BW Media Spotlight

I try to stay out of politics with this site. Yes, the current trend of ideological preaching over good storytelling (thus in essence negating any positivity that can be had from trying to diversify the ranks) is annoying but for me it’s a symptom of a larger problem and better political commentators than I already cover that area better than I could. As I’ve noted numerous times there is a pecking order in media and anything not involving live actors or centuries old media formats like prose books are rather low on the list. This includes animation, video games, and comics, with the latter apparently willing to accept their place as an intellectual property engine for the “higher” media or trying to reach outside of comics to find an audience by hiring novelists instead of comic writers and doing all kinds of cheap marketing tricks to increase sales. The people behind comics seem to have no faith in themselves as a media format. Idealogues coming in and altering things in hopes of influencing the movies and reaching an audience who couldn’t care less about the comics no matter how many Marvel or DC movies and shows they watch is just part of the problem resulting from that mindset. As reviewers deeper into the statistics have gone over, the success of Black Panther hasn’t led to increased comic sales or The Boys leading to new readers. Comics just keeps shooting themselves in the foot and ideology is only part of the problem.

And yet it’s Eric July’s political leanings (officially Libertarian) and his constant calling out of actions both political and apolitical errors in the comics industry many of his defenders blame for the lack of discussion in the mainstream comic news sites, or in some cases outright negative, while being one of the biggest launches to hit indie publishers in a while. As I talked about after my July (as in the month) hiatus July (as in Eric) didn’t turn to crowdfunding for Isom #1 or hunt down investors; he started his own publishing company. Instead of going through Diamond or other traditional distributors for his first graphic novel he started a site and set up a campaign to get the whole company started. Additionally Reddit has blocked ANY discussion of the Rippaverse on their comic subreddit because of his politics and pushing back against the mainstream comic industry.

What July himself hadn’t counted on was how much support he had gained between his commentary and his music, bursting his $1,000,000 goal in a day rather than the months he thought it would take. As I write this on Monday (as I had the time, maybe scheduled for Tuesday) his current proclaimed revenue is $3,463,142.46 (admittedly I’m not sure where the 46¢ came from given that the prices are all in dollars) with 32 days left to go. There are comics, posters, trading cards the size of postcards, and a bunch of other stuff but this isn’t about promoting Rippaverse Comics. It’s about one set of comments by the critics of the Rippaverse and how it affects other indie publishers who may want to start out, which it seems to be the goal to stop and not give the big boys further competition. You know, like a department store squeezing out a mom & pop. It’s like an episode of The A-Team, except July is both Hannibal Smith AND B.A. Baraccas. (No version of Face and Murdoch though.)

Back in 2010 I took a look at the cost of publishing a comic to ask why DC and Marvel’s prices were constantly so high, and they’ve gotten worse since. Nobody complains about their price increase even though both DC and Marvel are now part of larger media conglomerates that could easily offset the prices a bit but they don’t care about the comic books themselves. For some reason this black-owned first-time indie publisher working out of his own funds is the hill they won’t die on. The current paper shortage hasn’t helped. However, to see if $35.00 really is too much for a first graphic novel that is launching an entire universe (not whether I can afford it…I’ve just gotten over medical issues that left me unemployed for years…I can’t afford anything right now that isn’t an emergency) I went to three different publishers this time. Not knowing what the stitching is on the binder, the size of the final product or the name of the quality paper used for the cover and interior pages I’m admittedly doing some guesswork. I’ll post all the data and we’ll see if the price of making the comic with a profit (you don’t start a comic company on posters and t-shirts) is in line with what’s being asked for. Just remember this is all guess work based on what I could find out.

Continue reading →