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Image Expo is kicking off with a stirring speech by Eric Stephenson. We’ll social media it along for you   Image Expo is 10 minutes from starting, and the venue certainly has some swagger to it. #imageexpo pic.twitter.com/ML7zoPbNWd — Christopher Butcher (@Comics212) April 6, 2016 "Whatever you imagine, it can happen." Starting the keynote at […]

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Karen Berger ranks with Stan Lee and William Gaines as one of the most influential editors in the history of American comics.

— Chris Roberson (@chris_roberson) December 4, 2012

It would be hard to overemphasize the influence that Karen Berger had on the comics industry. I’m sure some people will argue her influence only extended to the mainstream comics industry, but it would be hard to find too many young adults reading comics in the from the 80s on who didn’t find something to enjoy in somewhere in the line up of Swamp Thing, Sandman, Hellblazer, Animal Man, Doom Patrol, Shade The Changing Man, The Invisibles, Transmetropolitan, Preacher, 100 Bullets, Fables, Y the Last Man, Scalped and beyond. That’s an insanely powerful line-up of iconic comics series and characters, and the creators who worked on the books were a who’s who of the engaged, inspired and imaginative creators of the era. In the tweet above, Roberson put Berger, whose exit from DC after 33 years was announced yesterday, in the proper company. Like Gaines and Lee, Berger excelled at the tricky business of matching story and art from disparate sources. You could add Julius Schwartz and Archie Goodwin to the list of the great editors, but they didn’t change the landscape the way Gaines, Lee and Berger did, terraforming it into a new thing with a new viewpoint.Julian Darius at Sequart has a succinct history of Berger’s career at DC, and he nails the rite of passage for just about everyone who wanted to write comics for the last 20 years: “getting a book at Vertigo” became universally known as the way to make your mark on comics.

Vertigo soon came to be regarded as a proving ground for many of the industry’s best writers. The imprint also became known for limited ongoing series in the model of The Sandman, although now creator-owned. Such a series came to feel like a rite of passage in a major writer’s career, increasingly even the case for writers Berger hadn’t personally recruited. Such series, all published by Vertigo, prominently included Grant Morrison’s The Invisibles, Garth Ennis’s Preacher, Warren Ellis’s Transmetropolitan (after moving to Vertigo from DC’s defunct sci-fi imprint, Helix), Mike Carey’s Lucifer (a follow-up to The Sandman), Brian Azzarello’s 100 Bullets, Brian K. Vaughan’s Y: The Last Man, Bill Willingham’s Fables (although not designed to be limited in duration), and Jason Aaron’s Scalped. Even when one of these series didn’t sell particularly well, it almost invariably came to be listed as one of the first works mentioned in connection with that writer. Sometimes, these series helped catapult a writer to A-list status; in other cases, they were concurrent with such a rise, helping to legitimize that writer as a serious mind capable of serious works. Such was the power of Vertigo at its height.

With the support of then DC publisher Jenette Kahn and especially president Paul Levitz, Berger was able to carve out the dark, striking horror of Swamp Thing and imaginative fantasy of Sandman into a whole line of books—and did it offering creators a piece of the pie in an equitable publishing model that far outlasted similar efforts. Even with writers whose styles were as disparate as the above, the adjective “Vertigo-esque” was immediately understood by everyone who had come near a comic in the last 20 years. “Dark and edgy” soon became meaningless buzzwords, but there would be something gothic, something about expanding consciousness, blurry sexuality, disgusting maggots and decay, a hidden world. The earliest books of the proto Vertigo took bland superhero characters and made them angsty explorers. It was grown up (if often melodramatic) and it was very much the way Berger envisioned things should be. Writing for Vertigo meant you had to be enormously literate about not only comics but literature and science and weird, unexplainable things…and it was all on the page. At its best Vertigo meant intelligent comics for intelligent readers.

It was an extraordinary run, and twitter was filled with tributes:

Thanks, Karen Berger, for giving me a career as a writer and many hours of enjoyment as a reader. Best of luck wherever you head next.

— Jason Aaron (@jasonaaron) December 3, 2012

Karen Berger is to comics what Maxwell Perkins was to the history of American letters. My imagination has always been a Vertigo imagination.

— Joe Hill (@joe_hill) December 3, 2012

Karen Berger is the most significant editor of my lifetime and shepherded about 90% of the best comics I’ve ever read. Huge loss to DC.

— Mark Millar (@mrmarkmillar) December 4, 2012

#KarenBerger Thanks for giving us weird kids in high school a Sub Pop Records for comics.

— gerardway (@gerardway) December 4, 2012

I’ve worked with a legend for 25 years. She’s the best, & I’ll miss her gentleness & sanity at VertigoDC: j.mp/SsS4mR#KarenBerger

— Neil Gaiman (@neilhimself) December 3, 2012

I did not appreciate Karen Berger nearly enough when I was younger. I thought she was tough. Now I get it, and wish she was around forever.

— Colleen Doran (@ColleenDoran) December 3, 2012

Karen Berger was the editor I wanted to work with since I was old enough to know what an editor was. She launched my career. I <3 that woman

— G. Willow Wilson (@GWillowWilson) December 3, 2012

Karen was my boss for two years, from 2000-02, and it’s safe to say that working at Vertigo was not a good fit for me, and we often clashed. We both cared enormously—but about different things. That said, they were mostly philosophical differences and I didn’t lose sight of Karen’s enduring legacy as an editor or the fact that she was, at heart, an incredibly nice and thoughtful lady. I was very pleased earlier this year when she agreed to appear on my panel about editing comics at New York Comic Con, and enjoyed hearing her talk about some of her most recent graphic novel projects. Mariah Huehner, who was an intern and assistant editor during my tenure, has her own remembrance of working at Vertigo:

Of the many things I noticed about Karen Berger, the high level of respect and esteem in which the other editors and creators held her was the most obvious. People -liked- working with her. They respected her opinions even when they disagreed, and she was a huge reason why people wanted to work there. Creators felt understood and encouraged, while also challenged and held to an extremely  high writing standard. Her story notes were always simple and insightful, asking questions, never criticizing, but not letting things slide either. She made sure the story worked and helped the creator tell it, without trying to write it for them or push an agenda. She clearly understood how to be a story collaborator and agent, without ever taking anything away from the writer or artist responsible for its creation.

Although I didn’t work with Karen directly most of the time, she would encourage my writing and ask my opinion on pitches from time to time. She was always very fair in her reviews of my work and seemed to really believe I had the ability to be a good editor in my own right. It meant a lot. Before working at Vertigo I had somewhat taken my writing abilities for granted, even though I loved to do it.  During my tenure there I was encouraged to do interviews, press releases, and copy a great deal, and learned a lot about what worked and what didn’t.

If all this has an elegiac tone to it, it’s that for all it’s huge success, influence and multiple Eisner Awards, it’s impossible to see Vertigo going on without Karen Berger, or even if DC and WB have any interest in continuing, or what that would mean. While news of Berger’s departure was stunning, it surprised no one who had been paying any attention, and over the last 12 months the demise of Vertigo and Berger’s potential exit were a staple of the rumor mill. Rich Johnston has a succinct write-up of the downward spiral of the last few years: from having signature characters Swamp Thing and then Constantine taken back to the DCU, and the end of Vertigo’s Hellblazer, to be replaced by a DCU Constantine. Only yesterday, Peter Milligan, the last of the Vertigo’s elder gods to still work on books regularly, was talking about the end of Hellblazer in curt, pained answers:

Was the end of the series a surprise to you, or is this something that has been in the works for some time?

Like I said, that my run was coming to an end was no surprise. I’d been thinking about it for a little while and thinking of my “out.” I had a strong suspicion that the series would end, but when it came, it came suddenly. Like death.

Are you surprised at all by the outcry from creators and readers alike that are angered/upset/dismayed about the end of “Hellblazer?”

No. Not surprised at all.

As the latest DC sales chart which is going up later today will show, sales had eroded immensely and looking at the bleak numbers—and without the idea of developing creators and properties to support it—the idea of a Vertigo imprint doesn’t make that much publishing sense any more from a business standpoint. Aside from the fact that a huge chunk of the Big Two comics writer of note for the last 20 years got “discovered” at Vertigo. Scott Snyder, the hero of the New 52, was a Vertigo find; Jeff Lemire was an an acclaimed, award winning indie cartoonist, much respected in his native Canada, but it’s fair to say Sweet Tooth got his name on the board at DC. Besides the Brit crew, writer who blossomed at Vertigo include Azzarello, Brubaker, Aaron, Brian Wood, Brian K Vaughn, and so on. Without Vertigo to give talent a platform to really show what they can do, the scouting trips to Image are already underway. But will they really be needed? For me the death knell for Vertigo came when it was announced that Scott Snyder would be taking leave of American Vampire, his series for Vertigo, to catch up on Batman and Superman. Here’s the entire story, courtesy of Newsarama:

Nrama: So this hiatus you’re taking is definitely not going to become the end of the series. You’re setting up what’s happening next.

Snyder: Yeah, I cannot emphasize enough how absolutely firm we are in terms of how temporary this hiatus is.

[snip] We know we’re only taking about six months off from the series, between us. That might mean a little longer between issues that the readers see. So what I mean is that Rafael is only taking off six months after he finishes #34, and I’m only taking about six months off from writing American Vampire — maybe even less. For me, it’s mainly so I can get ahead on Batman and Superman, and I can also get ahead on The Wake with Sean Murphy. Part of it is needing to be able to stagger these books to make sure I’m able to give 100 percent on each one.

The only thing that would really make me not want to do the books is if I couldn’t give everything I have to each one. So I’d rather stop doing a book for a few months than put out a book that I don’t feel 100 percent about.

And by the time we come back, I’ll essentially be way ahead on Batman and Superman. I’m ahead now, but I’ll be way ahead, hopefully. And I’ll be far enough into The Wake, because Sean [Murphy] has a really meticulous drawing style, which is incredible and I love, that it will be staggered by the time we come back. What I mean is, I’ll be far enough ahead on the books that it will be almost like having two books and not four at that point.

Although Snyder’s new Vertigo book (even typing that seems so tentative now) wath Sean Murphy, The Wake, will doubtless come out, considering what a valuable player he is for the DCU, but it is’t hard to imagine that becoming more of an “Icon” type thing. Others have an even more pessimistic view.

Without Karen Berger, I have doubts that Seaguy 3 will ever see the light of day…

— Cameron Stewart (@cameronMstewart) December 3, 2012

Stewart has been drifting away from superhero work for a while, and without a champion, a third volume of a quirky book about a guy in a scuba suit does sound rather a reach for the modern corporate comics company.

There’s still the “Before Sandman” project, a new Neil Gaiman written Sandman tale, announced at the last San Diego Comic-Con which was to cap off the 25th anniversary of Sandman festivities. The artist on this project, JH Williams III, is wistful (and surprisingly candid) about the project’s completion,

I find the timing of her departure from DC to be sadly ironic, in that next year when Karen says her final goodbyes to the company it will also be the 25 year anniversary of Sandman, one the titles that sort of started the whole thing (to which there is a brand new Sandman project on the way for this anniversary that I’m to start illustrating very soon). Sandman issue 1 was published in October of 1988 but dated January 1989, which helped lead to the formation of Vertigo under Karen’s direction, next year will bring the 20th anniversary of the legendary imprint. Having known Karen for many years and doing a few things for vertigo here or there, I had long been looking forward to working with her at a much closer level on this new Sandman project. So while excited over Sandman, its become bittersweet as her involvement will be going away. I’m a bit uncomfortable over it, actually. But it is what it is. I know I will not help but think of her that first day I put pen to paper, on that very first page Karen will be there in spirit.

I was also seriously disappointed when I’d heard about the demise of Vertigo’s Hellblazer recently announced, in favor of transitioning the lead character into the DCU entirely, not an idea I’m overly fond of. As a longtime reader of Hellblazer it was disheartening. I felt as if Vertigo was beginning to slowly be sucked dry, it’s life’s blood drained away. And with the departure of Karen Berger I have to admit that I’m feeling even more disheartened. And speaking as bit of a fan here, not an industry professional, I’m feeling torn between a struggle of anger about some things and rather optimistic for what the future may hold for Karen, and in turn for us as readers. As a creative editor Karen has something to say, always has, and I’m certain her voice will rise up out of the din and resonate with something new. And when that voice does sound, in whatever form that may take, I know I’m there to listen.

So what then of the future? For Karen Berger’s future, although everyone wants to see her take on some new project, it’s unknown if she has a no compete clause the way many departed DC execs do. Also, she’s 54 and has nothing to prove. A boutique imprint at a major publisher like Random House maybe? Certainly this will become an interesting topic for the hot stove league.

As for Vertigo, the line itself, there will be “assisting in the transition to a new leadership team which includes veteran staffers whom she has mentored over the years,” a rather mysterious statement in the official PR that comes off like asking Rex Ryan who’s starting at quarterback for the Jets next week. This had to be in the cards for a while and yet Berger was making plans for new projects as recently as last week, according to one freelancer I spoke with.

As for who those “veteran staffers” might be, on is, obviously, there’s Shelly Bond, who was made Group Editor nearly a decade ago and continues to oversee the successful Fables franchise. Another is Senior Editor Will Dennis, whose work on many a DCU project, including Before Watchmen, leaves him in a strong position. Mark Doyle, who signed up Scott Snyder, would be another name in the mix. I’ve heard a few other, more surprising names, however. We’ll have to wait and see.

While any of these fine editors could carry the torch forward, the real, brutal question is…is the Vertigo imprint even needed any more? Johanna Draper Carlson lays it out:

It’s very possible to envision an American comic industry without Vertigo, and many people are. Although DC’s press release indicates intent to continue the imprint, as many people started wondering after the announcement of the cancellation of Hellblazer last month, it’s an open question whether Vertigo is needed at all these days, or whether it had a future under the Warner/DC Entertainment regime with or without her. There’s no longer any need it fulfills for the company or creators, as the main DC line now publishes mature readers material and creator ownership is easier to get elsewhere. I don’t know whether Berger intends to change industries or find something else to do in comics or retire, whether she’s tired of what DC has become or simply feels like a change, whether the company made her an offer she couldn’t refuse or suggested she leave before they pushed or were tired of paying that many vice presidents. I hope we hear more from her next year. She had a long and storied career, responsible for all kinds of major accomplishments it’s too late for me to list accurately. On a political level, she was one of the most visible women in a high-ranking position at a comic company, and losing her feels to me like another sign of how female-unfriendly corporate American comics have become.

At the most brutal level, there is no place in corporate comics for creator owned comics. That is just a fact. And on another level, Vertigo’s mission has become almost unnecessary. It isn’t a choice between Hawkman and X-force any more. It’s a choice between Hark a Vagrant and XKCD, Saga and The Walking Dead, Ganges and Sailor Twain, Building Stories and The Freddie Stories.

Vertigo, the brand, is still a valuable name on the spine of many of DC’s best selling backlist books, but how long will a book publishing program remain important to Warner Bros? In the face of declining sales, Vertigo tried to relaunch a bunch of monthly titles earlier this year—most recently with Saucer Country and New Deadwardians and so on and…well, that was it. The graphic novel program launched years ago and still has books in the pipeline, but has had dwindling internal support from all signs. Would the market have supported these projects with a new imprint, like DC Blaze or something? Corporate comics don’t do new too well.

All of this will unfold, privately and publicly. But it will all be different. In all of the outpouring of comments today, the one overriding feeling was that this was the end of an era. And you know, it was a pretty awesome era.

I’ll end this, Death of Speedy style, with a video from 1985 of young Karen Berger and young Alan Moore taking about Swamp Thing. It was all so innocent then, but the stories will endure.

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