>This article should feature a bunch of blank photos representing the comics that don't exist. Those are the problem. It's ok to have super sexed-up comics in the store, but it's really sad that's all they have.
It's a vicious cycle. Comic book stores sell products that appeal to adolescent men, because their customers are adolescent men, because comic book stores sell products that appeal to adolescent men.
You can easily find English-language translations of the kind of Manga you describe, or of Franco-Belgian comics, but most American comic book stores won't make any effort to stock them, because they don't expect to sell them.
Here in Europe the comics market is more diverse, but that's as much an accident of history as anything else. For "normal" comic shops to exist, you need both a tradition of "normal" comics and a market for them, neither of which really exists in the US. You had Stan Lee and Siegel & Shuster, we had Hergé, Franquin and Peyo, and from there we diverged.
Amazon and online retail are actually a huge sociological problem in this context. If you can just order manga you like, and form bonds w/ online communities of folks w/ similar tastes on tumblr or twitter or wherever, what's the incentive to go to a physical place in your town?
Gaming stores have reinvented themselves as places to play games with others, but it'd be an interesting challenge to reinvent comic shops in that same way.
In the New England area, I think Newbury Comics has done a good job of reinventing itself -- it wasn't ever (in my memory at least) just a comics store and made a lot of its money from music for a while, but if you go in there now it's got some movies, music, a comic section/room, but it's mostly other stuff -- merchandise from trendy games, shows, movies etc. Funny/quirky gifts, toys, jewelry, etc.
Maybe doesn't appeal to die hard comic book fans, but it's a fun experience for the casual shopper, which makes it viable. My 12 year old is always excited to stop in there.
It's a vicious cycle. Comic book stores sell products that appeal to adolescent men, because their customers are adolescent men, because comic book stores sell products that appeal to adolescent men.
You can easily find English-language translations of the kind of Manga you describe, or of Franco-Belgian comics, but most American comic book stores won't make any effort to stock them, because they don't expect to sell them.
Here in Europe the comics market is more diverse, but that's as much an accident of history as anything else. For "normal" comic shops to exist, you need both a tradition of "normal" comics and a market for them, neither of which really exists in the US. You had Stan Lee and Siegel & Shuster, we had Hergé, Franquin and Peyo, and from there we diverged.