h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

The reason you don't see reviews of Graphic Novels in the broadsheets or Late Review (Gawd, I hate that program) is simple - snobbery.

Most "broadsheet" critics move in certain circles which regard certain things as "acceptable" and certain things not. This explains why the excellent Lord of the Rings film was given poor reviews by some (although, thankfully, few) broadsheet reviewers. They could not be seen to enjoy a film that was:

1)A fantasy film
2)Based on a novel which is not accepted as "proper" serious grown-up literature
3)Popular with tabloid reviewers
4)Had recieved rave reviews - they have to be seen as "above" the rabble

One of the worst was in a British broadsheet where the reviewer desperately tried to display how above-it-all he was by pretending he hadn't "caught" the names of any of the characters "there was a wizard called Sarazan or somthing". Yeah, right

Bearing this mentality in mind, they could not *possibly* be seen to be regarding "comics" as serious fiction. Some people might laugh at them in fasionable watering-holes.

Rant ends

Which is all well and good, except the Guardian has given very favourable reports of Manga, The Dark Knight Returns and Preacher to name but three.
It was the Guardian that gave 'Jimmy Corrigan' the award, not the Telegraph.
The reason that people don't take comics seriously is way more complicated than cultural critics inability to 'think outside the box' though.
Mostly it's due to the fact that,simply, most comics are cr*p. How can you expect anyone to take a medium seriously when the best selling titles are all, without exception, about blokes who wear their underpants outside their trousers.
There is a reason why Moore and Miller are so good-they are the only writers in the last couple of decades who have manged to lift super-heroes beyond the dullard level. They have addressed real political concerns in a serious way using super-heroes as icons. But next to them on the shelf-'Suicide Squad', 'Deadpool', 'Danger Girl'.
*I* can't take then seriously, and I *like* comics...

Haven't read the new Suicide Squad, but the old one (15 years ago) was a superior piece of work - then again it did have John Ostrander writing it.

'Comics aren't taken seriously because most of the successful ones are crap'? You could make exactly the same case against cinema as an art-form but it's clearly not the case. I blame the industry; too conservative, not ambitious enough.

Cinema has history on its side.
Over eighty or so years it has produced artifacts of genuine cultural significance.
Comics has been doing that for a decade at best.

Cinema has history on its side.
Over eighty or so years it has produced artifacts of genuine cultural significance.
Comics has been doing that for a decade at best.

You're surely not argiung that characters like Superman and Batman (and possibly Spidey and the Hulk) don't have any cultural significance? I don't mean artistic merit, but importance.

In terms of the sociology of America during the second world war... and also the fragmenting of society and alienation of youth during the 60s, as well as the development of pop-art as a subgenre... comic books were of tremendous cultural significance.

(Decade or so at most...? Moore's Swamp Thing started 18 years ago. Watchmen was 17 years ago. I'd even put a vote in for some of Denny O'Neill's Green Lantern stories from over 30 years ago.)

Ok, I'll give you 18 years, going back to Moore's Swamp Thing.
O'Neill's Green Lantern is, by any modern standard, clunky, didactic and sophomoric. History has not been kind to it, I think.
Part of the problem lies with the way that people continually overblow the importance of stories that aren't worth it. To get comics taken seriously by cultural critics, we *have* to pick the medium's 'Nosferatu', rather than some pot-boiler western with Tom Mix. (To pick examples from an equivalent stage of cinema's development.)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/guide/A682139

Today's Speech Bubble Burst - expanded and tweaked for Your Reading Pleasure!

I've been thinking a lot about this and I'm not sure 'being taken seriously' is necessarily a good thing for any arts media. Forty years ago there wasn't the distinction in, say, music, that there is now, between serious artists and popular ones. Pop music wasn't taken seriously but that didn't stop it being an important, vital medium.

Then the Beatles came along and started writing what were clearly sophisticated high-quality songs and lo and behold 'serious' critics got involved... and ultimately this has led, I think, to the situation today where you have a talented, 'serious' performer (eg PJ Harvey, and if you disagree with my argument don't just do it by disagreeing with my examples, okay?) who sells a tiny fraction of the amount shifted by a manufactured rubbish one (eg the unlamented Steps). It's this idea that you have to be accepted by the critics, and the prejudice of the critics that to be good you can't be populist.

The same thing arguably happened to the cinema post- the mid 70s. Although populist, critically-acclaimed cinema is showing signs of a small revival.

How does this apply to comics? Well, since Alan Moore got noticed by the critics his style of story has got split off into 'mature' imprints on the whole (Vertigo being the obvious example), much to the detriment of mainstream long-john books. It's a funny coincidence, to say the least...

Just a thought.

Critics breed ossification, no doubt about it.
Just take a look at 'The Comics Journal', one of the most boring publications on the planet...

I'd rather not.

I suppose critics have to justify their existence somehow (hey, hang on a minute... I'M a critic, in a half-baked amateurish kinda way... dagnabbit, I've outsmarted myself again...).

The last time the Journal was worth reading was when Groth interviewed Harlan Ellison and he proceeded to annoy/irritate and disgust the entire readership.
It is still one of Harlan's finest hours...
I've done a bit of critic-ing myself, so I guess we can bail the boat out together...

Harlan has that effect, doesn't he?

I remember when he got the gig writing an introduction for some American Doctor Who novelisations... he basically said how wonderful DW was, so much better than Trek, Galactica, etc, but still somehow managed to rub every DW fan who read the piece up the wrong way. Now that's talent.

The Comics Journal?

...

Exactly.
I think Harlan's principle sin was that he was effectively shouting in the library and woke up the snoring old f*rts at the back.
Good on him, I say.

Well, anyway, I've decided to do my media studies essay on "Can comics ever gain the same measure of respectability as other forms of media?"

Should be interesting. My fellow students were amused and puzzled in equal measure when I said I wanted to do comics. I guess they didn't see the Chomsky/Monbiot/Pilger disciple as the comics type

Hey, if Umberto Eco can write about comics...

... then he might be worth quoting

I'd think so.
It was about twenty years ago-a piece about Superman if I remember correctly. Lots of stuff on the net-I just did a quick Umberto Eco + Comics search on Google and got loads of hits.

I'd think so.
It was about twenty years ago-a piece about Superman if I remember correctly. Lots of stuff on the net-I just did a quick Umberto Eco + Comics search on Google and got loads of hits.