We've talked about this issue on and off on the Podcast, and I thought I'd weigh in on the subject. A lot of famous comic strips have a tendency to continue on after their creators have passed away, put in the hands of relatives or completely new artists. Obviously, this is troublesome to anyone trying to get that precious foothold into the syndication world, because a continuing, aging strip means no room for something new.
On a zen level, complaining about this is like complaining about the sun coming up in the east tomorrow morning. You can yell until you're blue in the face, but it ain't going to change a thing. Just because Johnny Hart passes away, do we really think a syndicate is going to just stop putting his millions dollar product out there and put in some untried cartoonist who might be picked up by 25 papers if he's lucky? Strips like "Beetle Bailey," "Hagar the Horrible," and the "Family Circus" are basically cash cows out there for the syndicates. And besides, there's a long history in the comics world of strips outliving their creators for many years. Do we really think Chester Gould is still writing "Dick Tracy?" It was common practice for artists to be assigned to different strips all the time, and still is.
Of course, that works for some strips, most notably the soap opera ones like "Mary Worth" or "Apartment 3-G." It's not about the artist or the writer then...it's about the storyline and the characters. But I could certainly make a case that in your normal four panel strip (or one panel for that matter), it just seems wrong that people are riding the coattails of the original creator. I suppose if my father was a famous artist and had created some classic strip, maybe I'd be taking over the reigns eventually and carrying on the legacy. I'd personally like to think I wouldn't...I'd prefer to do my own thing, and respect the unique voice that created the strip by letting it die with him. Isn't it weird that we don't question the continuation of "Beetle Bailey", but can you conceive of anyone drawing and writing "Peanuts?" Or "Calvin and Hobbes?"
I'm sure a lot of this is simply a matter of rights and ownership. If the syndicate actually owns the characters, then they are free to do whatever they want with them, as well they should. Or, if it's the wish of the creator to hand the strip down to their children or estates, like "The Family Circus", then again...so be it.
But for me, I still don't like it. I wish there were no zombie comics. I wish that the syndicates would phase them out over time, perhaps...run "The Wizard of Id" for five more years, and then retire it with the dignity it deserves, and open up the space for someone new to fill. The comics need new blood, and they're not getting much of it. "Pearls Before Swine" and "Get Fuzzy" are great, but they're just two voices out there.
Cyncially enough, I know this utopian idea is just not going to happen. Like I said above, we're talking about millions of dollars in syndication and commercial products here. Shiva knows if I was in charge of the syndicate, I doubt I'd want to just stop running "B.C." just because the creator died. But, luckily, we have an alternative today that we didn't have, even ten years ago. The web. I hate to sound like an old fogey and get out the "back in my days!" stories...but back in my day, you gathered up your 6-8 weeks of strips to submit, you sent them off to the 5 or 6 syndicates, and sat back and waited to collect your "dear creator, you suck" rejection letters. (I have about 10 of them in a file somewhere.) And that was it, boys and girls. That was your shot. You'd never learn a damn thing about your strip...am I on the right track? Am I close? Are people laughing at all? Are my characters striking a nerve? None of those questions would be answered. There was no guidance, no response. THAT to me is the single best thing about webcartooning...the immediacy of your audience. Even if you know your stuff is being read by a handful of people, it makes you want to create more and keep going. And very often, you start meeting other artists, other writers, and you see that there is support out there to be had.
We need to find a way to make it pay. We need to find a way to eke out even a side income doing this work, and there are ways to do it. The internet allows us unparalleled freedom of expression and art, in ways that have never existed in history. Think about it...when in the history of mankind have we been able to reach such a vast audience so easily? Sure, YOU know about Van Gogh...but he died penniless and neurotic. Now, put him on YouTube cutting off his ear, and he'd be on Letterman tomorrow night.
Anyway...I'm off topic. (That will happen a LOT.) I don't like zombie comics. But they're here to stay. It's best we don't waste valuable time and effort complaining about what we can't change, and rather turn that energy to finding ways we CAN succeed...ways we can get all our unique voices out there to be heard. Let's work on that.
-
|Registered |2007-06-14 11:37:42 geoff.munnI think my biggest problem with "zombie" comics is the fact that they take up the space that could be used by the next big thing. Sure, most people don't get their news from newspapers anymore, and we webcomic creators are taking things into the next millennium, but I think it's funny that we all harbor that want to be published in papers. Well, that and they shuffle around mumbling "Braaaaiinnsss..." all the time.
-
|Administrator |2007-06-15 21:19:24 tracineWe still think of syndication as the gold standard because currently, that's what it is. There are certainly some comic artists out there making a living at this gig, but that's far and few between. But at least in the future, we have the control, not the syndicates. That's the key...we own our work, and we can put as much or little effort into things as we want. It requires us to be much more entrepreneurial than we probably want to be...I know that most artists I know have weaknesses in...
I'm not saying there isn't a place for the classics... Just like there's TV land for old shows, there are book collections for old strips. I won't even make an exception for peanuts. Pe...