@auem:
manga has been really making inroad to non-japanese readers since DBZ exploded and 'anime' started to rub shoulder with 'cartoon'…..less than 20 years...then online scanlation....started around the end of 20th century...then came online readers...around 2004-05...readership increased exponentially.....
characters like spider-man,superman have had been in the scene for long enough and still attract way way more worldwide attention ....but i think 30-40 years from now manga will have bigger audience than these western heroes and those first print-first volume of classic mangas will have great attraction,particularly outside of Japan.....
It's going to stay a niche entertainment.And sadly, Anime had an incredibly larger audience (casual, not hardcore fans) outside Japan 30-20 years ago.I take France (second market I believe) as a prime example : In the late 80's and early 90's, you could watch Anime all day long.You just had to switch between channels (public!!) and enjoy (club Dorothée was a cult emission).You had all kind of shits, those were good times.Even my (ignorant) mother wouldn't miss her daily Princess Sarah dose.We had our own Anime generics, and they were so popular they are now part of our cultural heritage like any other cult song of the past.But it was 25 years ago…
Nowadays Anime in TV is gone.Completely.The only survivor is...Pokemon.It's been crushed by western kid cartoons, following always the same pattern (a colourful hero with multi-colour friends, they like hip hop and dancing).No plot of course, always a one shot story.
To watch Anime you have to switch on private channels, but even then, they mainly broadcast Bleach or Naruto (and the same episodes since 10 years, not even kidding).Anime are dead, except for pirates or the few buying the official releases.But the general audience can't name anything else than DBZ or Naruto and these guys haven't ever watched a Naruto episode anyway.Even the Manga channel I had did broadcast the same Anime for 15 years straight with nothing new to add (I wish I was kidding but I am not).Hence I didn't subscribe when suddenly my internet operator wouldn't give it to me for free anymore.There's no point in watching the same Ken the Survivor episode for the 4785th time at always the same hour.
Manga had a fair boost in the last 10 years, but only for one and only reason : they sold all the big hits at the same time (Naruto, Bleach, Full Metal Alchemist, Yu-Gi-Ho, Eyeshield21 and the list goes on and on).A lot of the big hits that were finished in Japan since long all came up at the same time.Now that most of these are done, the sale are negatively stalemating, even more than Japan fails to create big hits since 15 years now (One Piece and Naruto are old, Bleach too and the lack of quality destroyed it's sales).The Problem is that in the western industry, just a few Manga can generate 50 to 80% of the global sales.That means that when Naruto and Bleach ends, the markets are gonna crumble apart.Studies have shown in France that Naruto readers do NOT read any other manga and are less than likely than others to do so.The late blooming of One Piece (overtook Naruto last year, with OP volumes 1,2,3 and more incredibly being the best-sellers) won't be enough.
I really worry for the manga market.I think we've already reached the peak 2 years ago, now it can only fall.But to people like us it won't change anything.
Even the blooming J-Rock industry has been annihilated by K-pop and their American RNB wanna be.Same with the Dramas.But I guess there were too many girls to begin with, and they don't seem to care as much about the quality.