DC's Dan DiDio Out as Co-Publisher

[Sodam Yat]

However, by that token, maybe some people were upset to learn that, despite the movie telling them otherwise, Captain America, Black Widow, and Hawkeye were actually not founding members of the Avengers.

Certainly. That's all I wanted to know.

[Green Goblin of Sector 2814]

Certainly. That's all I wanted to know.

Lol. That was actually me being facetious. Not many people actually cared about the discrepancy. And if there were any people who were upset, it was actually more likely that they were comic book fans who wanted the original line-up from the comics to be the one in the first movie. That's how it always is: comic fans want the movie to be like the comic. It's rarely, if ever, the other way around.

[Holt]

Regardless of how much the comics have tried to make themselves closer to the movies or TV shows, it's rarely, if ever, actually drawn in a significant amount of new readers. Nobody has actually figured out how to turn movie audiences that love these characters into readers.

[Ascended]

I think the biggest hurdle there is distribution.

Not every movie goer is also an avid reader. Not every movie goer who likes to read is going to be invested enough in superhero films (even if they enjoy them) to want to take that next step to print. But for the ones who do? They'd probably buy comics.....if they could find them. The distribution is too limited. First you have to know that you need a LCS. Then you have to find a LCS near you. And odds are that means an extra stop when you're running errands, possibly across town far from your other stops. And if this movie going fan makes it that far, they're confronted with a high price tag and a slow release schedule. The distribution and production models just no longer work for mass consumption.

We've seen trade sales on the rise the last several years. I suspect most of our hypothetical movie-watching-book-reading-superhero-fans are getting their comics at Books A Million instead of their LCS. And I don't blame them. If I wasn't already a Wednesday Warrior I sure as hell wouldn't start now.

[Lee Stone]

I think the biggest hurdle there is distribution.

Not every movie goer is also an avid reader. Not every movie goer who likes to read is going to be invested enough in superhero films (even if they enjoy them) to want to take that next step to print. But for the ones who do? They'd probably buy comics.....if they could find them. The distribution is too limited. First you have to know that you need a LCS. Then you have to find a LCS near you. And odds are that means an extra stop when you're running errands, possibly across town far from your other stops. And if this movie going fan makes it that far, they're confronted with a high price tag and a slow release schedule. The distribution and production models just no longer work for mass consumption.

We've seen trade sales on the rise the last several years. I suspect most of our hypothetical movie-watching-book-reading-superhero-fans are getting their comics at Books A Million instead of their LCS. And I don't blame them. If I wasn't already a Wednesday Warrior I sure as hell wouldn't start now.

I agree.

My hometown, which had a population of about 19k in the mid-'90s only had one comic shop when I lived there, and it lasted a few years. It was a baseball card shop that added comics when the speculator boom happened around Image and Valiant, and then folded around 1995 or so.

Prior to this, comics could be found in various places. We had several convenience stores that carried comics (three within walking distance of my house), a couple pharmacies that carried comics and a couple grocery stores that carried comics.
And we had a Waldenbooks in the late '80s that carried comics, before our Mall died.

I remember they disappeared from the grocery stores here first.
Then the pharmacies.
Then the spinner racks were gone from the convenience stores. Replaced by a magazine rack that held both comics and magazines.

About the time that the comic shop opened, the local Walmart started carrying comics, but their selection was very limited.
It was typical of our Walmart to expand a department when a new business opened in the town. Then keep it up until the business closed.
But, before I get sidetracked...

Before the one comic shop, comics were everywhere!
Like I mentioned earlier, there were three stores with walking distance from my house that carried comics.
And they all had slightly different selections.
Batman, Superman and Spider-Man would be at all three, but the rest of the comics were pretty much unique to that store.
I remember the Avengers was only sold at one of the pharmacies and I would want to ride with my mom or grandparents so I could try to catch an issue.

The Waldenbooks arrived there around the time of Dark Knight Returns and then left a few year later in 1989 or so. Unfortunately, the Mall was on the other side of town, so I couldn't go there as much as I wanted to.

By the time the comic shop arrived, everything dried up.
All the convenience stores had stopped carrying comics, except for one. And that one slowly phased them out by 1993.

When the card shop turned comic shop closed its doors, we only had a sparse selection at Walmart. About a handful of titles. But they did carry Morrison's JLA when it launched. But they stopped selling comics a year or two after JLA launched. First they moved the comics from the stationary/magazine section to the toys section, then took away the rack and just had them laying on the shelves. Then they were completely gone from my town.

When I went home to visit last month, I discovered they now had a new comic shop that had just opened a few months earlier.
But my hometown went just over two decades with no comics. Two generations of kids not knowing the experience of walking or riding a bike to the nearby store to 'get a soda' or 'get a candy bar' just so they could look at the comics.

There was another comic shop that I did go to once me and my friends were old enough to drive.
The closest one to us, which was just over 50 miles away at a city that still had a mall.
We would go there at least twice a month, with everyone pitching in for gas, mainly to go to the mall.
But if my friend and I hadn't already been reading comics, we would never have bothered to seek out a comic shop while we were there.

If I hadn't had the experiences I had growing up, with comics easily accessible at areas I was already going to on a regular basis, I would not be reading comics today.
And I even grew up with video games and action figures. And movies. And I watched MTV like an addict.
I had no shortage of things to distract me from comics, yet I still read them. Because they were there.
They were both accessible and affordable.
Affordable meaning, they balanced well to the price of a soda and chips or candy bar.
Kinda like going to the gas station and buying an impulse item near the register. Once it goes over $5, hesitation stops you from grabbing it and adding to your purchase.
Of course, prices are another thing altogether.

Kids grow up in their environment.
If something isn't there, something else will fill the void.
Kids that never saw comics in my town never missed them.
Because they didn't know they existed.
And because their innate desire to find something that entertained them or spoke to them had to come from other sources that were available to them.

I think that while the movies have done a lot of good in bringing attention to general audiences that may have never read a comic, there may be an unintentional side-effect in that new readers coming from the movies may see comics as the inferior medium and turn their nose up at them.
"Meh, it's alright, but it would be better as a movie" or "For that price? I'll just watch a movie instead."

On the bright side, libraries have been carrying more trade paperbacks and they're a perfect environment for kids to privately indulge themselves in the comics just like kids used to do when they'd ditch their parents to read the comics on the spinner racks.
We also have digital now, with Hoopla being a free (and legal) source that's carried by most libraries.
However, I'm not sure how many families make a point to promote the library to their children these days.
Especially if the parents themselves don't read.
But then, my parents didn't read. And here I am.

Apologies for rambling.

[sifighter]

Regardless of how much the comics have tried to make themselves closer to the movies or TV shows, it's rarely, if ever, actually drawn in a significant amount of new readers. Nobody has actually figured out how to turn movie audiences that love these characters into readers.

The same thing I keep hearing from podcasts I listen to is that movies and tv, or at least the animated movies and cartoon shows available on direct to dvd and streaming services, should at least run a brief ad with “hey if you liked the Death of Superman movie maybe check out in the comics Superman: Secret Origins or Man of Steel or Batman/Superman and you find them online or potentially at stores near you.”

I mean it would have made some sense for CW’s Crisis on Infinite earth to advertise the Crisis on Infinite Earths Giant comics that were at least a comic adaptation of the CW story to an extent.

[Vampire Savior]

I think the biggest hurdle there is distribution.

Not every movie goer is also an avid reader. Not every movie goer who likes to read is going to be invested enough in superhero films (even if they enjoy them) to want to take that next step to print. But for the ones who do? They'd probably buy comics.....if they could find them.

There's also people like me who tried DC Comics and didn't/don't like them because they're too dissimilar to the stuff with these characters they actually like and usually considerably worse.

And if the idea is that people who watch movies and whatnot never read comics, so who gives a care about making it easy for people to transition...then that's a very sorry state of affairs some have gotten comfortable with, and someone (like DiDio) should be taken to task for not converting a decent number of fans over to the comics. The audience is clearly there, and somehow it slipped through his fingers. If it requires new distribution models, then that's something the publisher needs to see about implementing. Who else would do it if not the publisher?

[Lee]

I mean it would have made some sense for CW’s Crisis on Infinite earth to advertise the Crisis on Infinite Earths Giant comics that were at least a comic adaptation of the CW story to an extent.

The CW doesn't give out ad time for free.

[sifighter]

The CW doesn't give out ad time for free.

I wouldn't know much about that, just throwing out suggestions.

[ERON]

I think the biggest hurdle there is distribution.

Not every movie goer is also an avid reader. Not every movie goer who likes to read is going to be invested enough in superhero films (even if they enjoy them) to want to take that next step to print. But for the ones who do? They'd probably buy comics.....if they could find them. The distribution is too limited. First you have to know that you need a LCS. Then you have to find a LCS near you. And odds are that means an extra stop when you're running errands, possibly across town far from your other stops. And if this movie going fan makes it that far, they're confronted with a high price tag and a slow release schedule. The distribution and production models just no longer work for mass consumption.

We've seen trade sales on the rise the last several years. I suspect most of our hypothetical movie-watching-book-reading-superhero-fans are getting their comics at Books A Million instead of their LCS. And I don't blame them. If I wasn't already a Wednesday Warrior I sure as hell wouldn't start now.

Absolutely. I use comics to teach my students how to map out the plot of a story. I give each group a comic to read and a blank plot diagram to fill out. Invariably, they fall in love with the comics and ask me, "Why don't they make these anymore?" And I have to explain that they do still make them; you just have to drive to some shop on the other side of town to find them.

[manwhohaseverything]

People catch up with manga's cause of anime. They want to get ahead and get to know the rest of the story of before anime airs. Manga's are sold because of stories. Comics are sold because of characters. So, expecting outside media to help comics side will be futile exercise.Because outside media don't provide same story as the comics

[ROM Spaceknight]

Non-comic collectors who liked the Marvel/DC movies/TV shows and want to "get their feet wet" re: comics aren't going to bother looking for/going to a LCS. I suspect most of them will just buy CE's/comics online, like many have been doing for a while. Or, if their local library has some CE's they may just check them out & read them - and not buy anything.

I myself have been a comic book collector off & on since the '80's, and have been a more avid collector since around 2006. And, I haven't stepped foot in a LCS in 5+ years. I get all of my CE's online, and stopped collecting floppies years ago. It's a lot easier & cheaper to get these delivered to your door than to worry about/deal with driving to & from the LCS (which in my case was a distance away), worry about not getting your requested books held for you, etc.

[kingaliencracker]

https://www.bleedingcool.com/2020/03...edium=facebook

The more I read the more it sounds like Didio was let go over 5G and the turmoil it was creating behind the scenes.

[skyvolt2000]

The same thing I keep hearing from podcasts I listen to is that movies and tv, or at least the animated movies and cartoon shows available on direct to dvd and streaming services, should at least run a brief ad with “hey if you liked the Death of Superman movie maybe check out in the comics Superman: Secret Origins or Man of Steel or Batman/Superman and you find them online or potentially at stores near you.”

I mean it would have made some sense for CW’s Crisis on Infinite earth to advertise the Crisis on Infinite Earths Giant comics that were at least a comic adaptation of the CW story to an extent.

One issue-you do that and now we get into what store will sell it? Lets say Wal-Mart.

Another issue-not every Wal-mart sells those books.

You have to have a product that you are 100% sure will be in every store.

I remember Fox's Fantastic Four did a promotion with Crush about collecting all the member's can and in some cases getting a free ticket.

One MAJOR issue-Michael B Jordan was on Cherry Crush. A flavor that I discovered was not carried in 99% of the stores not just in Dallas but any city 100 miles of Dallas.

Now think of the PR-the black guy who was getting backlash was on the one product that nobody could find. I found 2 cases at one store.

I have had this issue with some dvds (hello Star Trek Beyond, Fantastic Four, Static Shock, Black Lightning and a LOT of DC animated shows) and toys.

Right now the only way DC could get comics to folk is do it in an AT&T store.

[Vampire Savior]

One issue-you do that and now we get into what store will sell it? Lets say Wal-Mart.

Another issue-not every Wal-mart sells those books.

You have to have a product that you are 100% sure will be in every store.

I remember Fox's Fantastic Four did a promotion with Crush about collecting all the member's can and in some cases getting a free ticket.

One MAJOR issue-Michael B Jordan was on Cherry Crush. A flavor that I discovered was not carried in 99% of the stores not just in Dallas but any city 100 miles of Dallas.

Now think of the PR-the black guy who was getting backlash was on the one product that nobody could find. I found 2 cases at one store.

I have had this issue with some dvds (hello Star Trek Beyond, Fantastic Four, Static Shock, Black Lightning and a LOT of DC animated shows) and toys.

Right now the only way DC could get comics to folk is do it in an AT&T store.

In a scenario like that, the best thing to do is avoid the brick and mortar stores entirely and advertise an ap that people can use to buy comics digitally. And apps are things that I believe AT&T would certainly be able to get down with.