| REVIEWS: MOVIES & DVDs | COMIC BOOKS | VIDEOGAMES | WEB SITES & MORE Too Many Ads by Mike-oh
In this issue of Daredevil, there were 22 story pages (that's standard in the industry) along with 26 pages of ads (which varies from title to title and publisher to publisher). As I said, my problem isn't with the number of advertising pages, although more ads than story seems wrong, especially when it's not lowering the price of the comic, but we can come back to that point. My problem is that nearly every single spread in the book (spread meaning two, side-by-side pages) was divided between one story page and one ad. In other words, it means that every single page is interrupted by an ad. And it means that there are no big spreads of art or even layouts that take advantage of the spread by overlapping panels onto opposing pages or having the sequence of events stretch across a larger area. It's the video equivalent of having to watch all of your movies on an iPod size screen instead of in a movie theater. In this entire issue, there was only one spread of story pages. There were, however four spreads of ads. That's one spread given to the story that I paid to read and four spreads given to the ads that are running in the middle of the story. Keep in mind, I'm not counting the back cover or either of the inside cover panels. It's simply outrageous. Compare this with DC's 52, issue 29, that came out the same day as Daredevil, issue 91. In 52, there were the standard 22 pages of story with only 18 pages of ads. What's more, there are 5 spreads (or 10 pages) of the story, nearly half of the story, compared to three advertising spreads. This is a much more acceptable ratio as far as I'm concerned. Although I would much prefer other approaches that I've seen before. In the past, Image Comics was very good at restricting their ad space to the end of the comic book rather than allowing ads to be placed in the middle of their stories. Dark Horse has followed the same approach, oftentimes publishing issues completely devoid of ads altogether. The complaint isn't about advertising. I don't have a problem with advertising. I've worked as an art director for some of the largest advertising agencies in the world. I like advertising. The complaint is about the publishers. And right now, namely Marvel. To allow their great stories, created by such amazing talents as Ed Brubaker and Michael Lark, to be completely compromised by their greed for advertising dollars, is an offense that should not go unpunished. I wonder how Brubaker and Lark feel about having their creative accomplishment ruined as it is. They should refuse to produce their work under these conditions. It would be like the producers of the TV show, Lost, having their showtime stretched to an hour and a half, still with only forty minutes of the show but now with fifty minutes of advertising instead of only twenty minutes. Commercial breaks would still fall every ten minutes but now they would be twice as long with twice as many commercials. The Lost producers would never stand for it. And neither would the audience. The creators and fans of Marvel Comics should not take this lying down. You can send a message to several of their creators at MySpace, including: Ed
Brubaker If you're not outraged by all of this, you should be. The average comic book costs $2.50 to $3.00 an issue. That's for 22 pages of story and somewhere in the neighborhood of 18 - 16 pages of advertising. Compare that with X-Box Magazine's newsstand price of $7.99 that includes a DVD and about three to four times the printed content. Some issues sell for as low as $4.99 at the newsstand. And consider Wizard Magazine. Its cover price is only $5.99, has over 140 pages and often includes complete issues of comics within those pages. Or WIRED Magazine's $4.50 newsstand price for nearly 400 pages of content. Of course all of these magazines cary advertising as a way to support their expenses. My point is that the expenses for those monthly magazines -- editorial and production costs -- must far outweigh the expenses for producing a monthly comic book but they manage to keep their prices low and their ads out of the main body of content. Magazine ads appear in the front and back and are never found among the pages of articles and content created by the magazine's key editorial staff. The real danger in this is that it will errode comic book readership at a time when comics are really making a comeback. You know they are making a comeback becasue DC and Marvel are having no problem convincing big brands to pay big bucks to buy space in the pages of Daredevil and Justice League of America. It's not unlike back in the seventies when comics were finally reaping the benefits of Marvel's impact in the marketplace. Then comics were experiencing a genuine wave of success. One that was supported by a wave of advertising that choked out stories, encouraged cutrate creative content in order to produce more titles, and discouraged readers because they were being taken for a ride while Marvel and DC were laughing all the way to the bank. Sound familiar? Let's hope things turn out differently this time. So, what do you think? Agree? Disagree? Give us your feedback. |
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