Current Events > I dont get why people say Manga > Western Comics

(+) Yeah! (+)

also the price.

If I had to choose between the two I enjoy the texture and feel of a book in my hand and when turning the pages much more than I do the glazed over thin magazines of American comics.

For comics, DC and Marvel canon is a mess and you're sort of expected to have at least a passing familiarity with most of the universe already because sometimes the whole conceit of a character's portrayal in a run is "check it out, they're different from before!"

Its not too hard to figure out, really, he said. Theres a lot of dedication, passion, and craft in manga comics. And thats missing, almost entirely, from the Big Two. Marvel and DC still run the store here. They still are the market leaders. And unfortunately, there is no variety there. Theres nothing really different. Theres not something for everybody the way there is in manga.
I mean, in Japanese manga theres golf comics. Theres not one comic about golf. Theres multiple [manga] about golf. And Ive made reference on these videos to one of my favorite manga, which is about fishing. Its just about fishing. Its not about vampires fishing on another planet or witches fishing or fishing after a zombie apocalypse. This is about guys fishing. Surf casting and whatever. Fishing from boats, fishing on the shore, fishing from the banks of rivers, and the stories are fascinating, and beautifully drawn, and beautifully realized.
But here, what do we get? We get superheroes and poorly done superheroes. There really isnt anything else at the mainstream companies. Its superheroes, superheroes, superheroes.
Why, why would you want to read this crap if you had a choice of reading a genre that you prefer, be it horror, or mystery, or espionage, or golf? When theres only one flavor in American comics, of course Japanese comics are going to win the day.
He went on, The biggest problem here is that all I see American comic book creators, the people in the mainstream do, is complain about manga. Well, why dont you learn from manga? Why dont you look at what manga is doing and do that? And I dont mean draw people with huge eyes and lots of speed lines. Do more varied stories, do more complex stories. Put more effort into the artwork. Put more effort into the craft.
While he thinks comic book writers ought to look toward manga, he doesnt mean just copy it. If they try to copy it just like they did in the 90s here in the United States, theyll just get it all wrong. They dont know what theyre doing. They have no interest. Theyre just complain about it, as if thats going to get them any more readers. . . I dont see the mainstream, the Big Two ever catching up, he said.

Manga is just a whole lot more accessible than comic. It's very easy to find scanlations of newly released series and ongoing favorites that you can read at your leisure hours, days even years later. With comics it's a lot more difficult. You gotta actually buy those, subscribe to a service, or hope you can find a decent torrent.

You like it better because its easier to steal is not a great argument

It actually is a very informative argument to understand why there's a lot more interest and discussion in one when one is significantly easier to access than the other.

People definitely say this about anime but ive been told this before about multiple long running mangas.

At least most manga doesn't feel the need to "one more day" reset itself every couple years

Could also be an argument that piracy can serve as a good advertisement since the physical/digital sales of manga far surpass comics nowadays.

This is absolutely true. Sure, the initial views are pirated, but if someone likes a series enough they'll actually go out and buy the books, buy merch, purchase movie tickets, buy the games, etc etc etc

Yeah, I'll admit it, I never bought a physical book or a subscription to read Naruto, but you can bet I forked over hundreds worth of merchandise and video game sales because of it.

People definitely say this about anime but ive been told this before about multiple long running mangas.

I think this is also why they don't go so hard against manga pirate sites. Even if people pirate the manga, they could still end up buying the merch and the creators still make a profit.

western is not funding enough for their own hentai though

words from a veteran Batman writer himself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utGdLiGOWFg&t=1233s

Yes, the typical counterpoint is "read more than just marvel/DC comics" but that doesn't change that there's simply much less variety with American comics. For example, even something as big as spies were in the past, there are now barely if any spy comics around. Whereas there are a ton of spy mangas in a variety of genres. Not to mention romance manga (popular with women) are as massive as romance movies, maybe even bigger these days, while romance comics are cryptids.

Its not too hard to figure out, really, he said. Theres a lot of dedication, passion, and craft in manga comics. And thats missing, almost entirely, from the Big Two. Marvel and DC still run the store here. They still are the market leaders. And unfortunately, there is no variety there. Theres nothing really different. Theres not something for everybody the way there is in manga.
I mean, in Japanese manga theres golf comics. Theres not one comic about golf. Theres multiple [manga] about golf. And Ive made reference on these videos to one of my favorite manga, which is about fishing. Its just about fishing. Its not about vampires fishing on another planet or witches fishing or fishing after a zombie apocalypse. This is about guys fishing. Surf casting and whatever. Fishing from boats, fishing on the shore, fishing from the banks of rivers, and the stories are fascinating, and beautifully drawn, and beautifully realized.
But here, what do we get? We get superheroes and poorly done superheroes. There really isnt anything else at the mainstream companies. Its superheroes, superheroes, superheroes.
Why, why would you want to read this crap if you had a choice of reading a genre that you prefer, be it horror, or mystery, or espionage, or golf? When theres only one flavor in American comics, of course Japanese comics are going to win the day.

I wonder if Webcomics getting more prominent could help. Sure there's a lot of garbage but there is variety

Tons of webcomics also publish deadtree versions. I've got xkcd, smbc, and girl genius on my rack.

The vast majority of manga is generic shovelware chasing trends like the isekei genre thats been in overdrive the past few years.

Anime/Manga importers have actually used piracy rates to justify official localization in the past. I think fansubber groups even have unofficial agreements that as long as they stop when an official project is announced they won't go after any of them legally.