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For publishers, selling copies of their publications has always been more important than advancing the status of comics as an art form. This commercial concern was what made comic books a pillar of the mass periodical industry in North America until the beginning of the 1960s. Comics magazines, distributed at the start of the 1930s wherever periodicals were sold, benefited from a large-scale visibility that accounted for its initial success as well as its subsequent failure. In North America, the survival of comic books was tied to a much greater degree on their sales than on their advertising receipts. This chapter examines the business of comic books, from advertising to distribution, both traditional and direct market. It also looks at the crisis suffered by the comic book industry that began in 1993 and ended in 1996, along with the business of comic book specialty stores and their synergy with publishers.

This chapter examines the anti-comics crusade of the 1950s. Rooted in the ethos of an atomic modernity in which the suburban home was thought of as a vanguard against internal and external threats, this mainstream movement identified the comic book industry as a threat to children and hence to the nation's virtue and security. Superheroes were accused of undermining gender norms, atomizing families, promoting violent and antisocial behavior, subverting democracy, and otherwise making Americans more susceptible to the values of a capitalist economy run amok. As a result of the success of the anti-comics crusade, comic book companies reworked their characters, stripping superheroes of their more transgressive qualities and making them conform to Cold War consensus culture. The chapter concludes by studying how baby boomer aficionados of the superhero genre organized themselves into fan communities and reactivated the superhero's anti-modern potential during the 1960s as part of a broader rebellion against consensus culture.

The comic book industry lives in a universe of complex professional trajectories involving several thousand individuals ranging from artists, cartoonists, and writers to employees of publishing houses. There is no typical career path in the comic book industry; comics artists may work in newspaper comics, animation, illustration, advertising, or even writing, whereas writers may find themselves in newspapers, magazines, radio, television, cinema, or literature. This chapter describes a succession of generations of comics creators by analyzing the history of the comic book industry as it has been represented by the creators themselves and their activities. It looks at four generations of creators: the pioneers such as Jack Kirby and Stan Lee; the postwar creators, including Carmine Infantino and Steve Ditko; the third generation that included Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams; and the fourth generation that included Dave Sim and the brothers Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez. The chapter also considers four professional associations: the Society of Comic Book Illustrators, the Academy of Comic Book Arts, the United Cartoon Workers of America, and the Comic Creators Guild.

The North American comic book industry appeared to undergo a period of transition eight years after suffering a crisis in 1954, when many publishers went under. Once it emerged from a purge and a restructuring, the market introduced a new generation of superheroes that allowed the genre to create a niche. These superheroes eventually supplanted the funny animals and humor comics that had dominated comic books for more than two decades. This chapter examines the decline and revival of the comic book industry between 1955 and 1962. It first looks at the creation of the Comics Code and the Comics Code Authority by the Comics Magazine Association of America, as well as the economic impact of the Code on comic books. It then discusses the emergence of a new group of publishers that led the market, including DC Comics and Marvel Comics, and the introduction of new comics genres. It also considers the return of superhero comics, the rebirth of Marvel Comics and the collapse of Dell Comics, and the decline in popularity of comic books.

The comic book industry reached its commercial apogee over the course of the seven years that followed the end of World War II. Although the number of releases and combined print runs was never equaled afterward, the enormous demand for comic books—courtesy of young consumers—gave rise to an economic boom and increased visibility in the media. As a result, comic magazines were stigmatized as one of the main causes of the ills of America’s youth. More specifically, juvenile delinquency was blamed on comic magazines for their allegedly crime-inducing nature. The industry suffered a long economic decline in 1953, regaining stability only in the early 1960s. This chapter examines the rise and fall of the comic book industry in America in the period 1945–1954. It first looks at the industry’s commercial golden age and the publishing of comic books geared toward women readers, including romance comics. It then discusses the decline of superhero comics and how publishers tried to fill the void left by superheroes by offering western comics and crime comics. It also looks at the legacy of William Gaines, publisher of Educational Comics.

The comic book industry underwent dramatic changes in the 1970s, when the large publishers failed to arrest declining sales despite saturating the market with hundreds of new titles. It was also during this decade that the underground movement experienced phenomenal growth until 1973 and subsequently adjusted to the influx of artists who were in pursuit of creative independence yet external to the countercultural agenda. The industry’s restructuring took place at the same time that distribution networks underwent a major overhaul. The neighborhood and retail outlets that had been the main suppliers of comic books for the past thirty years witnessed the emergence of a new distribution system by the mid-1970s that could cope with the economic demands of the first comic book specialty stores. This chapter examines trends in the comic book industry from 1969 to 1979, first by describing its instability during the 1970s and how comics became relevant again. It discusses the introduction of a number of variations in the superhero genre by publishers such as DC Comics and Marvel Comics, the release of comic book adaptations of movies and television series, the decline of underground comics, and the emergence of cartoonists who desired freedom of expression that was refused to them by the mainstream publishers.

During a short period in the 1960s, the comic book industry underwent a creative phase the effects of which still linger in the early twenty-first century. The industry’s new commercial and cultural dynamic coalesced around Marvel Comics and DC Comics, the two leading publishers at the time, and the superhero genre. In addition, a new conception of comic books, epitomized by the first generation of creators that had grown up with them, emerged. The newcomers overhauled the codes and contents of the medium, the most radical among them producing the first “underground” comics, also known as comix. This chapter examines the comic book industry’s age of innovation, which spanned the years 1963 to 1969. It looks at the rebirth of the superhero genre, led by Batman, and the rise of comix as a direct emanation of the independent press that appeared in the wake of the counterculture—that is, the ideological, social, and cultural rebellion of many baby boomers. It also discusses the industry’s evolution that gave pride of place to comics artists.

This chapter examines the influence of the graphic novel on American comics. It looks at two factors that indirectly led to the creation of the graphic novel in the 1970s and 1980s: the introduction of the “direct market” in which publishers sold comic books directly to specialty comics stores; and challenges to the Comics Code Authority that regulated the newsstand comic book industry. The chapter also shows how, after a series of unstable economic and material conditions, graphic novels have emerged as common fixtures in libraries and bookshops independent of the comics shops and newsstands. It provides a background on the Comics Code Authority and how it worked in tandem with the production, distribution, and reception of American comics. Moreover, the chapter considers the Comics Magazine Association of America, founded in 1954 by several major comics publishers to govern the content of comic books. It describes the rise of black and white “alternative” comics published by cartoonists, along with self-publishing and small press publications. Finally, the chapter focuses on three comics publishers: DC Comics, Marvel Comics, and Dark Horse Comics.

During World War II, the American comic book industry continued to experience growth as the number of titles proliferated. In addition, contents became increasingly diverse and recurring characters multiplied in comic magazines. Comic books gave rise to an industry that became a source of considerable revenue and acknowledged by the public to be different from newspaper comics and pulp magazines. The increase in household income, coupled with reduced availability of consumer durables, provided the impetus for comic books and all forms of mass entertainment. The war also witnessed the emergence of illustrated magazines, which benefited from the momentum gathered by the nascent industry before the war. This chapter examines the status of the comic book industry during World War II, its competition with newspapers, and the publishing of comic books that targeted preadolescent readers by injecting them with juvenile characters and humor. It also looks at the rise of educational comic books based on history and literature.

At the start of the 1980s, the comic book industry underwent a crisis of identity and stagnation. The preceding decade had seen underground comics yield its place to alternative publishers who were willing to grant more creative freedom to artists than their mainstream counterparts would allow. Thanks to the derivative products that were based on their comic book characters, Marvel Comics and DC Comics survived while the small publishers experienced a growing success not only because of the quality of the content on offer, but also because of a new visibility stemming from the growing network of specialized comic book stores. This chapter examines the recovery of the comic book industry during the 1980s after the instability they suffered in the previous years. It discusses the principal factors that contributed to this recovery, including the evolution of comics readership, the market’s adaptation to the proliferation of specialized bookstores, and the increasingly important role given to comics creators. It also looks at the debate among comics creators over censorship in comic books, the renewal of DC and its competition with Marvel, and the success of small publishers.

The complementarity between publishers and creators is crucial to the success of the comic book industry. The creative end—which consists of the structures and processes that are articulated around writers and artists—and the business end—the activities of publication and circulation that constitute the domain of publishers and publishing houses—are two sectors that can never be considered separately. This chapter examines the practical conditions of the production of comic books, first by looking at the role of studios as suppliers of comics. It then discusses the initiatives of publishers such as DC Comics and Marvel Comics to bind comics creators’ services with contracts, comics manufacture based on a strict division of labor, the publishers’ adoption of the “house” style to ensure stylistic unity and the self-regulation of content, and the Marvel method of production. It also considers the last step in the creative process of comic book production: coloring and the work of colorists.

This concluding chapter reflects on the various market strategies used by comic book companies to survive the decline of the comic book industry as well as the emergence of superhero films in the twenty-first century. The major comic book companies managed to survive the setbacks of the 1990s by catering to their traditional fans while simultaneously drawing in new readers through the publication of non-traditional superhero fiction inspired by the deconstructionist trends of the 1980s. This mix of innovative storytelling and more traditional approaches produced comic books that both earned critical acclaim and generated a modest rise in sales, keeping the industry alive into the first decades of the twenty-first century. Despite the uncertainty of the future of comic books, superheroes themselves seem more relevant today than ever before. Moving off the comic book page, they have transitioned to other media with increasing success, most notably in the American motion picture industry.

During the 1990s, the comic book industry’s direct sales distribution system faced an extremely grave crisis after seven years of uninterrupted growth. This crisis decimated the ranks of comic book specialty stores and the most fragile publishers, at a time when comics was beginning to penetrate the book market thanks to the growth of “graphic novels.” After Art Spiegelman received a Pulitzer Prize Special Award for his creation Maus II in 1992, audiences outside of comic book specialty stores discovered the diversity and richness of work that was far removed from standardized superhero stories. Meanwhile, Marvel Comics and DC Comics entrusted their titles to a new generation of writers, most of them of British origin who explored the margins of the superhero genre with occasionally impressive results.

This chapter presents an excerpt from Jules Feiffer’s pioneering study The Great Comic Book Heroes (1965), which offers a fledgling cartoonist’s account of the early days of the comic book industry. Like Feiffer many of the early comic book creators, including Siegel and Shuster, were teens or young adults when they joined the burgeoning industry in the 1930s and 1940s. The account brings to life the youthful enthusiasm of this first generation of comic book artists and the excitement of working in a new art form that was developing its own visual language and techniques.

This book has shown that the cultural history of comic books in America is not limited to the history of publishers. Instead, cultural products correspond to a public that uses them in a variety of ways. Since the 1950s, the comic book industry has witnessed a transformation of its readers. The appearance of “graphic novels” finally allowed for the emergence of works that are sold in bookstores, where “real” books are. In addition to helping eradicate much of the stigma that comic books have endured as products primarily destined for boys enduring an extended adolescence, graphic novels enabled comics to shift toward the field of “adult culture” and inscribed the medium into a commercial life that was unrelated to the monthly periodicity of comic books. Comic books saw the rise of the superhero genre that was embedded in American popular culture since the end of the 1930s. The cultural legitimation of American comics proved beneficial to the heirs of underground comics.