RIT Cooper Comics Collection
Comic Reprint and Availability Analysis
The following is an academic analysis of the reproduction and modern availability of legacy Comics from the Cooper Comics Collection at the Rochester Institue of Technology. The analysis places a particular focus on the forms in which these comics have been made available to modern audiences, as well as what is and is not available. This analysis hopes to show how modern tastes and market forces have shaped public perception of the history of comics, and may not serve as an accurate representation of the medium's legacy.
Download Raw DataProject Overview
Using a number of online resources including Grand Comics Database, Mike's Amazing World's Guide to Comic Book Reprints, Marvel and DC and Archie's online catalogs, as well as the catalogs of online retailers including Amazon and Comixology I assessed the availability of every comic featured in our corpus. My analysis focused on comics sold as part of collected editions as well as single issues that are available digitaly on online storefronts. The results of this analysis showed that only 23% of the series in the collection were availbale and only 16% of the specific issues in our collection were available.
What's Available
This is a full list of all of the issues in our corpus that are currently available for purchase new in some form.
| Series | Issue | Publisher |
|---|---|---|
| Battle Action | 22 | Atlas |
| Battle Front | 39 | Atlas |
| Black Knight, The | 5 | Atlas |
| Frontier Western | 2 | Atlas |
| Journey Into Mystery | 33 | Atlas |
| Cowboy Western | 59 | Charlton |
| Davy Crockett | 5 | Charlton |
| Fightin' Army | 17 | Charlton |
| Nature Boy | 3 | Charlton |
| Robin Hood & His Merry Men | 28 | Charlton |
| Space Adventures | 20 | Charlton |
| Strange Suspense Stories | 28 | Charlton |
| Unusual Tales | 3 | Charlton |
| Zaza the Mystic | 10 | Charlton |
| Brave and the Bold, The | 5 | DC |
| Falling in Love | 4 | DC |
| Strange Adventures | 67 | DC |
| Tales of the Unexpected | 2 | DC |
| World's Finest | 81 | DC |
| Donald Duck | 46 | Dell |
| Dotty, Dripple, and Taffy | 691 | Dell |
| Lone Ranger, The | 94 | Dell |
| Popeye | 36 | Dell |
| Prince Valiant | FC699 | Dell |
| Rex Allen | 20 | Dell |
| Uncle Scrooge | 13 | Dell |
| MAD | 27 | EC |
| Daredevil | 131 | Gleason |
| Casper the Friendly Ghost | 43 | Harvey |
| Dick Tracy | 98 | Harvey |
| Little Max | 40 | Harvey |
| Red Mask | 52 | Magazine Enterprises |
| Exploits of Daniel Boone | 3 | Quality |
The Breakdown
I've noticed several notable trends in the content that has been republished. Firstly, there is a noticeable discrepancy between the number of comics Dell published and the number available today. This trend is reflected in the volume of Children and Funny Animal comics that have not been republished. I surmise that this trend is likely due to the disproportionate amount of content in these genres that were based on licensed properties from Disney and other rights holders.
Additionally, to no one's surprise, there is also a measurable increase in the availability of Superhero comics, rising above Science Fiction and increase in popularity of the genre, as well as the ongoing legacy of many of the characters from this era.
Something that may be surprising, however, is that the availability of comics from defunct entities exceeds that of what's available from DC, Marvel, and Archie.
"Collected" Editions
Many of the works in our corpus that are availbale to day, have been made so through hard bound Collected Editions and Omnibuses. This factor however, is also the reason many of the specific issues we have are not. These Collected Editions, which are usually released by major publishers or bespoke publishers like Fantagraphics, are typicaly curated collections rather than comprehensive ones.
Many of these Collected Editions focus on single characters or themes such as this Silver Age Super Girl volume. The Super Girl Collection which reprints stories from several Silver Age Action Comics also helps account for issues #106 - #251 of Action Comics being missing from modern distribution platforms. While issues #1 - #105 are all available thanks to Golden Age Superman Collections, the next available issue is #252 as it is the first appearance of Super Girl. This speaks to a large, trend specifically among DC and Marvel, of only offering their back catalog as part of these collections or as single digital issues out of said collections. The result of this trend is that there is no legal way to purchase new copies of many of these missing issues, making them inaccessible to most audiences.
Public Domain
A significant number of publishers whose work is featured in the collection have long since gone out of business. As a result, much of their work featured in the collection has now entered the public domain. This matter has lead to a notable increase in the availability of materials from these publishers in the contemporary comics market. In addition to websites like Digital Comics Museum seeking to offer high-quality scans of most of these comics, platforms like Amazon's Kindle Store are offering their own scans of public domain comics from Harvey, Dell, and Charlton.
Digital Reprints
Of the comics that are available on digital comics platforms, two separate approaches have emerged for how to treat the materials. The first method, that can be seen below with Popeye, is more of a remastering than a complete recoloring. In this case, it is apparent that IDW has opted to modify a scan of the original comic rather than digitally reproduce it. Here, IDW has likely used digital tools such as Photoshop to clean up and regrade a scan of the original comic. While this technique produces a more pleasing result for a screen based reading experience, it does negatively affect the overall contrast and accuracy of the colors. A second approach can be seen with the issue of Worlds Finest. In this case, the approach DC appears to implement involves artists completely digitally re-inking and coloring the comics. DC's method suffers from the same color issues as IDW's Popeye but offers a cleaner and more detailed image for modern displays. DC's approach does, however, leave room for problems with the linework and scale of the comics not being one-to-one with their originals.
