I'll try doing comics again.
Indie comics - Is there such a thing?
Tags op/ed
What is an Indie comic? Does this term really mean anything? Does such a thing exist?
For music labels, there is a clear difference between major and indie labels most importantly in terms of access to distribution channels. The difference is not what it once was because of the internet but it's still a real difference. No such difference in access to distribution channels exists for comics. There really is only one comics distributor: Diamond Comic Distributors inc. They distribute titles from a wide variety of publishers. They distribute small press titles as well as Marvel or DC ones. The major companies have no lock over distribution. Many stores don't carry them but they can get them from the same distributor they get Spiderman and Batman from.
The difference isn't content or it hasn't been since the Silver Age ended. DC and Marvel are associated with super hero comics. They do publish quite a few of them but they publish a lot of other content as well under their various imprints like Max or Vertigo. Now that Marvel is publishing titles licensed from Soleil and reviving the old Crossgen titles, that line is even more blurred.
So what is an indie comic? Does this term have any real meaning outside of the music industry it came from?
For music labels, there is a clear difference between major and indie labels most importantly in terms of access to distribution channels. The difference is not what it once was because of the internet but it's still a real difference. No such difference in access to distribution channels exists for comics. There really is only one comics distributor: Diamond Comic Distributors inc. They distribute titles from a wide variety of publishers. They distribute small press titles as well as Marvel or DC ones. The major companies have no lock over distribution. Many stores don't carry them but they can get them from the same distributor they get Spiderman and Batman from.
The difference isn't content or it hasn't been since the Silver Age ended. DC and Marvel are associated with super hero comics. They do publish quite a few of them but they publish a lot of other content as well under their various imprints like Max or Vertigo. Now that Marvel is publishing titles licensed from Soleil and reviving the old Crossgen titles, that line is even more blurred.
So what is an indie comic? Does this term have any real meaning outside of the music industry it came from?
Total Comments 7
Comments
-
I doubt it has any meaning at all, and is just something to make the comics sell more, or try to classify them in some way such that they're more easily distinguished. Just my 2c.Posted October 30th, 2011 at 06:54 AM by Vaikyuko 
-
I'd say it's more tone than content or distribution. Just like trying to turn Indie into a "music genre" over distribution. If they're "strange" like anything in the Vertigo line (Spaceman, Gabriel Ba, and all that)Posted October 31st, 2011 at 07:41 AM by JoeStrummer
-
I didn't say anything about an indie music "genre" or use the word genre at all. Genre isn't even relevant. Distribution also has nothing to do with genre. Where did you get "music genre" from in what I wrote?
Vertigo is a DC imprint though and several of the Vertigo characters are back in the main DCU now. By that definition, several of the new DC titles and some of the 616 Marvel titles are indie.Posted November 1st, 2011 at 12:33 AM by old hat
-
Jesus Christ old hat.
I'm just saying that it's basically the same kind of thing, that "indie comics" are a genre rather than having anything to do with distribution.Posted November 9th, 2011 at 11:36 AM by JoeStrummer
-
Sometimes it looks like you are responding to a trivialized version of what I wrote.
That divorces the meaning almost completely from the meaning of the term for music. That is the main distinction in music. Major labels can get your CD into Wallymart and on to Clear Channel stations...if you play ball and do what they want.
I think what are called indie comics are too dissimilar to be called a genre. Little seems to unite them beyond what they are not. They are not mainstream super hero titles. Several DC and Marvel titles aren't either.Posted November 11th, 2011 at 03:09 AM by old hat
-
What I mean by comparing it to music is that indie has almost become a genre just as how I see indie comics as a genre.
They're all different, but they all share some kind of tone in my eyes, I find it hard to explain, but I can always point out what I think is "indie"Posted November 12th, 2011 at 01:12 PM by JoeStrummer
-
I don't see what are usually called indie comics as being enough alike in tone, style or content to call it a genre. Deconstructing the super hero genre is popular for small publishers but both DC and Marvel have published that kind of content too. Watchmen was a DC book. Horror is also popular but both DC and Marvel do that too. The tone in small press titles often seems to mimic the tone in Vertigo titles to me.
Posted November 12th, 2011 at 05:46 PM by old hat
Total Trackbacks 0
