Marvel

Each year, Marvel SVP of Publishing Tom Brevoort gives a lecture on editing to younger Marvel staffers. At this year's Baltimore Comic-Con, he presented the two-hour talk for the audience, as recounted by Alex Zalben. Although there's definitely some "Marvel Way" in the talk, most of it was the kind of common sense that everyone needs drilled into them. However, it's also a pretty interesting glimpse into the day-to-day thinking behind Marvel's editorial decision making. The whole thing is worth a read, but a few selected excerpts to give the flava:

Here's today's teaser: Dennis Hopeless. Salvador Larroca. December 2012 Paging Robert Langdon! What could this lettering mean?

One of the topics we've all had our eyes on here at Creator Watch 2012 is the Jim Starlin Situation. In brief, as you all know, Thanos was teased as a villain at the end of THE AVENGERS, and the announced Guardians of the Galaxy seems to be setting up some kind of cosmic menace for Marvel's movie universe. And it just so happens that Thanos -- and Gamora, who is a member of the GotG -- were both created by Starlin as part of his run on Warlock. In the case of Thanos, Starlin has posted evidence showing that he created the character prior to working at Marvel. And when asked about the character's appearance in the third highest grossing movie of all time, it turned out that he had been in the dark about it. As if that wasn't ominous enough, a Thanos miniseries to be written by Joe Keatinge was announced with great fanfare and then very hastily canceled, with no reason given, leaving room for all kinds of speculation that the character might be in some kind of ownership tussle.

Time for a new teaser image from Marvel! Your word of the day is "Survive". So just what the ruddy deuce could this one be...

By Steve Morris Pleased with the success of these teasers at the start of Marvel NOW, it looks like Marvel will now be slowly announcing...

By Steve Morris Via that very best of methods: the Dustin Weaver giganti-cover. The covers for issues 1-3 of Jonathan Hickman's Avengers relaunch have been...

By Steve Morris Over on his Tumblr blog, writer Brian Wood has confirmed that his run on adjectiveless X-Men - otherwise known as 'Steve's favourite...

By Steve Morris Subject of one of the most famous X-Men stories ever told and perpetual fear for Jean Grey fans around the World, Marvel...

Marvel has released a couple of variant covers for UNCANNY AVENGERS #1 and #2, and if you like the Scarlet Witch, well, you are very happy right now.

Showing that they were anxious to pass the Hollywood IQ test about spinning off a popular movie into a TV show run by an experienced TV vet who also directed the popular movie, ABC has ordered a pilot for a SHIELD TV show, to be guided by AVENGERS director Joss Whedon, Deadline reports. Whedon will co-write the pilot along with brother Jed Whedon and Maurissa Tancharoen (who is Jed's wife). This is the trio responsible for Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, and other Whedon-verse projects, so get ready to start that letter writing campaign right now.

Via Alyssa Rosenberg: Yahoo’s got an alternate look at what could have been the beginning of The Avengers, and what would have been a striking,...

The AVENGERS VS X-MEN crossover continued to dominate both franchises in July. There are also two new ongoing titles - CAPTAIN MARVEL and X-TREME X-MEN - which unusually launch in the middle of the big crossover. And while Marvel have generally eased off on their miniseries of late, we have two this month - SPACE PUNISHER and INFERNAL MAN-THING. In terms of market share, DC won the month, leading Marvel by 37% to 35% in units and 33% to 32% in dollars. The other big news, of course, is the remarkable sales of WALKING DEAD #100, which topped the charts with an extraordinary estimated sale of over 335,000 - but that's a story for another column. (It also seems like a good opportunity to remind people that these figures only reflect sales to the direct market in North America. Total sales are therefore bound to be higher once you factor in sales through other channels, most obviously to the UK and Europe.)