Plot and politics and groundwork don't have to be mutually exclusive - and that might have been fine if Hickman had a second book with actual plot. Most readers were never going to pick up every book and the guaranteed draw was X-Men, so it seems a waste to me to make that the setup book.
Does it need doing?
Yes.
Then it will be done.
I said this to BP fans hating on Coates and now I will say it here. These poor comic sales are probably more reflective of the comic market in general as opposed to readers liking or not liking the story. With pirating and now covid there are a lot of factors that can adversely impact sales numbers.
Last edited by butterflykyss; 04-22-2021 at 03:17 PM.
ALL HAIL THE HADARI YAO, THE OMEGA'S OMEGA, BEYOND OMEGA, THE VOICE OF SOL!!!! NOW AGAIN THE ONE TRUE AND ONLY GODDESS OF THE X-MEN AS CLAREMONT INTENDED!!!!!
I just want to chime in by saying that normally I'd plan to buy both digital and print of the coming X-Men book and the Hellfire Gala comics, but right now I'm planning to only get digital because of COVID. I might change my mind as we get closer since I'll be fully vaccinated, but it's definitely leading me to not buy some things I would if COVID wasn't happening.
I can also be reached on BlueSky and Tumblr. Avatar by kahlart.
Ghosts of Genosha minicomic focused on Polaris, written by me and drawn by Fin_NoMore.
Polaris 50th anniversary minicomic written by me and drawn by Mlad!
Gallery of Polaris commissions (without NSFW or minicomics)
If we look at Amazon top 100 graphic novels-House of X hardcover is at 62 with something by Hickman at 100.
The rest are in the 300-1000 range.
Not making an excuse but look at how many number ones was on that list.It's too bad they got greedy and tried to launch 90's-level numbers of spin offs from HoX/PoX. Spreading Hickman's concepts across so many different writers/books diminished the strength of his own book, and without the focused, robust flagship, the derivatives are floundering.
I feel like if Hickman just had two books(like X-Men/Uncanny) to tell his story, he might could have stayed at the top of the charts(and on top of things creatively). I wonder, from Marvel's perspective, if they would rather have two books consistently selling 100k copies each month, or 10 books hemorrhage readers every month. I guess in the end they are casting a wider net with more books, but at what cost? Sword has been great every issue, sad to see it didn't capture a large audience.
How many variants ALONE did Keanu Reeve's book have?
Also how many of the X-books had finished up an arc? How many were in the middle of an arc?
Also how many unsold copies are in stores? That they can't get rid of? One of my stores had a dollar sale of ALL books (not just X-Men). NOBODY took advantage outside of variants. They did another sale at 40%-nobody took advantage.
Once you get past the folks who want the books-what is the unsold pile looking like? If it's too big-you lower order numbers. One store did this and it helped and got them more sold out copies.
Going to agree with this.
Sales right now aren't reflective of the actual readership. In a year or so, it'll start be more representative, but right now, it's an odd time.
I feel like there is some sort of confirmation bias here, like "well because the comic I don't like aren't selling well, it must mean in right", no, it just means that the way People are reading their books may be different.
We have no idea on digital sales, those who wait for the books to be on Marvel Unlimited, graphic novel sales, those buying from the secondary market etc. Heck, we don't know the readership for pirated books which would be impossible to determine.
There's a lot of factors, the sad reality is that most books can't sustain with trade waits. However this era must be doing something good if it means they are making multiple trade lines.
And with regards to X-Men being plotless, Hickman has always worked better making one or two issue arcs. So the economics issue was not only giving us where the X-Men are in the World, but also creating conflicts that would most likely be paid off in Hickman's next book.
The secrets behind the children of the Vault, that'll be detailed in the next book as well, essentially planting seeds in this volume of X-Men before Hickman now starts to pay them off.
Is it annoying that this is the way it's plotted? Yes. At the same time, I'm enjoying the ride. Anything too big and it'll effect what the other writers are doing. Instead we get an issue here and there which would later be constructed in a larger narrative.
We already had the plot of the other Island in X of Swords, which was built up in a couple of issues of X-Men and Excalibur.
The brood egg issues were okay off for the Hickman penned issues of New Mutants, and will lead into the next plot point.
I wouldn't be surprised if Hickman's next book will just be tying up these loose ends before giving us a finale.
As I asked before, is it annoying? Yes, but that's what People like about Hickman. It's the slow build. It may not be for you which is fine, everybody has different tastes.
But I'm okay with it.
And I look forward to reading back through his run again once it's all finished, finding the stuff I missed.