U.S and the Tooth.

[Valhalla]

I was just wondering why it is the Tooth cannot stand alone as is and be accepted in the states?

Many moons ago there was the eagle/quality/fleetway reprints.

Then there was the (crap)DC Dredd stuff.

And now we have 2000ad showcase due to be released!

What is it about 2000Ad that the Americans cannot accept?

Is it the anthology format?

Is it the size of The Mighty Ones Organ? All the reprints and the DC versions have been weeny us sized.

What is it?

This is driving me nuts. I just don't understand how one format (the origanl one) can do poorly but a rehash does alright!

Please explain....

Anyone...


Valhalla.

[Mikey]

Well it has been suggested that the yanks aren't keen on anthologies-as ye know its mostly monthly single character/team stuff a lot of the time.

Format has also been cited-doesn't fit the newsstands or something.

Plus,IMHO,a lot of yanks wouldn't 'get' the vibe.Dredd's takin the piss out of *them* after all.Too gritty in comparison with some books perhaps(IMHO)

I also think it's bang fer your buck stuff too-for each issue 6 pages for a story you like maybe isnt much for the price(how much in the states?)

And the"Whut ina tarnation isa this here gawd dem limey two bit chickenshit unamerican terrist propa ganda a doin in mah hometown cawmik shawp??Gawd bleyss Umerica.Yessir."attitude.
;p

M.

[Trout]

It must also be difficult to persuade someone to climb aboard something in the middle of the ride, when they haven't had the chance before.

- Trout

[Tu-plang]

It's their loss.

[critter]

I was just wondering why it is the Tooth cannot stand alone as is and be accepted in the states?

Well I likes it.

Critter the Last American

[Steamboy]

I think its to hard core for em. Wizard(american comics mag)did a bit of a review on Dredd Vs Alien (dark horse edition) thought it rocked, did mention 2000ad in review as "that ultraviolent british weekly anthology". Reckon nows the chance to break into the US scene as there comics have been getting more adult over the last few year.(thanks to Ennis, Dillon, Morrison, Millar(wasn't his dredd shit grudamn Crusade), god so many X AD alumni cant mention them here). think tooths
x-pats have something to do with that.

[Dudley]

> It must also be difficult to persuade someone
> to climb aboard something in the middle of the
> ride, when they haven't had the chance before.

Ummm... wouldn't that apply to about 2/3rds of 2000ad's current readership?

[Trout]

Yes, Dudley, but back progs and reprints are more readily available in the UK.

In the States, there's been little or no chance to have seen 2K before now, and it's a lot of history to catch up on.

- Trout

[Dudley]

Take your point, but most people surely get into the comic by picking up someone else's, getting interested, buying their own, reading it regularly.  Only after they've been doing that for about 6 months do they start getting interested in the back issues, reprints etc.  I know I'm extrapolating too much from my own experience, but I started reading in the middle of the Democracy storyline and didn't really care about the missed parts, ditto for the other series that were going on at the time.  Comics actually are a very good artform for coming in in the middle, in that everything's constantly being rehashed either in recap in the strip or in the Thargnotes, or in the nerve centre.  

Supplementary: how much effort has been put in to promoting 2000ad Stateside?  Has the comic even a tenth as much cash for promotion as the US biggies?

[Darryl]

Also, if you look at the majority of the US market, it's geared towards costumed, brightly coloured heroes, and villans who look like bad guys, not yer average person..... and tooth is the (virtually) opposite of this....

The yanks wont take it on board becuase of this and the supposed 'left' leaning of the stories.

Oh, and i agree, mark millars work on tooth was shite. thank god he works for marvel now the dolts..... hes ruined xmen i think.....

[judge dreddd]

in general british sc-fi is pessimistic and us stuff optimistic,,, radiation,summary execution..mutants...its not optimistic is it ?

[Trout]

"Left" leanings of 2000AD? There's an interesting concept.

I propose, in the interest of good chumhood, all of 2000AD's assets are split equally between the readership as a positive way of dividing the wealth of society.

I'll have the rights to Halo Jones Book 3.

Who wants Chronos Carnival?

Anyone?

Anyone?



Helloooooo?


- Trout

[Grant Goggans]

In my opinion, the format has always worked against it, since the average American retailer and fan has preconceived notions about what comic books should offer and what they should be.  When US comic shops were beginning to boom in the mid-80s, many of them ordered 2000 AD, but the almost-square newsprint format didn't fit well in boxes or on shelves and there weren't any bags-n-boards which would fit it.  The industry did a decent job of brainwashing Americans that if you wanted to collect comics, they had to go in these size "acid-free" boxes and this size "acid-free" bags-n-boards and you could check your collection against this price guide, which didn't list 2000 AD... You also had an industry which printed in color, for the most part.  Even the black-n-white indie comics, from whom 2000 AD had the best chance of getting readership, were printed on much better paper.

So 2000 AD remained a niche item, sold mainly to people who wanted it.  Then one day it just stopped coming.  This was in the 860s or so.  2000 AD just didn't come to the US at all for about seven months.  It was frustrating enough that we couldn't get the Megazine, and so we couldn't see what was happening to Anderson, or the crossover episodes of Judgement Day, but I imagine a good chunk of 2000 AD's small American readership imagined it was cancelled.  Retailers stopped ordering it, since it wasn't going to ship anyway.  When it finally did start shipping again, I imagine many shops didn't think to look for it.

In the last several years, the retailing business has really been hit hard.  Most shops can't justify ordering anything unless they're pretty sure it's going to sell, and many others are staffed by lazy idiots who don't want to go to the effort of ordering anything new.

The business is pretty bleak these days.  I play Heroclix with some fellows at one of Atlanta's two best stores, Dr. No's.  Even here, when I decided to order some copies of a "forthcoming" issue as a gift to coincide with the Heroclix Indy expansion, I had to pay in advance: $17.75 for five copies of prog 1356, which will ship in 2 weeks.  I think five copies of Megazine 210 would have been a better sell, but the Megazine is criminally expensive in the US: $10.99 an issue.

At any rate, it's a catch-22: shops will not carry 2000 AD unless they know it will sell.  I think it would sell better if more people had the chance to see it.

Which is why *I* think Tharg should have a special offer for a limited edition Heroclix in a forthcoming prog.  Once word gets out to the crowd, a thousand or so people will order that issue and I'm sure many of them will like what they see and stick around.

--Grant