Official : Bendis gets both books

[Armor of God]

This isn't the first time Lois has left the Planet. Won't be the last either. Lois isn't being replaced any more than Ron Troupe replaced Clark. Whatever drama is going on that lead to Lois leaving the Planet, it'll be resolved and she'll be back to work before we know it.

Its about good will, there's not much of it in various quarters as far as Bendis is concerned.

[Ra-El]

Are people really throwing a fit over this?

Krypton having an imperialist past is nothing new. That song has been sung a few times. Hell, given how messed up continuity is right now, are we even sure this *is* a retcon?

And even if it is, that's nothing compared to the changes Rebirth made. Dumped most of the New52, but not all. Brought in a lot of post-Crisis, but not all. Brought in a few pre-Crisis elements, but not all. Even brought in some completely new facets that completely change everything anyway.

At this point, DC in general and Superman in particular don't have continuity. There's a vague idea of things that might've happened, in some form or fashion at some point but certainly not the way we remember.

If all Bendis did was bring back the idea of Krypton having a space-faring past? Pfft. That doesn't even register as a retcon these days.

I like this idea. Something that always bothered me is how a race advanced as Krypton didn't have space travel. But perhaps with the fall of their empire they were for a better word, imprisoned on one of the few places where they wouldn't have powers, Krypton. Then a taboo was established forbidding space travel so they couldn't expande and conquer other planets again.

[Sacred Knight]

Lois and Clark was not even a secondary but a tertiary book featuring different versions of Superman and Lois while DC was still publishing Superman & Action and hyping up the arcs written there.

MOS is coming with a lot of hype, its been heavily marketed, its got Bendis and top draw artists. Its the only Superman book running in June and it has put the entire status quo of Superman books on the line. This book should be big. There's no excuse.

L&C was hugely hyped despite it, at least as far as people knew at the time, not intended to be the "main" Superman, because it was a book for the vocal post-Crisis fans at the time and they marketed it towards them. As hyped as this? No. But it was hyped (and in retrospect just as relevant, even if we didn't quite know how much at the time). So its one example of a Superman mini not doing all that well. In fact, when the Rebirth details were revealed and those very same versions of the characters and status quo jumped to the main books, you got a jump. Which again serves to reinforce the main point that you get bigger boosts once things translate to the main books over the mini in such a situation.

Its disappointing either way, if DC is disappointed than of course that's not the best news in the world. But the reality is what the reality is when it comes to Superman and his popularity or lack thereof these days. I'm not apologizing for poor performance. But there's always reasons. This could very well be one of them. Could a wariness of Bendis be another? Perhaps. I'm not a Marvel reader and I haven't been a Bendis reader before this, I don't know how deep the resentment on their end goes nor can I quantify how that would translate to DC readers.

[manofsteel1979]

I think there is many reasons why sales for MOS seem to be underwhelming. It's indeed possible that there is a weariness of Bendis from many readers and they are either doing a wait and see approach or are staying away altogether.

There may be a few that are not picking up the mini out of protest for losing Jurgens and Tomasi from the books because they were generally happy with the Reborn direction and are upset its seemingly being upended for the sake of another superstar hotshot.


It's even possible as others have said it could be in part because mini series generally get overlooked in favor of the main books and some readers don't realize MOS is the real start of Bendis run.

I think the biggest factor though may be the worst one...apathy. Apathy from comics buyers who have written off Superman in general, and yes, apathy among Superman fandom over the latest " new exciting direction!" hype train that seems to keep showing up with greater and greater frequency. Honestly you can't blame people who have heard and seen so many restarts and relaunches for Superman in the last 10,20 and 30 years to roll their eyes and scoff. It's possible DC has cried wolf so many times, a sizable portion of the readers and potential readers just ignore it. If so thats a big problem. One that Bendis will have to work hard to overcome. It may be an unfair burden for him, because that apathy is not his fault.

[Ascended]

Its about good will, there's not much of it in various quarters as far as Bendis is concerned.

Not only Bendis; but DC and Superman as well.

Consider the last seven years; New52, Convergence, Lois&Clark, Rebirth, Reborn, Bendis.......reboots followed by reboots, status quo changes followed by status quo changes......we here are among the most zealous Super-fans around and even most of us seem to have run out steam. If we're losing interest and becoming apathetic (as manofsteel said) imagine how the average fan feels. Bendis is a controversial writer, but I suspect we'd be looking at similar results no matter who was writing.

Except Morrison. I think Morrison coming back would still generate big sales. But he's become THE Superman writer of the modern era.

I think the biggest factor though may be the worst one...apathy. Apathy from comics buyers who have written off Superman in general, and yes, apathy among Superman fandom over the latest " new exciting direction!" hype train that seems to keep showing up with greater and greater frequency. Honestly you can't blame people who have heard and seen so many restarts and relaunches for Superman in the last 10,20 and 30 years to roll their eyes and scoff. It's possible DC has cried wolf so many times, a sizable portion of the readers and potential readers just ignore it. If so thats a big problem. One that Bendis will have to work hard to overcome. It may be an unfair burden for him, because that apathy is not his fault.

All of this. DC has screwed this property up, rebooted it, changed its direction, so many times in recent decades there's no reason for anyone to get excited or invested anymore; whatever happens will just be undone in a few months anyway so why bother?

[RepHope]

Interesting story regarding MOS. Thoughts?

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2018/05/...mics-expected/

This would not surprise me. DC made the mistake of thinking Bendis is still thought of as "the guy who wrote Ultimate Spider-Man". That's not how he's viewed nowadays, and hasn't been for a long time. Bendis is blamed for Marvel's failures rather than credited for Marvel's successes. People complain about his dialogue, his decompression, his love for diversity (they can &%$# off for that one), and his last two terrible events (CWII and AoU). Bendis has not been a powerhouse sales-wise for a while now, and he's got a ton of nay-sayers bad-mouthing him. I guess we'll see how this plays out, I hope he can win over people, but starting with an extremely generic villain probably isn't going to help his case, even though I think his post Man of Steel work shows promise.

[RepHope]

L&C was hugely hyped despite it, at least as far as people knew at the time, not intended to be the "main" Superman, because it was a book for the vocal post-Crisis fans at the time and they marketed it towards them. As hyped as this? No. But it was hyped (and in retrospect just as relevant, even if we didn't quite know how much at the time). So its one example of a Superman mini not doing all that well. In fact, when the Rebirth details were revealed and those very same versions of the characters and status quo jumped to the main books, you got a jump. Which again serves to reinforce the main point that you get bigger boosts once things translate to the main books over the mini in such a situation.

Its disappointing either way, if DC is disappointed than of course that's not the best news in the world. But the reality is what the reality is when it comes to Superman and his popularity or lack thereof these days. I'm not apologizing for poor performance. But there's always reasons. This could very well be one of them. Could a wariness of Bendis be another? Perhaps. I'm not a Marvel reader and I haven't been a Bendis reader before this, I don't know how deep the resentment on their end goes nor can I quantify how that would translate to DC readers.

Oh man do you guys not really know much about Bendis? To give you some perspective, people over in the Marvel sub-forums were celebrating when it was announced he had left. Bendis is not popular over there, partly because of how he mishandled the last two events he wrote. He also is not the big seller he used to be, his Defenders and Moon Knight didn't sell very well.

Bendis is mostly viewed as a burn-out over on the Marvel side, a guy whose best years are behind him. That's not to say he doesn't have a fanbase, but he made a lot of enemies with his GotG and X-Men runs (which were both... not good imo). I'm excited for his run but even I'll admit this mini sounds weak, and the main villain seems generic, although the inclusion of Kara is a huge plus in my book.

[Sacred Knight]

More now than I did a few months ago, only because reading up suddenly became relevant to me with his arrival on Superman. But I haven't read Marvel in over a decade, so his heyday, and the ensuing burn-out, pretty much passed me by. I knew of him, just didn't play much attention other than that.

[RepHope]

More now than I did a few months ago, only because reading up suddenly became relevant to me with his arrival on Superman. But I haven't read Marvel in over a decade, so his heyday, and the ensuing burn-out, pretty much passed me by. I knew of him, just didn't play much attention other than that.

Might be a bit off-topic but what have you read and what did you think of it?

This whole mini is DC wanting to recreate the Byrne Man of Steel, but failing to take into account both the goodwill that Tomasi/Jurgens had accumulated and the ill-will Bendis had accumulated over at Marvel. Byrne was a hot creator when he made the jump, whereas Bendis has more people talking about how they hope he has his own "Rebirth". Of course this could also all be Rich talking bull, so who knows? Regardless I hope they stick with it, the last thing we need is a repeat of New Krypton where they got cold feet and went scorched earth and hard reset.

[Sacred Knight]

TBH what I checked out most was older Ultimate Spider-Man because Spider-Man appeals to me. I liked it, however that's what's generally considered good, right? I haven't touched the stuff most notably called out as bad (I've heard what he's done with Sentry, and then your examples). So I guess what I have checked out rather defeats the purpose in a sense. I guess its hard to work up the motivation to read stuff that has bad reputations, ha. I am hopeful that, if he was in a rut at Marvel, the change of scenery will help with the creativity.

[Kuwagaton]

Lois and Clark was not even a secondary but a tertiary book featuring different versions of Superman and Lois while DC was still publishing Superman & Action and hyping up the arcs written there.

MOS is coming with a lot of hype, its been heavily marketed, its got Bendis and top draw artists. Its the only Superman book running in June and it has put the entire status quo of Superman books on the line. This book should be big. There's no excuse.

Funny enough, L&C started the same time Bendis launched Iron Man.

34 43 Convergence Superman 2 $3.99 DC 46,900

1 2 Invincible Iron Man 1 $3.99 Marvel 279,514
64 66 Superman Lois and Clark 1 $3.99 DC 35,009

27 30 Invincible Iron Man 9 $3.99 Marvel 49,334
104 101 Superman Lois and Clark 8 $3.99 DC 18,284

1 1 Civil War II 1 $5.99 Marvel 381,737
8 10 Superman Rebirth 1* $2.99 DC 118,434
10 13 Superman 1* $2.99 DC 105,380
26 40 Action Comics 957* $2.99 DC 75,349

There's not really an excuse for the middling performance of L&C, when the Convergence two parter was rather popular and it was revealed before the story ended that he would be the main Superman going forward. You had an existing character being killed off and replaced by a lead doing 20k estimates in sales, looked pretty bad. But despite implication that's not really true to how things went.

I think there is many reasons why sales for MOS seem to be underwhelming. It's indeed possible that there is a weariness of Bendis from many readers and they are either doing a wait and see approach or are staying away altogether.

It's not even sales yet. Like those Iron Man estimates above are what Marvel will tout, because having a huge amount ordered and going out to retailers gives a much better chance of success. But huge order comics rarely sell out at the retail level the way Action #1000 did and estimate far less than half in just months. DC may have expecting MoS to track for 80-100k and it may just be more like 60-70k. If there's a decent consensus of liking what he puts down we can definitely see big numbers after the mini series.

[Sacred Knight]

It's not even sales yet. Like those Iron Man estimates above are what Marvel will tout, because having a huge amount ordered and going out to retailers gives a much better chance of success. But huge order comics rarely sell out at the retail level the way Action #1000 did. DC may have expecting MoS to track for 80-100k and it may just be more like 60-70k. If there's a decent consensus of liking what he puts down we can definitely see big numbers after the mini series.

Good point. We're being a little reactionary.

[RepHope]

TBH what I checked out most was older Ultimate Spider-Man because Spider-Man appeals to me. I liked it, however that's what's generally considered good, right? I haven't touched the stuff most notably called out as bad (I've heard what he's done with Sentry, and then your examples). So I guess what I have checked out rather defeats the purpose in a sense. I guess its hard to work up the motivation to read stuff that has bad reputations, ha. I am hopeful that, if he was in a rut at Marvel, the change of scenery will help with the creativity.

Yeah his Ultimate Spider-Man, Daredevil, and Alias books are considered his best work, and are also stuff he created at the start of his career. It's his more recent stuff that's angered people, although his Avengers both made people furious and sold a ton. He's the one who made Wolverine and Spidey Avengers.

[SanityOrMadness]

I think the key point in Rich's post was (bolded):

However, I have been tipped off by DC editorial sources that the numbers that DC Comics received were a lot lower than expected. A lot lower. Less than you might expect for a new Superman title relaunching the character with A-List talent and spinning out of Action Comics #1001 and DC Nation #0 and more like – well, a newly launching Brian Bendis title at Marvel, without the tiered variants.

Basically saying "it's selling what you would expect a 2017/18 Bendis comic to sell", whereas DC may have been expecting more like 2007/08 Bendis when they greased his palm...

It's not even sales yet. Like those Iron Man estimates above are what Marvel will tout, because having a huge amount ordered and going out to retailers gives a much better chance of success. But huge order comics rarely sell out at the retail level the way Action #1000 did and estimate far less than half in just months. DC may have expecting MoS to track for 80-100k and it may just be more like 60-70k. If there's a decent consensus of liking what he puts down we can definitely see big numbers after the mini series.

There's no way DC were expecting MoS #1 to track sub-100k.

For one thing, despite your last sentence, it's the rare exception that sales actually grow - both Superman & Action are likely to be de facto capped at the orders MoS gets.

For a second, they're not shoving out "BENDIS IS COMING!" ads for literally months on end just to see a launch lower than the *normal* sales of Batman - MoS #1 has to be one of DC's biggest issues of the year (not AC #1000 big, but still Event Big, comparing to the likes of Doomsday Clock & Metal) to justify the level of promotion they're giving it, when allowing that it will basically be downhill from there.

And third, both Superman & Action are dropping to monthly as part of the relaunch (not to mention the cancellations of Super-Sons, Supergirl and New Super-Man), and I doubt Bendis is on a lower writing page rate than Tomasi/Gleason or Jurgens. It's too crude to say it needs to sell twice as much per issue to justify it, but it certainly needs to be waaaay ahead of where the prior runs were to stand still from a profit standpoint, and they were both in the 40-50k band. A settled level 60-70k is unlikely to be enough, never mind a launch.

[JasonTodd428]

I think there is many reasons why sales for MOS seem to be underwhelming. It's indeed possible that there is a weariness of Bendis from many readers and they are either doing a wait and see approach or are staying away altogether.

There may be a few that are not picking up the mini out of protest for losing Jurgens and Tomasi from the books because they were generally happy with the Reborn direction and are upset its seemingly being upended for the sake of another superstar hotshot.


It's even possible as others have said it could be in part because mini series generally get overlooked in favor of the main books and some readers don't realize MOS is the real start of Bendis run.

I think the biggest factor though may be the worst one...apathy. Apathy from comics buyers who have written off Superman in general, and yes, apathy among Superman fandom over the latest " new exciting direction!" hype train that seems to keep showing up with greater and greater frequency. Honestly you can't blame people who have heard and seen so many restarts and relaunches for Superman in the last 10,20 and 30 years to roll their eyes and scoff. It's possible DC has cried wolf so many times, a sizable portion of the readers and potential readers just ignore it. If so thats a big problem. One that Bendis will have to work hard to overcome. It may be an unfair burden for him, because that apathy is not his fault.

I'm not entirely in agreement with you that apathy with Superman is the biggest issue though I do agree that is a part of the problem here as are other things you and others have mentioned. I feel that its Bendis apathy that is the bigger problem. Bendis may be a "big name" but he hasn't been a big seller for Marvel in recent years and that coupled several recent instances of grossly mishandling characters and their continuity, and some poorly handled events has made readers reluctant to commit, most especially those of us who were enjoying the Rebirth era titles. I really can't blame retailers for not buying into the hype train connected with Bendis's MoS when he's not been the juggernaut he once was sales-wise and when they are also likely well aware of fans lack of interest in anything he's writing. To be honest I think even a Bendis penned Batman run would sell lower than normal numbers because of how much readers have felt burned by him in the past and that's saying something.