Kev F Sutherland Asks British Kids What Comics They Actually Read
Kev F Sutherland Asks British Kids What Comics They Actually Read
Kev F Sutherland has a keen ear to the ground on the stuff kids like. And he has shared his most recent discoveries straiught from the classroom.
Comic fans might be interested to know what I'm finding kids to be enthusing about these days. I've just been doing a few weeks of summer classes, which have a higher proportion of comics enthusiasts, in comparison to my usual classes in schools. So, here's what seems to be hot and not:
Bunny Vs Monkey – Hot. A kid today was wearing the t shirt, lots of kids know them from the books. Way more than ever talked about The Phoenix (though one kid today, in Larne, was telling about this comic he gets as well as The Beano. "It's called The Poe-nicks" he said).
Dog Man – Hot. Followed by Cat Kid. Captain Underpants is a distant third.
Manga various – Hot. All the kids recognise Naruto. And 11+ kids will regularly ask me to draw someone I'm only vaguely familiar with. Today is was Deku from (checks notes) My Hero Academia.
Beano – Luke Warm. If they know it, they're fans. In inner-city schools, 75% of kids have never heard of it. In these summer schools, most recognise Minnie The Minx, and a couple have brought issues and annuals – with my work in, would you believe – to be signed.
Marvel – Luke Warm. Two years ago they were all over it. Now, the primary school kids seem almost unfamiliar with Marvel (Endgame was 5 years ago, which is pre-history to them, so Iron Man and Captain America have been dead as long as they can remember), and the teenagers have moved on since the movies stopped being any good. Everyone had, however, seen Guardians Of The Galaxy 3.
DC – Luke Warm. They are as likely to name a DC character as a Marvel one, when asked, but with no great fan enthusiasm.
Star Wars – Luke Warm. There are some leftover Baby Yoda t shirts around, and occasional kids want to know how to draw Darth Vader.
Stranger Things & Wednesday Addams – Cold. They have very quickly become last year's thing. They'll revive as fast, I'm sure.
Doctor Who – Cold. It's a rare child, always a geek, who has any interest in this particular franchise.
2000AD – Heat death of the universe. No child has ever mentioned 2000AD.
Also consider The Phoenix, it's a British anthology comic aimed at 7-14 year olds, bridging the gap between kids comics and more grown-up ones - they have a 6 issues for £1 Introductory offer.
I was desperate to get my sons into The Phoenix and we subscribed for 2 years until they just piled up. One of them did like Mega Robo Bros and bought a couple of the collections.
All my attempts to indoctrinate my kids into comics have always crashed to earth in a flaming failure. YouTube seems to have them in its thrall.
I was desperate to get my sons into The Phoenix and we subscribed for 2 years until they just piled up. One of them did like Mega Robo Bros and bought a couple of the collections.
I salute your dedication but feel anthologies are probably not the way for modern kids.
All my attempts to indoctrinate my kids into comics have always crashed to earth in a flaming failure. YouTube seems to have them in its thrall.
Yeah, once screens enter the equation reading can be a fight unless they love it. My nephew has a PS5 and got a VR headset for Christmas - good luck dragging him away from all that! He spent Christmas Day largely hunched over behind his bedroom door so he could keep the headset charged he was playing on it so much (I had a go too mind you).
Handy if you are thinking about giving the gift of reading this Christmas - I find comics just go down better than books. As an example, in the most recent round of birthdays I bought:
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God-daughter (16) - the first new Marvel Star Wars and Darth Vader trades as she's getting back into Star Wars and I know she'll love Dr Aphra.
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Nephew (12) - Batman x Fortnite as Fortnite was one of the few ways we could hang out during lockdown and that has some exclusive skins.
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Niece (10) - Ride On by Faith Erin Hicks as she is at the loving ponies stage and this is supposed to be really good. FEH is consistently top-notch, so it was an easy buy.
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2000AD – Heat death of the universe. No child has ever mentioned 2000AD.
Ha. Not surprised. 2000AD grew up with its first generation of readers and isn't accessible to kids at all. I'd love to know the sales figues for the ever-increasing kid-friendly "regened" (?) issues and whether anyone except the usual adult readers buy it.
Manga surprises me in terms of its continued appeal to kids. My own kids find anything Japanese "cool" and places like HMV are stuffed full of products based on anime and manga (as well as those hideous plushies!). Brian Hibbs on CBR did an exhaustive look at book sales in US and it seemed to suggest that - unlike US superheroe stuff - anime drives the sales of manga.
Doctor Who – Cold. It's a rare child, always a geek, who has any interest in this particular franchise.
It's not really been on the tv for years and doesn't seem pitched at a modern kids audience. (As a Doctor Who fan from childhood in the 1970s and 1980s, I'm not really sure WHO the new Who is aimed at.) I also wonder if it's always been the odd geeky kid into the show. I recently read a book about ASD in children where an interest in Doctor Who was given as an indicator of being ASD.
Ha. Not surprised. 2000AD grew up with its first generation of readers and isn’t accessible to kids at all.
Yeah, my friend's son just read the first Judge Death story and all the stopping and starting, and recapitulation put him right off. You can understand that these stories pre-dated trade paperbacks and we're written as if each issue was someone's first (as it often was back then) but that doesn't make it easier to digest.
Manga surprises me in terms of its continued appeal to kids.
The decompressed storytelling seems to work better for them (although I have had no complaints from younger readers working through the Sandman collections, so...) and most modern American comic books, following The Authority, are decompressed too.
Brian Hibbs on CBR did an exhaustive look at book sales in US and it seemed to suggest that - unlike US superheroe stuff - anime drives the sales of manga.
It's an interesting one as there doesn't seem to be much of an upswing in comic book sales after popular superhero movies are released - I suspect it all looks so convoluted and impenetrable that it is difficult to know where to start. With manga, you just grab the first book and go from there.
I’d love to know the sales figues for the ever-increasing kid-friendly “regened” (?) issues and whether anyone except the usual adult readers buy it.
I've not seen it in a newsagents so must assume it's largely bought by adult 2000AD readers for their kids, although it'd be interesting to find out which member of the household reads it more. 🤔
As a Doctor Who fan from childhood in the 1970s and 1980s, I’m not really sure WHO the new Who is aimed at.
The good thing his casting is definitely aimed at a younger audience as he was fantastic in Sex Education (as all the cast were) and should draw in a younger demographic while I am sure still appealing to us old farts.
I also wonder if it’s always been the odd geeky kid into the show.
It ebbs and flows - it was massive when I was in school (Tom Baker/Peter Davidson) but died off as the series tailed off to it's end, so was just the geeky kids by then.
I recently read a book about ASD in children where an interest in Doctor Who was given as an indicator of being ASD.
I doubt it'd make the official criteria for diagnosis but...