***A caveat.  Being a Manga vs Western comic fan isn’t an either or proposition.  The more diverse this genre is, the better off we as fans will be.  By that I mean that in writing this I don’t want to come off like someone railing about gosh-durn ‘Mericans buying Japanese cars when they should be buying American. But I think that we should have a conversation about why it is that American kids seem to lean towards Manga over Wester/American comics***

I’m not a Manga fan…or rather I don’t seek out new Manga to read like I do American comics.  I’ve started to read Buddah and some other classics of the genre and I have liked them even though they don’t get me as excited as a reader as say classic Kirby Fantastic Four (for the record I started writing, Lee/Kirby, then switched to Kirby/Lee and finally just got rid of Stan the Man there altogether).  I appreciate that Manga has a graphic language and sensibility all of its own just like western comics do, even though I don’t totally ‘get’ that language or sensibility yet.

Manga has some rather funny ‘high concept’ premise titles (like Detroit Metal City where the leader of a Death Metal Band secretly wants to be a swedish pop star)that speak to the wide variety of ideas that are flowing out of the genre.  I may not have much desire/time/money to read them myself at this moment but that could change.

And I have to respect how widely read/respected comics are in Japan.  Seemingly everyone reads comics there and the variety of titles made for every group and sub-group is impressive and in some ways is reminiscent of American comics during the Silver Age when we were able to support many Capes, Romance, Western, Horror & Sci-Fi titles as opposed to now when its 95% capes and a single Horror or Western book that never lasts more than 6 issues every once in a while.

American comics have had 2 of the biggest movies of all time (DK Returns and Iron Man) and have failed to translate the obvious interest in those characters into a significant and lasting rise in comic sales.  Why?  Why when American comics have some of THE MOST recognizable icons in not just comics but in all media is our genre struggling but Manga not only thriving but growing with much less recognizable names (Ask my grandmother who Astro Boy is she’ll have no idea but she’d obviously know who Batman/Superman/Spiderman was).  I think that ‘fault’ lies on the American companies and if we want American comics to grow beyond the ‘minor leagues’ status it has now we should probably start demanding more from the companies *with* those iconic character than Brand New Day, Dark Reign, Countdown, Civil War, etc.

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