Comic Book Guy: Rise of the Graphic Novel

Bob Dylan’s The times they are a changing choruses slowly over the opening credits of The Watchmen, before crime fighters in slightly camp-looking costumes meet their various demises in the opening montage. These lyrics, however, echo throughout the comic book industry in a different reality: the times are not just changing, they’ve already changed. For decades the comic book has been a popular and collectable read, predominantly for the young male telling tales of Superheroes or Pulp Fiction, but the slow evolution over 20 years of the Graphic Novel has changed everything.

The Graphic novel, a collection of several comic book issues or an extended story, is bound together and presented as a book or, in author Neil Gaiman’s words, a “fat comic that can be sold as a book in a bookstore”. A far more accessible format that caused a new dawn to rise over the last decade, with bookstores making more and more space for the expanding sales of this emerging medium. Yes, there is and will always be a fan base of comic book readers with an encyclopaedic knowledge of the fictional universes created by their preferred publishers (the battle between Marvel and DC rages ever on), but the pure quality of writing is what draws more people to the format.

There has always been critically acclaimed material within Graphic Novels: Alan Moore’s The Watchmen was last year’s highest selling Graphic novel, despite being published in 1986. It is also constantly voted by industry experts into prestigious lists of the greatest books ever written. More recently household names such as Stephen King turned their attention to the format, as have Hollywood writers such as Kevin Smith and Joss Whedon, penning issues of Daredevil and X-men respectfully.

The creative crossover with Hollywood can’t be ignored as a huge factor in the increase of publication sales as audience seek out source materials from the latest adaptation seen on the big screen. The movie mill is continuingly working overtime on its newly acquired wealth or source material in an effort to make many different loved characters come from their pages to life. But there is so much more to this realm than just the superheroes, such as the more character orientated world of Manga. The East has embraced the culture of graphic art every bit as much as the West and opened up the market to an international level as hybrid styles emerge. The insurgence of Manga also brought a far higher percentage of female readers, formally a minority in the comic book world, and helped diversify out to a new uncategorised audience.

You see, the point is that the comic book and the Graphic Novel are open to everyone. They are tales of the superhuman, tales of the everyman, horror, fantasy, science fiction and romance. They are Pulitzer Prize Winners, groundbreaking art work, quick reads or a heavy tomb. Like a circus of literature and art they are for children of all ages, accessible, entertaining and enthralling.

So put the book down and pick the Graphic Novel up.