Weekly Shonen Jump versus Brit Comics
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With the Japanese method of production, the comic readers follow the adventures of their favourite characters, in the weekly or fortnightly or monthly comics anthology, for a sustained period (more often than not building an interest in other characters) and then when the various chapters are pulled together into a series of graphic novels, each comprising one meaty volume, the fans are more than eager to collect the new books.
Those same fans are similarly delighted when their favourite idol graduates from their own graphic novels to anime, and even live-action TV shows, and then sometimes movies and more often than not games and it goes without saying that the accompanying merchandise is equally eagerly sought. This, almost organic business model, where the character, if successful, follows a very well trodden path, has proved both robust, and an important source of income for the cartoonists and writers, the comics publisher, the graphic novels publishers, the printers, the animation studios, the TV companies, the actors, the film studios, the toy designers and toy companies and, of course, the entire Japanese economy. It is a business that although past the zenith of its popularity, generates 500-billion yen, and employs hundreds of people.
The British method of comics production, on the other hand, was strange and insular. The comics seemed to be a sort of afterthought, created because the printing presses were already there, on the premises, and in use anyway. Whether that was the case or not, the Japanese system of allowing creators free-reign to produce their wildest imaginings, and to reap a share of any profits, was not practised in Britain, where comics artists and writers got no more than a fixed payment per page. In fact, it was only with a degree of reluctance that one of the two major British comics publishers even allowed their artists to sign their own art work. This obsession with exercising strict control over the content invariably led to the companies pushing their own in-house characters, rather than anything the cartoonists and writers might come up with, unless of course they handed all the copyright in all the world over to the publisher. And, arguably, ensured that British comics were essentially pushing old concepts and ideas onto their readers, decades after those ideas had already become tired and old fashioned. This meant, inevitably, that there were no new and relevant characters that spoke to the succeeding generations.
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