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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 132626
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 7:56am | IP Logged | 1
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Every so often, the notion comes around that the monthly format should be retired, and that comics should become graphic novels or go "straight to the trade". Whenever this comes up, I think back to the first stand-alone trade paperback I ever read, Stan Lee's and Jack Kirby's 100 page SILVER SURFER, that came out in the 70s. At the time, that seemed a colossal achievement, 100 pages all in one go. I have no idea of the schedule on which Kirby produced the work -- whether he did it all in one pass or in chunks peppered around his other work at the time -- but whenever I think of something like that, I try to imagine how most modern artists and writers would accomplish it. One of the reasons many readers have started to "wait for the trade", after all, is the inability of so many current prima donnas to actually produce a monthly book on a monthly schedule.I have thought sometimes about doing some of my own stuff "straight to trade". NEXT MEN, for instance. I have about 20 issues of story left to tell. Call that 500 pages, give or take. Suppose I did it as four or five trade paperbacks? Or -- even more adventurous -- a single "phonebook". There are several projects I've thought about over the years that would work best in trade paperback form. I mentioned a week or so back that I was kicking around the notion of doing the life of Queen Elizabeth the First, but as a scii-fi epic a la STAR WARS. That just screams trade paperback. Yesterday I got to thinking about a straight biography of Lucrezia Borgia, which again would work best in the more formal format. Even CITIZEN ZERO might work better as a single long volume than a series of short ones. Of course, I have worked "long form" before. TRUE BRIT is 96 pages, only four short of Kirby's SURFER job. I started out doing that around other work, but from about 1/3rd of the way in decided to do it all in one go. Gotta say, it is intriguing, the idea of doing some true novels in the long form.
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Donald Miller
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 03 February 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 3601
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:09am | IP Logged | 2
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I am very interested in learning how your writing would change if you decided to go for a longer format.
Would you still write in chapters approximating a single comic books length?
Or, would the longer format allow the freedom to shorten or lengthen as needed?
Or, would you forgo chapters altogether and simply write a huge long form narrative?
There are all kinds of possibilities, but, I like the chapter length as needed approach, as I love your trademark full page cliffhanger chapter endings...
I would love to see your take on historical figures Like Elizabeth I and Lucretia Borgia...your talent for historical reproduction would surly be exercised by a project like that.
looking forward to many more Byrne works...
D-
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Tom French
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 07 January 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 4154
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:15am | IP Logged | 3
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I confess that lately, I've only picked up trades. The monthlies don't "do it" for me anymore. Interestingly, I just picked up the trade compiling your run on ACTION with Louise and though I enjoyed it well enough, there were a couple of instances with text pages to catch the reader up on the action from other books, or crossover events, or what have you, that I found annoying.
I would love to see more "novels" presented in this format. That's one of the reasons NEXT MEN falls so well into this -- it was mostly a novel to begin with. If you did the "rest" of NEXT MEN this way, I think it would be far in a way more successful than doing a monthly.
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Flavio Sapha
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: Brazil
Posts: 12912
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:17am | IP Logged | 4
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Isn´t it akin to the GRAPHIC NOVELS Marvel and other publishers put out in the 80s?
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Flavio Sapha
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: Brazil
Posts: 12912
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:18am | IP Logged | 5
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Dave Gibbons´s THE ORIGINALS springs to mind as a straight-to-the-trade book or OGN (original graphic novel).
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Gerry Turnbull
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: Scotland
Posts: 8767
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:21am | IP Logged | 6
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i hope this is a direction you pursue JB
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Mike Farley
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 2701
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:22am | IP Logged | 7
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I like the idea of stand alone trades or original graphic novels. I like stories that are as long as it takes to tell the story without standard page count considerations.
But I can't say I would want comics to drop the monthly format and go to OGNs exclusively.
There's cost to consider. One of the reasons trade sales are so lucrative is that they are mostly profit. The "bills" have already been paid by the monthly release. How much will an OGN cost when it becomes the initial sale and the revenue stream that the companies pay the talent from?
Also think of the things we would lose. Small intimate one-offs like "Metropolis 900 Miles". If Assignment: Earth had been an OGN would we have gotten the Isis backups? Stories that weren't BIG 100 pages ideas would be gone. You'd lose the larger stories too. The kind that build long term. The goal would be to be done in one. And cliffhangers...
So while I would welcome an extensive OGN line I wouldn't want it to replace the monthies. In the best of both worlds both should co-exist and the creative team would work in whatever format best suited the story being told.
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Geoff Gibson
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 21 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 5741
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:24am | IP Logged | 8
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I'd love to see this. But I'd like Next Men Trades rather than a phone book. For two reasons (1) it would more episodic that way, which I enjoy; and (2) we'd get new volumes sooner than the complete phone book. I would like a couple of Omnibus type volumes after the story was wrapped up.
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Juan Jose Colin Arciniega
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 6413
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:36am | IP Logged | 9
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Every month i get so few comics, that maybe i'll switch to trades in the future...
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Matt Hawes
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 16464
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:40am | IP Logged | 10
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I think finishing "Next Men" as trades would be a good idea.
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Mike Farley
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 2701
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:43am | IP Logged | 11
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And here's the Fanboy Future: After the switchover to trade only publication the companies start releasing omnibus collections binding 2 or 3 trades. Soon fanboys are stating they only buy omnibi because "flimsy" trades just aren't satisfying.
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John Popa
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 20 March 2008
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| Posted: 30 September 2008 at 8:44am | IP Logged | 12
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I love when creators work in longer forms and would rather read an original novel, as opposed to just a trade reprinting several issues of a serial. I enjoy the different pacing a novel offers over the monthly serials. (Nothing aginst the monthly serial format, of course, but there are other ways to tell a story, too.)
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