Official : Bendis gets both books

[Ascended]

I'm not a math guy but it seems to be essentially in line with the market. Superman dropped 3,495 copies from December to March, a little over 6%. (It moved up the charts a bit, going from 24 to 21). Batman in contrast dropped 6,812, which about 7.5%. Heroes in Crisis, probably the only book more people online seem to hate more, dropped 5,201 copies from November through March, also about a 6% drop. All seems pretty consistent across the board. Books like Amazing Spider-Man also seem to have dropped about 6% in the same stretch, going from 79,799 to 74,466, again a drop of about 6%. And from what I see, Spencer's run is pretty popular.

Couple of more data points, Green Lantern dropped 16,800 copies from December to March. That's going from issue #2 to #5, so that's the new run drop rather than atrophy. But even then the drop from February to March was about 3150 copies, around 5%. And that's again a really well received book from what I've seen on Twitter and other places. In contrast Superman dropped about 1550 copies or 3% between February and March, from 50,475 to 48,919.

Venom dropped only about 3.5% from December to March, around 2150 copies.

Nice, thanks for doing some of the math!

So yeah, it looks like Bendis' run is holding steady and doing just fine. Bad news for the people who aren't enjoying it but personally Im just happy that Superman is doing well!

[Miles To Go]

To be fair though, people who are enjoying the titles will look at the sales and try to spin things to their liking.

I see it all the time with Marvel sales. Both sides for and against try to make the sales fit their narrative.

[Ascended]

I dont see any spin here. Other than someone pointing to typical sales atrophy and claiming that it indicates the failure of the run, as if no other books lose readers issue to issue.

Are the rankings holding fairly steady? Yes, as far as I know. Is the sales atrophy within the current market average? Seems to be.

That's not spin, that's just data. Some people will try to make it fit their opinion, yes (that's a bad habit people!), but the numbers themselves dont lie and seem pretty clear. Bendis isn't pushing the books into a higher sales bracket but they're not failing. They seem to be, from what I recall, well within the standard range for Superman comics in the modern age.

[Truman Burbank]

I dont see any spin here. Other than someone pointing to typical sales atrophy and claiming that it indicates the failure of the run, as if no other books lose readers issue to issue.

I did no such thing, and I'll thank you not to put words in my mouth.

Here are the sales numbers for the entire Bendis run on the regular books. December to March does look a lot better, since the precipitous drop was from October to November (and in fairness was probably a bigger drop because the October issues had sales-boosting foil variants).

JUL 2018: Superman 1: 133,703; Action 1001: 79,327
AUG 2018: Superman 2: 77,464; Action 1002: 61,916
SEP 2018: Superman 3: 67,405; Action 1003: 57,865
OCT 2018: Superman 4: 67,197; Action 1004: 60,420
NOV 2018: Superman 5: 54,727; Action 1005: 49,149
DEC 2018: Superman 6: 52,414; Action 1006: 46,140
JAN 2019: Superman 7: 50,713; Action 1007: 44,405
FEB 2019: Superman 8: 50,475; Action 1008: 44,084
MAR 2019: Superman 9: 48,919; Action 1009; 43,014

Now, is that in line with market decline? Maybe in places. But is the statement that Bendis has lost readers with every issue except one true? YES. And that is what I said.

[Yoda]

I did no such thing, and I'll thank you not to put words in my mouth.

Here are the sales numbers for the entire Bendis run on the regular books. December to March does look a lot better, since the precipitous drop was from October to November (and in fairness was probably a bigger drop because the October issues had sales-boosting foil variants).

JUL 2018: Superman 1: 133,703; Action 1001: 79,327
AUG 2018: Superman 2: 77,464; Action 1002: 61,916
SEP 2018: Superman 3: 67,405; Action 1003: 57,865
OCT 2018: Superman 4: 67,197; Action 1004: 60,420
NOV 2018: Superman 5: 54,727; Action 1005: 49,149
DEC 2018: Superman 6: 52,414; Action 1006: 46,140
JAN 2019: Superman 7: 50,713; Action 1007: 44,405
FEB 2019: Superman 8: 50,475; Action 1008: 44,084
MAR 2019: Superman 9: 48,919; Action 1009; 43,014

Now, is that in line with market decline? Maybe in places. But is the statement that Bendis has lost readers with every issue except one true? YES. And that is what I said.

Comparing Superman to Green Lantern, it's again almost the same drop. About 59% over the 1st 5 issues. Morrison is a huge name in comics, similar in status to Bendis and that run has been pretty widely acclaimed with none of the controversial elements or pushback that Superman has gotten.

Now I don't know if that holds up across other titles but these two are at least a pretty analogous situation with a big name writer, new #1, and a soft shift in direction.

[stargazer01]

Found this relevant since Bendis used him a bit...Adam Strange is getting his own animated short

https://www.newsarama.com/45078-new-...eath-more.html

Adam Strange is like the biggest Superman fanboy in the show Krypton.

I'm very new to that character.

[Ascended]

I did no such thing, and I'll thank you not to put words in my mouth.

If there was a miscommunication, my bad!

But statements like this

Bendis will blow off criticism because he knows he's not leaving the books until he wants to, no matter how much his sales keep dropping.

and

He's lost readers with every issue of Superman and Action except one. Now, I can grant that part of that is related to the poor market, since the chart positions are roughly the same despite the drops, but he's trending the wrong way.

made it sound (to me) like you were implying he's not keeping afloat in the market and his sales were tanking.

If I misunderstood what you were saying, apologies.

(that said, I do agree that Bendis is on the books until he decides to leave. )

[Ascended]

Morrison is a huge name in comics, similar in status to Bendis

I'd argue that Morrison is actually a bigger name, personally. That might just be my personal bias coloring my perceptions of course; Im a big fan of Morrison (most of the time, he has his clunkers) and not really a fan of Bendis so much as a fan of some of his runs (Daredevil, Ultimate Spidey, Superman....so far). But I think Morrison is actually closer to the Ellis/Moore level than the Bendis/Johns one.

That's just me splitting hairs though, and you're point is still totally valid.

[Yoda]

I'd argue that Morrison is actually a bigger name, personally. That might just be my personal bias coloring my perceptions of course; Im a big fan of Morrison (most of the time, he has his clunkers) and not really a fan of Bendis so much as a fan of some of his runs (Daredevil, Ultimate Spidey, Superman....so far). But I think Morrison is actually closer to the Ellis/Moore level than the Bendis/Johns one.

That's just me splitting hairs though, and you're point is still totally valid.

I'd agree with you on Morrison having a bigger name within comics, and I'm not a fan of a lot of his stuff. I am enjoying Green Lantern at the moment though. Bendis I'd argue is more commercially successful at the moment and definitely has more name recognition outside of comics, with the popularity of Jessica Jones and Miles (Spider-Verse). He's had a bunch of profiles in Time and the NY Times, etc. That may show how little that actually matters for commercial success when it comes to floppies. I think they are comparable in the sense that they both have fanbases that will follow them no matter what, although Bendis has probably as many detractors as he does die-hard fans. Morrison doesn't seem to incite as strong of reactions in fans as Bendis does.

Honestly, the fact that the trajectories were so similar kinda surprised me. It'd be interesting to see if it holds up across some other books/time periods.

And again, definitely not a math guy, so people should feel free to double check my work!

[Yoda]

I am procrastinating, so I plugged this all in and let Google do the math for me. Gotta say I find this kinda interesting. Action seems to have been the steadier book for the first arc and overall is holding it's audience better.

[Ascended]

Wow, go Action.

[Vordan]

I'd agree with you on Morrison having a bigger name within comics, and I'm not a fan of a lot of his stuff. I am enjoying Green Lantern at the moment though. Bendis I'd argue is more commercially successful at the moment and definitely has more name recognition outside of comics, with the popularity of Jessica Jones and Miles (Spider-Verse). He's had a bunch of profiles in Time and the NY Times, etc. That may show how little that actually matters for commercial success when it comes to floppies. I think they are comparable in the sense that they both have fanbases that will follow them no matter what, although Bendis has probably as many detractors as he does die-hard fans. Morrison doesn't seem to incite as strong of reactions in fans as Bendis does.

Honestly, the fact that the trajectories were so similar kinda surprised me. It'd be interesting to see if it holds up across some other books/time periods.

And again, definitely not a math guy, so people should feel free to double check my work!

Part of it is that Morrison’s impact usually isn’t properly appreciated until years later unlike Johns and Bendis who tend to make big splashes with lots of shakeups when they get put on books. And part of it is that as bad as we Superman fans might feel we have it, the GL franchise has arguably had it just as bad if not worse. That franchise has been in severe decline ever since the movie flopped and Johns left. Remember when GL could sustain four ongoings? Look at them now, it’s hard to believe that only ten years ago GL was at its peak.

I am procrastinating, so I plugged this all in and let Google do the math for me. Gotta say I find this kinda interesting. Action seems to have been the steadier book for the first arc and overall is holding it's audience better.

Unsurprising, even Bendis detractors tend to consider it the better of the two, and it doesn’t have as many controversial elements. People tend to rate Red Cloud, the Invisible Mafia, and the undercover stuff higher than Rogal, Teen Jon, and Jor-El understandably.

[Miles To Go]

Unsurprising, even Bendis detractors tend to consider it the better of the two, and it doesn’t have as many controversial elements. People tend to rate Red Cloud, the Invisible Mafia, and the undercover stuff higher than Rogal, Teen Jon, and Jor-El understandably.

Yeah, the only thing people find distasteful about Action is the way Lois and the "modern marriage" is handled by Bendis, though I love how Bendis writes them together in Superman. Lois acts more like a loving human being in that comic, she's fairly robotic and 'cold' in Action

[objectivewatcher2013]

Frankly speaking, Bendis lost me from the beginning when he brought back the trunks. His attempts to "modernize" Lois and Clark marriage while holding on to those outdated trunks feels ridiculous to me. And I could care less about Leviathon.

[Yoda]

Frankly speaking, Bendis lost me from the beginning when he brought back the trunks. His attempts to "modernize" Lois and Clark marriage while holding on to those outdated trunks feels ridiculous to me. And I could care less about Leviathon.

The trunks were Didio.