“Literally the last thing I did before I left Marvel was the first Marvel’s Voices. It was a huge fight,” Chris Robinson says of the anthology series focused on marginalized creators and characters. The publisher has since put out six follow-up anthologies celebrating first “diverse” intellectual property and, second, diverse creators. “While you guys are breaking your arms to pat yourself on the back, we are helping creators become their own self-made business, telling their story as they want to tell it with characters that they own.”
Robinson is the exclusive partnership manager for Tapas, a webcomic platform and publisher. He spent his time at Marvel on titles like Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Black Panther, the 2019 X-Men line relaunch, the Grand Design line of graphic novels and Moon Girl & Devil Dinosaur. His role at Tapas is a bit different.
“I spend a bunch of money,” he says as we discuss the changes in his career since the last time we talked in 2020. Now he acts more like an acquisitions editor, finding new talent for Tapas to invest in and highlight.
There are broadly three publishing categories on Tapas, a platform that claims more than 101,000 stories. The first is community comics — think about how anyone can upload to YouTube, and you have the jist of it. There are some work-for-hire comics that Tapas controls. And then there’s the bulk of Chris’ output, Tapas Originals. This works similar to traditional publishing where creatives are paid, own their IP and get support and marketing from a publisher.
The market for Tapas is unlike what you’ll find in the direct market, the industry name for the world DC and Marvel play in. The majority of their readers are women ages 18-24. Instead of action comics, there’s a high density of fantasy and romance comics. The readership is large and expanding, with more than 9 million monthly active users.
Robinson sees value in investing in creators who want to tell their own stories. The direct market has been dominated by straight white men since its inception. Per the company, 63% of Tapas’ top comics are made by women. Tapas isn’t holding writers to the same strict standards and practices guidelines seen at his previous employer.
“Everyone is telling the stories they want to tell,” he says. “There’s no ‘wink wink’ like they’re a little different.”
Their bread and butter is “everything that doesn’t work in the direct market,” and while that’s always going to be part of Tapas’ brand, it speaks to an untapped audience on its platform. Robinson was brought in specifically for his experience in the mainstream comics world. He’s looking to bring more of the “big, loud, popcorn movie” feel as the organization looks to target Wednesday warriors with four-quadrant appeal, or, as Robinson says, “all the buzzwords.”
He has about 25 titles in various stages of development, with about half of them currently released. Robinson is stretching the genres Tapas touches with Animal Heads, which he calls “Breaking Bad for Gen Z”; Safe As Houses, described as “The Walking Dead but hot”; and Iris Complex, a mystery series in the spirit of Junji Ito.
Robinson is a true believer in this new comics platform, citing the proliferation of digital-exclusive content on apps like DC Universe Infinite and Marvel Unlimited. The lack of printing costs and the ease of readership lead to huge advantages for creators. And his impact at Tapas is just starting to be felt.
“I’m trying to raise things that [mainstream comics readers] would like,” Robinson says. “I’m diversifying the pool.”
Zachary Jenkins co-hosts the podcast Battle of the Atom and is the former editor-in-chief of ComicsXF. Shocking everyone, he has a full and vibrant life outside all this.
