And you constantly see publishers working in the industry being confused at how comics aren’t more popular and cancelling series left and right wondering where it all went wrong.
We like comics, but I hate “the canon” and crossovers. Just let writers do what they want and not have to tie in to vastly different works, it’s not that hard.
Publishers aren’t confused about anything. The idea that some readers like clear jumping-on points and isolated cannon isn’t news to anyone.
Ultimate Spider-Man proved it a long time ago. Graphic novels have been around forever. Both DC and Marvel published and still publish stand alone works all the time.
It’s that they choose to serve two different audiences: the readers that like the shared universe, lose cannon, and rotating writership, because those things aren’t that big a deal for them. Then there’s the readers that want small, self contained, one author experiences. The mainline comics aren’t made for the latter, and in fact they would lose the former if they tried to pivot in that direction.
It just never ceases to amaze me how some people can’t wrap their head around the idea others have no problem jumping into a series rather than worrying about starting from issue 1. It’s not that bizarre.
This is why comics aren’t more popular in the west, constant rebooting. I get if it happened once or even twice in all the decades, but the reboots are constant.
Catching up on a manga can be a slog, but at least I know what the chronology is without having to consult a wiki, and they basically never reboot so the catching up is actually worthwhile!
That has little to do with comics being unpopular lol
But what if I want to read something that doesn’t sexualize children?
You might be out of luck.
Someone else suggested a long-form serial called “The New York Times”
I am having a hell of a time trying to find issue #1 though so idk if it’s worth starting in the middle somewhere
Oh no, you’ll be lost if you don’t start at the beginning.
The Bible idk
Well… about that…
Wrong.
C’mon, this only happens with super hero comics. Even in DC, if you want to read 100 Bullets you start in chapter one. That ain’t a manga exclusive feature
This is fair though superhero books do tend to represent the medium more in the west(even though they have and are continuing to steadily decline in popularity)
Well the obvious counterpoint would be Fate, but I’m sure there are more.
Also: monogatari
Well, the monogatari series isn’t a manga as well.
To be fair, Fate series isn’t a manga.
I didn’t know JoJo Star was a real person
17 year old high school student btw
Some people need to slow down with the evolution.
I used to read Batman comics, until DC rebooted their universe… again.
Nowadays, I stick with manga.
I just wish there was a good list of what’s still considered canon.
There hasn’t been a reboot since 2011.
That’s the one I was thinking about. They rebooted in the 90s and I dropped out when they rebooted again in 2011.
Tbf, most of the canon was kept intact, but I thought it was a good dropping point for me.
Yeah, thats probably the one he’s talking about.
Chapter 1: last page of book
This is where I’m at with Comics. I had to look up various sites to understand what the Knight Terrors arc was, or Fall of X, House of M…Hellfire Gala event? I’ll probably just give up.
Age of Apocalypse did that to me, spans like 10 different series.
*Correction 16 counting a couple of one shots.
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You probably dont want to start with 2011 since the nu52 continuity ended quite a long time ago and Batman year one would be a good starter issue to read. Marvel and DC needs to stop with their relaunching, renumbering, and returning back to legacy numbering nonsense. Its issue one, now issue 345, now issue 1 again, and we figured out if we add up all the relaunches and side series we can get to 400 so back to an inflated legacy numbering!
Manga is written by one person. Any given mainstream comic character has at least 30 years of history with at least a dozen writers. It isn’t a problem with comics but with the continuity being reconned every few years.
The real answer is to start where ever you want with comics because stories are self contained and rarely serialized. Crossover characters will revisit the comic and it’s fun but usually comics are easy to get into. It’s why trades are so cheap - it’s open for anyone to pick up and read.
Bro’s never tried to get into Slayers
Okay, but is the beginning the front page or the last page?
The first page.
That nose.
