New Manga, Webtoon Imprints Flourish As Publishers Aim For Red Hot Market

Two of the hottest segments of the US comics market are Asian-style manga and vertically-scrolling digital comics known as webtoons. Both have experienced nearly triple digit growth since the pandemic, with popular series garnering millions of readers in digital and paper formats. Now the gold rush is on to bring new titles to bookshelves. Penguin Random House (PRH) just announced a new manga-oriented imprint, digital comics platform Webtoon is expanding its print operations, pioneering manga publisher TokyoPop is launching a new romance-oriented lineup, and DC Comics is expanding its partnership with Kodansha.

This week, PRH announced the launch of Inklore, a new imprint focused on comics from around the world, including manga (Japan), manwa (Korea), manhua (China), European comics, digital-first webtoons and light novels. Inklore will focus on romance, fantasy, horror, slice-of-life and similar genres that have proven popular with webtoon readers, typically a younger, more demographically diverse and gender-balanced readership than American superhero comics.

Rebecca Taylor, who worked previously at BOOM! Studios and Vault Comics, will serve as editorial director. The imprint has announced a solid introductory roster including The Heavens, a sci-fi epic by Lev Grossman and Lilah Sturges; Under the Oak Tree, a successful fantasy-romance webtoon by South Korean creator Kim Suji, Cherry Blossoms After Winter, a romance Korean manwa/webtoon by Bamwoo, and Norther Lights, by Malin Falch, YA-fantasy graphic novels previously published in Norway.

Webtoon, the digital comics platform run by South Korean tech giant Naver, has also been getting into the action on the bookshelf with Webtoon Unscrolled, a publishing imprint that just launched last year and has already sold more than 200,000 copies of top titles like True Beauty, Tower of God and Cursed Princess Club. Webtoon Unscrolled is part of the company’s ambitious vertical strategy of expanding its content to books, screens, games, animation and licensed merchandise through Wattpad Webtoon Studios.

TokyoPop was one of the first publishers to turn manga into a mass market phenomenon in bookstores with its pocket-sized paperbacks in the early 2000s. After a rough patch, the company has reemerged as a player in the space and just announced a range of new love and romance-oriented genre titles to be released through a new imprint LoveLove.

According to the company, the stories will appeal to “straight, LGBTQ+, male and female readers,” and will be age appropriate for readers from teen to adults. The company notes that romance novels generated over $1.44 billion in revenue and 19 million printed units in 2022, making it one of the hottest categories for sales.

LoveLove titles will hit shelves in October and November, with introductory releases to include The Black Cat & The Vampire Vol. 1 by Nikke Taino, Undead: Finding Love in the Zombie Apocalypse Vol. 1 by Fumi Tsuyuhisa, Sating the Wolf by Troy Arukuno, and Lullaby Of The Dawn, Vol. 1, by Ichika Yuno.

Even DC Comics, the elder statesman of North American superhero comics publishing, has recently been partnering with manga giant Kodansha for manga-style versions of characters like Batman, Superman and the Joker. DC will be releasing English language collected editions of Joker: One Operation Joker, Superman vs. Meshi, and Batman: Justice Buster in print later this year. DC also partners with Webtoon on popular series like Wayne Family Adventures, Vixen: NYC and Red Hood. The collected print edition of volume 2 of Wayne Family Adventures will be out in October.