Top 300 - Feb 2008

[Diabolical]

I won't copy/paste the entire thing, but I thought there are a few surprises.
http://www.icv2.com/articles/home/12242.html

6 ALL STAR BATMAN & ROBIN BOY WONDER #9 - 93,766
If it sucks so bad, why is it in the top 10?

33 WOLVERINE ORIGINS #22 - 50,324
Further down that I would've guessed. Looks like everyone else is getting bored with it.

38 KICK ASS #1 - 47,841
Maybe I'm overestimating it, but I figured it'd much higher, especially considering the creative team.

56 PUNISHER WAR JOURNAL #16 - 32,508
Droppin' like a rock. Not even in the top 50. Fuck you Fraction.

61 STAR WARS LEGACY #19 - 30,953
This is the highest ranking Star Wars title at 61? And Dark Horse considers this one of their top properties?

94 SPAWN #175 - 22,338
Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

260 Y LAST MAN #60 - 3,329
3,000 copies? That's it? Unless its a a reorder, it must be the trades.

299 STAR WARS KNIGHTS O/OLD REPUBLIC #25 - 2,019
HAW! Archie's Veronica and Betty each sold more!

[jjreason]

With all the Amazing Spidey books way up at the top, Marvel made the right call in making ASM tri-monthly. No way would FN and/or Sensational been up that high. Btw, it will pass FF next month as the highest numbered Marvel title. If anyone gives a shit.

X-Force is #1, eh? Cements my theory that (much like forums these days), 99% of all folks buying/reading comics are 'tards.

[vynsane]

With all the Amazing Spidey books way up at the top, Marvel made the right call in making ASM tri-monthly. No way would FN and/or Sensational been up that high. Btw, it will pass FF next month as the highest numbered Marvel title. If anyone gives a shit.

interesting... i think the jury's still out, but it seems as though the gamble has paid off for the time being, based on my analysis over at comics-database.com

http://comics-database.com/forum/viewto ... 1038#p2660

they are easily beating the curve... at this point. the only possible negative indication is the steady decline in per-issue sales across the month:

3 AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #549 101,112
9 AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #550 90,874
13 AMAZING SPIDER-MAN #551 88,084

11,000 less units sold between #549 and #550 is a rather large gap. perhaps that's the initial dip after the "big event", with the ~3000 unit drop between #550 and #551 being a bit more realistic. that's still a steady decline. still, they are much larger numbers than the three separate titles were pulling in, and as i said in my analysis linked above, they would break even on the gamble with a per-issue sales figure of 70,000.

[Diabolical]

I wasn't too surprised at the massive drop between #549 and #550 (and not because I still think the idea is snigtadian).
To me it looks like a first issue item (which it is, sorta), where people that normally don't buy Spidey picked up the first one because of the hype.

[vynsane]

I wasn't too surprised at the massive drop between #549 and #550 (and not because I still think the idea is snigtadian).
To me it looks like a first issue item (which it is, sorta), where people that normally don't buy Spidey picked up the first one because of the hype.

but #546 was the "first issue item" as it was the first BND issue. #549 was the fourth issue in BND.

[Diabolical]

Looks like I had my numbering wrong. I thought it started with in Feb.
Damn, I guess that is a massive drop.

[RoIIo Tomassi]

Looking at those numbers, made me think of two things. If this were 1992, NONE of the books below #10 would still be in production, and the top ten books would all be on the bubble for cancellation.

And number 2. If at some point in the future I decide I want to find any of those back issues, it's going to be fucking hard! I didn't realize print runs on soo many books were so tiny. There's only 10,000 issues of some books?? That's fucking crazy!

[vynsane]

Looking at those numbers, made me think of two things. If this were 1992, NONE of the books below #10 would still be in production, and the top ten books would all be on the bubble for cancellation.

totally. of course the quality of this day and age over the quantity of that needs to be taken into account.

And number 2. If at some point in the future I decide I want to find any of those back issues, it's going to be fucking hard! I didn't realize print runs on soo many books were so tiny. There's only 10,000 issues of some books?? That's fucking crazy!

true, i never thought about it that way. what's simultaneously bad for the industry right now is actually GOOD for collecting/speculating. interesting juxtaposition...

[jjreason]

It's the age old adage "If a tree falls in the forest...." all over again - if no one likes comics, is it possible that anyone can give a shit about low production runs?

Regarding the drop in Spidey sales, I'm wondering if a few people didn't drop the book because they found it to be too much at 3x per month? I've even let the last arc sit there for a couple of weeks because I didn't get around to reading them - all of a sudden I had 3 issues to catch up on!

[RoIIo Tomassi]

There's an interesting thread over at WizardUniverseMessageBoards from couple of store owners talking about how Marvel/Joe Q and Diamond Comics might have exaggerated the "overwhelming success" of the BND reboot in order to placate the advertisers and/or the Marvel stockholders. It's all speculation, of course, but it makes for interesting reading.


Edit. Technically the posts are from comicbookrecource.com but here's the topic.

[jjreason]

Interesting to say the very least - those were EXTREMELY well written. A little scary though, I had kinda been thinking all that stuff about the comic industry going down the shitter was more hot air than substance.... I guess not, eh?

That part about comics being worth $10 a pop without the advertising money was a little scary, too. I hope I'm not around to see the end of the comic book - that would be entirely too sad.

[anarky]

Stupid idea: why don't they charge less for the advertising? If an ad in X-Force #1 (original series) cost, say, $10,000, well, obviously they can't justify charging that for the new X-Force #1. So why not charge $1,000? It's money. You have the pages. If not, add four more pages to the book. Duh.

And why not print on cheaper paper again? Manga does that. That's how they print so many more copies more cheaply. Plus they're in black and white. Let people bitch about "manga killing comics" all they want. They're the same goddamned thing, just from different companies.

I'm not sure we'll see the death of the comic book soon, but the death of the "mainstream" comic may be afoot.

More to come...

[jjreason]

I think the biggest hurdles are cost, and a lack of ANYTHING out there suitable for kids. Marvel Adventures, for example, are about as convoluted as the real books. Both Marvel and DC (who I know nothing about, remember, they might already be doing this) NEED, fucking NEED to offer comics for kids at REASONABLE prices - and by reasonable, I mean 99cents. Print them on newsprint and make them less pages if you must... but there's a desperate need out there for comic books that are priced the same as chocolate bars and are available at gas stations, grocery stores and variety stores.

Thinking about it, there is another driving issue here: the environment. There are a great many (and more all the time) people who don't want to waste paper or plastic - and comic collecting is a frivolous use of both these things (I'm thinking the books themselves, plus the bags & boards & boxes we need to store them in as anally safe a fashion as possible).

I think they should also start offering people a chance to subscribe to emailed versions of the books that come out on the same day as the comics themselves (make them readable on the pc as well as printable) - at a reduced cost. As part of the subscription, people could also receive a DVD every year of the previous year's issues (plus throw on a few teasers for other books, ads for new stuff, trailers for movies, etc). I know this sounds like it would "kill" the hobby as we know it (at the very least it would seriously damage Diamond Distributing, not to mention kicking the local comic shops right in the balls) but at least the creators would continue making new stories and we wouldn't lose the heroes themselves, right? I'm not ready for a Marvel Universe that is only composed of Hollywood Blockbusters.

[anarky]

I'm at my parents, and don't want to be on this site if they come in the room (wonder why), which is why my responses are cryptically short.

I'm with you 100%, JJ. The industry (primarily the Big Two) have been so ass-backwards since the implosion of the 90s that it's ridiculous. Everything from Marvel seems like knockoff Watchmen styled deconstruction of heroes, and DC is one ongoing massive crossover spanning several years.

Monthlies cannot survive if they're just five-parters tailor-made for reprinting. There have to be standalones. Every issue should be treated as if it's someone's first, which it likely is.

And the majority of stories are insane. They're just the same Liefeld stories except with better looking feet. I know an awful lot of folks our age who stopped reading, but only because the stories just stopped being fun and intelligent. The ideal mainstream comic story should interest a 30 year old, and be acceptable for a 10 year old. Does it have to be dumbed down for kids? No. Absolutely not. Kids know when they're being pandered to, and they hate it.

Marvel has Marvel Adventures. Like you said, it's as convoluted as the "main" books. Plus, there's no backstory, and kids aren't dumb enough to not see they're not the real titles.

But loading X-Men with sex and violence, while they're still the same guys in neon underwear, then selling the books at the mall or grocery store is just begging a kid to read them and get in trouble, probably being kept away from comics by angry parents.

Fuck, what's with killing the titles and logos? Those are important parts of any periodical design. Any fool can tell you that.

DC is far worse. I recall reading about an upcoming line of Superfriends titles geared toward kids where they'd be rescuing kittens from trees. KIDS ARE NOT RETARDED! YOU AND I READ COMICS WHEN WE WERE KIDS, AND WE DIDN'T NEED TO SEE BATMAN SAVING KITTENS!!

It's pretty telling, too, when the new Spider-Man or Batman movie gets millions of viewers, and spawns successful action figure lines and whatnot, but none of that spills over into the comics. Why don't these companies make a deal with the shops to give away a copy of a comic with the ticket stub from the movie based on it? The closest they ever came were the $0.25 issues of Uncanny and Hulk a few years back.

I'll be back more with some more rants on the subject....

[Diabolical]

Why don't these companies make a deal with the shops to give away a copy of a comic with the ticket stub from the movie based on it? The closest they ever came were the $0.25 issues of Uncanny and Hulk a few years back.

When The Punisher opened they gave away reprints of Amazing Spider-Man #129. They really should do something like that with more comic movies. And not just a cheap 30-year-old reprint. Commission new stories (with character info) from a creative team that doesn't suck. These issues shouldn't be a throw away; they should open the door for the non-reader to comics.
Hell, even number them and make the comic a cool collectible itself. For example, this year Iron Man could be #1 of the series, The Incredible Hulk #2, Punisher: War Zone #3, ect. That would not only get Joe Public to read a comic, but also get comic fans to the theaters opening day/weekend.