Tokyopop Shakes Things Up

Comics’ news lately has been filled with stories about manga publisher Tokyopop. From the controversy surrounding their Pilot Manga contract to their recently announced restructuring, there has been a lot of things to talk about. Most of these recent tales of publishing woes have been covered fairly well by places like Comics Reporter or the Beat.

Selfishly, when I first read about the restructuring and the resultant reduction in Tokyopop releases by as much as 50%, my first thought was one of fear for the future of my favorite manga series, the under performing Beck Mongolian Chop Squad, rather than all the people that have lost their jobs. 39 people in total have lost their jobs in the restructuring including several editors and layout artists. This number of laid off employees does not include the number of freelancers that will no longer be picking up work due to the cut book releases.

It was not until this morning that I was struck with how this effects Tokyopop’s OEL program. Many North American comic creators, including two of my favorites Becky Cloonan and Brandon Graham, have books that were a part of that program; one where the works copyright is tied up with both the creator and Tokyopop. This copyright situation may make it difficult for series that are pulled from the publishing schedule to ever see release if Tokyopop no longer has any interest in printing them. Cartoonist Ross Campbell already has a zombie trilogy that is dead in the water due to a parting of ways between him and Tokyopop. Due to the nature of the original agreement between them, he cannot continue the story, the Abandoned, through another publisher. It may be that series like East Coast Rising or King City never have a printed conclusion if Tokyopop chooses not to release them. We’ll see as Tokyopop continues to roll out their books for the year which ones will see print and which will stay unreleased.

-Nick