How many effing times is the Ultimate Universe "never going to be the same again". I wish they'd tone down the cataclysmic events and just tell cool stories.
The solicits look pretty interesting. Quite an overkill of Deadpool stuff out there.
So, it does look like they are going back to the original numbering on Ultimate Spider-Man. Oh well. And Amazing sounds pretty interesting to me. I am interested in what that new suit is about and what it will do against this new Hobgoblin.
And, yeah, where the hell is Punisher MAX at? It was a great book and it just seems to have disappeared off the face of the earth. I notice they have been doing one shots but does anyone know what's up with the delays with Aaron/Dillon?
I know, it's awesome. After sitting through tons of Iron Man, Hulk, Deadpool, and Wolverine comics for the past few years, it's finally Thor's time. I don't know if even I'm gonna buy all of that stuff, but it's great to know it's there.
Glad to see another round of What If, too. I'll be picking up #200 and What If: Dark Reign. Maybe the Iron Man one as well, but I'm not sure.
PunisherMAX has been missing on the solits for 2 months straight. It worries me because this months issue has been pushed back a week. I wonder what's going on with Aaron and Dillon. The Bullseye HC is on the list.
As usual, my initial thoughts/rants/mad-man ravings about December's Solicitations.
- In last week's CBR interview with top editors Tom Brevoort and Axel Alonso, Tom poo-poo'd the price of Marvel comics as claiming that "a majority" of what they publish is still $2.99. I did some math of my own. Not including the Marvel Handbook and Iron Man Magazine, and maybe even the indie Strange Tales, Marvel is releasing about 93 comics in 12/2010. Out of those 93, 26 of them are $2.99. That means 67 out of 93 comics for the month are $3.99. If you believe that 26 out of 93 is a "majority", then you're either as challenged with math as Tom Brevoort is, or as dumb as he believes readers and retailers are. Maybe Tom means a "majority" of their ongoing titles are $2.99. But the reality is that ongoing titles are barely a majority of what they publish anymore. Throw in mini series and one-shots, and ongoings are lucky to be half of what is published in a given month. And even many ongoing series debut at $3.99, like HEROES FOR HIRE #1, or are priced up there after years for no good reason, like THUNDERBOLTS. Now, the editors claimed they're not in charge of pricing, that's another department. That's the same answer Joe Q gives. You're telling me that if Marvel's entire editorial staff, including their EIC and their two VP editors, were that dead set against those prices for a vast majority of their comics, they'd remain so? Bull. Flipping. Spit.
Want the reality? Marvel is flush with a $4 Billion Dollar check, corporate protection in Disney's arms, and expectations of more from their next slate of films. For every dollar that Marvel takes in, at least 60 cents are from stuff that has nothing to do with raw comic sales or advertising in comic books, and that's a modest figure. Marvel, corporately, doesn't give an 8th of a spec of fecal matter about the plight of the retailers in the direct market or their readers, only seeing them as pawns to move around the board or cows to milk. Quite bluntly, I believe Marvel expects that the direct market is on it's last legs. Rather than try to starve that off or correct course from the self-destructive market they've helped create this past decade, they are cashing in their chips, flooding the market with as much as they can as highly priced as they can, to reap in as many dollars as possible before the iceberg hits and it all comes crashing down. Because when that happens, 60% of their bottom line will still be uneffected in the slightest, and they could likely just sell reprinted material to bookstores forever. Rather than try to steer the ship away from the iceberg or plan an escape, they only care about being the last person on the roulette wheel to split, knowing that they're already in a life boat with a preserver. The problem is for Marvel, this is the best time of their lives. For everyone else, it is their worst. That's the disconnect, and it will simply never go away unless and until something as catastrophic as 1994 or worse happens. And if it does, I hope not a single retailer falls for it again and keeps their shops open, or orders from Marvel again. I hope they abandon Marvel to rot to death just as Marvel has long abandoned and manipulated them into the grave. Retailers are flailing in the water desperate for air, and all Marvel throws them are bricks. The customer is barely even considered. No one in Marvel's higher offices sees them beyond at conventions, and they merely exist as message board code-names for stunts like CUP O' JOE. The writers are still on the front lines, but unless their name begins with a B and ends in an S, they really don't matter to the higher ups, at least to the degree that they could make any possible dent in the big decisions. And even that unmentioned writer's influence only covers so much outside the panels and script pages.
Their corporate greed has never been so unparalleled and so merciless. VP Editors who seriously equate what is being done now to when Stan Lee was in charge and comics were no more than .15 are so far from a reality check, that it's light won't hit them for about twenty years. And by then it will be too late.
One supposes the only way that pattern above could be broken beyond their control is if fans collectively did something, and retailers responded without being wiped out. But that isn't happening, and it won't.
- Spam Check:
4 Deadpool books
5 Spider-Man books (not counting Ultimate or Marvel Adventures)
3 Captain America books (not including Avengers or Secret Avengers)
4 Hulk books
5 Iron Man books (including the magazine and one he shares with Thor, and not counting team titles)
10 Thor books (including the one he shares with Iron Man, and not Avengers)
4 Wolverine titles (not including team titles)
And yes, I counted mini's or series about side characters as franchise titles. Anyone who doesn't see CARNAGE or OSBORN as Spider-Books or X-23 or Daken as Wolverine-Books is, well, the sort of fan Tom Brevoort likes best.
These figures would be worse if I included Ultimate or WHAT IF material. But Marvel certainly isn't flooding the market with stuff that shops won't even be able to GIVE AWAY FOR FREE AT CONVENTIONS, no sir. While I can almost understand the need to spam Thor and Cap this year, especially at the end, why the others? Besides, why not have THOR's sales go up from the film, versus confuse fans with so many different titles? Marvel doesn't make it any easier for any new fan to walk in from a movie theater and hop onto something.
Imagine this situation. A parent and their child walk into a comic shop that happens to be near a movie theater; I can attest that some shops are near theaters. They just came out of "THOR" and loved it. The parent figures, maybe I can see what Thor's comic is up to, maybe buy it for the kid or myself, or both. So they walk in. They are faced with a mass of TEN Thor titles, without the foggiest clue where to start. They go to the trade section and aside for the ESSENTIALS, nothing is numbered. They have no clue where to even start. Junior grabs a comic at random, and the cover price is $4 - at least as much as a gallon of gas, if not more. The parent whisks their kid out and never sets foot into a store again, or at least for the year. "At least I know how long a video game will last and where to start," they think. This is not an altogether unrealistic situation, and it happens every year Marvel has a big movie. They do nothing every year to fix it. Instead they rely on the fans who buy 10-100 books a month and have for years (or decades), and charge them as much as possible until their budget can't take it or they literally die off. Why can no one see this is not a sustainable pattern?
The entire future of comic book sales should not rely on every single comic store clerk being able to psychically notice when a new customer enters and is overwhelmed and then decides to walk them through the process like it is tax season at H&R BLOCK. I am not saying it is as simple as lowering prices and not spamming certain franchises so much; what I am saying is those things would help, while what is being done currently only hinders.
How many effing times is the Ultimate Universe "never going to be the same again". I wish they'd tone down the cataclysmic events and just tell cool stories.
Does the "Widowmaker" storyline becoming a mini mean that it's goodbye for Black Widow and Hawkeye and Mockingbird? It'll be a shame if the latter goes, I've been loving that book
the 616 universe was literally like this at one point: Norman kills the Skrull queen, and in the next issue, Steve is lol respawn and throwing his shield at Norman's face. There was so much packed into the 616 at one point.
Does the "Widowmaker" storyline becoming a mini mean that it's goodbye for Black Widow and Hawkeye and Mockingbird? It'll be a shame if the latter goes, I've been loving that book
the 616 universe was literally like this at one point: Norman kills the Skrull queen, and in the next issue, Steve is lol respawn and throwing his shield at Norman's face. There was so much packed into the 616 at one point.
Ultimatum was prob the biggest Ultimate-event since Galactus came(lol). It ended with Cyclops being shot in between the eyes at a press conference; just for reference. Not the kinda thing we should have "moved past" yet.
Now, yes. Back in the olden days, events weren't quite so prevalent. Hell, when the 616 universe was the same age as the Ultimate universe is now, events were practically unheard of.
Well, that's the nature of the medium at the moment because people keep shelling out their cash for lots of events and tie-ins. When they get bored enough to stop telling Marvel and DC that events are a successful financial strategy, Marvel and DC will stop treating events like a successful financial strategy.
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where is Punisher Max?!?
