Writing for The Los Angeles Times, Tim Cavanaugh searches desperately for evidence that the American comics industry is on the upswing and finds, well:

… [I]t comes as quite a surprise to find that sales of comic books have been increasing steadily for the last five years. And that doesn’t just include graphic novels—the perfect-bound trade paperbacks that have become the default format for the medium. Diamond Comic Distributors Inc., the company that has a practical monopoly on comics distribution, has seen improving figures in almost all formats.

What’s strange about this grim reprieve for the industry is that it is so hard to see in the popular culture. While half-century-old superheroes continue to dominate the dying medium of motion pictures, and manga and graphic novels have provided a transfusion for the dying medium of books, there’s precious little anecdotal evidence that comics are anything but moribund. If you take your kids to a comic shop (as I foolishly did a few weeks back), the cloying, creepy, did-I-accidentally-enter-a-porn-shop vibe will underscore just how empty and depressed the place is. Visit a full-service newsstand and the lone, ragged Green Lantern title brings home the grim news that there’s nothing left for the guardians of Oa to guard.

It’s a short, and choppy, piece that falters in trying to cover too much territory. Cavanaugh glides by manga, the direct market, the speculator boom and webcomics, but doesn’t pause long enough to provide context or to prop up his points. Still, though, he does get a couple of good quotes from Tom Spurgeon and Peter Bagge.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 at 10:05 am and is filed under Comic Books, Graphic Novels, Industry, Manga, Retailers, Webcomics. 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.