Publishers

If you didn't hear about it, the Ghost Rider sequel film, "Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance" debuted this weekend. It also didn't finish where the experts thought it would. Initial estimates have it in the #3 slot behind Safe House and The Vow.

IDW has hired a new marketing and PR person, namely John Schork, who has joined the company as Associate Manager, Marketing and Public Relations. The position opened up when AnnaMaria White left to start her own PR company. Schork was formerly an assistant editor at Dark Horse. In his new position he'll work with IDW's Director of Marketing Dirk Wood and Marketing Coordinator Chloe Zuanich on industry outreach and social media.

Uh, uh, looks like maybe Dynamite should have entitled its Barsoomian comics "Master of the Male Wedgie" and not Dejah Thoris and so on, because ERB, Inc., the family-owned corporation which controls existing trademarks to the Edgar Rice Burroughs estate, is suing Dynamite, Dynamic Forces, and Savage Tales Entertainment for trademark infringement and unfair competition over Dynamite's publication of books entitled "Lord of the Jungle," "Warlord of Mars," "Warlord of Mars: Dejah Thoris", and "Warlord of Mars: Fall of Barsoom" based on the Edgar Rice Burroughs originals.

Sam Humphries is going to the ultimate ultimate with ULTIMATE COMICS: ULTIMATES. We are really just posting this as a shout out to long time Beat pal Sam Humphries, who will be co-writing the book with Jonathan Hickman starting with issue #10; Luke Ross is the interior artist. Humphries has been at the writing game for a few years, but he's finally about to blow up, with a ton of new assignments.

Dynamite has passed along the covers to GAME OF THRONES #6 and Jim Butcher's Dresden Files FOOL MOON #3. Both issues go on sale in May.

Although we're used to those strategic "print run sellout" press releases coming from publishers at a steady clip, it's less often that comics publishers tout topping the BookScan sales chart, which tracks sales in bookstores, and other non DM outlets, for the week. However, Dark Horse notes that Avatar: The Last Airbender—The Promise Part 1 "soared" to the top of the BookScan chart last week. This is the Gene Luen Yang-penned bridging story between the popular TV show and the eagerly awaited sequel, Legend of Korra. The art is by the Japanese team Gurihiru.

With The Shadow already scheduled Dynamite is now scheduling their second pulp adaptation, The Spider. The Spider was effectively The Shadow's nastier little brother. Originally created to tap into the popularity of the Shadow's pulp magazine, The Spider amped up the Shadow's format: more violent, more lurid, wider-ranging schemes from the villains, more outright "weirdness" in the "Weird Tales" sense of "weird." The other major difference was that The Spider had a more streamlined backstory: only one identity and a much smaller circle of sidekicks/assistance.

With less than a month to the premiere of JOHN CARTER, Disney is releasing all kinds of new goodies, to try to explain why you should see this.

. Here's the second part of February's preview.  There's some unusual titles here (including a publisher of religious graphic novels), some which don't seem to...

We've never been able to hide our adoration of Jason's time travel tale I KILLED ADOLF HITLER, and we're far from alone in this regard. Fantagraphics has just announced that Studio Eight in association with Up Country Productions has optioned the film rights to the book. Jamie and Alex Brown of Studio Eight have previously produced LAND OF THE BLIND and CAPTURED. They've tapped screenwriter D.C. Walker of Up Country Productions for the script.

Well, speak of the devil. As we posted only a few hours ago, Marvel is in a very vulnerable PR position on the Gary Friedrich matter...so much so that they have sent both CCO Joe Quesada and publisher Dan Buckley to clarify and soothe at Comic Book Resources. As they point out, the matter is still under litigation and a settlement is being negotiated. Buckley and Quesada do a good job of trying to handle the negatives—they're pros—especially with this:

You can be sympathetic to Gary Friedrich's current situation—older, broke and in bad health—while still being alarmed over all the issues his court case has raised. My own email and IMs are full of variant views on it. So let's trace the evolution of this a bit.