@wan @Arkana Interesting. Tbh the comic book scene prior to the dominance of manga is a foreign thing to me, on multiple levels, and the only real experience of comics before the current zietgiest is getting some Star Wars comics at the local store as a child; I never cared for superhero stuff even at that age.
This is no dig at Bones, I've never read it, but the fact that the alternative western comic market is largely captured by Scholastic doesn't sit well with me at all. I don't think a large company dominant in the industry focused on children's media, which is an issue unto itself, can really support the artistic freedom that we praise in manga.
There is a lot of work to still be done here to even approximate the artistic and mature creative quality that you can can find in even the smallest manga periodical. Also the possibility of a de-facto "Comics Code" forming in such an environment is worrying.