So here's what I'm thinking about today. At lot of the people who work for the Big Two American comic companies are locked into exclusive deals, or if they aren't locked in contractually, are choosing to only work for one company right now. What I want to know is whether you think this is a good thing or not.
On the one hand, it could be argued the exclusive contracts are a sign of heightened competition between the two, and that should lead to better results. In biology, competition usually leads to the elimination of the weaker members, or - when considering multiple species - to the species divvying up the resources in manner most advantageous to them. So you could argue that Marvel has the capes sect locked down (they don't really, despite their recent sales advantage, this is just for sake of argument), but DC has made more advances into other areas, with the Minx line, Vertigo, Jonah Hex, and so on, thus they have the sales edge there. I don't know whether that's an accurate assessment or not (I doubt it), but it was a thought.
There's also the possibility that creators are willing to sign exclusive contracts because it gives them the opportunity to write the characters and stories they really want. Creators are people like us, and just as some of us have distinct preferences for one set of characters or the other, it stands to reason they would as well. And of course I'd be remiss if I didn't theorize that exclusive contracts probably pay better, to provide added encouragement to sign on the dotted line. I don't have any actual evidence of that, but it would seem to make sense.
On the negative side, I wonder if the companies don't overtax the creators, based on the delays we've seen the last few years. I know, some of those delays are by people who spend most of their time working in TV or movies, but not all of them are. I have no idea the process that leads to a project being greenlit, or to a creative team being assigned, but I could see DC or Marvel wanting to put a writer or artistic talent on as many projects as they could, especially if it's a creator with their own legion of fans like a Morrison, to enhance sales. This leads to overwork, which leads to the dreaded delays and/or fill-in teams, depending on the companies' preference (Marvel seeming to vote for the former, DC the latter).
But on a more personal note, I think fans miss out when creators can only work for one company. Think of it this way, if Keith Giffen had an exclusive contract we either would have been without his influence on 52, or we wouldn't have gotten Annihilation (or it likely wouldn't have been as good). While others might disagree about Annihilation, I think the comics world would be poorer for that scenario.
Do you like the exclusive contracts? Think they're a problem? Good for creativity? Bad for creativity? Completely irrelevant even within the limited confines of the comic book industry?
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3 comments:
It's probably good for the creators themselves in terms of security.
The bad part, as far as DC is concerned, is that people like Grant Morrison and Geoff Johns get spread pretty thin - to diminishing results.
As far as Marvel is concerned, they grab so many artists and have such a deep bench that worthy talents like Leonard Kirk and Mike Wieringo end up on secondary titles or mini-series instead of the flagship titles they deserve.
As far as fans are concerned, I'd say its a wash. I don't know if I want Mark Millar revamping the DC Universe or Geoff Johns dismembering MJ.
So, guess I'm kinda wishy-washy about the whole thing.
Well, I know that Peter David and Warren Ellis's contract allows them a few grandfathered projects, books they did for IDW and... I might be wrong but I tought Ellis was finishing up something for DC. I could be wrong, but on the whole it speaks well that they are able to keep up the projects they were invested in as well as get medical/dental, so to speak.
On the other hand, Sean McKeever on DC means no more Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane. So on a completely biased basis, I think contracts are lame.
fortress keeper: I think it's less wishy-washy, and more recognizing the good and the bad of the situation.
Though it seems like Johns featured less dismemberment in his Avengers run than we see nowadays, so he might scale it back a bit. Or he might not have been a big enough name then, and so he'd really cut loose now.
carla: I thought Spider-Man loves Mary jane was getting a new writer so it could continue? Or was that them replacing the artist a few months back?
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