Comics

The month of December was dripping with excitement at DC Comics, as the publisher's comic-book line shivered on the brink of a new year of bold opportunities and potential tours de force. DC's œuvre held strong and even grew slightly in total unit sales versus November, as the publisher thrust into an already booming direct market with stiff opposition its new DC Universe title JUSTICE LEAGUE 3000. The Vertigo imprint, alas, which added DEAD BOY DETECTIVES to its arousing line-up in December, continued its refractory period in-between new issues of THE SANDMAN, the second and next of which shall find release no sooner than February.

By Bruce Lidl Indie comics publisher Top Shelf announced yesterday that they will be selling a selection of their digital titles, without any DRM copy...

Marvel continues its sneaky move towards more interesting, quirky takes on its heroes with ALL-NEW GHOST RIDER #1 by Felipe Smith and Tradd Moore,...

Here. It's hard to say what I love the most about this image. The Eltingville Club #1, first of two issues wrapping up heir...

Ike Perlmutter, billionaire, CEO of Marvel and one of Disney's largest stockholders, is probably the most feared man in comics. A mysterious and powerful...

The Great Sundering, aka Fox's Marvel movie line, has announced the cast for their Fantastic Four reboot, to be directed by Josh Trank and...

A new mini series by Jason Aaron and Mike Deodato will be the "ultimate NSA leak" of Marvel, says Tom Brevoort. The body of the Watcher is found on the moon with his eye missing. I'm pretty much sold right there, but more information is being given out RIGHT NOW at a Marvel press conference.

David Brothers is one of the most accomplished writers-about-comics around, a blogger who recently moved into the industry himself as a member of the...

“Culture seeks narrators and fiction is a narrative prerogative.” This quote is supplemented above a two image spread, each featuring brushstrokes of a blackened sea...

I admit I watched this trailer twice in a row, even though the best parts were in the footage floating around. Finally, a character...

Or at least that's what a a wraparound ad on this week's Publishers Weekly states. (The ad in itself is a bold, pricey buy.) The...

By Paul O'Brien

[Editor's Note: As noted this is Paul's last column for now. He's been an incredible collaborator and commentator, and I think we all owe him a big round of applause! And yes I know these are late -- we'll have the new guys in place VERY shortly! Thanks again, Paul.] And so the end of an era is upon us. No, I do not speak of the latest cancellation of DEFENDERS, nor even of the final OZ miniseries. As Heidi explained a little while back, this will be my final sales column, after over a decade of writing these things. Good luck to whoever takes over for this; I'll be reading with interest, and with a sense of relief that I didn't have to do the number crunching. So. One last time! December sees a barrage of Inhumanity tie-ins, all building to the launch of the new series that's since been delayed. We also have the start of ORIGIN II, and the first of the Marvel Now Wave 2 titles. As per usual, Marvel had the largest share of the North American direct market, leading DC by 37% to 31% in unit terms, and 35% to 28% in dollars. Thanks as always to ICV2.com for permission to use these figures.

1.  ORIGIN II
12/13  Origin II #1 of 5 - 131,724

Books set in the past and with no direct impact on present day continuity generally seem to be a tough sell. But ORIGIN II is the top seller of the month, presumably because Marvel have successfully portrayed it as an event - in the sense of a book fans will be talking about.