For the past 25 years, comic books have formed the foundation for much of our most popular media. Not just characters from Marvel and DC, but also franchises like The Walking Dead. But those comics became popular because of the more mature storytelling direction the medium started going in, during the dawn of the local comic book store era. Without comic book stores creating a new audience, a lot of these current series wouldn’t exist today. Now, via Boing Boing, we’ve learned of a new documentary by filmmaker Wes Eastin called Shopping for Superman, about the rise, and current decline, of the American comic book shop. You can watch the trailer for Shopping for Superman below:
Here’s part of the official description for Shopping for Superman:
Shopping for Superman, guides viewers through a 50-year journey revealing the origin story of their friendly neighborhood comic shops and the people fighting to keep their doors open. Since it began, the retail comics industry has contracted by over 75% with more shops closing every month. After five years of diminished sales, a global pandemic, and the digitization of retail shopping dominating most markets, Shopping for Superman asks the question, “Can our local comic shops be saved?”
From the 1930s to the late 1960s, roughly the Golden Age to the Silver Age of comics, comics were mainly sold to young kids at newsstands and drugstore spinner racks. In the early ’70s, two things happened that changed that. First, the readership got older, and second, comics as collectibles emerged as a hobby. That’s when the comic book store sprang up. By the ’80s, the local comic book shop became the main way that readers bought their comics. Now, because of various factors, including digital comics, comic book shops are closing left and right. Hopefully, this new documentary can help shed light on why this important piece of Americana is something that needs preserving.
There is no release date yet for Shopping for Superman, but we expect to learn of one soon. But for more information, head on over to their official site.
Content shared from nerdist.com.