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Post by G on Aug 22, 2008 10:55:43 GMT -5
You know, I remember walking around a convention around 1994 or so and realizing that it was time to get out of Valiant and I was really glad I did. But I also did not realize it was also really a good time to get out of comics period. I never realized that it wasn't just Valiant getting ready to nosedive, it was comics themselves. The mid to late 90s saw lots of negativity. A lot of comic shops went out of business. A lot of comics struggled to sell. Heck, even Marvel went bankrupt.
What REALLY doomed comics in the mid 90's? You cant blame it on Valiant. They were just the 1st domino to fall. Was it the sheer glut of comics? Was it generally a lower quality time in comics? Did the Playstation suddenly make comic purchases by teenagers go away? Did gimmicks turn a lot of people off? Did it suddenly go from too many people making a lot of money to too many people not making money? I'm seriously glad comics survived and I'd say comics puts out a better product now in most cases than they did then. (In most cases). It seemed comics had to evolve and regroup in order to survive. In the end, it may have been good for comics in some ways. But I know personally I have never seen nearly the amount of hysteria for comics now as I seen back then. But when it all went sour, it went sour everywhere.
Just why did comics in general suddenly nose dive? What was the #1 reason in your opinion that comics became ice cold?
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Post by comickings on Aug 22, 2008 23:07:33 GMT -5
You know, I remember walking around a convention around 1994 or so and realizing that it was time to get out of Valiant and I was really glad I did. But I also did not realize it was also really a good time to get out of comics period. I never realized that it wasn't just Valiant getting ready to nosedive, it was comics themselves. The mid to late 90s saw lots of negativity. A lot of comic shops went out of business. A lot of comics struggled to sell. Heck, even Marvel went bankrupt. What REALLY doomed comics in the mid 90's? You cant blame it on Valiant. They were just the 1st domino to fall. Was it the sheer glut of comics? Was it generally a lower quality time in comics? Did the Playstation suddenly make comic purchases by teenagers go away? Did gimmicks turn a lot of people off? Did it suddenly go from too many people making a lot of money to too many people not making money? I'm seriously glad comics survived and I'd say comics puts out a better product now in most cases than they did then. (In most cases). It seemed comics had to evolve and regroup in order to survive. In the end, it may have been good for comics in some ways. But I know personally I have never seen nearly the amount of hysteria for comics now as I seen back then. But when it all went sour, it went sour everywhere. Just why did comics in general suddenly nose dive? What was the #1 reason in your opinion that comics became ice cold? What killed it was the speculators. They are also the guys that made the market. Just like the stock market....A few guys got people all hyped up on something...then they hooked up with the Wizard Price Guide to get the frenzy really going...so everybody out there had to have 10 copies of everything...it seemed like any book we ordered,would sell out...then after about 2-3 years,the guys buying 10 copies of everything,stopped buying 10 copies of everything,then the panic set in...dealers were jammed up on everything and started to dump their back stock,the speculating customers saw what was going on and stopped buying,and started dumping their hoards,...and the market went back to just the true collectors.People learned their lesson,and started to buy just what they collected,and pretty much quit speculating. |
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Post by G on Aug 23, 2008 9:13:46 GMT -5
Yeah, that pretty much summed up the downfall pretty nicely. I remember during those last good days I had and that walk, what made me notice that it was over for Valiant, was I was seeing so many people now doing shows who I had never seen before and who looked like they had never done a show or cared about comics at all. Instead, they had bought a booth and showed up with their token boxes of Valiants as well as 2 or 3 other boxes of hot books that everyone else had. I seen an old couple doing this. I seen a couple who had their 12 yr old son doing this. It was everywhere. I knew it couldnt last. It was a sad realization for me. Before that realization, it felt like I was living a dream. It seemed like it was good if only a few of us were doing it. Like it was a secret that you didnt want other people to get in on. Being I already loved comics, it was an awesome way for me to make extra cash and build up my collection. For about 2 yrs, there was a sweet spot there. But it just seemed like everyone caught on. I heard a lot of the baseball card dealers got into it too. The market got crowded. If we was all buying 10 copies, we all needed to find 10 buyers. Pretty soon werent able to. When before if we bought 10 copies, we really needed 50. It was sad for many reasons. Money wise this was really sad. Comics wise, it was sad because the fanbase was a mirage and it had looked so strong now went back to the original true fanbase. Suddenly a lot of comics stopped being cool. It was like a faucet that was turned off. Man, I miss those convenient around town mall shows!  |
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Post by cyberstrike on Aug 27, 2008 8:09:07 GMT -5
You know, I remember walking around a convention around 1994 or so and realizing that it was time to get out of Valiant and I was really glad I did. But I also did not realize it was also really a good time to get out of comics period. I never realized that it wasn't just Valiant getting ready to nosedive, it was comics themselves. The mid to late 90s saw lots of negativity. A lot of comic shops went out of business. A lot of comics struggled to sell. Heck, even Marvel went bankrupt. What REALLY doomed comics in the mid 90's? You cant blame it on Valiant. They were just the 1st domino to fall. Was it the sheer glut of comics? Was it generally a lower quality time in comics? Did the Playstation suddenly make comic purchases by teenagers go away? Did gimmicks turn a lot of people off? Did it suddenly go from too many people making a lot of money to too many people not making money? I'm seriously glad comics survived and I'd say comics puts out a better product now in most cases than they did then. (In most cases). It seemed comics had to evolve and regroup in order to survive. In the end, it may have been good for comics in some ways. But I know personally I have never seen nearly the amount of hysteria for comics now as I seen back then. But when it all went sour, it went sour everywhere. Just why did comics in general suddenly nose dive? What was the #1 reason in your opinion that comics became ice cold? All of the above. |
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