Superman January 2019 Solicitation

[Armor of God]

Bendis-I like Jon! Don't worry!
*sends him off to space ASAP to age jump him almost immediately while canceling Super Sons*
Me- Yeah, this kind of thing rarely ends well.

I get people are "liking" Bendis' take on Superman. I get people wanted Young Justice back (though bringing back things of the 90s best LEFT in the 90s is something else entirely). But the more of these solicitations I see, the more of his work I read, the less and less excited I get for his work.

Same here, I have no clue why on one hand Tomasi was criticized for using Batman but Bendis just goes ahead and uses Batman Incorporated villains in his Action Comics while also likely tying a bunch of Bat books to his event. Can the editorial please put a leash on this man? Its bad enough that crossovers interrupt books now we have to worry crossovers and Bendis crossovers.

[bigstupidjellyfish]

Yeah. During the last year or so Dan Jurgens was writing SUPERMAN. Mid 98-99 I believe. I remember absolutely loving his work.

Oh, well that was way before I got into comics lol. I was in Pre-K in 1999-2000, couldn’t even read.

I know how beautiful his work is now, however, and that excites me.

[Miles To Go]

I get people are "liking" Bendis' take on Superman.

Must we put the word "like" in Doctor Evil quote marks? It makes it sound like you don't believe people are being sincere about their enjoyment.

I'm just as cautious as you are, but I do definitely trust Bendis, and people are getting something out of his books that Rebirth didn't quite manage for them. We can't all be satisfied at the end of the day, but it's nice to have less to complain about from both sides of the fence these days.

[DragonPiece]

Bendis-I like Jon! Don't worry!
*sends him off to space ASAP to age jump him almost immediately while canceling Super Sons*
Me- Yeah, this kind of thing rarely ends well.

I get people are "liking" Bendis' take on Superman. I get people wanted Young Justice back (though bringing back things of the 90s best LEFT in the 90s is something else entirely). But the more of these solicitations I see, the more of his work I read, the less and less excited I get for his work.

He didn't cancel super sons though, that book is still going and Tomasi said if sales are good, he can keep doing the series in mini series format.

I geuinely think if Bendis didn't come onto these titles, the superman line would be in even worse shape than it is now. Lets look at facts

1. A lot of editorial does not like the marriage between Lois and Clark. While Bendis separated them, if another writer came in, it's very likely they would have been forced to divorce them.
2.Bendis could have also just straight up wrote jon out permanently, but he didn't do that either.

[Miles To Go]

A lot of editorial does not like the marriage between Lois and Clark. While Bendis separated them, if another writer came in, it's very likely they would have been forced to divorce them.

Marriage drama with Lois and Clark was going to happen whether Bendis was involved in it or not according to the solicitations for volumes that still promoted Dan Jurgens as writer before he was taken off the book to make way for Bendis.

We still don't know what kind of relationship Lois and Clark will have going forward until next week's Action Comics, all we have are buzz words like "they'll be a modern family" and "there's a little bit of a reset". The Kents might not go through a divorce, but what good is the marriage if the idea we all fear Bendis is going with is that Lois will reveal herself to be Superman's girlfriend and her relationship with Clark was simply arranged to provide a smokescreen for Jon's upbringing?

[Jackalope89]

He didn't cancel super sons though, that book is still going and Tomasi said if sales are good, he can keep doing the series in mini series format.

The current series is only a mini, unlike the previous, and it takes place in the past. The main WAS canceled.

I geuinely think if Bendis didn't come onto these titles, the superman line would be in even worse shape than it is now. Lets look at facts

That's opinion. Not fact.

1. A lot of editorial does not like the marriage between Lois and Clark. While Bendis separated them, if another writer came in, it's very likely they would have been forced to divorce them.

A lot of talk already of Lois and Clark being a smokescreen for Lois and Superman anyway.

2.Bendis could have also just straight up wrote jon out permanently, but he didn't do that either.

Yeah, because Bendis wasn't already doing a 180 degree shift on Jon's character anyway, at the ripe old age of 10.
Bendis Jon- Angsty 10 year old with confidence issues.
Super Sons Jon- Happy and confident 10 year old.

[Armor of God]

Previously we had 2 twice monthly shipping ongoings and 4 other ongoings though Superwoman was admittedly cancelled eventually.

Now we have 3 monthly ongoings and a limited series. Both the main books are by Bendis while Supergirl is using Bendis's plot.
Quantiatively and creatively the Superline is much worse off and sales aren't anything special either.

[Vordan]

The line was floundering before Bendis though. Superwoman and Supergirl were cancelled. Tomasi and Gleason were struggling to keep up with the schedule, and the summer of filler had rapidly sunk sales. Jurgens Action was boring to me personally but it did stabilize, but the sales still weren’t spectacular. Like it or not the line feels like it’s got a goal it’s moving towards whereas before it was just running in circles.

[Truman Burbank]

Previously we had 2 twice monthly shipping ongoings and 4 other ongoings though Superwoman was admittedly cancelled eventually.

Now we have 3 monthly ongoings and a limited series. Both the main books are by Bendis while Supergirl is using Bendis's plot.
Quantiatively and creatively the Superline is much worse off and sales aren't anything special either.

Sales are dropping like a rock. The books got the relaunch boost, but Bendis's Superman 3 sold just about half of what his Superman 1 did. Action already dropped back to under 60K. They drop too much more (like, say, from poorly-received reveals in upcoming issues), and things could get real interesting real quick with the Super-line.

[Sacred Knight]

I don't get why people keep bagging on Bendis for Super Sons getting canceled. If you want to be mad at something, be mad at its lagging sales. Maybe Bendis doesn't get that part of his pitch if the book was still doing really well. But it dropped hard, just like most titles in the Super-line tend to do. Not even Damian's presence stopped it. Bendis had a pitch, obviously DC thought it was worth it as that book was middling in the first place. That trend continues even now, as #2 of the new maxi series dropped like a ton of bricks compared to the #1 sales. This is life in the Superman line of books and has been for a long time. And the new Superboy did not change that.

[Vordan]

Sales are dropping like a rock. The books got the relaunch boost, but Bendis's Superman 3 sold just about half of what his Superman 1 did. Action already dropped back to under 60K. They drop too much more (like, say, from poorly-received reveals in upcoming issues), and things could get real interesting real quick with the Super-line.

Correct. Digitally though it’s doing much better than Tomasi/Jurgens did. And I’m betting DC wants to see how Bendis does in the trades. Rebirth sold worse trade-wise than New 52 did. Might be they’re hoping for a reversal of that now.

[Truman Burbank]

Correct. Digitally though it’s doing much better than Tomasi/Jurgens did. And I’m betting DC wants to see how Bendis does in the trades. Rebirth sold worse trade-wise than New 52 did. Might be they’re hoping for a reversal of that now.

I'd be curious to see the digital numbers.

Trades will help, but they won't make up for bad economics with single issues. Sales leveled out before the relaunch at about 40K an issue for Action and Superman - but with the double-shipping, that meant about 80K books sold per month. Bendis is helped with the price hike, but the monthly schedule means single issues now have to sell 60K to keep the money the same for DC. That's going to be very difficult to maintain.

[HeroVladimir93]

Sometimes, I think Superman would do much better economically if DC stopped publishing monthly issues and instead focused on trades and graphic novels. Then again, it might backfire in the long run.

[Myskin]

The mere idea that Bendis cancelled a series written by another creator to get rid of one character is surreal to say the least.
And it is really telling about a certain type of fandom.

[Sacred Knight]

He's not, and never did, get rid of anyone. The numerous times Lex Luthor is put on the backburner to do other things and then build something with him back up was never getting rid of him. Same exact concept here.

I mean hey if he kills Jon off in #8 or jettisons him off again to hybrid Kryptonian school or something, okay, then there will be some tangible evidence that he has no desire to use him. But what we have now, with it publicly transparent from the day the last issue of MOS came out that he was returning, its an extreme reach to claim he's out to bury the character.