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Thread: DC sales

  1. #31
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    Quote Originally Posted by HandofPrometheus View Post
    Maybe floppies need to go. Aren't tpbs doing better anyway?

    I've been saying modern comics read way better in trades and honestly floppies are just too expensive for the small content they contain. Older comics feels like more things happened in one issue.
    But this also mean we have to wait every 6 months just to get a new trade. That's not worth it at all.

    I think most comic books retailers didn't offer some discounts for the remaining piles of comic books so that it could encourage the audience to buy its floppies everytime when they missed out or the orginal prices is too expensive for them. That's how you do when the book has been around a months.

  2. #32
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    Quote Originally Posted by Username taken View Post
    Manga has for a good long while had a massive LGBT subsection and Boys Love anime is even becoming mainstream. Seriously, the anti-SJW crowd are doing everything possible to antagonize creators that are not straight or white or male. We’ve seen trans and gay creators get severely harassed on social media and even guys like Coates have been targeted (unfortunately for them, Coates isn’t on social media and doesn’t really care).
    I should mention that Boys Love anime isn't made to appeal LGBT audience. Boys Love anime is often created to appeal (straight) women. And writers of Boys Love manga (especially mainstream) are often women too.

    Many gay men have problems with the way these stories represent their relationships.


    Also, manga or anime mainly directed to a male audience would have a lot of problems of LGBT representation.

  3. #33
    Ultimate Member Lee Stone's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Captain Nostalgia View Post
    Decades of reading DC comics has made me realize that if your not a big fan of the trinity (or Nightwing) it's pretty rough going in terms of your favourite characters.

    I've come to the conclusion (Batman aside) that DC has the problem of having a vast selection of interesting 2nd tier and obscure heroes, that can't get exposure, while Marvel overall, simply doesn't have the wealth of interesting superheroes, but most probably, has a more solid core of premier heroes.




    Good list, I'd add the previous post discussion about killing off, replacing, altering or rebooting people's favourite characters...or superhero teams (Legion anyone?)

    I'd put that at the top with streaming internet piracy, distribution and price....absolutely price, as someone just mentioned!
    Legion suffered a similar fate with New Teen Titans.
    Both were DC's biggest sellers between 1980 and 1986.
    And yet, you wouldn't know that by looking at their comics today.

    They seem to have a problem acknowledging anything other than Batman ever being a hit.
    "There's magic in the sound of analog audio." - CNET.

  4. #34

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lee Stone View Post
    Legion suffered a similar fate with New Teen Titans.
    Both were DC's biggest sellers between 1980 and 1986.
    And yet, you wouldn't know that by looking at their comics today.

    They seem to have a problem acknowledging anything other than Batman ever being a hit.
    As I recall, they were the first two titles I started collecting as a young kid.

    They killed the Legion with the zero hour reboot. (as your probably aware) but what caused the Teen Titans decline in popularity?

  5. #35
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    Quote Originally Posted by hairys View Post
    IMO, the problems with DC and Marvel's comic books business, in order:

    1. Distribution - The Big 2 are not placing comics where would-be new readers can easily access them and/or parents can impulse buy them for their kids. Comic books need to be sold at grocery stores, theaters, airport convenience stores, etc.

    2. Price Too Expensive - They have increased the price past the rate of inflation. It is hard to sell customers on paying $30 for a 6-issue story/arc. Why not spend $30 on a video game instead or two good novels, when the comic book story would likely be bad anyway? Which brings me to...

    3. Writer Quality is at a Nadir - Instead of fixing the issues with distribution and price, the Big 2 have instead dealt with the problem of declining sales by, with few exceptions, hiring cheap writers, which has impacted writing quality for most of their lines. This is exacerbated by...

    4. Competition from Creator-Owned Publishers - The problem of awful writer quality is worsened by Image and other creator-owned publishers who can take away top talent. Further exacerbation comes from...

    5. Creators Being on Social Media - Too many creators seem to be thin-skinned and can't take criticism and should therefore not be on social media, where they end up feuding with customers and insulting them. That by itself would be decently bad, but these creators seem to then hold grudges and let the grudges affect their writing by giving customers exactly what they don't want to see in comic books as payback, lol.

    6. SJWs - I can not say that SJWs have cost the comic book industry zero sales. They're just not one of the major problems like distribution and price.

    7. Piracy - Ditto.
    1. Agree, I've been saying this for months.

    2. Agree, especially since Marvel like to double ship, do countless minis and one-shots for a single story (See Spencer's Spider-Man).

    3. Disagree, Writing is the best it's been since the 80's in my opinion. The 90's were a hogwash (I'll get onto the 90's in a second) and this is the strongest generation of writers the big 2 have had in years. The worst of the 00's have been filtered out, we still got folks like Morrison on books. There's always going to be bad writers, but with the industry being as big as it is now, we have a lot of solid writers.

    4. Agree, but this isn't a bad thing. It expands the industry greatly. Also, the big 2 need to give better incentives to stay with their Company.

    5. Agree, there's a few creators I like who I feel spend way too much time on Twitter. It's a great place to advertise and interact with fans, but I feel there are People who like to stir **** up.

    6. Disagree, comics have always been focused on Social and political issues. Some of the best comics and most celebrated comics of the 80's also dealt with these issues. I do feel like some writers do it badly however. But again, much like everything, time will filter out the bad and you'll only remember the good stuff or the incredibly bad stuff. (I wonder who Watchman would have fared with the anti-sjw crowd if Youtube existed in 1984).

    7. Disagree, those who are pirating are probably not going to buy the comics anyway. Plus with comics being as expensive as they are, some folks feel the need to pirate comics.

  6. #36
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    If they solve the cost issue odds they'll greatly reduce (solve) the piracy issue

  7. #37
    Fantastic Member db105's Avatar
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    Comics are really expensive for the amount of reading time you get, yes.

    Apart from that, even though it's paradoxical because I'm a Batman fan, I have always felt that the fixation with always having the same characters is a serious problem from a storytelling point of view. If I read a manga, or something creator-owned like Invincible, I get a beginning, middle story and ending. It can be a long story, but I get a complete story. What happens during the story matters. With DC or Marvel comics I get rambling stories where nothing that matters can happen. There is always the illusion of change in the status quo, but basically the status quo has to remain the same in the long run.

    People want to read about events that matter, and then we get what they call "events", huge crossovers where supposedly things that matter will happen, but truly it's just more of the same illusion of change. Characters may die or change, but you know it doesn't matter, they'll be back soon enough.

    Someone in this thread complained that manga got close adaptations, while the same was not true of mainstream comics. But seriously, how can there be a close adaptation of a random monthly comic? Take a number 1 and read from there trying to put yourself in the frame of mind of a casual fan. It often feels like the story is just making time between events, and then it's affected by things that happens elsewhere. It doesn't feel like a complete story.

    Then when you look at manga, you see actual diversity, not the fake diversity where everything is the same. Wherever there is a demand, there will be manga catering to it. You want LGTB stories? Manga will cater to you. You are a white heterosexual young guy who wants an escapist power fantasy? Manga will cater to you, instead of telling you that you are racist, sexist and homofobe for wanting such a thing. Mainstream comics have allowed this ideological stuff to become the point of what they do, and that may work great to sell to a part of the audience who buys the narrative of "these brave creators are telling diverse stories but the racist alt-right is being unfair to them, let's buy their stuff to fight back against the cultural enemy", but for someone who doesn't share that religion, this tiresome stuff feels like paying Mormon missionaries to preach to you.

  8. #38
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  9. #39
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    Quote Originally Posted by db105 View Post
    Comics are really expensive for the amount of reading time you get, yes.

    Apart from that, even though it's paradoxical because I'm a Batman fan, I have always felt that the fixation with always having the same characters is a serious problem from a storytelling point of view. If I read a manga, or something creator-owned like Invincible, I get a beginning, middle story and ending. It can be a long story, but I get a complete story. What happens during the story matters. With DC or Marvel comics I get rambling stories where nothing that matters can happen. There is always the illusion of change in the status quo, but basically the status quo has to remain the same in the long run.

    People want to read about events that matter, and then we get what they call "events", huge crossovers where supposedly things that matter will happen, but truly it's just more of the same illusion of change. Characters may die or change, but you know it doesn't matter, they'll be back soon enough.

    Someone in this thread complained that manga got close adaptations, while the same was not true of mainstream comics. But seriously, how can there be a close adaptation of a random monthly comic? Take a number 1 and read from there trying to put yourself in the frame of mind of a casual fan. It often feels like the story is just making time between events, and then it's affected by things that happens elsewhere. It doesn't feel like a complete story.

    Then when you look at manga, you see actual diversity, not the fake diversity where everything is the same. Wherever there is a demand, there will be manga catering to it. You want LGTB stories? Manga will cater to you. You are a white heterosexual young guy who wants an escapist power fantasy? Manga will cater to you, instead of telling you that you are racist, sexist and homofobe for wanting such a thing. Mainstream comics have allowed this ideological stuff to become the point of what they do, and that may work great to sell to a part of the audience who buys the narrative of "these brave creators are telling diverse stories but the racist alt-right is being unfair to them, let's buy their stuff to fight back against the cultural enemy", but for someone who doesn't share that religion, this tiresome stuff feels like paying Mormon missionaries to preach to you.
    You had me til the bolded part. Can you elaborate on "mainstream comics have allowed this ideological stuff to become the point of what they do"? Like that whole last sentence seems like it's coming from a place of strong resentment and negativity and I'm not sure what that has to do with DC's sales lol.

  10. #40
    Ultimate Member Lee Stone's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Captain Nostalgia View Post
    As I recall, they were the first two titles I started collecting as a young kid.

    They killed the Legion with the zero hour reboot. (as your probably aware) but what caused the Teen Titans decline in popularity?
    Partly it was DC cancelling the title and failing to follow up Wolfman with a high profile creator.

    However, I think it's a bit more complicated than that.
    I would say Wolfman had grown complacent with the team and really needed a break.
    He fell into a 'safe-zone' where the team had become too precious, and almost every new character he introduced would become cannon-fodder or expendable to keep them safe. The only new member that didn't die (at least not yet) was Jericho.
    And Danny Chase. We can always point to Danny Chase as the Titans' 'Cousin Oliver'.

    Then Jonathan Peterson took over as editor and pushed Wolfman to take chances again with the team. Some of these ideas were controversial, but it did put the Titans back on the map again with three ongoing titles being published simultaneously: New Titans, Deathstroke and Team Titans (and a fourth one, Titans West, planned).

    But when Peterson left, and Wolfman continued without him, the book started to just tread water as DC just didn't know what to do with it, and gave it artists not quite on par with the best Titans or X-Men artists.
    The last 30 issues is basically a ship slowly sinking and DC not making any effort to save it. Instead, by this time they were focusing on keeping their high profile creators on Batman related books.
    The launch of Image was also impacting DC, as well as Marvel, as far as who to use and who to trust to stay.

    Unfortunately, since the Zero Hour line-up didn't set the world on fire, DC determined that simply changing the line-up wouldn't work and they cancelled the book.

    A good rundown of the sinking boat here.

    They had an opportunity with Zero Hour and the #0 issue, but it saw Wolfman continuing on with another unknown artist, and with a new team line-up that I would say rivaled Marvel's Avengers during the time when Black Knight, Sersi, Crystal and Vision were the main characters. I think I would say I would've expected a bit more for a major change in direction.

    Another good rundown, focusing on the Zero Hour team, is here.

    It didn't help that when the book was finally cancelled, it was absent for over half a year.
    Teen Titans #1, by Dan Jurgens, would launch eight months later.
    It also didn't help that it was an entirely new team. While it did have some fans, it only lasted for 24 issues.
    Which basically resulted in two more years without the original team having their own book and lessening the franchise's image.
    "There's magic in the sound of analog audio." - CNET.

  11. #41
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    Quote Originally Posted by Shimbo View Post
    You had me til the bolded part. Can you elaborate on "mainstream comics have allowed this ideological stuff to become the point of what they do"? Like that whole last sentence seems like it's coming from a place of strong resentment and negativity and I'm not sure what that has to do with DC's sales lol.
    It doesn't. Nobody is saying you can't have straight white make lead anything. What folks get TIRED of is the Jedi Handwaving that acts like a book or movie or show with a white guys does not sell because folks do not know QUALITY.

    While anything that is not straight white male is only there to pander to SJWS. It does not have quality & only gets participation awards.


    5. Creators Being on Social Media - Too many creators seem to be thin-skinned and can't take criticism and should therefore not be on social media, where they end up feuding with customers and insulting them.
    Most creators are NOT bothering anyone. Yet get attacked for not being a certain demographic. What was Darwin Cooke's widow doing to be attacked? Dwyane McDuffie's widow? Creators do not mind criticism what they mind are trolls who make up stuff about them with no substance.

    But this also mean we have to wait every 6 months just to get a new trade. That's not worth it at all.

    I think most comic books retailers didn't offer some discounts for the remaining piles of comic books so that it could encourage the audience to buy its floppies everytime when they missed out or the orginal prices is too expensive for them. That's how you do when the book has been around a months.
    Most do-see Midtown Comics that does it every DAY.

    If someone wanted to read Batman but NOT pay cover price-they have Midtown, Hal Price Books and Ebay to do to.

    Maybe floppies need to go. Aren't tpbs doing better anyway?
    I would say certain characters do not need a floppy. Do a trade instead or a $10 OGN.

    Since there is such a hatred for anything at Dc or Marvel that is not straight, white and male yet can find audiences as trades. You do them.

    Aqualad does not need a 6 issue mini nor does his Daddy- OGN for both would work better.

    Raven & Beast Boy have had OGNs that stayed among the top sellers on Amazon-they don't need floppies.

    Star Girl does not need a floppy-give her an OGN.

    I would say the same for Milestone and Wildstorm as well.

    It would be easier for me-a school employee to get those trades in my school than those floppies.

  12. #42
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lee Stone View Post
    Legion suffered a similar fate with New Teen Titans.
    Both were DC's biggest sellers between 1980 and 1986.
    And yet, you wouldn't know that by looking at their comics today.

    They seem to have a problem acknowledging anything other than Batman ever being a hit.
    Going to Baxter format and taking Legion/NTT/Outsiders and all that, basically killed those books and franchises. Arguably the worst decision in DC Comics history.

  13. #43
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    Quote Originally Posted by skyvolt2000 View Post
    It doesn't. Nobody is saying you can't have straight white make lead anything. What folks get TIRED of is the Jedi Handwaving that acts like a book or movie or show with a white guys does not sell because folks do not know QUALITY.

    While anything that is not straight white male is only there to pander to SJWS. It does not have quality & only gets participation awards.




    Most creators are NOT bothering anyone. Yet get attacked for not being a certain demographic. What was Darwin Cooke's widow doing to be attacked? Dwyane McDuffie's widow? Creators do not mind criticism what they mind are trolls who make up stuff about them with no substance.



    Most do-see Midtown Comics that does it every DAY.

    If someone wanted to read Batman but NOT pay cover price-they have Midtown, Hal Price Books and Ebay to do to.



    I would say certain characters do not need a floppy. Do a trade instead or a $10 OGN.

    Since there is such a hatred for anything at Dc or Marvel that is not straight, white and male yet can find audiences as trades. You do them.

    Aqualad does not need a 6 issue mini nor does his Daddy- OGN for both would work better.

    Raven & Beast Boy have had OGNs that stayed among the top sellers on Amazon-they don't need floppies.

    Star Girl does not need a floppy-give her an OGN.

    I would say the same for Milestone and Wildstorm as well.

    It would be easier for me-a school employee to get those trades in my school than those floppies.
    I always thought minis were wasted as floppplies and don't help them in the long run.

  14. #44
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    Well, the answer to the whole floppy dilemma is digital. Perhaps many comics fans now aren't ready for that, but eventually people will be. And I think A LOT of people are ready to read in that format, hence why digital piracy is so popular.

    At some point in time I think the floppies won't be the main backbone of the Marvel/DC Comic industry and the stories released in pieces will come out primarily digitally. I'm sure the trades and graphic novels will keep being printed. I think people will always like books. At least for the foreseeable future.

  15. #45

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    Quote Originally Posted by Lee Stone View Post
    Partly it was DC cancelling the title and failing to follow up Wolfman with a high profile creator.

    However, I think it's a bit more complicated than that.
    I would say Wolfman had grown complacent with the team and really needed a break.
    He fell into a 'safe-zone' where the team had become too precious, and almost every new character he introduced would become cannon-fodder or expendable to keep them safe. The only new member that didn't die (at least not yet) was Jericho.
    And Danny Chase. We can always point to Danny Chase as the Titans' 'Cousin Oliver'.

    Then Jonathan Peterson took over as editor and pushed Wolfman to take chances again with the team. Some of these ideas were controversial, but it did put the Titans back on the map again with three ongoing titles being published simultaneously: New Titans, Deathstroke and Team Titans (and a fourth one, Titans West, planned).

    But when Peterson left, and Wolfman continued without him, the book started to just tread water as DC just didn't know what to do with it, and gave it artists not quite on par with the best Titans or X-Men artists.
    The last 30 issues is basically a ship slowly sinking and DC not making any effort to save it. Instead, by this time they were focusing on keeping their high profile creators on Batman related books.
    The launch of Image was also impacting DC, as well as Marvel, as far as who to use and who to trust to stay.

    Unfortunately, since the Zero Hour line-up didn't set the world on fire, DC determined that simply changing the line-up wouldn't work and they cancelled the book.

    A good rundown of the sinking boat here.

    They had an opportunity with Zero Hour and the #0 issue, but it saw Wolfman continuing on with another unknown artist, and with a new team line-up that I would say rivaled Marvel's Avengers during the time when Black Knight, Sersi, Crystal and Vision were the main characters. I think I would say I would've expected a bit more for a major change in direction.

    Another good rundown, focusing on the Zero Hour team, is here.

    It didn't help that when the book was finally cancelled, it was absent for over half a year.
    Teen Titans #1, by Dan Jurgens, would launch eight months later.
    It also didn't help that it was an entirely new team. While it did have some fans, it only lasted for 24 issues.
    Which basically resulted in two more years without the original team having their own book and lessening the franchise's image.
    Marv Wolfman burn out sounds about right. He was a brilliant writer, but someone else eventually needed to take the helm.
    (As per example; as much as I love Paul Levitz, I personally thought Giffen's takeover of the legion was really good)

    I can see how the rise of Image could de-stabilize things.

    Personally, I don't mind when they cancel a series to give things a rest, but rebooting it with an entirely new team isn't the smartest move.

    Thanks, you painted a good picture of why the Teen Titans went into decline.

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