The Great Comics Flood of 2010
It has been reported that for the first time in 15 months no single comic book gathered more than
100,000 copies in orders in the direct sales market. Make that 93,459, to put a
point on it.
Conventional wisdom has it that sales have dropped because the average cover price has gone up, and who am I to question conventional wisdom? But there’s another reason. A big one.
Historically, whenever one of the major publishers (which means Marvel and DC; I’m talking superhero comics here) felt they were being challenged by one or more upstart publishers, that company would flood the market with crap, usually reprints or revivals of frequently cancelled titles. The other publisher would rapidly follow. Before the direct sales tail started wagging the dog, it was believed there was only so much space in the newsstands
and DC and Marvel could crowd the others out. That, of course, was nonsense: if the newsstands cared about comic books (how much profit is there in a 40 cent item?) nobody would have to crowd anybody out.
This philosophy extended to the direct sales market. When companies such as First, Eclipse and Malibu were making waves and racking up competitive sales, DC and Marvel started dumping product into the pipeline. How many times could you revive Kull The Conqueror? But retailers had to order at least a few copies because it was a Marvel Comic, and cumulatively all that sucked a lot of bucks out of retailers’ tills. Remember, they buy this stuff non-returnable.
But now comic book stores have dwindled down to a precious few and the big bookstore chains such as Barnes and Noble and Borders are coughing up blood, sales truly suck.
Which makes it real curious to see that Marvel is once again flooding the comics rack. Having finally lost the Kull license, the House of Idea has gone the Oreo Cookies route: they’re jerking their “going to the movies” properties as though they were crack fiends at a milk farm.
For example: the September Marvel Previews (books on sale November) lists no less than six Iron Man titles, eight Thor titles, and 13 Avengers books. There’s also two event series: Shadowland, which winds up with a mere four titles, and Chaos War, which boasts five.
I didn’t even mention the massive – and expanding – X-Men group. That’s old news.
27 issues featuring Thor, Iron Man, and/or The Avengers.
Boy, you’d think there was a Thor movie coming out that, oh I don’t know, tied in to the Iron Man movies, to be followed by the big The Avengers
movie.
So, why the flood? Is Marvel worried about competition from Boom, Dynamite, and IDW? I don’t think so. They started producing material
for this latest dump just about the time the Disney takeover was ratified. They are trying to impress the Mouse.
Disney doesn’t care about their comic book profits, and nor does Warner Bros. Marvel and DC, respectively, are there as R&D, fodder for movies, television and animation – and their concomitant merchandising revenues. All Marvel and DC have to do on the publishing front is show a decent
return on investment and their new masters will be content.
It’s hard for me to think of a way Marvel could better promote comic book bootlegging.
The Harvey Awards, named for famed writer/cartoonist Harvey Kurtzman, once again hit the Baltimore Comic Con in style. Emceed by PvP’s esteemed artist and writer Scott Kurtz (not only because his name is close to Harvey’s, but because he’s genuinely funny!), is held in tandem with a celebratory dinner and ceremony. Our intrepid Glenn Hauman was on scene tweeting the winners to us all, and shucks, he even joined the folks for the after-party. We here at ComicMix congratulate all this years nominees and celebrate the victories for this years winners! Did your favorite take home the ole’ Harv’? Find out below!
We, the true believers all have that “home show”. That convention we never miss because it’s in our backyard. We treasure the memories we build there. And for those of us who aspire to become creators (like me and my Unshaven Comics cohorts) the “home show” is also where we first took the plunge and moved to the other side of the aisle to become creators, not just conventioneers. For me, that home show has been the Chicago Comic Con. I, of course, knew it as “Wizard World Chicago” when I first walked in the doors a newly christened comic fan in 1999. Ever since, that show has been a stalwart in my calender. I’ve not missed it, now, for 11 years in a row. Suffice to say, I’ve had a ton of great memories over the years. From catching the first glimpse of The Dark Knight, sitting mere feet away from Christian Bale, Christopher Nolan, and David Goyer… to sitting in a jam packed ballroom, sharing a laugh over the secrets of Wonder Woman #219… to that first year I had to give up attending Wizard School panels, in order to sell my first graphic novel. 
Angel has been revealed to be the Big Bad in the latter issues of Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight so it makes perfect sense for the comic book adventures of the vampire with a soul to shift from IDW back to Dark Horse.
The 22nd annual Eisner Awards, the
1:20: The Eisner Spirit of Retailing Award goes to 
Yesterday, BOOM! Studios joined the growing number of companies to add the rank of Chief Creative Officer to their mastheads. Mark Waid, the publisher’s Editor-in-Chief was named CCO with Matt Gagnon promoted to Editor-in-Chief. Marvel also formalized C.B. Cebulski’s talent scout role by naming him Senior Vice President, Creator & Content Development of Marvel
The 2009 
