Vertigo and the Death of a Thousand Cuts

Karen Berger stepped down as Executive Editor of Vertigo and Senior VP of DC on Monday, and it truly is the company’s loss.  Though “Star Wars” comics may have been my gateway into the medium, it was Vertigo’s output that not only helped keep me there but also provides the foundation for a lot of what I like to see in my comics.  If anyone has ever expressed an interest in reading comics to me, I’ll always recommend the likes of “Preacher,” “Transmetropolitan,” “Y:  The Last Man,” or “Fables” as great starting points; and, if it wasn’t for Karen, we wouldn’t have any of these.  Not only was she responsible for recruiting the likes of Alan Moore, Grant Morrison, Garth Ennis, Warren Ellis and more to work for DC, but it was the dark, strange and fascinating group of books she edited in the late 80’s and early 90’s that led to the formation of the imprint.  

“Sandman,” “Hellblazer,” “Doom Patrol,” “Shade, The Changing Man,” and “Animal Man,” were nicknamed the “Berger Books” due to their mature themes and sensibilities.  Forming an imprint for these titles through which the publisher could push mature content to an appropriate audience seemed like a natural idea after a certain point.  Though it wasn’t the only outlet for “mature content” at the time, coming under the auspices of one of the “Big Two” comics publishers gave Vertigo’s titles a visibility they wouldn’t normally have had.  As Brian Hibbs pointed out in his post, the fact that their titles were published on a regular basis not only helped develop a dedicated audience, but also allowed retailers to actually make a living selling the comics as well.

Though not everything the publisher released was memorable, the rule usually was that every few years they’d publish something that was a huge critical and commercial success.  This was last seen with the dual launch of “Fables” and “Y:  The Last Man” back in the early aughts.  Yes, we’ve had the successful launch of “American Vampire,” but that had Stephen King’s name attached to it.  There have also been two successful “Fables” spinoffs, but the lack of breakout original properties has been effectively nil.

Yes, titles like “DMZ” and “Scalped” managed to sustain themselves to the end, but they were both punching well below 10K an issue by the time they were done.  Bookstore sales helped, and are also likely to be a factor in what’s keeping “The Unwritten” going as we speak. However, none of these titles really achieved the, “Everyone is talking about this!” vibe that the elite Vertigo titles captured.

I’m sure that a lack of proper promotion was part of the problem, only because that can be said of just about ANY non-superhero comic series that isn’t “The Walking Dead.”  Rich Johnston, however, has also brought up another.  Several years back the contracts for creator-owned titles for the imprint were tightened up considerably to give DC, and by extension their parent company Warner Bros., more say in how they were exploited in other media.  After that, you hardly saw any of the old guard contribute anything new for the imprint.  Morrison was an exception, as I imagine he had the clout to get the terms he wanted because of his contributions to “Batman” and “Superman.”  These days, though, all of the creator-owned buzz comes from Image as they keep rolling out flashy new titles month after month.  They’ve also published Morrison’s latest creator-owned work, “Happy,” and that should tell you something about how attractive the imprint is to all creators these days.

I don’t see Vertigo going away entirely, but its future as a creative force is dim.  Its last two launches, “Dominique Laveau, Voodoo Child,” and Paul Cornell’s “Saucer Country” have crashed and burned horribly, and are headed for a quick death, respectively (more on the latter tomorrow).  DC is likely to keep the imprint going as an outlet for creators that it really likes and wants to keep happy, much in the way that Marvel’s Icon imprint keeps publishing comics from Bendis.  Scott Snyder has already announced that he’s doing a new sci-fi series with Sean Murphy through them after all.  However, if the adaptations of “Django Unchained” and “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” are as successful as the publisher expects them to be, then these kinds of things will become the new order of the day.

Wow, this started off as an appreciation and turned into an eulogy for something that isn’t quite dead yet.  So where does this leave Karen?  Hopefully with the freedom to set up shop by herself or with another publisher to show DC what they’ve lost.  Her contributions to the company over the past 25 years can be overestimated, but you’d have to try really, REALLY hard to do so.  At this point, though, I think she’s better off free of the company.  Part of the title of this article comes from how I heard Ennis describe the slow death of the imprint at Comic-Con a couple years back.  Accurate and glib as it may be, I can only imagine how hard it was on Karen to see it unfold in real time.  Whatever she does, here’s hoping for an equally awesome second act after this.