feminist_thor_sales

Fusion’s Danielle Henderson runs some numbers and shows that New feminist Thor is totally outselling old Thor. Of course, we know all about first issue bump, standard attrition and all that, but obviously the book launched with a high degree of interest.

Our own Xavier Lancel wrote that “It’s still a little too early to tell where this one is gonna go but its sales level is quite high so far. I would have expected a sales bump with this male VS female Thor issue. Did you check how awesome this male Thor by Russel Dauterman on the cover is? Big nipples, hairy chest, it was time for Thor to enter the realm of masculine hairy guys!”

Which really gets to the heart of the matter.

I see some of the gufflegobbers out there are using Lady Thor as an example of how the wimmens have ruined the masculine hairy guys of comics. If only these ceaseless watchdogs of objective thinking had been around when the Hulk was grey—can you imagine the horrors we’d have been spared?

9 COMMENTS

  1. Its almost impossible to directly compare the two due to so many variances. The biggest problem are the variant chase covers which inflate numbers. Ignoring the regular covers, here’s how it breaks down:

    Th:GoT 1 – 6 variants + 1 2nd printing
    Thor 1 – 12 variants plus a 2-4th printing.
    Th:GoT 2 – 1 variant plus 2nd printing
    Thor 2 – 3 variants plus 2nd and 3rd printing
    Th:GoT 3 – 1 variant plus 2nd printing
    Thor 3 – 1 variant
    Th:GoT 4 – 1 variant plus 2nd printing
    Thor 4 – 1 variant
    Th:GoT 5 -1 variant plus 2nd printing
    Thor 5 – 1 variant
    Th:GoT 6 – 0 variants plus 2nd printing
    Thor 6 – 2 variants

    The new Thor has had way more variants which artificially inflates the numbers. We have no idea how many books are sitting on racks that were ordered to get the variants. Marvel is also notorious for requiring a retailer to order a certain percentage over another book’s order to be eligible to get some variants. There were also retailer chain exclusive covers for the new Thor that would have required a substancial order number to get, likely in the thousands to be cost effective.

    Also, what can we make of the reprint numbers? Are those included? While the new Thor went back to print more times in the beginning, GoT has had more second prints overall. Does that mean retailers underestimated GoT’s popularity and had to reorder more? How do you factor in the media hype? How do we know how many people bought the book as a speculator to flip, and therefore don’t care about the female Thor?

    There are so many variables that make this impossible to gauge. I say if you like it, great. If not, the old Thor will be back eventually, so find something else to read in the meantime.

  2. The new Thor series got a massive amount of publicity and it’s selling very well. Ms. Marvel got a fair amount of publicity and it’s selling fairly well. Electra, Black Widow, She-Hulk, and Captain Marvel got very little publicity and they’re selling poorly. People keep trying to make this about gender, but the simple fact is that books which receive heavy promotion (Spider-Gwen) tend to sell a lot better than the books that don’t (Storm).

  3. Brian Hibbs: Can you not assume it will do about the same as Thor? It’s the same writer, and will hopefully continue plots from the current book.

  4. I would say no. I’ve heard a few people around the local shop that are sitting it out and waiting to see what’s left after. Some people who are reading the new Thor don’t care about the other ones, and some the read the old one don’t care about the new one. In some ways, the series is alienating both groups.

  5. This isn’t much of an analysis. Literally any relaunch of Thor should do this. If you can’t have the first three issues of a new series outsell the last three of another then you are doing something terribly wrong.

  6. @Rando Calrissian Except that’s not what’s getting compared. #1 – #5 are compared, from both series. Still many unknowns (like the mentioned variants, overall size of market etc. pp.), but it’s not apples to oranges like comparing #25 of GoT to a #1 of Thor.

  7. Does this analysis also factor in relative popularity of creators?

    Does it account for differences in advertising?

    Mainstream news publicity? I don’t remember Man-thor #1 getting appearances on the Daily Show or the New York Times.

    Don’t get started on the variants, as another commenter already figured out in detail.

    None of the above? Well who cares! It promotes our agenda so lazy work is good enough and every comics site is already quoting this study without thinking too hard about it. If you think too hard you’re a misogynist!

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