Judge Dredd is a good example of what Marvel and DC should be doing. He's been going since 1977, and even though it's one long continous story, his universe has been allowed to change and evolve (with the effects being permanent), dead characters stay dead, and the characters age in real time.

When I was younger I used to think that the open ended nature of Big 2 comics was a hurdle to meaningful stories. "What's the point of X-Men if they can never actually achieve their goal?" "How effective is Batman, really, if the Joker is just going to escape and kill hundreds of more people?" The thing is, superhero comics were never designed to have an ending. They also didn't set out to tell a long form coherent story. They were just illustrated pulp stories to entertain. It was assumed most people would read a character for a couple of years and move on. The series would end, not when it was done, but when sales dropped enough to cancel it. It's a relatively moden desire for any "ongoing" series to finish a character's story. And they don't really need to. These days, it's comfort reading. I don't care that Batman should be 110 years old or should have killed The Joker in his 3rd appearance (or stayed dead in his first). What matters to me is that something I care about will probably outlive me. If I need a full story with closure? There's a lot of manga, or Image or any number of smaller publishers offering that experience. But modern superheroes? They're fighting a never-ending battle.

Books like Archie can be forever books. Archie is forever trapped in high school even as time passes. Nobody cares because it's intended as comfort food stories. The big two have a problem where they've allowed growth and then realized, oh shit, change can be permanent. Characters like Spider-Man *slowly* changed from 1962 to 2006, but he did change with life events and major deaths. Somewhere in the late 90s, we hit the "toys back in the box" mentality and it's been stagnant ever since. We currently have mixed feelings about the new Ultimate line, but I hope this round sticks with permanent change and growth, especially since the story is moving in real time.

The ending matters. The ending keeps you on the journey because you know it's going somewhere exciting.With One Piece the journey is so much fun that the ending doesn't really matter....but they fact that we KNOW we're getting one keeps us going just as much as everything else does. So yes the ending even in One Piece still matters.

I appreciated @drewtheunspoken3988 mentioning that comics began as "pulp" fiction that was episodic and not intended to be long-form storytelling. It has evolved since then and I don't see it going back, however. DC's failed "everything matters" attempt to return to some mutated bastard of episodic storytelling is clear evidence that it won't be happening any time soon, at least. I think that in order to overcome the "forever" problem, the Big 2 either need to organically retire the original heroes and promote legacy characters into their lead roles (because its the costume that gets licensed, not the person wearing it) or they need to reboot their super hero universes every 20 years so that each new generation gets an updated version of the hero without the continuity baggage. While I think the former creates better opportunities for telling new stories, I believe the latter would be easier and more financially appealing to our corporate overlords.

Ironically that superboy run is a whole closed story it had a begining middle and end

I think part of the problem is also that books that do have definitive endings (Hellboy, Invincible) aren’t getting the support they need which dissuades the big two from taking such risks.

Starman is about the only big two title that ended on its own terms and hasn't been messed with since

Only reason for forever characters is having different talent giving their own version of it, continuity may be considered but it’s optional in my opinion.

"American comic publishers milk their IPs dry." I mean... Yes, you figured out the game. That's what every entertainment company would do too if they can get away with it like comic publishers could.

With American Comics however, it just feels like they're spinning it's wheels but the car's not moving. They're on a hamster wheel. Going round and round. Yet going nowhere. Eventually it goes on so long you begin to wonder what the hell the point of all this even is. Why am I reading when I know that these characters will never be allowed to truly change or grow or even end? At least with One Piece the journey is more fun than worrying about the destination. But with American Comics the journey isn't even fun because a lot of it is just the same story over and over again. Which is made even worse by the constant retcons and inconsistent continuity that make it feel as though nothing matters.

I think it would be better if comics had clear story arc endings without dangling mysteries that weren't going to be resolved in the next arc. A good example was the Bishop storyline of the x traitor from the 90's. By the time it was resolved, the resolution was obviously shoe horned and obviously nothing like the original arc intended. This was always something I found frustrating about comics.

Both the original Astro Boy and Black Jack series by Osamu Tezuka are some of the few exceptions I can think of when it comes to manga that didn't have an "ending", Tezuka kept both series running for as long as he can running (with Astro Boy running from 1952 to 1968), while they did have serialized arcs, both manga didn't have a completely serialized narrative from beginning to end like most manga are nowadays. And that's not to say Tezuka himself didn't know do manga with serialized stories as his other classic works such as Dororu had a serialzied narrative.

FYI. One Piece is not even in the top 10 of the longest running manga...

Claremont X-Men was interesting because the long plot hints give an idea that things were progressing. You can say that have an ending with the death of Phoenix, with Fall of Mutants, when they enter the portal in the end of Australia run. What they still missing is enemies each time more strong.

It's mostly only Big 2 comics.

A friend of mine promptly dropped daredevil at the end of bendis' run. For him, it ended with murdoch in jail. For me that was a good book or few seasons, and I was up for Brubraker. They really need to have confidence in closing out arcs like it's a full story with some room to continue but feels like it has some closure

Maybe im missing the boat here but 1. 90s superboy series started iff fantastic 2. The clone sickness was a small part to a much larger story involving lex luthor and the upcoming battle for metropolis. 3. The prior issues superboy battled knockout, scavanger and Steel sword. The next issues he would battle parasite, worlds collide, king shark, team up with a new suicide squad. The 90s superboy series was full of action and drama. Whats this guys complaint again?

Superhero comics often resemble more of a mythological framework than a conventional narrative. Much like ancient myths, these comics offer us ample freedom to interpret heroes and villains through the prism of our contemporary society and personal viewpoints. Yet, there's an underlying consistency in all mythologies that some comics may inadvertently overlook or deliberately omit. This discrepancy can lead to friction when different generations recall their superhero tales differently. Manga, on the other hand, adopts a novelistic and cinematic approach, demanding a definitive event and conclusion, even if the scale is grand. Unlike superhero comics, manga doesn't quite echo the same mythological essence found in American superhero narratives. Nonetheless, both mediums have their unique advantages and drawbacks. I occasionally explore superhero comics for their fresh concepts, though my expectations are low these days. Heck I do spend a lot less than I used to. And as always, excellent video, Perch.

That superboy issue is a fricken great issue Kessel just says fk it in the middle of writing and writes a pilot for the superboy show and itv plays into the gimmic of superboy being a self absorbed fame obbsessed tv personality. Man the whole Kessel run is the best Superboy comic might be my second favourite super family based media Even the tie in to zero hour was great where both superboys meet and he gets mentored by young Kal el whos adult self was actively avoiding him but his younger self is way more mature about the existence of another superboy I recommend that comic

Superboy is such a bad example because the character has depth theres a complex complete story. Each issue builds on the last. Most of the big 2 90s comics had big 2-4 year long stories they would build to a satisfying climax.

Pretty sure if Batman, Superman, Wonser Woman, etc… ended when their creators wanted a lot of us wouldn’t have gotten to meet those characters or would have viewed them as period pieces. I guess technically some superhero comics have their own conclusions either in Elseworlds or in unofficial stories (like Silver Age Superman in Alan Moore’s Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow) but super hero fans aren’t really ready to let go.

There is one exception in manga. Golgo 13 author died and the title continued by his former assistants because of his desire it never ends.

I’ve been saying that comics should work on a 10 year cycle, start now by rebooting the entire line, you start from scratch. Then over the next 10 years you tell your story that spans the characters lifetime, by the end all the characters are old & die. Then at the end you reboot again and start the cycle again. This is why I love manga, stories like Berserk & Mushoku Tensei that have a clear progression of time are just so good. This is one of the main things why I took to manga so much, because comics have no end, it’s a forever story.

Best practice is run it on eras with a reboot event every now and then

Mexican soap operas have a beggening middle and end, like manga

I think forever stories is less the problem than stagnancy. The Simpsons and Guiding Light are both forever shows that ran for decades. The Simpsons never let the characters age, and as a result it became impossible to do anything interesting with the show after enough time. Guiding Light and other soap operas had the cast age and die, new characters added, and everything evolved naturally. Soap operas had plenty of problems, but stagnancy was never one of them. Under Stan Lee, the Marvel characters aged consistently. Under Chris Claremont, the X-Men were always changing. Had those styles been the norm, interesting stories could have continued for much longer in American mainstream comics. This would mean that solo superhero characters would have to be ended and therefore not be forever, because they'd eventually get too old. But the team books could still continue on indefinitely.

So personally I know this is probably controversial but I'm feeling like Marvel and DC should have 40ish year cycle universes. Once the universe has reached maturity its probably time to reset it back to basics. Also back when DC had the old earth 2 it told that Batman's story all the way to his death, I like that that Batman got an ending. Looking at Batman now even though I love the Bat family there really are too many, so I think a full reset to Batman, Alfred, and Robin (Dick) would be a good thing. Though I recognize most full reboots haven't gone too well I still think they could work if they actually planned it out well. On the Marvel side they've really stopped letting Peter's life advance at all for like 20 years, because they want him a certain way so why not actually just make the character a teen again in a new continuity and let the original get a happy ending.

Why don't they just do what DC once did? The original DC superheroes were from Earth-2 (I think). Superman got old, Batman married Catwoman, then died. Green Lantern retired. Their children/younger relatives went on to Infinity, Inc (Power Girl, Huntress, Jade & Obsidian). And Earth-1 (?) was created to update the heroes for the modern age (70s-80s?). Just create a new Earth every 20-30 years, with the same heroes updated for modern times, and the old Earth belongs to a parallel universe, which you can still publish comics for as needed. While I enjoyed Crisis of Infinite Earths, I didn't really see the need for it. I understood the differences between the heroes of different Earths.

I think Marvel should have ended and restarted the whole universe in 1986 like Shooter wanted to. Do that every 15-20 years. Give all the characters an ending and then start over. DC kind of did this but didn't fully commit. This whole "heroes showed up 5 years ago and all stories before all happened in that time" is getting ridiculous.

Mangas are very superior because all them supposed to have a definitve ending and show us a true message. Comics not. Comics are just business for the publishers and nothing more. Mangas are true artwork just like a novel book.

Interesting topic. Manga fandom is more resistant to the idea of changing the writer/artist. A popular manga is always synonymous with a single creator, and it's understood that they would rather the creator end the story than it be passed onto someone else... And if the torch is going to passed on, you know the new creator is in it for the long haul. Similar to euro comics. In american comics you have more of a disposable attitude toward writer/artists. They matter less than the character/property, so the idea of giving any one writer the ownership to 'end'' a series seems too huge compared to if the original writer does it. Just my thoughts on it.

Here is the thing: Some people LIKE the episodic nature of comics. It's like people that watch soap operas. The difference being in that case that you have living actors who age so the stories have to shift as it goes along. In comics, yes, perhaps Marvel has let their stories go on for too long and the sliding time scale is getting harder to justify. But, if you're a reader of a character, you might actually want to see their life and how it shifts. And to see how different writers handle the characters. If anything, one thing that may be hurting current American Big 2 comics is the fact that too many comics are TRYING to be short novellas where a story comes and goes in 5 issues. Some of us want to be surprised and enjoy a book month to month. We might not WANT a book to be a 4-5 issues run and it's over and they try to start the character again the next month with no continuation. The way Marvel in particular keeps doing this with a lot of their characters, a lot of us just kind of give up on them. Unless that story is REALLY good, I don't care to waste money and time on the same old thing. I mean, I was happy to see Daredevil and Moon Knight actually manage to get their numbers into the 30-issue range. It wasn't always a feeling of: This story ends in four months! I just looked forward month after month to seeing what would happen. In my case, I won't even look at Previews because I don't want my story spoiled three months in advance. Of course, Daredevil and Moon Knight both got "restarted" and drifted into more of the same format. There is nothing wrong with Manga. If you like Manga, read it. But if someone wants American comics to follow the same formulas as Manga, don't read American comics. Read Manga. I read a little of both. And there are tropes in Manga that I personally don't like. Like the trope where in the middle of a continuing story, the action stops and you'll get several volumes of flashbacks that ruin the momentum of the story. Some people probably like that. I don't. So, if I see that trend, I tend to stay away from it. I don't mind an issue that is a flashback story. But I don't want three volumes telling about Joe Bob when Joe Bob and Hero Guy were literally throwing down. I want to see the throw down. The other thing people tend to gloss over is the fact that not all Manga is awesome. 1) We tend to get the best of the best in America. They're not going to bother bringing the crappy or tropey stuff over here. Yeah, the Manga fans will scour the internet for the millionth Isekai story. But for the most part, as far as published stuff, it's usually the best selling stuff. Just like in other countries, they tend to get the best of the American comics. They're not going to bother with Devil Dinosaur in most places, but rather the top-rated Spider-Man and Batman stuff. Or course we're inundated with garbage comics in America, because that's where they're being published. Just like you'll find plenty of trash manga in Japan. It's easy to say how something is soooo much better in another country. Sure, until you live there. Familiarity breeds contempt.

I love manga. I want American comics to sell like manga. I don't want American comics to BE manga. The ongoing "soap opera" aspect is a selling point in my opinion. For me at least.

"Manga pacing" the person who wrote the e-mail should branch out on their manga. Not everything is a shonen battle manga.

Golgo 13 style ongoing manga do exist. 1968 until right now, yo.

I’ve often thought that American comics would be better off if they were like manga in that respect, that the creator of the characters owned them and were able to end the series when they wanted. A big pro there is that todays creators wouldn’t be trying to use someone else’s work to catapult their own careers. And we would get so much more original content. However then the downside to Spider-Man ending when Ditko left or X-Men ending with Kirby leaving is that there are so many stories that wouldn’t exist. We wouldn’t have gotten Miller’s Daredevil or McFarlane’s Spider-Man or Jim Lee’s X-Men. Who knows how characters like Wolverine would exist. And so the selfish part of me that loves the comics I grew up with. Is fine with Marvel and DC comics being corporate owned over creator owned.

Kneon from clownfish tv said we should have 10 year iterations of universes, what do you think of that?

All I can think of is James Tynion’s “ongoing” projects out there spinning their wheels: SIKTC, Department of Truth, Nice House on [body of water], W0rldtr33, etc.

Superhero comics should be written like they are going to have an end, because they will. No one stays in the sunshine forever. Popularity waxes and wanes and eventually the story will be stopped by something, most likely corporate cost cutting. I'm not saying they should actually WRITE that end, at least not for everyone, but they should be written as though they are progressing in that manner, and some things are going to be in the past and not part of the story anymore. And some characters, yeah, should get a complete story and they stop getting a title (maybe they still appear in group books depending on their ending).

5:13 I have a question for you, Perch. If all these ideas and pitches that were given to indies like for example Ultramega and Home Sick Pilots. They both are true to the Genre of Mecha and Kaijus. If those ips were Manga instead of a western Indie comics would they get more an audience? Even Mirka’s Sweet Paprika is a rom com. You think it get a more an audience it is was a manga instead of a western comic? Jesus have you actual seen Juni Ba’s art. He was inspired by Manga and anime. Plus you don’t even mentioned other manga publishers aside from Shonen jump. There other publishers in Japan. Kodansha. Kadokawa, Comic Bridge. You have been into Japan

Agreed, when a creator comes on I’m not fond of I simply drop the book. Unfortunately the big companies actively work against you by switching creative teams around so I just dropped all western books. Was thinking of picking up Ghost Machine books, but I’ll have to order them, as there are no stores near me.

If you like a creator you buy the book they are working on and then you stop when they leave is how I think a lot of American comic readers approach their consuming habits already. And the sabermetrics the company gathers from these spending habits sets the bar for who is a top drawing creator and who is not. Unfortunately I don’t think these companies are necessarily following this formula anymore. When you study the trajectory of creators there is not a lot of logic to their career path if it’s going to be based on sales and success. It makes a little more sense if you take into account who is an affordable creator, who is cheap. Sales success doesn’t seem to be in their top 5 metrics for recruiting and pushing talent.

I respectfully disagree. I think the comfort food of forever comics, and building your own contunuity, is fantastic. The fact that I've been reading Batman off and on for over 35 years is just cool! I dont agree with a lot of the way American comics are being handled currently, but i know that that will change... so i hope comic books stay this way.

I will say, headcanon is the west's greatest story-telling strength. Pick and choose your way to the best possible story. Hell, write your own! Supes is about to be public property anyways.

Conner made a deal with WGBS, so that cartoon was getting made

And No ending is the ultimate flaw in superhero comics. They can’t change grow or mature. It was hammered home with the spider marriage. These are ip and the company wants to have the ip For the next generation. Although they could tell stories from anytime within a super heroes life.

Dragon Ball is somewhat becoming a forever comic, that will continue on even after the artist’s death. It’s an important IP for Shueisha, but even more so for Bandai Namco (DB has probably made more money through games than any other Shueisha IP). Another forever content in manga is Doraemon. The artist died almost 30 years ago, but the anime and movie has continued on. Detective Conan is on that trajectory as well. If the author dies, but the content is indispensable to the publisher and other stakes holders, it’ll probably keep on going (just like Batman or Spider-man).

This is why I like legacy heroes, or at least the concept. If comics are going to go on forever it should at least have a way to refresh things built into the story.

I'll just repeat what I said over at Comics League: "The answer to constant comic reboots is to actually END eras. This is something Shounen battle manga and Super Sentai do very well. Let generations end and let a new wave of heroes take over. But you don't do it the way DC & Marvel are currently doing it. You have to do it like it's a shounen. Similar to My Hero Academia or Naruto. Introduce us to the new rookies and have them actually BE rookies that need to work their way to greatness. That journey is part of the fun. You don't just shove new characters in our faces and tell us to love them. Nor can you convince us that they're great just because you said so. You need to build them up first. Let them start at the bottom and actually work their way up. You cannot force diversity otherwise it just pisses everyone off. Even the people who want it. You have to let it build naturally and seamlessly. So that when you do give them some sort of high position or high level of respect it's well earned. DC & Marvel constantly fail at this. And it's frustrating to watch when there are already popular examples of this being done well."

Your regular reminder that The Incredible Hulk ended in 1997 at #467.

Mark Waid left Shazam!. I dropped the book. I only follow writers now.

Everything after Claremont is fanfiction.

COMPLETELY disagree with your last statement! The fact that so many American comics DONT END is probably one of the WORST things in USA comics in my opinion. It is very much a negative aspect of the medium in the USA. No other major storytelling medium feels the need to do this. Books, Movies, Television, Plays, etc generally speaking DO NOT do this. Just telling one straightforward story with a satisfying conclusion will always be superior in my opinion. You won’t find 10 different versions of Lord of The Rings. Yet it’s still one of the best selling books and films of all time. It ended satisfactorily. If comics worked like the movies and just rebooted their series with a new creative team every several years then I think it might work better. But they don’t and instead this creates a confusing, convoluted narrative structure that actively repels new readers. You know how many times someone has asked me “how to start reading One Piece or Naruto? Never. But for Batman, Superman, and Winder Woman it’s happened numerous times. Three big issues with comics never ending: 1. The stories often become unwieldy because there’s no clear vision. Shared universe, tie-ins, events, and multiple writers just end up making things more complicated. 2. The fact that there’s no singular voice means the creators can easily be deprioritized. This has been shown throughout the history of western comics. When you see Horikoshi (MHA) get half a million likes on twitter from a simple sketch… Meanwhile USA comic creators would commit war crimes just to hit 100 twitter likes. Manga creators are FAR more well known and prioritized than western creators in general. 3. The medium itself suffers as an art form. This is subjective. But the quality of the overall product as a piece of art and literature fluctuates wildly because it is diluted by dozens or even hundreds of mediocre works that are directly tied to it. For a manga, the quality of the product is set and stable whether it’s good or bad overall. There’s great things about western comics that don’t exist in eastern comics too. But never ending stories about characters made by past creators who have been shit on in the past is not one of them. In my opinion.

DC got rid of Vertigo and just went DC BLACK: just edgy versions of current I.P. Marvel doesn’t even try at alllll. At least kill off someone like Reed or whatever (something …). Or have someone leave and stay dead like Barry Allen … it’s just protecting I.P. What’s the point?? We could have had Jesse Quick as the flash in FLASHPOINT or a POW black woman take the green lantern etc …

One issue Perch is not mentioing: western fans often don't want things to end and will resent a story with a fixed ending. Look at how Harry Potter left so many dissatisfied with its conclusion. So now, they are opening up the door slightly to even more sequels. Look at Game of Thrones, Indiana Jones, the original Star Trek, etc. Did anyone really like seeing James Bond die in that last movie? If you want a fixed ending, then that should have been built into the story in the first place so the ending looks organic. Not "we've run out of money. Let's just have the dragons kill everybody."

1:51 Are you kidding me, Perch? Detective Conan? Hajime no Ippo? They are still going it felt like forever. 2:55 Midoriya’s character development. I appreciate that Jack Knight is one of the Few Heroes that has an ending. And Geoff Johns respect Jack Knight to keep his ending. 6:02 I hate Batman. He is overrated and he needs less titles. Why in god’s name We need a Batman Barbarian? You rather say in your tone deaf voice: oh uh Batman sell comics. I rather have Hawkman Barbarian than seeing Batman. Hawkman was screwed by Batman. 6:15 Just because One Piece ends doesn’t mean it will be over. Like One Piece will be the same as Dragon Ball. Since Dragon Ball ends in manga it still lives on in Games, anime and movies. Yugioh is a manga from Shonen Jump. It has a trilogy and after the ending pharaoh, Atem lose and he goes he goes back home Yugioh still lives on as popular franchise with sequels and spinoffs. Even Scott Pilgrim lives in movie, video game and the controversial anime and Bryan Lee O’Malley own the rights. What about TMNT franchise? It start out as a indie comic. That original mirage comic ended but TMNT lives on in other comics, tv shows, games and movies. 9:48 You are Confusing that with Rick Remender’s *Tokyo Ghost,* Perch. Sean Gordan Murphy would’ve been disappointed in you, Perch. Also it would be too late for Black Science to get an adaptation with *Hollywood overusing Multiverse stories* 10:00 In Deadly Class issue 54. Rick Remender express how feel about Deadly Class offer by Syfy into Marcus. Disappointed at but he still appreciate that his work come to life. 10:11 Joke on you, Perch. Rick Remender’s Grommets issue 1 sold a lot of copies and got 2nd printing. 13:17 you continue to frustrate me, Perchington. And I do not buy Mark Waid comics. 13:41 Really? DC and Marvel gave these Writers too much power. Tom King has too much power. Stephanie Philips has too much power. Alyssa Wong has too much power.

American comics at their best (which is not in the last 15 years) own and dump on manga. The emergence of manga is possible because Americans comics destroyed themselves first with a zero growth (leading to an aging and declining readership) distribution model and more recently bad quality. l

I like forever stories. Whenever a story ends like Demon Slayer I’m often left with a sad feeling and wanting to know what happens next. Unfortunately, usually what happens next sometimes is sad like the killing off of a beloved character. And maybe id have preferred that it ended at the happy ending. But there’s no reason that you would have to end stories if you’re creative enough. In fact I want to know that my favorite characters are still having adventures somewhere. I just wish they would stop breaking them or making what they’re not.

To be fair the Post Crisis continuity of DC has an ending