Worthy comics.

Not long ago, I read a comment by Irene Roga (in Spanish, though) with a protest about, when people name their favourite comic, it's always one with serious undertones: Watchmen, Maus, From Hell, Paracuellos (1)...

"Paracuellos isn't only a serious work, even if quiet a lot of the content makes you feel like crying."

Correct, but I think my point is clear. For non-Spanish speakers, Irene Roga defended comedy as a worthy genre, in spite of the terrible attacks of those selfish and egocentric subhumans called hipsters. Indeed, it's fair to admit that it's a fight worthy of a Schillerian god, because the idea of comedy as a minor genre is pretty extended. In the Oscars, it's been years without a comedy winning the award for the best film because we live in a SERIOUS world. Humor is ussually appreciated in literature if it comes with a satyrical, even misanthropic, spirit. A funny, silly novel, without a heavy social criticism or even with some directed towards the serious gentlemen of literature, may go unnoticed.

Anyway, I'd say that, when it comes to comics, there isn't only a problem with humor, but there's also other with the publication format. See: traditionally, comic as a medium favours a exclusive time, where particular stories are more important than the global continuity.

The best example is The Simpsons: in this TV show, what counts is each episode and how it's resolved, but there isn't and will never be a very strong continuity. That's why none of the family members ages (2) and Springfield is in nowhere (I wouldn't find it strange if there is still a geek trying to resolve the enigma), it's just a "typical" American city. As a family, they need neither a start nor an end.

Mortadelo y Filemón, Zipi y Zape, (3), Urusei Yatsura (whose adorable main female character presides oveer this humble blog), Ranma 1/2, almost any superhero comic are other examples: virtually all of them feature the same "time loop" that forces the characters to be still the same age although the time flies for everything else. Superhero genre is distinguished by the retcon that updates a character's origin every few years. Furthermore, these stories are usually composed through a kind of accumulation: each chapter adds new anecdotes, that sometimes join the global continuity. That's why they're described with adjectives such as silly: they aren't as extense as a complete story because the characters are already known and can't be ubicated within a general continuity.

This medium has a problem: it's hard to reconciliate with the most appraised cultural standard, a story with a strong continuity, with both a very clear start and a very clear end. It could be said that modern literature was born with the publication of novels such as the Quixote, in whose second part the global continuity dominates over the funny parts.

Indeed, I think that's one of the reasons why genres such as fantasy and noir, among others, are less appreciated: lots of the works identified with those targets suffer the same problem, causing that knowing everything about Philip Marlowe implies reading various novels without relation among them.

But it would naive to consider only cultural prejudices, there is also an economic reason: How much does the entire collection of Mortadelo y Filemón cost? A lot, for sure. Even geeks find it troublesome to buy a particularly long series, like One Piece.

And that's likely another reason why a lot of people prefer saying that their favourite comic is a short work, bacause it's fequently assumed that the listener asks for advice. And it increases when it comes to editorial recommendations, because, as it's noticed with sacarsm, the objective of reading promotion plans isn't other but selling books.

If you know another reasons, don't doubt and just comment it below.

1 Paracuellos is a work by Carlos Giménez, about his experiences in a children home run by la Falange, during Francoist Spain.

2 Technically, it's obvious that Granpa Simpson and director Skinner do, just because both characters have been in two well known armed conflicts: Second World War and Vietnam War, respectively.
3 The former work is known by various names through various languages, such as Mort & Phil; the latter seems to have been translated as Zip & Zap, at the least according to Wikipedia.