Viz’s Searleman talks original submissions

October 10, 2009 in Comics Conundrum, Manga Minutiae, Potpourri | 7 comments

Anime Vice and Manga.About.Com have both scored interviews with Viz’s Senior Editor Eric Searleman, after the company announced it was taking open submissions.  Searleman reveals the rather minimal submission requirements – more like pitches, actually – and that the company is not looking for any style of story or art in particular.  And, perhaps, that he is a fan of Darwyn Cooke.

Man, if they had a lot of submissions before…

In Japan, many, if not most mangaka are discovered through competitions and regular submission requests in magazines.  (This is one reason why the anthology magazine has stuck around, despite how low sales have plummeted… how many manga publishers can you name that did not launch with a magazine?)  Such contests only deal with finished submissions, and that has the benefit of weeding out procrastinators, narcissistic dreamers, uncommitted dabblers, and the flat out talentless.  They don’t listen to mere pitches, because ideas are a dime a dozen… it’s the ability to execute that counts.  Even those portfolio reviews at doujinshi conventions you may have heard about, generally end with the editor encouraging prospective artists to complete a submission for the magazine contest.  Only after the artist has shown his true abilities, do the editors begin to work with him.

Now that Viz is openly courting original works, I do hope they incorporate a similar system into Shonen Jump.  Naturally, submissions for Jump would be somewhat limited in theme, but this would be such an unprecedented opportunity for American artists, hitherto available only to those with the chutzpah to relocate to Japan.  But the ramifications go far beyond that… this could ultimately change the relationship we have with manga, from a passive fandom to a community with a real stake in the creative process.  For all the young Shonen Jump readers, the stars of the fandom would no longer be the rippers, or scanlators, or bloggers, or the publisher PR point man, but the creator.  The artist, the writer… this is where the spotlight always should have been.  And kids can now aspire to be them, aspire to be professionals, because now they know it is possible.  The proof would be right in front of them.  This could elevate our level of engagement with manga, so that it would no longer be this foreign thing.  We would become a part of it, and manga, a part of us.

That said, I’m of the opinion that such an unfocused, open-ended submission call isn’t the optimal way to start, but it’ understandable why they would choose this route.  Viz isn’t just looking for artists who are hoping to begin their careers with them… they want industry veterans too.  Viz is competing for the same people who work for or publish through Marvel, DC, Image, Dark Horse, Top Shelf, Fantagraphics, you name it… they want to cast as wide a net as they could.  (And veterans would probably be quite turned off by any notion of a competition.)  And that’s perfectly fine.  Original publishing is tough, risky, and it’s still so early in the life of the initiative that even Viz isn’t quite sure what identity they want to have.  But I do hope they have the sense not to completely segregate their original publishing efforts from their licensed manga, for the reasons I gave above.  A creatively driven fandom like the doujin scene in Japan would be a wonderful thing, and forever cement manga’s place in our pop culture.

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Deb Aoki also has a summary of the new books Viz announced at NYAF, and a short Q&A with Marketing Director Candice Uyloan.

Side note… I actually inquired about one of Natsume Ono’s yaoi titles with the Japanese publisher, and the response was basically “will not license to you, no matter what the price.”  That was the beginning and end of our super secret yaoi imprint, heheh.

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Spotted on BoingBoing… with a proper character endorsement deal in Japan, this guy could become a bajillionaire.

Coincidentally, just the other day a friend imparted to me the story of a mentally challenged employee at a certain pizza restaurant who was caught sharing an amorous (and highly unsanitary) moment with the pizza dough.  So there’s definitely a market for gooey, blob-like companionship.

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Now that’s how you make a full disclosure.

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Squenix Producer Kouji Taguchi discusses that video game maker’s anime and manga publishing business, and makes some perceptive observations about the US manga industry, in particular the weaknesses in distribution at the retail end… there are fewer places for people to get manga, and manga itself is priced out of the impulse purchase range.  He also sees more opportunities for digital manga on semi-closed systems – handheld game consoles – than on the open web.

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Not manga-related, but the Escapist magazine has an article on Japanese video game characters of dubious sexuality, and how their genders or background stories were changed for US localization.  This too has happened in anime/manga, most notably in the US broadcast version of Sailor Moon…

7 comments

  1. gia on October 10, 2009 at 9:22 am

    I wonder about VIZ’s process too, but on the other hand…I feel like there might be a mindset in the US, that “contests” are for kids and reality TV, and that true “professionals” go through a submissions process. As such, if VIZ operated a Japanese style manga submission contest, particularly through Shonen Jump, they might not receive the caliber of work that they’d like. They’re open to submissions, so they’ll get people who are already pros; a contest might not.

    On the other hand, I think you’re right that their current process will naturally result, as it did the first time they opened their doors (and as mentioned in my own short interview), in the massive influx of all manner of pitch and sample, much of which must be sifted through to find anything of use.

    I’m not sure if it’s telling that VIZ has not so far announced an original title from their first batch of submissions.

    1. Simon on October 10, 2009 at 6:39 pm

      –>I feel like there might be a mindset in the US, that “contests” are for kids and reality TV

      Absolutely. Any established professional, American or Japanese, wouldn’t enter contests. So I understand why they are starting out this way (although if it’s established creators they want to work with, they ought to seek them out and convince them why their next project should be published through Viz, instead of asking for cold submissions. To established creators, it is Viz that is the unknown quantity, they’re the ones who have to make their case.)

      I just hope they do try something similar to the Japanese system with Jump somewhere down the line. (At the very least, there would be specifics… submission winners win X amount of money, and any published submission makes X amount of page rate.) It could also quickly change the entire fandom’s mentality, particularly on the issue of creator rights.

      In a way, I think the lack of specifics and any sense of direction is why this story hasn’t really picked up steam on the comics-related websites and forums. Or maybe people just don’t understand what a game changer this could potentially be.

  2. JRB on October 10, 2009 at 9:24 am

    “will not license to you, no matter what the price.”

    Wow. Did they say why? Coz you publish teh pr0nz, Icarus is too obscure a publisher, or because they just aren’t interested in an English release, or what?

    1. Simon on October 10, 2009 at 6:28 pm

      Heh, not literally, I’m just being dramatic. ;)

      But we did ask, and we were turned down without even discussing the advance. It could be any number of reasons… maybe the artist does not want her adult work to appear outside of Japan (many artists who have mainstream work and have “retired” from adult manga may feel that way). And even if she did, there are so many established American yaoi publishers to choose from (and frankly, *are* better choices than us.) That’s actually what prompted me to inquire about the rights in the first place… no one else has picked it up yet for some reason, and Ono is a name author/designer.

      So no, they didn’t say why, and we’re not going to ask why. All we need to know is that it’s the artist’s decision… knowledge of the underlying reasons wouldn’t change the outcome. Should there ever be a change of heart, they will not be shy in letting us know what terms would satisfy them.

  3. Masamonkey on October 10, 2009 at 7:52 pm

    Speaking of the quick doujin scene reference, wouldn’t most of the usual arguments against it in the US due to US copyright law not apply due to fair use protections for works of parody and satire? I’m not really seeing the inherent difference between doujin, even sold commercially, and Mad or Cracked magazines. As near as I can tell, Japanese copyright law offers much less protection for such works though enforcement may be more lax.

    1. Simon on October 10, 2009 at 9:53 pm

      IANAL…

      Unlike certain other “fan” activities, parody does exist in an actual gray area of copyright law, as competing judicial views heavily determine outcome. Some say a parody must make meaningful critique of the subject it parodies, others do not believe that is so. Parody protection is stronger for comedic or political works, traditionally not as strong for others. But in such matters, usually it is the copyright holder who must instigate action in civil court… it’s not a criminal matter. I’m not saying a doujinshika may not prevail in US court, but the cost of going to court in the first place is something best avoided.

      Doujinshika or fan artists can generally defer any potential problems by not using trademarked names, and not turning their hobby into a significant commercial enterprise. Honestly, I don’t think any current US manga publisher would think of going after someone who prints an originally-drawn fan comic, no matter the theme or print run.

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