My father is a librarian at a county jail. This morning he sent me this text...

My father is a librarian at a county jail. This morning he sent me this text. I'm out of the loop for cape comics so I didn't have a good answer for him.

Why do people in jail like DC?

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His response when I asked if there were particular heroes people asked for.

Told him I'd ask around.

ADDITIONALLY if you have suggestions for great TPBs that you think inmates would like, I'll let him know so he can buy them for them.

People want to aspire to be a badass like Batman. Not a sad pathetic alcholic like Iron Man

because they think the Suicide Squad is real and want to do research on how to join them

Probably because it's more escapism and less realist than marvel, no shade.

Same reason everybody else does, marvel is complete crap.

They relate to Gotham villains.

Why not ask the inmates.

This is a board for basement dwellers who cant form a proper opinion without an image macro and 9-to-5 normie zombies who occasionally watch capeflicks to relax and reminisce about their childhood watching "that superhero cartoon"

Because Arkham Asylum is a revolving door, just like American prisons.

Superman Earth One
What's so funny about truth, justice and the American way ?
Batman Earth One
Batman Court of Owls
Batman Night of Owls
Azzarrllo's joker
Azzarello's Wonder Woman
Justice League: Origin

Seems like a good starting list for jail inmates

Probably because they're more optimistic and "classic" like the older comics/shows although that's clearly just a generalization. Could also be because they think they're darker too because of the movies. A lot of possibilities

Because they want to find Jesus in Superman; and they love DC women because they're sexy and not annoying feminists.

Because Iron Man wasn't a household name yet when they were first jailed.

100 Bullets
Criminal
Manhunter
Suicide Squad

They're typically more inspiring and motivational. It helps if you're trying to set your life straight.

Joker's Asylum series.
A lot of stories about the perspectives of Gotham villains.

Unfortunately he doesn't get much time with them and can only really talk through glass or bars. He's also made a habit of not prying no matter how innocuous the question, since some inmates aren't fond of any questions.

Because DC is good

Get them Superman Up Up and Away

Shit list, ignore this OP

Proper list:

>All-Star Superman
>Fat JLA trades vol 1-7
>Ostrander Suicide Squad
>Batman Year One
>Jusice League International
>Robinson's Starman
>Gaiman's Sandman
>Moore's Swamp Thing

Tangentially related but have his slowly pick up Spirit Archives DC did from 2000 to 2009. There's 27 books an some are out of print

Not OP, but would those long runs be easier for a library to get than us normies? A lot of those are out of print to some degree.

People know and care about DC because of live action movies/shows and cartoons.

Mainly cartoons, nobody reads comics.

So when a bunch of guys that never read concise have to pick anything, they go with what is familiar.

I don't know but maybe the do have the budget to fish some $200 set of HCs from ebay

Because in general, DC has been writing better comics for the past couple of years.

For a new reader, DC has fun stories, Marvel has SJW pamphlets

For a long time fan, DC and Marvel shat the bed about a decade ago, but after some time and many hiccups DC is finally putting itself back together, while Marvel has hit rock bottom and then started digging. Probably in the hope of finding oil.

Batman 1966 and any feel good hero comics. These prisoners are the guys who like their inspirational heroes that never give up on people, no matter what.

Because DC has better street level villains. By far.

This is not really relevant. They aren't asking for new releases, they are asking for trades.

DC has generally supported the trade market much, much better than Marvel for decades. Even Image sells more trades in bookstores than Marvel. It's just imprinted in the general mindset of the populace that you have to go into nerd shops for Marvel comics but you can get the others anywhere that sells books so they don't bother to think about buying Marvel.

holy kek

My dad gets leftover books from the main library system and he gets to spend about $2000 bucks every four months, iirc

Bullshit. They probably love the Punisher and BatmanPunisher takes.

The simple reason is that since they are in fucking prison they never got the memo that IronMan,.groot and thor are supposed to be popular now. They probably associate Marvel with Spider-man, f4 and Hulk. And I dont see them reading Spider-man or f4

That'd be enough

I imagine if you're inside the most iconic stuff is the easiest to come to mind when asked what you'd like to read without access to the latest buzz on what's happening in comics.
DC has its staple heroes and villains so that's that.

Probably because the shit that Marvel shoves out nowadays is fucking garbage while DC has been putting out good stuff in recent years, especially with their Rebirth series. I mean what kind of jailbird wants to be seen reading Gwenpool? That's just asking for anal rape in the showers

Y-you don't have to be so mean about it.

KEK KEK

Well if that's the case what you need to do is send them some inspiring shit. Shit that will change their lives for the better not just put money in a publisher's pocket.

Of course it's entirely possible a good read or art could inspire someone to pursue writing or drawing, so don't cross those off the list.

my question Is, why would serious criminals like muderers or rapists lime superheroes of they are more likely to be beaten to bear death or killed by them

The Long Halloween

>gaiman's sandman
Something about jail inmates reading The Sandman makes me laugh.

Why do you assume only the serious criminals are using the library? There's probably some people who committed minor fraud or accidental manslaughter or something in there too.

And JLI doesn't?

DC is just better in general.

what condition do the books end up in

do they last a long time or do they end up eg coverless (which might imply a preference for using their covers as part of something the inmates do in their cells)

or do pages go missing, specifically the cheesecake pages

what specific comics are they reading the hell out of, are they by any chance the ones with WW, Black Canary and Starfire

aside from the usual concepts of prison populations (generally low educational attainment but reasonable to low intelligence as a cohort, lower than average literacy rates, etc) there's two other things likely to come into play: familiarity (as a population, they've become familiar with DC as a brand and shun others as a matter of pride) and, as an adjunct to familiarity, utility (of the words and concepts, not of the physical media), that is, whether it's simple to read and understand (or perceived as such), whether it's speaking directly to the kind of guy who gets incarcerated in that type of facility - which depends on the class of prisoner; if they're in for violent crimes but saw themselves as morally correct in their actions, for example, they might readily identify with Batman (or most superheroes, but especially with the unpowered human who just wants to avenge his childhood's wrongs)

whereas if they're in for violent motiveless crimes for which they've shown no remorse, they might be reading the same titles for the Joker

if like to help your father but he needs to collect more data on what the content they're actually reading is; it's kind of fascinating, i'm sure there's someone waiting to do a study on that kind of data

Escapism most likely.
I wonder if any of them like Mister Miracle.

Currently DC comics are way better than Marvel. For a long while Marvel seem obsessed with pushing out as many classic characters as they could and replacing them with people no one cares about with shitty writers. I think Disney just lets them do whatever crap they want and bleed money since they're more R&D for the movies than an actual money maker at this point.
>Captain America is a hydra agent
>Thor isn't worthy
>Iron Man is in a coma
>Hulk, Xavier, and Cyclops are dead
>Spider-Man is a rich playboy
Seems that someone finally got wise that people hate it though, because it seems they're going to take steps to fix it later this year. They already overhauled the X-men. They went from living in another dimension because there was a cloud floating around poisonous to Mutant to mostly back to normal, aside from Xavier and Cyclops still being dead.

People in jail likely aren't going to know current changes like that though.

Black people like DC better.

Get your father to bring them Dragon Ball and One Piece and they'll love him forever.

It's been going on long enough that even if they have to trade wait they know.

But what if Batman rapes the Joker? It would be a bridge to both audiences. They could learn from each other. Frankly the immates could dream with complete rehab if they read about a more down to Earth hero.

Aren't you tired of shitting up every second thread with your drama

He's grateful for the input. I've just been screenwriting posts to him.

My father's library is limited to jail inmates. He manages what amounts to a large closet of books and wheels various selections of them by cart to pods where inmates are housed, or individuals can make specific requests.

Yes, Im sure people in prison read the latest internet articles, Sup Forums complains and twitter rants.

If you actually think exclusively morally upright people indulge superhero fiction you've got another think coming.

Or they used to read Marvel but stopped a year or two ago because it got so bad.

Marvel in general has been rough for about 15 years but the stuff in has been less than 5 years. Current bullshit likely hasn't filtered down to them AND it wouldn't prevent them from requesting Marvel trades from the 90s or whatever.

There's no drama here though, people are just trying to figure out why inmates want to read DC comics by looking at recent history in the comics industry

>even inmates know marlel is shit

it got me thinking since I saw a documentary about underage criminals who were rapists and molesters. one really loved star wars
maybe they like sandman

Get them Morrison's Animal Man

I love Marvel, I wish it was better. I was just as critical of DC during New52 and DCYou. Ressurxion was a good first step and I'm cautiously optimistic for Legacy.

He often gets large hardcover books returned in poor condition because inmates use them as exercise weights, weapons, or tear off the covers to make taserproof vests.

Inmates are decent to paperback books, but still rougher than civilians. My father has investigated cheesecake pages and found they're usually left in.

He's very interested in data on this too and is learning what he can. He has found that inmates like "how to draw" books and books about writing fiction, nonfiction, and even poetry a lot so I think many people do seek artistic stimulation.

Why would he think that? Sup Forums is proof enough that only shitty human beings that are constantly angry at life like comics.

>inmates use them as exercise weights, weapons, or tear off the covers to make taserproof vests.
Jesus, these niggas on that Batman shit.

>county jail
So like 4/5 of the people there are for drug charges, half of which are marijuana. These are not the violent offenders, probably barely criminals, it's kids on time out for a few months cause they got caught getting high. Of course they're asking for comics

>He has found that inmates like "how to draw" books and books about writing fiction, nonfiction, and even poetry a lot so I think many people do seek artistic stimulation.

Understanding Comics would be good for this, assuming it's not already there

>He has found that inmates like "how to draw" books and books about writing fiction, nonfiction, and even poetry a lot so I think many people do seek artistic stimulation.

See, I knew some of them might be looking for an out from their situation. Something that encourages developing themselves and expression.

dc comics are lighter and inspire hope.
marvel's work depresses the hell out of you.
dc: FFFUCK YEAH SUPERMAN GOING FUCKING KICK ASS AND TAKE NAMES
marvel: captain america murdered 50 people under mind control WTF MARVEL!


in jail you don't wanna fucking make yourself more depressed than you normally are. this has been a marvel fanboy's opinion.

>underage criminals who were rapists and molesters. one really loved star wars

Someone took "use the force" literally.

This actually sounds like it'd be an interesting analytics project. Do you think your dad could maybe pass out surveys to the inmates? Possible questions could include things like desired series to read, Marvel vs DC, favorite hero/group, when they entered the jail, length of sentence, etc. If there's enough prisoners in there able to answer we could make some statistical models with the right questions. Plus your dad could do predictive analytics on what books to order for inmates based on crime patterns.

My guess without any data though is that it could possibly be that some of the guys were interested in the movies before they got sentenced. Since they cannot get out to movie theaters to keep up, people who otherwise would be movie-only viewers get into the comics and get hooked. Though the only question would be why they aren't also asking for Marvel series loved by the mainstream like GOTG...

Do you know if the prisoners get TV time? Maybe they can keep up with the Marvel series on Disney XD and don't need the comics, but they need them for DC series?

After you see slave Leia you're basically a ticking time bomb.

Why the fuck would they like what's so funny, it's preachy as fuck and not even good

Pic related is the small space he gets for books. It looks worse than it is. He sent this a while ago.

Weed is legal in our state, so there are substantially fewer drug charges for that, thankfully. Most of the people are in for minor stuff but there are many Ex cons who are back for other charges too.

It's not as dangerous as a prison, that's for sure.

>Marvel vs DC
For fuck sake, we don't get enough of that in here?
Also OP already said the inmates don't seem to like being interrogated or made to feel like they're being surveyed.

That whole list is trash besides maybe WW.

Johns WallyFlash collections

Yeah I get that they aren't fond of questions, but I feel like if you peddle it as a book survey where you tell them you are trying to get the right books on hand for everyone they'll probably be more receptive. Plus it's not his dad directly questioning them, it's just a piece of paper.

Plus I feel like the Marvel vs DC thing would be interesting because like OP said, the inmates are asking specifically for DC. We should try to find correlates if possible.

Of course real men will prefer comics by real men!

Because most Marvel events boil down to wanting to arrest or execute a hero/group of heroes

Who wants to read that shit? The numbers speak for themselves

>dat pic
Thank you, sir!

>tear off the covers to make taserproof vests
This info might be useful someday..

I think I saw that documentary. Wasn't that the one where some faggot was so detached from reality they had to constantly keep him in isolation because the rest of the kids were going to fuck him up?

Specifically these are labeled "The Flash by Geoff Johns" and I think there's like 3 or 4 collections out without another couple coming up to finish it off. The Morrison/Millar one is good too. Waid as well but I don't know if they'll do the whole run there.

>Johns is from that wasteland Detroit
>Morrison is from fucking Glasgow
>JRJR survived 1970s NY
>Didio used to be a debt collector
>Lee surely knows martial arts
>Snyder was a security guard
Welp.

DC is better than Marvel in most people's eyes.

The characters are more recognizeable and the villains arent as silly. It takes itself seriously, I assume prisoners like that.

Which one of DC's writers used to be a CIA agent? He wrote the one about Dick being a secret agent.

They trust Batman to let them live and Punisher strikes fear into their criminal hearts

Tom King

>Which one of DC's writers used to be a CIA agent?
Tom King.
>He wrote the one about Dick being a secret agent.
The Grayson book? That was Tim Seeley.

King and Seeley were both on Grayson

>[Muffled Hotline Miami Music playing in the distance]

Didn't know. Thanks.

Does your dad have access to prison logs? He could look at information on the inmates and cross reference it with who's renting out what.

Batman gives people hope.
You have to believe that no matter how awful a criminal someone is, they'll escape in a week.
It's uplifting.

There are a lot of reasons but the big one is probably that they don't want to pick up Hulk, Thor, Captain America or Iron Man and get She-Hulk, Amadeus Cho, Jane Foster, Captain Falcon, Nazi Cap, Riri Williams or Dr. Doom instead. When you go to DC, you buy a Superman or Batman comic, you get a Superman or Batman comic.

Larry Hama could kill all of them

...

>using guns
The coward.

>The characters are more recognizable and the villains aren't as silly. It takes itself seriously, I assume prisoners like that.
Only true during Nu52 (and Identity Crisis which stood out like a sore thumb because of it)
DC by and large was damn good at not getting swept up in Marvel-esque seriousness bullshit

He doesn't ask questions and most inmates aren't chatty with him, so he just looks at trends of what is and is not popular. He and my mother have both worked regular library jobs too, and they find that when it comes to most popular literature inmates like the same stuff as civilians.

I relayed the interest to him and he says he will try to keep better data.

He says he has several books similar to it and they are beloved.

Pic unrelattted, his dog

>ADDITIONALLY if you have suggestions for great TPBs that you think inmates would like, I'll let him know so he can buy them for them.
Fair dinkum, here you go, mate.

amazon.com/dp/140125831X/
amazon.com/dp/1401258336/
amazon.com/dp/1401260918/
amazon.com/dp/1401262619/
amazon.com/dp/1401265421/
amazon.com/dp/1401269044/
amazon.com/dp/1401274579/

You don't understand what he means by silly