Further to Jason McNamara’s question the other day, Larry Young offers his reasoning as to why kids don’t dig the comics:
[L]isten: just like in 1976 when Logan’s Run came out, my pals and I went to go see it because there were flame guns and people exploding in mid-air and robots and boobies and somebody gets stabbed with an American flag in the future overgrown Senate chambers, for God’s sake. That’s some pop culture entertainment. We didn’t think to ourselves, “Hmmm; the opening weekend gross is underperforming expectations, let’s wait until next week to see the percentage drop and make our decision then to see if we shouldn’t just wait for second run or drive-in.” What crap. Flame guns! Robots! Jenny Agutter! Why wait?
And that’s the same thing with kids. No kid in their right mind is thinking, “You know, I’d enjoy this book about pirates and conquistadors and talking ducks and a man made out of fish… if it was only in continuity! I enjoy the safety of the endless corporate teat-suckling I get from the latest Atom relaunch instead of the beginning/middle/end satisfaction of a good story, well-told, like 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, or, you know, Colonia. Oh, what? Comics and graphic novels cost money? Forget it; I’m off to the Wii my uncle just got me for my birthday.”
So, there you go; that’s why “kids” don’t read “comics.” “Kids” haven’t read comics since 1969, and “comics” just hadn’t noticed.
December 7th, 2006 at 10:38 am
Not exactly piercing insights I haven’t heard anywhere else. Once again, blame the geeks who like a coherent continuity.
That’s not the problem. It’s the comic publishers to offer something else besides the continuity-rich comics. Their appetite for risk-taking has never been lower.
December 7th, 2006 at 12:00 pm
To be fair to Larry (not that he always deserves it)I think all he was actually saying is that the debate is focused on how to make existing, ageing, fans happy and not on what grabs new readers.
Not exactly revolutionary stuff but there you go.
December 7th, 2006 at 1:32 pm
I’d really hope that new readers could get interested in Gail Simone’s Atom too - it’s not like you need to know about, say, M’Nagalah or Giganta’s previous appearances to enjoy them there.
And if one does enjoy Atom, exactly *whose* teat is Larry saying you’re sucking?
December 7th, 2006 at 5:11 pm
Kids today do like comics, but they’re reading Japanese and Korean comics. Or they’re like my now 12-year-old son, and they’re reading Little Lulu, Teen Titans Go!, Scooby-Doo, and other more kid-friendly fare than most current super hero comics. Believe me, they’re reading, but they’re going to the library and going to the bookstore, and they’re NOT going to the comics stores, where they mostly don’t feel welcome.
December 7th, 2006 at 6:22 pm
I’m sick of hearing this. Am I the only person who was so engrossed by comics as a kid because the little comic I bought for 75 cents was part of a HUGE HUGE story that spanned thousands of issues? The sheer massive nature of it was what drew me. It was a tiny part of something that was larger than I could get from playing video games or watching cartoons or most TV shows. It was unique.
I’ve never come across a kid who read a comic that I or someone else gave them and were so confused that they didn’t want to read more. I’ve never seen a kid like that. The only time I ever hear that is when someone on the internet’s complaining. If kids can collect a bazillion Yu-Gi-Oh cards or know everything about every pokemon ever, then they can handle this.