Rules, What Rules: Independent Superhero Comics

In the first post I published on this blog, I bemoaned the reductive nature of writing advice. “If you write like everyone else,” I wrote, “your writing will read like everyone else’s.” While I have gotten away from that theme from time-to-time, I try to return to it every now and then as part of my series: Rules: What Rules? which consists of a series of blogs that deal with common pieces of writing advice, and then present a famous work–by a successful author–which breaks those rules. My aim is not to criticize these authors—I enjoy all of them, that is the point. Rather, I present their works as examples of successfully writing, which might cause you to reexamine the writing “rule” critically. I am not advising you to ignore these rules, rather to take control of your own craft, and consider your choices actively. As always, I believe there is more than one path to success, more than one formula for great writing. Consider these posts synecdochally. The specific rule is not the point; it speaks to a general attitude which is prevalent within the contemporary writing community.

In each blog post in this series, I will give a brief summary of the rule, followed by a case study of a successful author, work, or series that breaks that rule. Finally, I will provide some analysis of the rule and the alternative techniques the featured author makes. Since the posts in this series will not necessarily be consecutive blog entries, I will link each piece to previous entries.

Previously in this series:

Dialogue Tags

Eliminating Adverbs

Avoid Alliteration

The Three Act Structure

The Rule: Don’t Write Independent Superhero Conics

One of the most common pieces of advice given to young comics creators is not to make superhero comics. How can you possibly compete with Marvel and DC, the big two companies who have a virtual monopoly in the genre? Do you really want to go up against the name recognition of those famous characters? Superhero readers know where to find the comics they enjoy, and they’re not coming to small-press row to find them. When I first started attending “Breaking into Comics” type panels at various cons, some piece of this advice was repeated on each panel.

And yet…

Recently, there have been many non-big two superhero comics which have enjoyed commercial and critical success. Titles like The Boys and Invincible have even been picked up for streaming, and Barbalien, a book from Jeff Lemire’s Black Hammer series was listed on NYPL top 100 books (all books released that year, not just comics and graphic novels) of the year list a couple of years back.

Big creators like Alan Moore have written non-big two superhero comics, Todd McFarlane’s Spawn, Mark Millar’s Kickass, and Mike Mignola’s Hell Boy are breakthrough indie comics from the relatively recent past.

Ahoy Comics, one of my favorite widely-available indie publishers (and not just because they’ve published my work) publishes multiple superhero titles, including two which I read regularly, The Wrong Earth, by Tom Pyer and Jamal Igle, and Second Coming, by Mark Russell and Richard Price.

If the major indie’s aren’t afraid of the big two, and are willing to publish superhero comics, shouldn’t all creators, regardless of where they are in their careers, be willing to do so as well? There certainly seems to be a path to success within the genre.

Analysis

I would imagine that the most common response to my point about the success of independent superhero comics which I listed above would be that many–if not all–of these titles are not traditional superhero stories, but rather twists or angles on the superhero genre. Each puts a unique spin on the concept of superheroes, often deconstructing and critiquing the traditional trope, or using the familiar trope to affect a critique of society and address some larger theme. While this is true, it is not really different from any other genre. You wouldn’t not be successful writing a zombie book that was exactly like the Walking Dead or a crime book that was too similar to 1000 bullets, Criminal, or Sin City either. Originality is important, regardless of genre.

To this point, when I walk around small press and artist alley at various comic cons, or visit indie-focused comics Facebook groups, superhero is far from the most common genre. If anything, it’s horror, and based on my experience, it’s not particularly close. We may be getting to the point where, at least in small indie circles, superhero comics stand out, ironically, because of their rarity.

When I posted this idea in one of my comics groups last week, one of the responses was that the most successful independent superhero comics were, by and large, created by big-name creators, like Mark Millar, Jeff Lemire, and Gath Ennis. This is also true, but is it really that different from any other genre? Jeff Lemire has had success writing horror comics, fantasy, and sci-fi as well. Mark Millar has done space adventure, time travel scifi, and slice of life horror. Gath Ennis has written major titles in crime and war comics. If an independent creator were to attempt to sell work in any of these genres, they would be up against name creators regardless.

Moreover, if superhero comics are successful, shouldn’t we be creating in them? Shouldn’t we be practicing to get better at them, so that when we have the opportunity to pitch editors we have the style under our belts. Should we have portfolio pieces which show we can do that kind of work? If the top of the industry is producing superhero books, how can we break into that segment if we do not know how to create them? If we, one day aspire to write or draw for Marvel or DC (recognizing how unlikely that dream is for any creator) shouldn’t we be practicing and publishing with an eye toward that type of work?

Additionally, I believe that there is a marketing angle to writing independent superhero books as well. I have found that when I table at cons, I can find potential customers by observing what they are wearing. If I see a goth, for example, I might call them over to my table to check out Into That Darkness Peering or Love Letters to Poe, the gothic horror titles at my table. Well, superhero fans make up a huge segment of the comics-buying community. “Do you like Spider-Man? perhaps you’d be interested in checking out this book about a teenage…” “Oh, I see you’re wearing a Batman shirt. Let me show you my book about a revenge-seeking…” It seems foolish to ignore the largest segment of the comics fans.

I will end by saying that the prejudice against superhero comics in indie circles is real. There are definitely people who will tune you out if you bring up a super hero concept. Some of these people have power within the industry, and may reject a pitch outright just for being a superhero title.

If, however, one has the opportunity to pitch a company which publishes superhero comics, why would one not do so? And, since many in the independent world self-publish, there are really no restrictions on the types of books one can create.

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Be sure to check out the links page to read some of my published writing, and to follow me on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Now Available for Free Download: Comic Book School Presents: Creator Connection, Panel 1 Comics and Flash Fiction Anthology

Today is release day for the Creator Connection, Panel 1, an anthology of comics and flash fiction which you can download for free here. I am super excited to share this book with you, as not only do I have two stories in it–one comic and one flash fiction–but I did a lot of editing work for the book as well.

Creator Connections: Panel 1 is a comics and flash fiction anthology. The anthology, which is the culmination of the 8-Page Challenge issued by Comic Book School after NYCC 2019, is now available to download for free at www.comicbookschool.com/titles/creator-connection-panel-1-anthology/.

Creators in the Comic Book School Community were challenged to create an 8-page comics story—from start-to-finish—over the course of the last year. They were mentored throughout the challenge by Buddy Scalera, the anthology’s publisher and Comic Book School’s dean of students, who wrote a series of blog posts that covered the creative and publishing process of a story that he wrote for Marvel Comics. Additionally, Comic Book School’s network of pros, including Darren Sanchez, Scalera’s editor at Marvel, and Cathy Kirsch (My Writing Hero), a Columbia University creative writing professor, provided support through live-streamed seminars, personal meetings, and forum posts.  

“This anthology turned out better than I’d expected,” Scalera said. “It’s proof that no matter how bad things are (and 2020 was very, very bad) you can still—to quote Neil Gaiman ‘make great art.’”  

The idea of the anthology was conceived during a conversation at New York Comic Con between Scalera and anthology editor Erin Donnalley at the annual Comic Book School Creator Connection panel.

“Buddy challenged me to write an 8-page comic for New York Comic Con 2020,” Donnalley said. “I wrote myself a schedule and sent it to Buddy for accountability. He thought it was great, and asked me to share it with others from the networking events. Thus, the 8-Page Challenge was born.”

“Every year, aspiring creators leave our educational panels with so much enthusiasm,” Scalera added. “We wanted to create something that not only allows them to sustain that enthusiasm, but also to build on it and sustain their momentum throughout the year. The 8-Page Challenge helped our community members do this and to achieve their goals to create and publish comics.”

The anthology also features a section of illuminated flash fiction pieces, which feature a one-page fiction story accompanied by a single, full page illustration. The Flash Fiction Challenge ran concurrently with the 8-Page Challenge and was also open to all members of the Comic Book School community.

These challenges were the first initiatives of the create.comicbookschool.com forums. The forums, which are housed on the Comic Book School website, are the new home of the Comic Book School community. They are designed to foster community and collaboration, and to allow members to build connections, interact with and support one another, access educational resources, and share news and accomplishments. Throughout the challenge, the members of the community posted their progress, provided feedback on each other’s work, and held each other accountable throughout the process. Many of the creative teams in the anthology met on the forums, which were crucial, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic when in-person meetings and comic cons were not an option.

“In some ways 2020 was the best possible year for making comics,” Scalera said. “The lockdown from the pandemic forced many of us to stay in the house. It gave us back a precious resource: time.

It also gave us time to reconsider our priorities. We had to set priorities that we’ve never had to consider before. In 2020, we had to consider the very real possibility of food shortages, household supply shortages, medication shortages, and even death.”

“The global events of 2020 can’t be overstated,” Donnalley said. “We all had a lot to deal with as our worlds turned upside down. But even with everything that happened, we succeeded and created this anthology. We built a community of creators and support for those creators. We hope to continue this 8-page challenge every year, bringing more creators into the world of published comics.”

Writing as Creative Play and The Remnants Anthology Release

I find it very sad that grown ups are not encouraged to play creatively. Most adults, following along with the conventions of contemporary society and do not engage in active, creative play. They rely on the creations of others to escape their dreary, every-day lives by watching television and movies, listening to music, reading books, and perhaps going to an art museum. Very few grownups, write, paint, compose, etc, Even when they do think creatively, it is often done in connection with their jobs, and therefore, they are creating for others—a boss, a company—rather than for themselves. In contrast, children are encouraged to play to draw, to make up stories and songs. Whether they consider themselves to be creative or not does not matter. Most children engage in creative play.

Many of the so-called-weird people who become successful in the arts encourage others to engage in creative activity as well. They claim, that there is a fulfillment one gets from doing art that is directly related to doing something creative for yourself. My favorite formulation of this idea is Kurt Vonnegut’s. Vonnegut, in a number of different places, encouraged his readers (and his listeners when he delivered his message as a speech) to engage in creative activities, even if what they end up producing is bad. One does not need, as Neil Gaiman exhorts his followers to do, make good art, rather, even making bad art is way of making “life bearable,” according to his view. “Practicing an art, no matter how well or badly, is a way to make your soul grow, for heaven’s sake,” Vonnegut claims.

I wholeheartedly agree, and I believe that the reason for this positive effect is the connection between making art—good or bad—and the creative play in which most people engaged as children. I have often, when speaking of my own writing, compared it to a (slightly) more socially acceptable version of childhood play.

During a recent live reading and discussion about the Remnants anthology from Kyanite Publishing (which was just released today), I extended that metaphor a bit further to explain the different mediums in which I write and connect them to common ways that children play.

When I want to play alone (and as an introverted writer-type, this is the kind of play in which I engage the most), I write short stories or poetry. During this type of play, I am the only one affecting the outcome of the “game.” When I want to play with others, I make comics. In this type of play, I collaborate with others to create. I work with an artist, and sometimes a team comprised of separate pencilers, inkers, colorists, and letterers, to create the final piece. We each have input into the story, and we collaborate to affect the outcome.

The Remnants anthology offered me a new way to play. Remnants is a “shared-world” anthology. It takes place in a post-apocalyptic world, created by Stephen Coghlan. Each of the authors in the anthology had to write a story which took place within this same, shared, world. Because of my background in comic books, I usually explain a shared world like the Marvel or DC universe. Each comic (or movie if you prefer) must take place within the shared world, but each is also the unique creation of the artists who made it. A Denny O’Neil Batman story is different from an Alan Moore Batman story, but they are both, recognizably Batman stories and therefore must follow the parameters of that universe. You could say the same thing about Kenneth Branagh’s Thor movie compared to Taika Waititi’s.

Similarly, the stories in the Remnants anthology each reflect the styles and talents of the authors who wrote them, yet they all take place within Stephen’s world. Writing for this anthology presented certain restrictions in terms of what I was allowed to do in the story, but it was also freeing in a way as I could just concentrate on writing the story without having to do all the world building associated with writing this type of science fiction story.

To return to my metaphor, writing this story was like go over someone’s house and being allowed to play with their toys. In this case, Stephen built this incredible world, a for a little while, he allowed me—and the other writers whose stories are included in this anthology—to come and play with it. The result’s which you can read in the anthology, are truly remarkable in they way they differ in tone, style, and content while all being true to the shared world.

I hope you consider purchasing a copy of Remnants, and reading my story, “The Forgotten,” (follow any of the hyperlinks throughout this post, including this one), and I really hope that if you endeavor to do something creative this week. Write a poem or story, draw a picture, write a song, even if you feel you’re doing it poorly, the benefits are immeasurable especially during these trying times.

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