Layoffs at DC?

[Frontier]

I hope the folks at DC who've lost their jobs today land on their feet and this most recent corporate shakeup lead to a stronger company moving forward that further shifts its focus away from chasing after the same dwindling fanbase.

Middle-aged hardcore fans have been catered to by mainstream comics for too many years. Hopefully, this leads to some positive change. Otherwise this just sucks.

Both DC and Marvel

A sort of update:

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/afte...for-dc-comics/

I'm...really not sure how to read this.

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

A sort of update:

https://bleedingcool.com/comics/afte...for-dc-comics/

Wasn’t Jonah the founder of CBR? Didn’t know he worked at DC. Either way that sucks

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Regardless of how one may feel about DC and the material they turn out, for staffers to get a pink slip in the middle of a pandemic is a dreadful thing I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. Meanwhile, could a similar sort of bloodletting happen over at Marvel?

[skyvolt2000]

Wonder if the bit at WB will affect that Flash movie almost no one outside of WB and DC wanted? And other planned DC movies? And will they cut budgets on their various TV productions?

The Snyder Cut got 30 million. Gee how many jobs could that have save let alone save money by letting that DIE.

I think it is rather funny how for years lots of people have been wishing that guys like Didio and Harras were fired and when it actually happened we got sky is falling reactions.

I think folks wanted the ones who help make the mess gone not those who did their jobs and tried to put out decent products.


Looking at this statement...

Because we also hear about what is described as a Two-Year Plan for DC Comics which will see DC Comics move to mass-market production through Walmart, the licensing of titles with editors moving to brand managers/approval roles, alongside a move from DC to digital serialisation and original graphic novels.

That say more folks are going to get looked at and given shots. Folks that the direct market don't care for.

Look at the success of Raven, Cassandra Cain, Aqualad and eventually Beast Boy in the OGN market. Especially Cass and Aqualad versions a LOT of folks never saw.
What could an OGN line of Amethyst, Young Justice, Naomi, Static, Conner, Bart, Cassie & Tim Drake do in the mass market?

Then there is this

Content will still be provided to the direct market but it will no longer be the priority that it (still) is at DC Comics.

This is the MOST telling. Folks dreaming of Green Lantern #1000? Can forget it. However if they are doing printing in house-what's to say those floppies won't pop up at Wal-Mart next to Red Rooster comics.

[Agent Z]

The Snyder Cut got 30 million. Gee how many jobs could that have save let alone save money by letting that DIE.

The Snyder Cut has nothing to do with this. It has everything to do with AT&T making a major mistake with their shareholders(Who revolted) and we are all now feeling that effects of them trying to “correct” the ship and cut cost back.

Anyone blaming this on the Snyder Cut either doesn't know the full story or is just looking for another petty reason to bitch about it.

[Ascended]

Well, I was apparently dead wrong back on page 1. This was some major impact on DC's publishing side.

Lots of good analysis by Ascended earlier in the thread. My read is that the "new" DC will be far more integrated into WB and AT&T, and dependant on other departments there. I guess DC will be more of a production studio than an independant publisher. Which might work or might not, but it will be some rough going for a while within all of WB.

Thanks.

I think calling this a shift towards a "production studio" is probably pretty spot on. I'm not sure if that'll be good or not, but I think that the quality and style of content in the floppies isn't likely to change much; this downsizing is seemingly about the economy not DC's performance (far as I can tell anyway). Seems to me that WB/DC/AT&T are going to ride the direct market into the ground but not really put a lot of effort into it either; I think the days of big initiatives designed to save comics are over and the effort will be going into the OGN stuff and digital. So the kind of comics we've been getting from DC's big names are what we'll continue to get....we'll just have far less to pick from.

One issue with that.
How does that work for folks who don't have anything let alone anything of interest to reprint?

Those characters won't (probably) show up at all. This is a downsizing man, we'll be lucky if B-list characters like Green Arrow manage to stick around somewhere, D-list characters like Thunder and Lightning are, almost certainly, screwed. And I don't know if we'll even get reprints. They seem like they'd be a good idea but I don't know if DC will do it or not.

There's a potential silver lining or three though. The direct market is going to be just/mostly the Big Names but that doesn't mean the OGN's or digital will be, so the lesser known characters might show up in those formats. Additionally, we might see the direct market titles bring in extra characters per title, sort of like Rebirth era Detective, so some of the little guys might still see panel time that way. And AT&T might want to focus on characters with some larger media presence, so characters like Vibe, Lightning, Thunder, and Constantine might find a home somewhere too.

But at this point, classic books that tend to sell "decent but not great" like Arrow and Nightwing might be in legit danger, books like Naomi that had a lot of hype and goodwill might get dumped, and I wouldn't expect much more from DC's floppies than them doubling down on the stuff they *know* will sell. They're downsizing, it is going to suck and there's no getting around that and a lot of characters are going to fall by the wayside no matter what DC does.

Does this mean shared universe thing is dead? Good riddance if you ask me. I am just fatigued by the nonsense in general.

I doubt it. Seems like that's not a problem spot for them, and if DC focuses on the high selling League books in the direct market, well, you can't have a JLA without a shared universe.

But the OGN's are largely all stand alone content.

I also wondered about Lee. The guy must have some serious connections.

Definitely. He's been around forever and helped build the third biggest comics publisher in America, and for a while there WildStorm was the company releasing all the best material like Planetary and Authority. I wouldn't write Lee off; he seems like he's got good business sense, which makes me wonder just how f*cked the corporate culture at DC really is.

[Konja7]

That say more folks are going to get looked at and given shots. Folks that the direct market don't care for.

Look at the success of Raven, Cassandra Cain, Aqualad and eventually Beast Boy in the OGN market. Especially Cass and Aqualad versions a LOT of folks never saw.
What could an OGN line of Amethyst, Young Justice, Naomi, Static, Conner, Bart, Cassie & Tim Drake do in the mass market?

I don't think the OGN has a lot of place for Tim, Bart and Cassie.

DC will likely focus on the big names (or young versions of the big names). Or minorities.

[skyvolt2000]

Regardless of how one may feel about DC and the material they turn out, for staffers to get a pink slip in the middle of a pandemic is a dreadful thing I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. Meanwhile, could a similar sort of bloodletting happen over at Marvel?

To a certain point it has just not at this level.
Also you have to ask how many full time Marvel staff do they have in all?

Along with what other job duties do they have at Disney. I saw the job duties for an assistant editor.
They were doing the jobs of at LEAST 4 folks. Including editing multiple books and in some case writing a book.

And how many writers are doing tv and movies at Disney?

I'm...really not sure how to read this.

To me it smells of "we are going to eventually leave the direct market and set up show at Wal-Mart."

If Wal-Mart lets them return any unsold floppies-all bets are OFF. They are gone.

AllegianceArts & Entertainment has their books in the book section (mainly in the kids section at the stores I have been to) and they sell. So far it seems like they take the old ones and put the new issue out monthly.

And the question I would ask of all-would you leave the direct market???

If it means the likes of Adam Strange, Wonder Twins, Doom Patrol and others can get LEGIT shots without a bias market in the way? And I don't mean 50 floppies but a mixture of trades, digest, OGN and floppies?

Because the MAIN complaint I hear from PARENTS is they would buy the stuff if they saw it or know about it. Because not everyone shops online.

[greatmetropolitan]

The first thing that strikes you about this is just how horrible the job losses are. Even aside from names you're aware of who've delivered amazing work (Andy Khouri! WTF) there are 600 people unemployed now during a pandemic that's taken the legs out of the jobs market. that's just horrible. Best wishes with them all and best of luck.

As for the actual business decisions in play...I'm not sure they're bad. Focusing on graphic novels and YA and kids titles, all of which are doing well and making a lot of money, is a great plan. Especially bringing more kids on board, as superhero comic buyers are basically an ageing, dying off fanbase who that isn't picking up new readers as quickly as its losing long timers. Chasing the bookstore market is a great idea, as it generally wipes the floor with sales of floppies.

A bigger shift to digital makes sense too. People often lament the loss of the spinner rack, but affordable digital comics should be the new spinner rack. I used to get the Smallville season 11 comic and it was this affordable, fun chunk of entertainment every week, and if that ramps up across the DC line, I'd be all for it.

Then there's the DC Universe platform, and HBO Max. It makes sense to fold DCU into HBO Max from a business perspective.

A streamlined line of floppies, bigger focus on digital, bookstore and YA really doesn't seem like a terrible strategy at all to me - in fact, it seems like one of the few viable strategies in an ailing art form.

But first and foremost, especially in a medium dominated by heroes, the most important thing is the good people out of work. Its genuinely tragic.

[Frontier]

The first thing that strikes you about this is just how horrible the job losses are. Even aside from names you're aware of who've delivered amazing work (Andy Khouri! WTF) there are 600 people unemployed now during a pandemic that's taken the legs out of the jobs market. that's just horrible. Best wishes with them all and best of luck.

As for the actual business decisions in play...I'm not sure they're bad. Focusing on graphic novels and YA and kids titles, all of which are doing well and making a lot of money, is a great plan. Especially bringing more kids on board, as superhero comic buyers are basically an ageing, dying off fanbase who that isn't picking up new readers as quickly as its losing long timers. Chasing the bookstore market is a great idea, as it generally wipes the floor with sales of floppies.

A bigger shift to digital makes sense too. People often lament the loss of the spinner rack, but affordable digital comics should be the new spinner rack. I used to get the Smallville season 11 comic and it was this affordable, fun chunk of entertainment every week, and if that ramps up across the DC line, I'd be all for it.

Then there's the DC Universe platform, and HBO Max. It makes sense to fold DCU into HBO Max from a business perspective.

A streamlined line of floppies, bigger focus on digital, bookstore and YA really doesn't seem like a terrible strategy at all to me - in fact, it seems like one of the few viable strategies in an ailing art form.

But first and foremost, especially in a medium dominated by heroes, the most important thing is the good people out of work. Its genuinely tragic.

I can understand the concern that streamlining the comic line and focusing on the GN's will narrow DC's core character focus even more than it already is, on-top of possibly leaving less chances to continue building up IP's for future adaptions. At least that's my take on it.

But, yeah, this is like the worst time to leave so many people out of a job, some extremely talented. Hopefully they can find new employment soon.

[scary harpy]

Let’s be grateful that we have so many comic-book inspired shows and movies.

Otherwise, I fear too many characters would have just become footnotes in comic-book history.

And job loss is tragic...especially now.

[Ascended]

I can understand the concern that streamlining the comic line and focusing on the GN's will narrow DC's core character focus even more than it already is, on-top of possibly leaving less chances to continue building up IP's for future adaptions. At least that's my take on it.

But, yeah, this is like the worst time to leave so many people out of a job, some extremely talented. Hopefully they can find new employment soon.

Actually, expanding the digital offerings and continued investment in the OGN's potentially opens up DC's lesser known characters more. We've seen characters like Raven (the go-to example) sell well in those formats, but Raven can't carry a direct market title to save her life.

Those other formats have different audiences who don't have the bias of the Wednesday Warrior; they don't care if Raven is a C-list character who only mattered for a few years back in the 80's, they know her from the cartoons and live action Titans show and aren't going to skip her book because they don't want a hole in their collected run of Batman.

Now, in the immediate future, yeah we might get almost nothing but the big name characters DC knows will sell well, but a Vibe OGN or digital title isn't nearly as big a risk as it would be as a floppy ongoing. Once the dust settles, we might see a massive surge in DC's lesser IP's.

Setting aside the horror of massive job loss and a murky restructuring and all the rest of the chaos, the basic business plan here, like greatmetropolitan says, isn't *necessarily* a bad thing. Bad for floppies, true, but not necessarily bad for everything else. Offerings might be on the lean side for a while (this *is* the result of economic insecurity after all), but these seem like the moves publishers need to make; the direct market is shrinking and a dead end. Publishers need to get a foothold in other markets while riding the floppy into the ground. It's a damn shame that it's taking a corporate collapse to make them take this seriously, but these basic changes? Publishers were going to have to do stuff like this eventually.

[Hypo]

From a retailer:

[kjn]

Thanks.


I think calling this a shift towards a "production studio" is probably pretty spot on. I'm not sure if that'll be good or not, but I think that the quality and style of content in the floppies isn't likely to change much; this downsizing is seemingly about the economy not DC's performance (far as I can tell anyway). Seems to me that WB/DC/AT&T are going to ride the direct market into the ground but not really put a lot of effort into it either; I think the days of big initiatives designed to save comics are over and the effort will be going into the OGN stuff and digital. So the kind of comics we've been getting from DC's big names are what we'll continue to get....we'll just have far less to pick from.

I mean it, you're one of the quality posters here.

I do hope that we will see a bit of a creative shift here. Nothing really drastic, but I think we might see a little greater spread in the creators who gets the "signature" titles and characters, and some more freedom for the creators, at least in the sense of less guidance from editors on what stories to write.

But it's really incidental to this change, though I think the positioning of Michele Wells as one of the new leaders points to a more creator-driven DC.

Those characters won't (probably) show up at all. This is a downsizing man, we'll be lucky if B-list characters like Green Arrow manage to stick around somewhere, D-list characters like Thunder and Lightning are, almost certainly, screwed. And I don't know if we'll even get reprints. They seem like they'd be a good idea but I don't know if DC will do it or not.

There's a potential silver lining or three though. The direct market is going to be just/mostly the Big Names but that doesn't mean the OGN's or digital will be, so the lesser known characters might show up in those formats. Additionally, we might see the direct market titles bring in extra characters per title, sort of like Rebirth era Detective, so some of the little guys might still see panel time that way. And AT&T might want to focus on characters with some larger media presence, so characters like Vibe, Lightning, Thunder, and Constantine might find a home somewhere too.

Agreed. However, the YA line was willing to put Cass back in as Batgirl, and Babs as Oracle, and give big solo pushes to characters like Raven or Beast Boy. I believe that if this new DC gets a good pitch for a Green Arrow limited series or OGN, I see no reason for why they won't go for it, no matter if it fits their current universe or not.

[greatmetropolitan]

I can understand the concern that streamlining the comic line and focusing on the GN's will narrow DC's core character focus even more than it already is, on-top of possibly leaving less chances to continue building up IP's for future adaptions. At least that's my take on it.

But, yeah, this is like the worst time to leave so many people out of a job, some extremely talented. Hopefully they can find new employment soon.

I can understand the concern that streamlining the comic line and focusing on the GN's will narrow DC's core character focus even more than it already is, on-top of possibly leaving less chances to continue building up IP's for future adaptions. At least that's my take on it.

But, yeah, this is like the worst time to leave so many people out of a job, some extremely talented. Hopefully they can find new employment soon.

Yeah, I think if there's going to be a big focus on digital, I'd like to see it include taking chances on new books and new characters. Shorter, cheaper digital comics could actually be an interesting testbed for new characters and types of stories. Do big GNs for their big guns, imagine a new Superman GN every year with the biggest names getting a shot at their take, but a more accessible superman title available digitally or in Walmart or something too, along with more YA stuff like Superman Smashes the Klan. And use your digital platform to push innovative new characters and see what takes off, like the success of the Injustice book.

I dunno, maybe I'm scrambling to see potential positives too much amidst the job losses.