126-504: Donny Cates (born September 14, 1984) is an American comic book writer, artist, and podcaster, known for his work on titles like Venom , Thanos , Doctor Strange , Thor , and Hulk . Donny Cates was born in Dallas, Texas . Raised in Garland, Texas , Cates states that he was taught to read by his father using comic books. Cates graduated from Garland High School and attended
252-513: A mass medium in the early 20th century with the advent of newspaper comic strips; magazine-style comic books followed in the 1930s, the superhero genre became prominent after Superman appeared in 1938. Histories of Japanese comics and cartooning ( manga ) propose origins as early as the 12th century. Japanese comics are generally held separate from the evolution of Euro-American comics, and Western comic art probably originated in 17th-century Italy. Modern Japanese comic strips emerged in
378-427: A singular noun when it refers to the medium itself (e.g. " Comics is a visual art form."), but becomes plural when referring to works collectively (e.g. " Comics are popular reading material."). The comics may be further adapted to animations (anime), dramas, TV shows, movies. The European, American, and Japanese comics traditions have followed different paths. Europeans have seen their tradition as beginning with
504-675: A tabloid form. Underground comics and "small press" titles have also appeared in the UK, notably Oz and Escape Magazine . The content of Action , another title aimed at children and launched in the mid-1970s, became the subject of discussion in the House of Commons . Although on a smaller scale than similar investigations in the US, such concerns led to a moderation of content published within British comics. Such moderation never became formalized to
630-636: A black artist or writer allowed in a major comics company." Asian characters within comic books encountered similar prejudiced treatment as black characters did. They were subjected to dehumanizing depictions, with narratives often portraying them as "incompetent and subhuman." In a 1944 edition of the publication United States Marines , there was a story titled The Smell of the Monkeymen . This narrative portrayed Japanese soldiers as brutish simians, and it depicted their concealed positions being betrayed by their repugnant body odor. Chinese characters received
756-560: A combined circulation of over 2 million copies by the 1950s. Their characters, including " Dennis the Menace ", " Desperate Dan " and " The Bash Street Kids " have been read by generations of British children. The comics originally experimented with superheroes and action stories before settling on humorous strips featuring a mix of the Amalgamated Press and US comic book styles. The popularity of superhero comic books declined in
882-473: A company named Comics Guaranty (CGC) initiated the practice of "slabbing" comics, which involves encasing them within thick plastic cases and assigning them a numerical grade. This approach inspired the emergence of Comic Book Certification Service . Given the significance of condition in determining the value of rare comics, the concept of grading by an impartial company, one that does not engage in buying or selling comics, seemed promising. Nevertheless, there
1008-551: A contract. His first long-term Marvel works were runs on Doctor Strange and Thanos. After the success of these titles, Cates was given writing duties on Venom , where he was paired with artist and podcaster Ryan Stegman . This led to him penning multiple company-wide events, including Absolute Carnage and King in Black . In January 2020, Cates took over as the new writer of Thor with Nic Klein as artist. Later that year, he would reteam with God Country artist Geoff Shaw on
1134-479: A defining factor, which can imply the exclusion of even photographic comics. The term manga is used in Japanese to indicate all forms of comics, cartooning, and caricature. The term comics refers to the comics medium when used as an uncountable noun and thus takes the singular: "comics is a medium" rather than "comics are a medium". When comic appears as a countable noun it refers to instances of
1260-497: A dozen stories; they are later compiled in tankōbon -format books. At the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries, nearly a quarter of all printed material in Japan was comics. Translations became extremely popular in foreign markets—in some cases equaling or surpassing the sales of domestic comics. Comic strips are generally short, multipanel comics that have, since the early 20th century, most commonly appeared in newspapers. In
1386-458: A famous example of the British comic annual. DC Thomson also repackages The Broons and Oor Wullie strips in softcover A4-size books for the holiday season. On 19 March 2012, the British postal service, the Royal Mail , released a set of stamps depicting British comic book characters and series. The collection featured The Beano , The Dandy , Eagle , The Topper , Roy of
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#17327982003161512-586: A five chapter spy genre tale written by Otto Binder and drawn by Al Carreno. It is readable online in the Digital Comic Museum . The magazine never reached a second issue. In 1950, St. John Publications produced the digest-sized , adult-oriented "picture novel" It Rhymes with Lust , a 128-page digest by pseudonymous writer "Drake Waller" ( Arnold Drake and Leslie Waller ), penciler Matt Baker and inker Ray Osrin , touted as "an original full-length novel" on its cover. "It Rhymes with Lust"
1638-628: A government ran program, the Writers' War Board, became heavily involved in what would be published in comics. "The Writers' War Board used comic books to shape popular perceptions of race and ethnicity..." Not only were they using comic books as a means of recruiting all Americans, they were also using it as propaganda to "[construct] a justification for race-based hatred of America's foreign enemies." The Writers' War Board created comics books that were meant to "[promote] domestic racial harmony". However, "these pro-tolerance narratives struggled to overcome
1764-603: A larger page size than used in many other cultures. In English-speaking countries, the trade paperback format originating from collected comic books have also been chosen for original material. Otherwise, bound volumes of comics are called graphic novels and are available in various formats. Despite incorporating the term "novel"—a term normally associated with fiction—"graphic novel" also refers to non-fiction and collections of short works. Japanese comics are collected in volumes called tankōbon following magazine serialization. Gag and editorial cartoons usually consist of
1890-427: A less superior race and cannot believe they bested his men."The Tuskegee Airmen, and images of black aviators appear in just three of the fifty three panels... the pilots of the 99th Squadron have no dialogue and interact with neither Hop Harrigan nor his Nazi captive." During this time, they also used black characters in comic books as a means to invalidate the militant black groups that were fighting for equality within
2016-412: A lifelong passion for the stories within comics, often focusing on specific superheroes and striving to gather a complete collection of a particular series. Comics are assigned sequential numbers, and the initial issue of a long-lasting comic book series tends to be both the scarcest and the most coveted among collectors. The introduction of a new character might occur within an existing title. For instance,
2142-622: A narrator, convey characters' dialogue or thoughts, or indicate place or time. Speech balloons themselves are strongly associated with comics, such that the addition of one to an image is sufficient to turn the image into comics. Sound effects mimic non-vocal sounds textually using onomatopoeia sound-words. Cartooning is most frequently used in making comics, traditionally using ink (especially India ink ) with dip pens or ink brushes; mixed media and digital technology have become common. Cartooning techniques such as motion lines and abstract symbols are often employed. While comics are often
2268-567: A physical release via Image Comics. In August 2023, it was revealed that he provided "additional literary material" for Kraven the Hunter . In October 2024, it was confirmed that he was allowed to read the screenplay for Venom: The Last Dance and consulted alongside Stegman in an advisory relationship due to the film's adaptation of their character Knull . Cates lived in Austin, Texas with his ex-wife, comic artist Megan Hutchison. They hosted
2394-788: A prolific body of work. Towards the close of the 20th century, these three traditions converged in a trend towards book-length comics: the comic album in Europe, the tankōbon in Japan, and the graphic novel in the English-speaking countries. Outside of these genealogies, comics theorists and historians have seen precedents for comics in the Lascaux cave paintings in France (some of which appear to be chronological sequences of images), Egyptian hieroglyphs , Trajan's Column in Rome,
2520-536: A similarly confusing history since they are most often not humorous and are periodicals, not regular books. It is common in English to refer to the comics of different cultures by the terms used in their languages, such as manga for Japanese comics, or bandes dessinées for French-language Franco-Belgian comics . Many cultures have taken their word for comics from English, including Russian ( комикс , komiks ) and German ( Comic ). Similarly,
2646-439: A single panel, often incorporating a caption or speech balloon. Definitions of comics which emphasize sequence usually exclude gag, editorial, and other single-panel cartoons; they can be included in definitions that emphasize the combination of word and image. Gag cartoons first began to proliferate in broadsheets published in Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries, and the term "cartoon" was first used to describe them in 1843 in
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#17327982003162772-497: A surge of creativity emerged in what became known as underground comix . Published and distributed independently of the established comics industry, most of such comics reflected the youth counterculture and drug culture of the time. Underground comix "reflected and commented on the social divisions and tensions of American society". Many had an uninhibited, often irreverent style; their frank depictions of nudity, sex, profanity, and politics had no parallel outside their precursors,
2898-406: A way that one could read the 6-panel comic, flip the book and keep reading. He made 64 such comics in total. In 2012, a remake of a selection of the comics was made by Marcus Ivarsson in the book 'In Uppåner med Lilla Lisen & Gamle Muppen'. ( ISBN 978-91-7089-524-1 ) Shorter, black-and-white daily strips began to appear early in the 20th century, and became established in newspapers after
3024-692: A year to pursue writing his own comics. After a chance meeting with a Dark Horse Comics staffer at C2E2 , Cates was given the opportunity to write short stories for the company. Cates' first comic work was a short story in Dark Horse Presents vol. 2 #24, released in August 2013. Co-written by himself and Eliot Rahal, the title of this story was Hunter Quaid: Armageddon Outta Here . It was followed up three issues later with Hunter Quaid: The Only Things We Have to Fear… are Nazis and Creepy Monsters . Satisfied with these stories, Dark Horse gave Cates
3150-502: Is also available to read online in the Digital Comic Museum. In 1971, writer-artist Gil Kane and collaborators applied a paperback format to their "comics novel" Blackmark . Will Eisner popularized the term "graphic novel" when he used it on the cover of the paperback edition of his work A Contract with God, and Other Tenement Stories in 1978 and, subsequently, the usage of the term began to increase. In 2017,
3276-458: Is an ongoing debate regarding whether the relatively high cost of this grading service is justified and whether it serves the interests of collectors or mainly caters to speculators seeking rapid profits, akin to trading in stocks or fine art. Comic grading has played a role in establishing standards for valuation, which online price guides such as GoCollect and GPAnalysis utilize to provide real-time market value information. Collectors also seek out
3402-662: Is generally considered the beginning of the modern comic book as it is known today. The Silver Age of Comic Books is generally considered to date from the first successful revival of the then-dormant superhero form, with the debut of the Flash in Showcase #4 (Oct. 1956). The Silver Age lasted through the late 1960s or early 1970s, during which time Marvel Comics revolutionized the medium with such naturalistic superheroes as Stan Lee and Jack Kirby 's Fantastic Four and Lee and Steve Ditko 's Spider-Man . The demarcation between
3528-625: Is largely set in Britain and starring the magician John Constantine , paved the way for British writers such as Jamie Delano . The English musician Peter Gabriel issued in 2000 The Story of OVO which was released in a CD-booklet-shaped comic book as part of the CD edition with the title " OVO The Millennium Show ". The 2000 Millennium Dome Show based on it. At Christmas, publishers repackage and commission material for comic annuals , printed and bound as hardcover A4 -size books; "Rupert" supplies
3654-513: Is no consensus among theorists and historians on a definition of comics ; some emphasize the combination of images and text, some sequentiality or other image relations, and others historical aspects such as mass reproduction or the use of recurring characters. Cartooning and other forms of illustration are the most common means of image-making in comics. Photo comics is a form that uses photographic images. Common forms include comic strips , editorial and gag cartoons , and comic books . Since
3780-411: Is the incorporation of verbal content". Aaron Meskin saw McCloud's theories as an artificial attempt to legitimize the place of comics in art history. Cross-cultural study of comics is complicated by the great difference in meaning and scope of the words for "comics" in different languages. The French term for comics, bandes dessinées ("drawn strip") emphasizes the juxtaposition of drawn images as
3906-597: Is used in South Korea to refer to both comics and cartooning in general. Outside South Korea, the term usually refers to comics originally published in the country. Manhwa is greatly influenced by Japanese Manga comics though it differs from manga and manhua with its own distinct features. Webtoons have become popular in South Korea as a new way to read comics. Thanks in part to different censorship rules, color and unique visual effects, and optimization for easier reading on smartphones and computers. More manhwa have made
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4032-614: The New York World and later the New York American , particularly Outcault's The Yellow Kid , led to the development of newspaper comic strips. Early Sunday strips were full-page and often in colour. Between 1896 and 1901 cartoonists experimented with sequentiality, movement, and speech balloons. An example is Gustave Verbeek , who wrote his comic series "The UpsideDowns of Old Man Muffaroo and Little Lady Lovekins" between 1903 and 1905. These comics were made in such
4158-473: The Savannah College of Art and Design , where he would meet future artistic collaborators Tradd Moore and Geoff Shaw. Cates majored in sequential art, but left the school after being accepted into a Marvel internship program. While interning, Cates stole a Diamond Distributors Gem Award awarded to Astonishing X-Men #1. At the advice of Marvel editor Mark Peniccia, Cates left the program after
4284-478: The United States , western Europe (especially France and Belgium ), and Japan . The history of European comics is often traced to Rodolphe Töpffer 's cartoon strips of the 1830s, while Wilhelm Busch and his Max and Moritz also had a global impact from 1865 on, and became popular following the success in the 1930s of strips and books such as The Adventures of Tintin . American comics emerged as
4410-586: The archetype of the superhero . According to historian Michael A. Amundson , appealing comic-book characters helped ease young readers' fear of nuclear war and neutralize anxiety about the questions posed by atomic power. Historians generally divide the timeline of the American comic book into eras. The Golden Age of Comic Books began in 1938, with the debut of Superman in Action Comics #1, published by Detective Comics (predecessor of DC Comics), which
4536-510: The 11th-century Norman Bayeux Tapestry , the 1370 bois Protat woodcut, the 15th-century Ars moriendi and block books , Michelangelo's The Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel, and William Hogarth 's 18th-century sequential engravings, amongst others. Illustrated humour periodicals were popular in 19th-century Britain, the earliest of which was the short-lived The Glasgow Looking Glass in 1825. The most popular
4662-501: The 1930s – and through really to the 1950s and 60s – these comics were almost the only entertainment available to children." Dennis the Menace was created in the 1950s, which saw sales for The Beano soar. He features in the cover of The Beano , with the BBC referring to him as the "definitive naughty boy of the comic world." In 1954, Tiger comics introduced Roy of the Rovers ,
4788-607: The 1930s, at first reprinting newspaper comic strips; by the end of the decade, original content began to dominate. The success in 1938 of Action Comics and its lead hero Superman marked the beginning of the Golden Age of Comic Books , in which the superhero genre was prominent. In the UK and the Commonwealth , the DC Thomson -created Dandy (1937) and Beano (1938) became successful humor-based titles, with
4914-422: The 1940s there was a change in portrayal of black characters. "A cursory glance...might give the impression that situations had improved for African Americans in comics." In many comics being produced in this time there was a major push for tolerance between races. "These equality minded heroes began to spring to action just as African Americans were being asked to participate in the war effort." During this time,
5040-481: The 1980s, mainstream sensibilities were reasserted and serialization became less common as the number of comics magazines decreased and many comics began to be published directly as albums. Smaller publishers such as L'Association that published longer works in non-traditional formats by auteur -istic creators also became common. Since the 1990s, mergers resulted in fewer large publishers, while smaller publishers proliferated. Sales overall continued to grow despite
5166-560: The 1990s, changed the format and distribution of their comics to more closely resemble non-comics publishing. The " minicomics " form, an extremely informal version of self-publishing , arose in the 1980s and became increasingly popular among artists in the 1990s, despite reaching an even more limited audience than the small press. Small publishers regularly releasing titles include Avatar Press , Hyperwerks , Raytoons, and Terminal Press , buoyed by such advances in printing technology as digital print-on-demand . In 1964, Richard Kyle coined
Donny Cates - Misplaced Pages Continue
5292-472: The 1990s. Formal theories of manga have focused on developing a "manga expression theory", with emphasis on spatial relationships in the structure of images on the page, distinguishing the medium from film or literature, in which the flow of time is the basic organizing element. Comics studies courses have proliferated at Japanese universities, and Japan Society for Studies in Cartoon and Comics ( ja )
5418-399: The 20th century, with the first comic standard-sized comic being Funnies on Parade . Funnies on Parades was the first book that established the size, duration, and format of the modern comic book. Following this was, Dell Publishing 's 36-page Famous Funnies: A Carnival of Comics as the first true newsstand American comic book; Goulart, for example, calls it "the cornerstone for one of
5544-459: The 21st century and which Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini adapted into a 2003 film . Some independent comics continued in the tradition of underground comics. While their content generally remained less explicit, others resembled the output of mainstream publishers in format and genre but were published by smaller artist-owned companies or by single artists. A few (notably RAW ) represented experimental attempts to bring comics closer to
5670-631: The British humour magazine Punch . Webcomics are comics that are available on the internet, first being published the 1980s. They are able to potentially reach large audiences, and new readers can often access archives of previous installments. Webcomics can make use of an infinite canvas , meaning they are not constrained by the size or dimensions of a printed comics page. Some consider storyboards and wordless novels to be comics. Film studios, especially in animation, often use sequences of images as guides for film sequences. These storyboards are not intended as an end product and are rarely seen by
5796-688: The Comics Magazine Association of America. The CMAA instilled the Comics Code Authority in 1954 and drafted the self-censorship Comics Code that year, which required all comic books to go through a process of approval. It was not until the 1970s that comic books could be published without passing through the inspection of the CMAA. The Code was made formally defunct in November 2011. In the late 1960s and early 1970s,
5922-658: The Incredible Hulk and the X-Men . The best-selling comic book categories in the US as of 2019 are juvenile children's fiction at 41%, manga at 28% and superhero comics at 10% of the market. Another major comic book market is France , where Franco-Belgian comics and Japanese manga each represent 40% of the market, followed by American comics at 10% market share. Comic books heavily rely on their organization and visual presentation. Authors dedicate significant attention to aspects like page layout, size, orientation, and
6048-565: The Innocent (1954). This critique led to the involvement of the American Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency , which launched an investigation into comic books. Wertham argued that comic books were accountable for a surge in juvenile delinquency and posed a potential impact on a child's sexuality and moral values. In response to attention from the government and from the media, the US comic book industry set up
6174-476: The Japanese term for comics and cartooning, manga , in the early 19th century. In the 1930s Harry "A" Chesler started a comics studio, which eventually at its height employed 40 artists working for 50 different publishers who helped make the comics medium flourish in "the Golden Age of Comics" after World War II. In the post-war era modern Japanese comics began to flourish when Osamu Tezuka produced
6300-661: The Magician , and the Phantom . Several reprint companies became involved in repackaging American material for the British market, notably the importer and distributor Thorpe & Porter . Marvel Comics established a UK office in 1972. DC Comics and Dark Horse Comics also opened offices in the 1990s. The repackaging of European material has occurred less frequently, although The Adventures of Tintin and Asterix serials have been successfully translated and repackaged in softcover books. The number of European comics available in
6426-426: The Rovers , Bunty , Buster , Valiant , Twinkle and 2000 AD . Comics Comics are a medium used to express ideas with images, often combined with text or other visual information. It typically takes the form of a sequence of panels of images. Textual devices such as speech balloons , captions , and onomatopoeia can indicate dialogue, narration, sound effects, or other information. There
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#17327982003166552-597: The Silver Age and the following era, the Bronze Age of Comic Books , is less well-defined, with the Bronze Age running from the very early 1970s through the mid-1980s. The Modern Age of Comic Books runs from the mid-1980s to the present day. A significant event in the timeline of American comic books occurred when psychiatrist Fredric Wertham voiced his criticisms of the medium through his book Seduction of
6678-663: The Swiss Rodolphe Töpffer from as early as 1827 and Americans have seen the origin of theirs in Richard ;F. Outcault 's 1890s newspaper strip The Yellow Kid , though many Americans have come to recognize Töpffer's precedence. Wilhelm Busch directly influenced Rudolph Dirks and his Katzenjammer Kids . Japan has a long history of satirical cartoons and comics leading up to the World War ;II era. The ukiyo-e artist Hokusai popularized
6804-426: The U.S. "Spider-Man 'made it clear that militant black power was not the remedy for racial injustice'." "The Falcon openly criticized black behavior stating' maybe it's important fo [ sic ] us to cool things down-so we can protect the rights we been fightin' for'." This portrayal and character development of black characters can be partially blamed on the fact that, during this time, "there had rarely been
6930-507: The UK has increased in the last two decades. The British company Cinebook , founded in 2005, has released English translated versions of many European series. In the 1980s, a resurgence of British writers and artists gained prominence in mainstream comic books, which was dubbed the " British Invasion " in comic book history. These writers and artists brought with them their own mature themes and philosophy such as anarchy, controversy and politics common in British media. These elements would pave
7056-848: The US, daily strips have normally occupied a single tier, while Sunday strips have been given multiple tiers. Since the early 20th century, daily newspaper comic strips have typically been printed in black-and-white and Sunday comics have usually been printed in colour and have often occupied a full newspaper page. Specialized comics periodicals formats vary greatly in different cultures. Comic books , primarily an American format, are thin periodicals usually published in colour. European and Japanese comics are frequently serialized in magazines—monthly or weekly in Europe, and usually black-and-white and weekly in Japan. Japanese comics magazine typically run to hundreds of pages. Book-length comics take different forms in different cultures. European comic albums are most commonly colour volumes printed at A4-size ,
7182-506: The United States. They were the ones painted as intolerant and disrespectful of the dominant concerns of white America". Manga (漫画) are comic books or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, though the art form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art . The term manga is used in Japan to refer to both comics and cartooning in general. Outside Japan,
7308-468: The artwork in ink; a colourist ; and a letterer , who adds the captions and speech balloons. The English-language term comics derives from the humorous (or " comic ") work which predominated in early American newspaper comic strips, but usage of the term has become standard for non-humorous works as well. The alternate spelling comix – coined by the underground comix movement – is sometimes used to address such ambiguities. The term "comic book" has
7434-405: The book Crossover . In June 2021, Cates and Stegman started their own production company entitled KLC Press, named after a Todd McFarlane quote ("Kids Love Chains"), with its first title set to be the book Vanish by Cates and Stegman. In November that same year, Cates became the new writer of Hulk , with Ryan Ottley joining as artist. In June 2022, it was announced Vanish would receive
7560-491: The brain's comprehension of comics is similar to comprehending other domains, such as language and music. Historical narratives of manga tend to focus either on its recent, post-WWII history, or on attempts to demonstrate deep roots in the past, such as to the Chōjū-jinbutsu-giga picture scroll of the 12th and 13th centuries, or the early 19th-century Hokusai Manga . The first historical overview of Japanese comics
7686-687: The comic book market size for North America was just over $ 1 billion with digital sales being flat, book stores having a 1 percent decline, and comic book stores having a 10 percent decline over 2016. The global comic book market saw a substantial 12% growth in 2020, reaching a total worth of US$ 8.49 billion. This positive trajectory continued in 2021, with the market's annual valuation surging to US$ 9.21 billion. The rising popularity of comic books can be attributed to heightened global interest, driven significantly by collaborative efforts among diverse brands. These collaborations are geared towards producing more engaging and appealing comic content, contributing to
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#17327982003167812-463: The comic book market. The rarest modern comic books include the original press run of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen #5, which DC executive Paul Levitz recalled and pulped due to the appearance of a vintage Victorian era advertisement for "Marvel Douche ", which the publisher considered offensive; only 100 copies exist, most of which have been CGC graded. (See Recalled comics for more pulped, recalled, and erroneous comics.) In 2000,
7938-441: The comic review podcast, The Devil’s AdvoCATES Book Club . In 2022, Cates was seriously injured in a car accident that gave him amnesia with no recall of the prior six months of his life. During this time, he also went through a divorce. Cates was forced to pull out of numerous writing projects as a result. Comic book A comic book , comic-magazine or simply ' comic' , is a publication that consists of comics art in
8064-545: The comics all together. There was a comic created about the 99th Squadron, also known as the Tuskegee Airmen , an all-black air force unit. Instead of making the comic about their story, the comic was about Hop Harrigan. A white pilot who captures a Nazi, shows him videos of the 99th Squadron defeating his men and then reveals to the Nazi that his men were defeated by African Americans which infuriated him as he sees them as
8190-433: The coon stereotype but had some subtle differences. They are both a derogatory way of portraying black characters. "The name itself, an abbreviation of raccoon, is dehumanizing. As with Sambo, the coon was portrayed as a lazy, easily frightened, chronically idle, inarticulate, buffoon." This portrayal "was of course another attempt to solidify the intellectual inferiority of the black race through popular culture." However, in
8316-637: The debut appearances of iconic characters such as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman , the Flash , Captain Marvel , Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk , Iron Man , Captain America and the Mighty Thor are regarded as priceless treasures within the comic book world. Many early iterations of black characters in comics "became variations on the 'single stereotypical image of Sambo'." Sambo was closely related to
8442-768: The definition of comics, a medium that has taken various, equally valid forms over its history. Morgan sees comics as a subset of " les littératures dessinées " (or "drawn literatures"). French theory has come to give special attention to the page, in distinction from American theories such as McCloud's which focus on panel-to-panel transitions. In the mid-2000s, Neil Cohn began analyzing how comics are understood using tools from cognitive science, extending beyond theory by using actual psychological and neuroscience experiments. This work has argued that sequential images and page layouts both use separate rule-bound "grammars" to be understood that extend beyond panel-to-panel transitions and categorical distinctions of types of layouts, and that
8568-400: The early 20th century, and the output of comic magazines and books rapidly expanded in the post-World War II era (1945)– with the popularity of cartoonists such as Osamu Tezuka . Comics has had a lowbrow reputation for much of their history, but towards the end of the 20th century, they began to find greater acceptance with the public and academics. The English term comics is used as
8694-420: The eradication of Asian invaders." There was "a constant relay race in which one Asian culture merely handed off the baton of hatred to another with no perceptible changes in the manner in which the characters would be portrayed." "The only specific depiction of a Hispanic superhero did not end well. In 1975, Marvel gave us Hector Ayala (a.k.a. The White Tiger)." "Although he fought for several years alongside
8820-472: The establishment of the Comics Code Authority self-censoring body. The Code has been blamed for stunting the growth of American comics and maintaining its low status in American society for much of the remainder of the century. Superheroes re-established themselves as the most prominent comic book genre by the early 1960s. Underground comix challenged the Code and readers with adult, countercultural content in
8946-413: The extent of promulgating a code, nor did it last long. The UK has also established a healthy market in the reprinting and repackaging of material, notably material originating in the US. The lack of reliable supplies of American comic books led to a variety of black-and-white reprints, including Marvel's monster comics of the 1950s, Fawcett's Captain Marvel , and other characters such as Sheena , Mandrake
9072-501: The first appearance of Spider-Man took place in Amazing Fantasy #15. New characters were frequently introduced in this manner, waiting for an established audience before launching their own titles. Consequently, comics featuring the debut appearance of a significant character can sometimes be even more challenging to locate than the inaugural issue of that character's standalone series. Some rare comic books include copies of
9198-508: The first appearance of Superman , both sold privately through online dealer ComicConnect.com in 2010, and Detective Comics #27, the first appearance of Batman , via public auction. Updating the above price obtained for Action Comics #1, the first appearance of Superman , the highest sale on record for this book is $ 3.2 million, for a 9.0 copy. Misprints, promotional comic-dealer incentive printings, and issues with exceptionally low distribution tend to possess scarcity value in
9324-527: The first modern Japanese comic strip. By the 1930s, comic strips were serialized in large-circulation monthly girls' and boys' magazine and collected into hardback volumes. The modern era of comics in Japan began after World War II, propelled by the success of the serialized comics of the prolific Osamu Tezuka and the comic strip Sazae-san . Genres and audiences diversified over the following decades. Stories are usually first serialized in magazines which are often hundreds of pages thick and may contain over
9450-466: The form of sequential juxtaposed panels that represent individual scenes. Panels are often accompanied by descriptive prose and written narrative, usually dialogue contained in word balloons emblematic of the comics art form. Comic Cuts was a British comic published from 1890 to 1953. It was preceded by Ally Sloper's Half Holiday (1884), which is notable for its use of sequential cartoons to unfold narrative. These British comics existed alongside
9576-492: The green light for later projects like Buzzkill , The Ghost Fleet with Daniel Warren Johnson and The Paybacks . Between 2016 and 2017 Cates also wrote stories for IDW Publishing, including an entry in Star Trek : Waypoint and a one-shot, Star Trek: Deviations . Cates eventually began writing for Image Comics , where he released God Country . With this title he attracted the attention of editors at Marvel, who offered him
9702-590: The hugely popular football based strip recounting the life of Roy Race and the team he played for, Melchester Rovers . The stock media phrase "real 'Roy of the Rovers' stuff" is often used by football writers, commentators and fans when describing displays of great skill, or surprising results that go against the odds, in reference to the dramatic storylines that were the strip's trademark. Other comic books such as Eagle , Valiant , Warrior , Viz and 2000 AD also flourished. Some comics, such as Judge Dredd and other 2000 AD titles, have been published in
9828-426: The industry's continued growth. The 1970s saw the advent of specialty comic book stores . Initially, comic books were marketed by publishers to children because comic books were perceived as children's entertainment. However, with increasing recognition of comics as an art form and the growing pop culture presence of comic book conventions , they are now embraced by many adults. Comic book collectors often exhibit
9954-471: The influence of the Francophone "Franco-Belgian" comics but have their own distinct style. Although Ally Sloper's Half Holiday (1884) was aimed at an adult market, publishers quickly targeted a younger demographic, which has led to most publications being for children and has created an association in the public's mind of comics as somewhat juvenile. The Guardian refers to Ally Sloper as "one of
10080-437: The late 1960s and early 1970s. The underground gave birth to the alternative comics movement in the 1980s and its mature, often experimental content in non-superhero genres. Comics in the US has had a lowbrow reputation stemming from its roots in mass culture ; cultural elites sometimes saw popular culture as threatening culture and society. In the latter half of the 20th century, popular culture won greater acceptance, and
10206-577: The late 19th century. New publications in both the Western and Japanese styles became popular, and at the end of the 1890s, American-style newspaper comics supplements began to appear in Japan, as well as some American comic strips. 1900 saw the debut of the Jiji Manga in the Jiji Shinpō newspaper—the first use of the word "manga" in its modern sense, and where, in 1902, Rakuten Kitazawa began
10332-412: The late 20th century, bound volumes such as graphic novels , comic albums , and tankōbon have become increasingly common, along with webcomics as well as scientific/medical comics. The history of comics has followed different paths in different cultures. Scholars have posited a pre-history as far back as the Lascaux cave paintings. By the mid-20th century, comics flourished, particularly in
10458-437: The likes of much more popular heroes such as Spider-Man and Daredevil, he only lasted six years before sales of comics featuring him got so bad that Marvel had him retire. The most famous Hispanic character is Bane, a villain from Batman." The Native American representation in comic books "can be summed up in the noble savage stereotype" " a recurring theme...urged American indians to abandon their traditional hostility towards
10584-462: The lines between high and low culture began to blur. Comics nevertheless continued to be stigmatized, as the medium was seen as entertainment for children and illiterates. The graphic novel —book-length comics—began to gain attention after Will Eisner popularized the term with his book A Contract with God (1978). The term became widely known with the public after the commercial success of Maus , Watchmen , and The Dark Knight Returns in
10710-498: The manga market in Japan reached a new record value of ¥612.5 billion due to a fast growth of digital manga sales as well as an increase in print sales. The comic book market in the United States and Canada was valued at $ 1.09 billion in 2016. As of 2017 , the largest comic book publisher in the United States is manga distributor Viz Media , followed by DC Comics and Marvel Comics featuring superhero comics franchises such as Superman , Batman , Wonder Woman , Spider-Man ,
10836-516: The medium, such as individual comic strips or comic books: "Tom's comics are in the basement." Panels are individual images containing a segment of action, often surrounded by a border. Prime moments in a narrative are broken down into panels via a process called encapsulation. The reader puts the pieces together via the process of closure by using background knowledge and an understanding of panel relations to combine panels mentally into events. The size, shape, and arrangement of panels each affect
10962-457: The mid-1980s. In the 21st century graphic novels became established in mainstream bookstores and libraries and webcomics became common. The francophone Swiss Rodolphe Töpffer produced comic strips beginning in 1827, and published theories behind the form. Wilhelm Busch first published his Max and Moritz in 1865. Cartoons appeared widely in newspapers and magazines from the 19th century. The success of Zig et Puce in 1925 popularized
11088-443: The most lucrative branches of magazine publishing". In 1905 G.W. Dillingham Company published 24 select strips by the cartoonist Gustave Verbeek in an anthology book called 'The Incredible Upside-Downs of Little Lady Lovekins and Old Man Muffaroo'. The introduction of Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster 's Superman in 1938 turned comic books into a major industry and ushered in the Golden Age of Comic Books . The Golden Age originated
11214-556: The name Foolbert Sturgeon, has been credited as the first underground comix; while R. Crumb and the crew of cartoonists who worked on Zap Comix popularized the form. The rise of comic book specialty stores in the late 1970s created and paralleled a dedicated market for "independent" or " alternative comics " in the US. The first such comics included the anthology series Star Reach , published by comic book writer Mike Friedrich from 1974 to 1979, and Harvey Pekar 's American Splendor , which continued sporadic publication into
11340-408: The original artwork pages from comic books, which are perhaps the most rarefied items in the realm of comic book collecting. These pages hold unparalleled scarcity due to the fact that there exists only one unique page of artwork for every page that was printed and published. The creation of these original artwork pages involves a collaborative effort: a writer crafts the story, a pencil artist designs
11466-499: The popular and widely understood negative tropes used for decades in American mass culture...". However, they were not accomplishing this agenda within all of their comics. In the comic series Captain Marvel Adventures , there was a character named Steamboat who embodied a collection of highly negative stereotypes prevalent during that period. The Writers' War Board did not request any alterations to this character despite
11592-437: The popular lurid " penny dreadfuls " (such as Spring-heeled Jack ), boys' " story papers " and the humorous Punch magazine, which was the first to use the term "cartoon" in its modern sense of a humorous drawing. The first modern American-style comic book , Famous Funnies: A Carnival of Comics , was released in the U.S. in 1933 and was a reprinting of earlier newspaper humor comic strips , which had established many of
11718-428: The pornographic and even more obscure " Tijuana bibles ". Underground comics were almost never sold at newsstands, but rather in such youth-oriented outlets as head shops and record stores, as well as by mail order . The underground comics encouraged creators to publish their work independently so that they would have full ownership rights to their characters. Frank Stack 's The Adventures of Jesus , published under
11844-736: The positioning of panels. These characteristics are crucial for effectively conveying the content and messages within the comic book. Key components of comic books encompass panels, speech bubbles (also known as balloons), text lines, and characters. Speech balloons generally take the form of convex containers that hold character dialogue and are connected to the character via a tail element. The tail comprises an origin, path, tip, and directional point. The creation of comic books involves several essential steps: writing, drawing, and coloring. Various technological tools and methods are employed to craft comic books, incorporating concepts such as directions, axes, data, and metrics. Following these formatting guidelines,
11970-440: The primacy of sequences of images. Towards the close of the 20th century, different cultures' discoveries of each other's comics traditions, the rediscovery of forgotten early comics forms, and the rise of new forms made defining comics a more complicated task. European comics studies began with Töpffer's theories of his own work in the 1840s, which emphasized panel transitions and the visual–verbal combination. No further progress
12096-524: The primary outlet for comics in the mid-20th century. As in the US, at the time comics were seen as infantile and a threat to culture and literacy; commentators stated that "none bear up to the slightest serious analysis", and that comics were "the sabotage of all art and all literature". In the 1960s, the term bandes dessinées ("drawn strips") came into wide use in French to denote the medium. Cartoonists began creating comics for mature audiences, and
12222-617: The problematic portrayal. The removal of Steamboat from the series only came about due to the persistent advocacy of a black youth group based in New York City." Originally their request was refused by individuals working on the comic stating, " Captain Marvel Adventures included many kinds of caricatures 'for the sake of humor'." The black youth group responded with "this is not the Negro race, but your one-and-a-half millions readers will think it so." Afterwards, Steamboat disappeared from
12348-562: The problems of defining literature and film, no consensus has been reached on a definition of the comics medium, and attempted definitions and descriptions have fallen prey to numerous exceptions. Theorists such as Töpffer, R. C. Harvey , Will Eisner , David Carrier, Alain Rey, and Lawrence Grove emphasize the combination of text and images, though there are prominent examples of pantomime comics throughout its history. Other critics, such as Thierry Groensteen and Scott McCloud, have emphasized
12474-488: The process unfolds with writing, drawing, and coloring. In the United States, the term "comic book", is generally used for comics periodicals and trade paperbacks while " graphic novel " is the term used for standalone books. Comics as a print medium have existed in the United States since the printing of The Adventures of Mr. Obadiah Oldbuck in 1842 in hardcover, making it the first known American prototype comic book. Proto-comics periodicals began appearing early in
12600-403: The public. Wordless novels are books which use sequences of captionless images to deliver a narrative. "Comics ... are sometimes four-legged and sometimes two-legged and sometimes fly and sometimes don't ... to employ a metaphor as mixed as the medium itself, defining comics entails cutting a Gordian-knotted enigma wrapped in a mystery ..." R. C. Harvey , 2001 Similar to
12726-452: The same for Asian people. However, "Japanese and Filipino characters were visually indistinguishable. Both groups have grotesque buckteeth, tattered clothing, and bright yellow skin." "Publishers depicted America's Asian allies through derogatory images and language honed over the preceding decades." Asian characters were previously portrayed as, "ghastly yellow demons". During WWII, "[every] major superhero worth his spandex devoted himself to
12852-399: The same treatment. "By the time the United States entered WWII, negative perceptions of Chinese were an established part of mass culture...." However, concerned that the Japanese could use America's anti-Chinese material as propaganda they began "to present a more positive image of America's Chinese allies..." Just as they tried to show better representation for Black people in comics they did
12978-625: The satirical and taboo-breaking Hara-Kiri defied censorship laws in the countercultural spirit that led to the May 1968 events . Frustration with censorship and editorial interference led to a group of Pilote cartoonists to found the adults-only L'Écho des savanes in 1972. Adult-oriented and experimental comics flourished in the 1970s, such as in the experimental science fiction of Mœbius and others in Métal hurlant , even mainstream publishers took to publishing prestige-format adult comics . From
13104-551: The sequential panels on the page, an ink artist goes over the pencil with pen and ink, a letterer provides the dialogue and narration through hand-lettering, and finally, a colorist adds color as the final touch before the pages are sent to the printer. When the printer returns the original artwork pages, they are typically returned to the artists themselves. These artists sometimes opt to sell these pages at comic book conventions, in galleries, and at art shows centered around comic book art. The original pages from DC and Marvel, featuring
13230-452: The status of fine art . During the 1970s the " small press " culture grew and diversified. By the 1980s, several independent publishers – such as Pacific , Eclipse , First , Comico , and Fantagraphics – had started releasing a wide range of styles and formats—from color-superhero, detective , and science-fiction comic books to black-and-white magazine-format stories of Latin American magical realism . A number of small publishers in
13356-558: The story-telling devices used in comics. The term comic book derives from American comic books once being a compilation of comic strips of a humorous tone; however, this practice was replaced by featuring stories of all genres, usually not humorous in tone. The largest comic book market is Japan. By 1995, the manga market in Japan was valued at ¥ 586.4 billion ( $ 6–7 billion ), with annual sales of 1.9 billion manga books ( tankōbon volumes and manga magazines ) in Japan, equivalent to 15 issues per person. In 2020
13482-562: The study of comics. David Carrier's The Aesthetics of Comics (2000) was the first full-length treatment of comics from a philosophical perspective. Prominent American attempts at definitions of comics include Eisner's, McCloud's, and Harvey's. Eisner described what he called " sequential art " as "the arrangement of pictures or images and words to narrate a story or dramatize an idea"; Scott McCloud defined comics as "juxtaposed pictorial and other images in deliberate sequence, intended to convey information and/or to produce an aesthetic response in
13608-496: The success in 1907 of Bud Fisher 's Mutt and Jeff . In Britain, the Amalgamated Press established a popular style of a sequence of images with text beneath them, including Illustrated Chips and Comic Cuts . Humour strips predominated at first, and in the 1920s and 1930s strips with continuing stories in genres such as adventure and drama also became popular. Thin periodicals called comic books appeared in
13734-697: The switch from traditional print manhwa to online webtoons thanks to better pay and more freedom than traditional print manhwa. The webtoon format has also expanded to other countries outside of Korea like China, Japan, Southeast Asia, and Western countries. Major webtoon distributors include Lezhin , Naver , and Kakao . France and Belgium have a long tradition in comics and comic books, often called BDs (an abbreviation of bandes dessinées , meaning literally "drawn strips") in French, and strips in Dutch or Flemish . Belgian comic books originally written in Dutch show
13860-406: The term " graphic novel ". Precursors of the form existed by the 1920s, which saw a revival of the medieval woodcut tradition by Belgian Frans Masereel , American Lynd Ward and others, including Stan Lee. In 1947, Fawcett Publications published "Comics Novel No. 1", as the first in an intended series of these "comics novels". The story in the first issue was "Anarcho, Dictator of Death",
13986-399: The term "Ninth Art" was coined, as comics began to attract public and academic attention as an artform. A group including René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo founded the magazine Pilote in 1959 to give artists greater freedom over their work. Goscinny and Uderzo's The Adventures of Asterix appeared in it and went on to become the best-selling French-language comics series. From 1960,
14112-428: The timing and pacing of the narrative. The contents of a panel may be asynchronous, with events depicted in the same image not necessarily occurring at the same time. Text is frequently incorporated into comics via speech balloons , captions, and sound effects. Speech balloons indicate dialogue (or thought, in the case of thought balloons ), with tails pointing at their respective speakers. Captions can give voice to
14238-600: The trend towards a shrinking print market. Japanese comics and cartooning ( manga ), have a history that has been seen as far back as the anthropomorphic characters in the 12th-to-13th-century Chōjū-jinbutsu-giga , 17th-century toba-e and kibyōshi picture books, and woodblock prints such as ukiyo-e which were popular between the 17th and 20th centuries. The kibyōshi contained examples of sequential images, movement lines, and sound effects. Illustrated magazines for Western expatriates introduced Western-style satirical cartoons to Japan in
14364-496: The unreleased Motion Picture Funnies Weekly #1 from 1939. Eight copies, plus one without a cover, emerged in the estate of the deceased publisher in 1974. The "Pay Copy" of this book sold for $ 43,125 in a 2005 Heritage auction. The most valuable American comics have combined rarity and quality with the first appearances of popular and enduring characters. Four comic books have sold for over US$ 1 million as of December 2010 , including two examples of Action Comics #1,
14490-534: The use of speech balloons in European comics, after which Franco-Belgian comics began to dominate. The Adventures of Tintin , with its signature clear line style, was first serialized in newspaper comics supplements beginning in 1929, and became an icon of Franco-Belgian comics. Following the success of Le Journal de Mickey (est. 1934), dedicated comics magazines like Spirou (est. 1938) and Tintin (1946–1993), and full-colour comic albums became
14616-539: The viewer", a strictly formal definition which detached comics from its historical and cultural trappings. R. C. Harvey defined comics as "pictorial narratives or expositions in which words (often lettered into the picture area within speech balloons) usually contribute to the meaning of the pictures and vice versa". Each definition has had its detractors. Harvey saw McCloud's definition as excluding single-panel cartoons, and objected to McCloud's de-emphasizing verbal elements, insisting "the essential characteristic of comics
14742-584: The way for mature and "darker and edgier" comic books and jump start the Modern Age of Comics . Writers included Alan Moore , famous for his V for Vendetta , From Hell , Watchmen , Marvelman , and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen ; Neil Gaiman with The Sandman mythos and Books of Magic ; Warren Ellis , creator of Transmetropolitan and Planetary ; and others such as Mark Millar , creator of Wanted and Kick-Ass . The comic book series John Constantine, Hellblazer , which
14868-417: The word is typically used to refer to comics originally published in the country. Dōjinshi ( 同人誌 , fan magazine ) , fan-made Japanese comics, operate in a far larger market in Japan than the American "underground comix" market; the largest dōjinshi fair, Comiket , attracts 500,000 visitors twice a year. Manhwa (만화) are comic books or graphic novels originating from South Korea . The term manhwa
14994-424: The work of a single creator, the labour of making them is frequently divided between a number of specialists. There may be separate writers and artists , and artists may specialize in parts of the artwork such as characters or backgrounds, as is common in Japan. Particularly in American superhero comic books, the art may be divided between a penciller , who lays out the artwork in pencil; an inker , who finishes
15120-609: The world's first iconic cartoon characters", and "as famous in Victorian Britain as Dennis the Menace would be a century later." British comics in the early 20th century typically evolved from illustrated penny dreadfuls of the Victorian era (featuring Sweeney Todd , Dick Turpin and Varney the Vampire ). First published in the 1830s, penny dreadfuls were "Britain's first taste of mass-produced popular culture for
15246-451: The years following World War II, while comic book sales continued to increase as other genres proliferated, such as romance , westerns , crime , horror , and humour. Following a sales peak in the early 1950s, the content of comic books (particularly crime and horror) was subjected to scrutiny from parent groups and government agencies, which culminated in Senate hearings that led to
15372-457: The young." The two most popular British comic books, The Beano and The Dandy , were first published by DC Thomson in the 1930s. By 1950 the weekly circulation of both reached two million. Explaining the enormous popularity of comics in the UK during this period, Anita O'Brien, director curator at London's Cartoon Museum, states: "When comics like the Beano and Dandy were invented back in
15498-437: Was Punch , which popularized the term cartoon for its humorous caricatures. On occasion the cartoons in these magazines appeared in sequences; the character Ally Sloper featured in the earliest serialized comic strip when the character began to feature in its own weekly magazine in 1884. American comics developed out of such magazines as Puck , Judge , and Life . The success of illustrated humour supplements in
15624-418: Was Seiki Hosokibara's Nihon Manga-Shi in 1924. Early post-war Japanese criticism was mostly of a left-wing political nature until the 1986 publication of Tomofusa Kure's Modern Manga: The Complete Picture , which de-emphasized politics in favour of formal aspects, such as structure and a "grammar" of comics. The field of manga studies increased rapidly, with numerous books on the subject appearing in
15750-521: Was established in 2001 to promote comics scholarship. The publication of Frederik L. Schodt 's Manga! Manga! The World of Japanese Comics in 1983 led to the spread of use of the word manga outside Japan to mean "Japanese comics" or "Japanese-style comics". Coulton Waugh attempted the first comprehensive history of American comics with The Comics (1947). Will Eisner's Comics and Sequential Art (1985) and Scott McCloud 's Understanding Comics (1993) were early attempts in English to formalize
15876-570: Was made until the 1970s. Pierre Fresnault-Deruelle then took a semiotics approach to the study of comics, analyzing text–image relations, page-level image relations, and image discontinuities, or what Scott McCloud later dubbed "closure". In 1987, Henri Vanlier introduced the term multicadre , or "multiframe", to refer to the comics page as a semantic unit. By the 1990s, theorists such as Benoît Peeters and Thierry Groensteen turned attention to artists' poïetic creative choices. Thierry Smolderen and Harry Morgan have held relativistic views of
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