half-dozen polybagged copies of Spider-Man #1. But there is hope. Creatively, the comics industry is in perhaps the best shape it’s been in since the ’60s. And the new digital age means the daunting overhead required to produce physical copies could be a thing of the past.

Which lands us at the boldest move taken since DC Comics scrapped its continuity in the mid-’80s. DC has (once again) started over. This time, launching with 52 all-new #1 issues and daring to change aspects of the origins of its roster of characters. No character is safe. Not even the sacred origin of the boyscout in blue and red.

DC has thrown off the floaties and jumped headfirst into the deep-end of the pool without knowing if anyone bothered to fill it with water first. It’s ballsy. And after the first full week of new #1 issues, it appears to be the real deal. The New DCU is here to stay. But will it matter?

In the short term, sales will boom. Those who already were picking up DC books on a regular basis will likely buy additional issues to get a better sense of the new landscape. Old readers will be intrigued by new possibilities and might like the idea of getting in on the ground floor. But, frankly, these people don’t matter. Over time, the sales will even out as readers thin their pull list to the essentials and casual readers fade away. Soon enough, we’ll be back where we were. The only thing that can bring true growth is attracting a new audience.

I’m not certain DC will manage to pull that off or hold those readers for long if it does.

We’re at the first full week of new DC books and as a lifelong DC Comics reader, I’m thrilled. The new Action Comics makes one of my least-liked heroes (yeah, I don’t like Superman that much) interesting. The new Joker feels more like a Dexter villain than Jack Nicholson in clown makeup (a good thing). And Gail Simone kept the core event of The Killing Joke intact and made sure it was essential to Batgirl. Animal Man, Swamp Thing — these are great reads. But there is a flaw in the plan.

As someone who reads comic books and who’s going to buy several books in the DC lineup, I can follow along with time jumps from one book to the next. Justice League starts off “five years earlier” but tells us that clearly at the outset. The other books aren’t always as clear. Action Comics #1 is set about five years in the past from the current DC timeline, showing the earliest days of Superman. Batman is, I think, set in the “present” as is Batgirl. Again, if you read comics often, it’s easy to figure out what is going on. If you don’t, I think this is going to confuse the hell out of people.

If you want to excite the current fanbase and draw in some former readers, the current structure works brilliantly. I’m hooked. I think it’s a great idea to have this mixture of present and past storylines that tell us how the DC Universe came to be. But it’s a terrible idea if you want new readers to jump in and stay in. You’ve got to set the status quo for them first. As is, I feel the new DC is geared towards selling a few extra issues to the same-sized group who were buying them before. I can’t see how it will get truly new blood into the mix.

This is a big issue for many websites. It’s easy to spike your pageviews (number of pages clicked). More great content means more things for your userbase to click on. The challenge is increasing unique visitors (individuals who come to the site). Throwing more content, even more interesting content, out there generally spikes pageviews, but has only a minimal (and temporary) affect on unique visitors. This is what happens with “events” in comics. And the New 52, right now, is just another big event.

The real test will be in three or four years. Know anyone who started watching Lost in the middle of season 4? Of course not. Got a lot of friends who are picking up Mass Effect 3 having never played the first two games? Doubtful. And comics run into the same issue time and again. Continuity is a barrier to new entrants. The real question, the one I haven’t heard asked yet, is how you keep from having to relaunch the whole universe again in another decade. What is changing with how comic books are structured or written that would invite in new readers when we are at Action Comics #50? If there’s no answer to this question, then there is no real solution yet to growing the industry.

Comic-book writers build long-lead hooks. Sub plots develop slowly over time and eventually elevate to main plots. Character introductions are taken for granted over time. This thing that happened in issue #14 to this one side-character suddenly means there’s a clone of Bruce Wayne running around in issue #40. To new readers, mainstream comic books are intimidating. There’s nothing worse to a new reader than feeling like you are missing out on something. This exciting new history becomes just as intimidating for new readers as it was before the relaunch. If you don’t get in now, will you be able to jump in later?

And then there is the issue of price. I commend DC Comics for going day-and-date with its releases. A $2.99 digital comic book, however, is not going to draw in new readers. It only services old readers who want the convenience of a digital experience. Yes, comics will now be more easily available, but in direct competition with millions of annual digital releases. The key to digital success is 99 cents. That is not a secret.

It’s hard to believe a serialized release could interest the average consumer at three times the cost of the one-time purchase of Angry Birds. That might be comparing apples to oranges, but last I checked, both were fruit. I don’t expect one piece of fruit to cost three times as much as another or to have to pay per bite. The economic model remains broken.

I believe in comic books. The industry will always be around. The digital age means smaller publishers will be able to grab a larger market share and are more likely to attract new readers due to minimal continuity concerns. But the big dogs, Marvel and DC, are in a lot of danger. I want to see the big boys grow, because they still account for a big chunk of the money (and higher pay scales) in the industry. So I hope they have more up their sleeves to solve these issues.

The New 52 is a great start. But it’s only a start. There’s a long, long road ahead for the comics industry and the two biggest issues (bringing new readers into continuity five years in and cost) have yet to be solved.

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