The NYT is using that term because most Americans have never even heard the more fitting English-language term "graphic novels", and wouldn't know what it meant if the NYT used it.

(Though, also, it's clickbait. They want to shock people into reading the article by asking an implicit question with an evocative contrast: highlighting the discrepancy of mood between a term usually used to refer to high-brow concepts — "Culture" — and a term usually applied to low-brow media — "Comic Books". The body of the article, though investigating a similar tension, doesn't carry that same derogatory editorial thrust.)