Well written! do you have some more resources to recommend? Thanks…

Also, it would be nice to see these write ups posted up and delivered each and every month, not just posted every other month or whatnot, y’know?

(Are these columns posted anywhere else, on a regular basis, or just on the two sites I’m aware of?)

Great stuff.

Please keep it coming.

Paul, IMO, McNiven’s artwork is a personal (leading) selling point for Civil War in the same way that Phil Jimenez’s artwork was a leading selling point for Infinite Crisis. Yes, the high-concept natures of both series pretty much ensured guaranteed audiences no matter who they put on the books (and Crisis proved that once Jimenez ran into scheduling trouble and DC decided to dilute his artwork by adding additional pencilers and inkers of similar style to pick up the slack — NO ONE liked that solution, which is why pages are getting redrawn for the trade paper back. But make no mistake, Jimenez’s artwork, which evokes that of original Crisis penciller George Perez was indeed a selling point because it further branded the series as a sequel to the original Crisis. McNiven has less personal history to draw on, but make no mistake, he’s probably the biggest draw of the series other than the story itself, which has been surprisingly readable.

The real problem IMO is that the editorial process is utterly broken — and it’s not CW editor’s Tom Brevoort’s fault. The problem is an overall stupid, unrealistic, untentable, unethical practice of not giving any penciller sufficient lead time to complete enough issues before solicition of the first issue that the book will have maintained its monthly schedule by the last issue (in the case of a miniseries like CW) or by the last issue by that artist of a continuing series (in the case of a delay-plagued regular book like the Ultimates. The delays are ridiculous and both publishers do it, to the extent that if Niven can only turn out a book of this high quality at a rate of six weeks per issue, then CW #1 shouldn’t have been solicited until #4 was entirely in the can, pencils, inks, lettering and all. McNiven needed at least three or four mroe months of lead time and he didn’t get it because at Marvel, like at DC, the tail of marketing wags the dog of publishing. That’s GOT to stop — NOW.

OTOH, damning-with-faint-praise goes to Brevoort for admitting that the worst case scenario has happened and he’s gone with the most severe delays and reschdules possible due to the controversy. Yes, we have to wait one more month for #4 and thereafter, the rest of the series comes out every other month, with the corresponding tie-in issues correspondingly late, but at least he’s telling the truth rather than lying the way that Todd MacFarlane did by refusing to cancel the orders for over a year’s worth of Spawn until either Eric or Jim told him to knock it off. Breevort’s choice is IMO the best one given that the bad situation exists. We know that CW is now on a more leisurely schedule, that’s fine with me *because* Brevoort and Marvel were so up front about it in the first place. Finally, the honest delays in this book likely won’t hurt it much *because* McNiven is so popular an artist — but also and more importantly, Marvel were so honest to the fans.

For once.

It’s quite refreshing, really.

The Marvel Month-to-Month Sales July 2006 by Paul O’Brien has been posted at THE BEAT. According to Paul “July was an extremely good month for Marvel, mostly thanks to CIVIL WAR. “…

Apparently HEROES FOR HIRE has already sold out its first printing. Amazing what the Civil War trade dress can do for sales.

Paul is correct.

sorry missed that it should read:

Where exactly is Spotlighta selling, Ive never seen a TPB of if and I can’t imagine it being sold in Wal Mart

Um… no, no, it wasn’t. You’re thinking of August. I’m writing about July.