NYT on Comics: Good or Bad?

Is it my imagination or are most of the New York Times articles on comics severely unsophisticated? I haven't paid close enough attention to know if it's one writer or a group of writers generating these things, but other than their magazine piece on the Drawn and Quarterly artists and Art Spiegelman, a lot of the Times' writing reads like perfunctory, rewritten press releases (the bulk from DC Comics) with a single phoned-quote spin.

Their longer pieces can be weird, too. Switch the word "e-commerce" for "catalog sales," and this week's puff piece on Midtown Comics could have been written in 1987. I like Midtown Comics, I've enjoyed shopping at Midtown Comics, but the Times' article reads more like a paid advertisement than an objective piece using Midtown as a window opening onto how comic shops work.

The article lacks a why. Its analysis is too unfocused to make Midtown a stand-in for all comic shops. And other than their relationship with the forthcoming New York Comic-Con, which I doubt was a prize of merit (I could be wrong), we learn nothing about Midtown that makes them a model shop of the kind that demands coverage because of their position within the industry. Hundreds of comic shops shared their recent economic journey, many with equal or greater aplomb. Several dozen have retail goals of equal scope and commitment. When this article's spotlight is used to speak of Midtown getting into e-commerce because of a "real shortage of good comic shops outside the New York City area," a statement unchallenged by the writer, this is a direct disservice to as many as 40-50 stores across North America at least as well-regarded as Midtown, many of which already practice some type of e-commerce.

What really kills me, though, is how much the whole piece operates out of a really musty model of thinking about the medium. If you read this article, you'll learn that comics is a medium of fantasy, that the art form stretches all the way from superheroes to zombies, that comics as objects are natural retail partners with toys and genre DVDs, and that the various comic-book movies have been a wonderful thing. It's a truth about comics, sure, but not the whole truth, and definitely not the best truth available. Not anymore. If this were an article in the Davenport Pennypincher, that would be one thing, but you'd think you'd see a smarter picture of this unique industry from the supposed newspaper of record.
 
posted 6:40 am PST | Permalink
 

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