Comic Book Websites 101
Comic book companies are always saying they want to market to the uncommon consumer – the person who wouldn’t ordinarily buy a comic book. Generally the theory had always been that there was very little a comic book company could do to turn off a true collector. But since the early 1990s, collecting comic books has become less of a quantity game and more of a quality pursuit. The comic book audience became jaded by collectors’ covers and crossover events. This resulted in the re-emergence of comic book readers vis a vis collectors.
Readers are less likely to slavishly collect every issue of a comic book just to complete a collection if the story and/or art is sub-par. To a reader, the pursuit isn’t of the tangible thing – the book itself – but rather of the knowledge itself. To the credit of the big publishers, they’ve responded to the change in the market by focusing on compelling story-telling rather than gimmicks.
But it’s still a challenge to keep up. I write for and edit a comic book fan site (www.supermanhomepage.com) so I need to stay abreast of both the stories on the comic book page as well as creator gossip. It took some time but here are the sites I visit regularly in order to feel well-informed about the industry.
1. Comics Continuum (www.comicscontinuum.com) – This website provides an overview of the industry. There’s one update daily generally and the daily report usually contains five to seven items ranging from news to previews of upcoming books to information about comic book characters in other media (TV, films, interactive, etc.). The site releases full advance solicited previews for every comic book company. From time to time, the site will feature interviews but their strong suit is news, not features.
2. Comic Book Resources (www.comicbookresources.com) – This site’s strong suit is features. There are regular columns from writers and artists in the comic book business. There’s a pretty good inventory of super-hero theme songs on MP3 and Real Audio (though my personal collection of such themes is more complete but that’s what makes me a comic book geek). They also provide a summary of news related to comic book film and television properties which is most often a compilation of information on other sites but it’s a virtually complete list of what’s happening with comic book characters in Hollywood on any given day.
3. Newsarama (www.newsarama.com) – This site is best known for their interviews with comic book creators.
4. Superherohype! (www.superherohype.com) – An excellent source for information on other-media adaptations of comic book heroes.
These four sites – and particularly the first two – are must-reading on a daily basis to keep up with the quick-changing comic book industry. Whether you’re a DC fan, a Marvel fan, or a fan of the independent companies, you’ll learn everything else there is to know about comic books other than the books themselves.
If you’re afraid of having the story spoiled for you by reading websites that preview things that haven’t happened yet in the comics you read, most sites include “spoilers” – warnings that you’re about to read something that could spoil your enjoyment of the story if you want to be surprised about story points.
I find that websites have largely replaced the old letter columns that appeared in the back of comic books. In my day, editors answered a handful of letters from readers every month, printing the letters and the replies in the back of the comic book. Letter columns often included detailed explanations for how heroes did certain things. Editors explained away story incongruities, inconsistencies, and mistakes. They’d summarize the different kinds of Kryptonite or say that a certain story took place on a parallel Earth. With the regular letter column historically allowing a peek into the industry, the comic book industry seemed tailor-made for the internet. And it has been.
