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Real Time comics today |
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On this web site, the definition of Real Time is "not Marvel Time." That is, we can anchor events to real dates in the real world. Marvel and DC do not sell real time comics at present, but some of their comics come close. And the closer they come, the better they sell. It's hardly rocket science. Real time means relevance. Relevance sells. The biggest selling comics of 2006-2007 The biggest selling comics of 2006-2007, month after month, are Marvel’s Civil War and DC’s 52. What do they have in common? Real time elements (or the closest thing we can have within Marvel Time and DC’s equivalent). DC's "52" is not strictly a real time comic, because it could not be tied down to a real world date. But it is closer than any other hyped comic, and it sells very well. Civil War is a thinly veiled version of current political events, where George W. Bush has polarised America by arguing that people must give up freedom for security. Like "52" it is not a real time comic (it never says "this is George Bush and 2007" or "the superhero prison is like Gitmo") but it is the closest thing Marvel are offering. And it sells. The biggest news at the time of writing (March 2007) is the ‘death’ of Captain America. It’s in all the real world newspapers. What's this? Characters get old and die and we move on? Yes folks, it's the shadow of real time again and it’s getting people excited about comics. The biggest selling comics of 2005-2006 Before Civil War, what were the biggest selling series? Marvel had ‘House of M’ and DC had ‘Infinite Crisis.’ What did they have in common? They both promised real and genuine changes that affected all the other comics. Real change is what sets real time apart from Marvel Time. I didn’t read ‘Infinite Crisis’ but ‘House of M’ was particularly interesting from a real time standpoint. It starts with real world dates (such as 1979) and real names (such as Richard Nixon) and real issues (such as stem cell research). It then creates an alternate world where time moves on like it would in the real world: Politics is dominated by superpowered beings, Spider-Man and Cyclops are married to their long time girlfriends and Steve Rogers is old. The scenario didn’t last (a sudden aging would not happen in real time) but House of M did make one big permanent change: reducing the number of mutants from an unfeasible ‘several million’ to a relative handful. A world with millions of mutants simply would not be like the world we live in, but a couple of hundred? That’s a major step toward reality, folks. House of M is not a real Time comic, because it plainly does not take place in a particular real world year. But it does start in real time, which is more than most comics do, and it does contain real time type changes. In other words, it is closer to real time than other comics... and it sells better. The biggest selling comics of 2004 and before Before 2005 there was a few years where no one series dominated. I don’t have enough experience to analyze the hundreds of individual ‘top ten’ comics to see which sold, how much was due to single issue hype, and how much was due to other causes. So let's move to the other big success story of the last few years: the Ultimate Marvel series. The Ultimates Marvel has a whole series of comics that consistently outsell their regular counterparts. They are the Ultimates. Ultimate Spiderman, Ultimate Fantastic Four, etc. So what is the difference? The Ultimates have more real time features. This is from Wikipedia: |
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"The stories and characters of Ultimate Marvel have been adapted to reflect the differences between the present and past continuities, most of which were created in the 1960s and 1970s. For example, Ultimate Spider-Man gains his superpowers from a genetically-engineered spider rather than a radioactive spider, and his alter ego, Peter Parker, originally a photographer for the Daily Bugle newspaper, now has a part-time job as the paper's webmaster." ... "Marvel characters with fantastical origins are often re-imagined to fit a more plausible (by comic-book standards) framework. [characters are usually normal human rather than alien or magic]. Also, many characters are somehow connected to Captain America and Nick Fury's attempt to recreate the Super-Soldier Serum [rather than having thousands of different ways to gain superpowers]." ... "Also, the phenomenon known as comic book death is rare in the Ultimate universe; the death of a character is treated as permanent and often has lasting consequences. However, due to the relative youth of the imprint, future writers and editors may choose to revive characters killed by earlier creative teams, such as the Ultimate versions of the Beast, who was killed off in Ultimate X-Men #45 and was recently revived in #81." ... "Furthermore, the imprint as a whole attempts to link the various and diverse titles to a few common themes or events in order to avoid sprawling storylines that do not intersect. The most important elements that overlap with many of the Ultimate titles are the super-soldier project and a genetic arms race that is escalating world-wide." |
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So the main differences seem to be greater links with the real world: more believable characters, and more believable continuity. Again it is not a real time series, but it is closer than its main rival. And surprise surprise, it sells better. It is interesting to see that those few real time elements are now being eroded. A character coming back from the dead is a strong symptom of Marvel Time, where real change is impossible. So it is interesting to see that (according to the figures linked on Wikipedia) sales have now been declining year on year. |
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Other comics set in a real time future Sometimes comic companies publish limited runs or one shots looking at their heroes having aged in the future. Titles include "Batman Beyond," Marvel's "The End" group of miniseries, and "Kingdom Come" (Superman). These are generally very successful. And when fans were asked to vote for the next Claremont X-Men project, they voted to find out what happens when the heroes grow older. It seems that old heroes are just as interesting as young heroes. What about John Byrne’s recent work? According to Wikipedia, John Byrne’s “Post-2000 works have involved characters and events in time periods mostly skipped over by other comics (Marvel: The Lost Generation), or alternate timelines (DC’s Superman & Batman: Generations); a common feature is to have characters who actually age during the course of the series, unlike typical characters in ongoing comics.” At first glance it appears that Byrne’s work would be an excellent test of the question “does real time sell?” However, his recent work has other continuity issues that overshadows any realism from aging heroes. The “Lost Generation” is set before the Marvel Universe began, but thanks to Marvel Time “before the Marvel Universe began” now includes the late 1980s. Which seriously destroys the sense of realism for older fans who were buying Marvel comics back then. “X-Men, the Hidden Years” jumped back into limbo in a similar way. Other series, such as his Doom Patrol, were rebooted with new origins, destroying any sense of continuity with the past. None of these recent series have yet lasted long enough for character aging to become significant. Conclusion The message is clear. More real time equals more sales. Of course, real time does not guarantee good sales, because it would be theoretically possible to write a real stinker set in real time, or a wonderful book where nothing changed, but in general, real time elements and good sales go together. |
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