Here is the official list, for reference.
Thoughts:
* Secret Invasion is still #1, with both Avengers books, which closely tie in with the event, at #3 and #5.
* Does Final Crisis skipping a month hurt this title and the event as a whole? Or is there enough FC product out to give the series a sense of continuity?
* I would really like to pin-point the appeal of All-Star Batman & Robin, which is one of the few DC books to make the Top 20 at #4. Is it the Frank Miller/Jim Lee combined name cachet? Or the fact that it is a Batman book that isn't continuity-heavy? Is this book, such as it is, a template for how other successful DC books should be?
* Marvel pseudo-reboots of Hulk, Iron Man, and Amazing Spider-Man still do quite well. Is this a viable strategy for a publisher -- to periodically just come up with a fresh new take on the characters and just push ahead?
* In line with the previous comment, should DC just start doing the same thing with a bunch of their titles? I mean -- for reals, not as a last-minute shuffle.
* I mean my God -- look at the numbers for a book like The Flash -- at #82. This book should be Iron Man/Thor level in sales for DC, if not Captain America level. Because that's how key and iconic this character is to the DCU. It should at least do as well as Green Lantern.
* And Green Arrow -- I mean, that character is classic & edgy & would totally appeal to today's reader -- he even is a semi-regular on TV's "Smallville." Yet the comic is at #85. That's horrible, horrible numbers for a property that is so viable & important.
The formula (and I know I have written this before, so please bear with me):
1. Take your second-tier & some of your third-tier books and apply the Top 50 Test on them.
2. Top 50 Test: are these books starring your best, most licensable intellectual property making it to the top 50? If not: overhaul them.
3. Get top writers & artists for each second tier/third tier book. Carefully talent search for these titles. Pick teams that are willing/likely to stay for at least two complete arcs (if not a full year). <---- this part most important.
4. If the title had been hopelessly mired in bad creative decisions/fill-ins, cancel it outright & start from scratch.
Marvel has applied this philosophy over and over and over again, to good results. Many years ago, when I was just a whelp collecting comics, books like Thor & Fantastic Four and Iron Man were considered "crap" -- all we wanted were "X-Titles" and Spider-Man. But now these second & third tier books are all doing great. This is a formula that works.
I mean, again -- Green Arrow! This should be DC's Iron Man -- there should be a movie out already.
And this is not a slam -- this is a kindness. Trying to figure out what would sell best is a kindness, far more so than a room full of "yes men." A room full of "yes men" can yes you right into bankruptcy. Ask the president.
FC - I think missing a few months is bad because it was hard to follow as it was. I'll be totally lost if I don't re-read the other issues before i get the next one (which is annoying).
ReplyDeleteAll-Star Batman - I dropped it. I didn't like it so I don't know the attraction.
Iron Man - Matt Fraction is doing a superb job on this. Tony Stark is smart and not evil. It also has the same "feel" as the movie so "civilians" could pick it up.
Green Arrow - I like the character but haven't picked up the book in a while. Would love a Geoff John's GL/GA series. Green Lanthern could return the favour that Green Arrow did him in the past.
Flash - I think Reborn might help.
I don't understand the All-Star love either. Best I can say is it's probably SO bad it's good. Like a trainwreck.
ReplyDeleteAny delay in events, especially the crucial parts, is bad. These events aren't exactly all that easy to follow. However, the main stuff never takes place in the main book anyway so it's not completely detramental.
Green Arrow, while I like the current book, I think it's hardly top 10 material. It's just a fun book to break up the monotony. Maybe this is a bad thing, but as long as it maintains some following it should be given a decent run. Hell, we know DC is a lot more forgiving than Marvel there.
It seems like everything sold well this month. Wonder Woman went up 15k, Daredevil was up 23k, FC: Revelations up 22k, Batgirl was up 8k even though it was terrible.
ReplyDeleteWhy did they cancel Batgirl's series? It outsold Catwoman, Wonder Woman, Hawkman, and Legends of The Dark Knight.
Just wondering if anyone knew.
All Star Batman is selling because of the creators, I believe. I think I wrote here before that the book is beautiful looking trash. I don't buy it, but I do read it.
ReplyDeleteConsidering Final Crisis is the big event of the year for DC, it should be coming out monthly, and there's no excuse for it not to.
Problem is:
ReplyDeleteBatman = Grant Morrison, and it's awful. I had to read Wikipedia to know what was going on in RIP and I have read the entire thing. It just doesn't make since.
Neither does Final Crisis. It's like there are pages and pages missing and no one seems to notice/care.
Flash = Geoff Johns. Done.
Green Lantern is probably my favorite DC book out right now. It's just so damn good.
And I have enjoyed Green Arrow/Black Canary, but I have issues with the art and the "goofiness"
Basically everything GJ writes is golden, Booster Gold is good, Blue Beetle, Wonder Woman is good, the new Supergirl is good, and the rest of the DC stuff is just god awful.
It's like painful to get through most of it.
Trinity reads more like a big event than Final Crisis does. I agree with the "pages missing" criticism. However, I've enjoyed Final Crisis Revelations and Legion of Three Worlds very much.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to write Green Arrow/Black Canary. These are two very dynamic, dangerous people. I don't want to see the title go ultra-violent, but it's way too cutesy now.
On the whole, I think superhero comics are too much about *insert bad guy here* attacks *insert hero here* so that the heroes are always reactionary instead of proactive, ie, Batman RIP or Batman Hush.
I think the middle aged audience for comics has thinned out with time and now we're seeing a resurgence of casual readership, brought in by the movies and books with more accessible storylines and recap pages every issue, but it would be a good idea to consider the larger view of the characters after their live-action appearances put them in the public view.
ReplyDeleteIron Man is about a guy who becomes a big stompy robot who fights The Terrorists with American-made lasers and rockets and kicks tanks into orbit in a multi-million-dollar movie with Robert Downey Jr in the title role, while Green Arrow is that identikit boyband-member-looking guy off Smallville who's a bit wet and features in scripts that go down the 'avoiding the whole superhero thing' road to the point that casual viewers aren't being sold the idea of a superhero in the real world being awsome, they're being sold an evasion of the very concept of the superhero - if the makers of Smallville are embarrassed by superheroes, why should the audience care about Green Arrow, who is clearly a superhero character?
I think DC needs to take more corporate responsibility for their properties and have a hand in how the movies and tv shows are made. Ignoring their impact on sales isn't a good idea - DC have lucrative print runs for cartoon spin-offs. Dan Didio ran a multinational media company - why isn't he getting more of a say in how the characters are portrayed onscreen?
I grant you that's big-picture thinking, though. The more immediate answer might be that Green Arrow just isn't that great a comic or character and never was. It's a guy with a bow and arrow "oh, so he's like Robin Hood?"
There's only so far that's gonna fly with people who aren't already into daffy comics characters from the 1960s, but Iron Man is still a big stompy robot with a fun movie.
I think DC has been putting a lot of their resources into correcting the mistakes made in the One Year Later jump.
ReplyDeleteThe lateness of Action Comics hurt them. The poor quality of Supergirl hurt them. The combined lateness and poor quality of Wonder Woman hurt them. But it seems they've finally got a handle on those specific issues. Maybe now they can concentrate on fixing Green Arrow and Teen Titans.
Thing is, you can't rush this stuff. Thor was out of the picture for years and also suffered from false starts. Neil Gaiman was supposed to write it at one point, but that never happened. Credit should go to Marvel for waiting until the stars were in alignment for that title. And even when the stars aren't in alignment, at least they make the attempt to test the waters. They've recently tested the waters (so to speak) with two Namor miniseries and two Silver Surfer miniseries (three if you count the Annihilation book).
Does anyone think we'll see any Aquaman solicitations in the next, oh, four or five months? Guy's gonna appear in the new Batman cartoon, and he doesn't even have a miniseries.
But again, I think this is because so much of DC's energy (when it's not being channeled into events) is going into Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Supergirl. They're trying to strengthen the foundations. The real crime is allowing those foundations to get that bad in the first place.
You know what this reminds me of? A story Bendis told in an interview with John Suintress about on of the first marvel retreats he attended.
ReplyDeleteApparently back in 2001 Bill Jemas stood in front of everyone and wrote all their major characters and books on a board. Then everyone in the room had to answer why each of those books were being published. and "Because they've always been published" wasn't an acceptable answer. Everyone was forced to boil down the characters to their core, and find out what makes them resonant with the audience.
I feel like we're seeing the benefits of that philosophy reaping dividends for Marvel right now.
Iron Man has a clear core concept. Thor has a clear core concept. The Avengers, Iron Fist, Captain America... all characters I never cared about until five years ago. I was an x-kid (still am) and now I find myself reading five or six books I'd never read before.
Where as DC... I'm actually not trying to bash DC when I say this... but reading DC I felt like they started catering exclusively to an audience that was enamored of DC's longstanding continuity. And was actually excited about the One Year Later relaunches because I felt like DC was gearing up to do the same boiling down that Marvel did. but instead it felt like every book only crawled farther and farther up into itself. And to the audiences that have been reading for thirty years and love that stuff, god bless. But it was just clear that as a reader I wasn't really welcome at DC anymore.
"Get top writers & artists for each second tier/third tier book. Carefully talent search for these titles. Pick teams that are willing/likely to stay for at least two complete arcs (if not a full year)."
ReplyDelete'Get top tier writers & artists'?
Most "top teir' writers today are either overused and boring me because nobody in editorial's got the balls to challenge them to do something outside of their individual comfort zones, or they're "new" writers (at least in terms of experience), but have nothing original of their own to offer, often merely recycling content I already own and immediately recognize, which I feel is an inferior, unworthy effort, and both a cheat and an insult to my intelligence.
And I really don't need writers from other media coming in to write comics, either. I can't stand most of the TV / film "writers" either, for much the same reasons, so why would their efforts in comics be any different?
And I don't know about you, Val, but *I* prefer to have some level of diversification in my entertainment venues, not the same boring ass shit by the same people everywhere I turn.
'Get top tier writers & artists'?
ReplyDeleteShe didn't say "top tier writers & artists." She said, "Get top writers & artists for each second tier/third tier book."
There's a difference between saying "top" writers & artists and "top tier" writers & artists. One means that these writers and artists are simply the best (better than all the rest). The other means that they are the most popular--at the top of the ladder. That's how I interpret it anyhow.
Scale:
ReplyDeleteThat was my error, adding the "tier" there, and I apologize any confusion it may have caused. I will say that in today's lexicon, "top tier", "top writer" and "most popular" are pretty near synonymous in terms of public perception.
But it still doesn't change the point of my original posting - that I am BORED with the vast majority of today's writers.
There are a number of reasons for that. Part of it is overfamiliarity with the writers on my part. Part of it is being an editor and publisher author myself and as such maybe I'm more apt to notice thematic redundancies, recurring dialogue patterns, overly simplistic plot structures, the commercial trends that are popular to follow, etc., than a typical comics reader may notice.
But I've long since come to the point where I'd like to make a list of elements for each writer, showing them what each of them does too much individually, and BAN them from doing that for X number of years, just to see if any of them can actually evolve as storytellers.
Are these really the best authors we have?
Go back and reread Valerie's post last week about how DC changed their submissions policy to "no unsolicited submissions", because the editorial staff members effectively were unwilling and / or unable to review the content.
Do you honestly believe that of all the unread submissions she had to return with rejection notices, that not a one of them would have been worthy of publication, possibly moreso than the works that were and are published by DC?
Do you honestly believe that you are being offered the absolute best possible content available today, when the editors are effectively limiting their searches for content to those creators in their own personal and/or group circles of favor?
I can't accept the notion that what's on the racks is the best content under those conditions.
I'm not saying that any of the current writers and artists are bad, nor am I suggesting that there are dozens or hundreds of creators out there who are better and deserve to "replace" the current rosters.
What I am saying, is that I have seen what I felt were better stories offered to the Big Two by veteran comics writers of the indy scene and prior generations of the mainstream comics scene who simply weren't and aren't in favor with current editorial at both DC and Marvel over the years. That I've seen both personal and group prejudice and hypocrisy cripple various creators' careers. Maybe it's due to ageism, political agenda, personal agenda, whatever. The bottom line is, it has to come to an end, if you want the industry to grow and evolve in a healthy manner. If you want the creators to grow and evolve as storytellers, because they're not going to if there's no equal balance of competition involved. If you want the characters to grow and evolve in a healthy manner, because the more inbred and limited the views of the editorial and creative teams, the more the illusion of change degenerates and the need for TRUE change becomes apparent.
I think the attraction of ASBAR is the sheer absurdity of it, to be honest. Nobody enjoys it because it's classic Batman; I don't want to say people enjoy it ironically, but it's close.
ReplyDelete