Japanese Manga and the ONE Thing American Comic Book Publishers CRAVE: A Female Readership

It's enough to make Superman jealous: those pointy-nosed characters with the saucer-shaped eyes and cute little animal sidekicks are doing something even Clark Kent can't get a handle on: pulling in female readers.

Welcome to diluted world of JapaneseManga. Love 'em or hate 'em, Manga is fast becoming the comicbook markets biggest success story. While publishing dynamo's Marvel and DC have continually had to re-invent themselves over the years in order to stay afloat and keep competitive with other forms of media like video games and movies, Japanese Manga has quietly enjoyed selling issue after issue of non-descript titles that typically crack one million-issues-sold a month. American comics haven't seen regular numbers like that since comic's golden age in the 1940's.

And now, Japanese Manga is preparing for its greatest feat of super-heroics: making a dent in the American publishing market. And it can thank a 60% femalebuying demographic that dominates the genre's sales. That type of female readership hasn't existed in the US since romance comics were a huge hit in the 1950's.

So what is Manga? Manga is the comic book's richly illustrated Japanese cousin - exploding with adolescent strife and romance, often written with a dose of the supernatural that has enjoyed growth in each of the last three years.

While Marvel Comics continues to concentrate on its heavy hitters like the X-Men and Fantastic Four and their successful translation to film, the Japanese-style graphic novel called Manga is rapidly gaining popularity with U.S. girls and teens. Marvel and DC have tried to market comics to female readers with little success. Even with a variety of female characters like She-Hulk and Shanna-the-She Devil, these characters are little more than silicone injected, underdressed pin-ups that appeal to young boys.