“It’s a street fight. Both Fantagraphics and Ellison have contributed a lot to comic literature and science fiction and speculative fiction. Everyone admires the work that both do and regrets the fact that they’re in this very public, unpleasant fight.”

– ICv2 Publisher Milton Griepp, on Harlan Ellison vs. Fantagraphics

“The discussion turned to the overseas market and transplanting foreign talent. I asked whether the success of titles in the States and Europe are making them cater to different audiences. The answer was, quite frankly, no. Japan is such a big local market, they are the first readers they aim to please. In the end, foreign volumes don’t actually make them much money anyway after rights and costs, etc. so it’s considered a small bonus on top of regular J-sales.”

– artist Takeshi Miyazawa, after talking about the manga industry with editors of Japan’s Comic GUM

“Comics readers sometimes aren’t so much appreciators of an art form, but more like sports fans. You know, the guys who will never be baseball managers and sit in the stands or on their living room couches and chew out baseball managers from afar for their failure to use the hit-and-run. Sports fans do this, I think, because they have a personal investment in ‘their’ team. They speak about their favorite team in the first person plural; their emotions often depend on the success or failure of their team. Fans often carry a sense of entitlement, too. An ‘I’m the fan; therefore you must do all you can to please me’ attitude. Comics fans feel this way about the companies who publish their superhero books.”

– Jennifer de Guzman, editor-in-chief of SLG Publishing, on fan entitlement

“I think that in many ways the indie market does seem to be suffering from a bit of a glut. We’ve seen Virgin Comics and Boom! Studios coming on very strong over the past year, and overall there’s an enormous amount of competition on the indie market.

“Unfortunately, if DC and Marvel are doing events or crossovers that many people are buying, there’s not a whole lot of retailer money left for the indie portion of the market, so we’re left fighting over a smaller piece of the pie.

“I think those are good problems to have: if the industry as a whole is putting out quality stuff, comics in general are doing well and that’s good for everybody. The more good work we put out together, the more people will be drawn back come into comics and the more the industry will go.”

– Mark Smylie, publisher of Archaia Studios Press, on the state of the independent-comics market

“For me it was very important that the girls were different looking and by no means perfect in a magazine kind of way. The four Janes come in different sizes and shapes and looks. Plain is such a weird thing, because what is plain? It’s totally subjective! Beauty is within the eye of the beholder, and I am of the opinion that there is a rare beauty in everyone. That said, Main Jane is average. Theater Jane is a larger girl. Polly ‘sporty’ Jane is a beanpole with Frida Kahlo eyebrows. Brain Jane covers her chest with books.”

– author Cecil Castelluci, on the appearance of the central characters in her Minx graphic novel, The PLAIN Janes

This entry was posted on Friday, March 30th, 2007 at 11:35 am and is filed under Comic Books, Creators, DC Comics, Graphic Novels, Independent, Industry, Manga, Marvel, Quote Unquote. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.