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It’d be nice if Marvel (and, to a growing extent, DC) would be more open about its cancellations. This growing habit of “listed this month, not next month” is very irritating. I didn’t know Illuminati was cancelled till I read the final page of #7.. At least in the 70’s, there was an excuse (flimsy as it was) for cancellations not being announced—some decided so fast that DC would have their little box saying something like “next issue on sale the third week of July” in the final issues.

“Even after having watched Star Wars: The Force Awakens, I had to check to see who this character is. Releasing an ongoing series focused on him seemed to me to be quite a daring move -or am I the only one who totally forgot his part in the movie?”

Poe Dameron has a lot of fans. It’s not that surprising to see Marvel try a series for him.

Merci pour les conseils culinaires en fin de rubrique. ;)

Pleasantly surprised the racists haven’t come out in response to the comments about black characters (and also pleasantly surprised about how well two of those books are selling).

You can not be a racist, and still be glad that as clichéd, unnecessary and overhyped a character as Red Wolf is failing.

Why does it matter if they put FINAL ISSUE in thr solicits?

Chris: simple courtesy for people paying dollars to buy their products.

You’re a bit harsch on Moon Knight I think, it’s not that a much a popular character for a start, both first and second issues went on reprint – and besides it’s beautifully drawn.

Why does it matter if they put FINAL ISSUE in thr solicits?
==================================================================
Chris:

Some of us aren’t rolling in mounds of cash. Ergo, we have to adhere to a budget each month. If I see a title I buy every month isn’t solicited and it doesn’t say “final issue”, how do I know it’s not coming back next month? Hard to commit to a new title if I’m not sure the unsolicited title is coming back or not. And, like most other comics fans, my budget is not flexible–once again, no mounds of money lying around. So, yes, it WOULD be nice, and it’s not too much to ask, for Marvel and DC to have the common courtesy to let us know when they’re cancelling a title. Considering the dwindling readership these days, the LAST thing they need is more disgruntled—possibly soon to be former—readers.

Yep, like Rob said. For us, overseas consumers, we HAVE to preorder a title to have a chance to read it. We don’t have racks with all the titles available to choose from. Comics shops with original floppy comics wouldn’t survive with racks like that. So we preorder. And yeah, knowing a title is stopped would be nice, same thing with knowing if it’s a limited serie or not.
That’s also why double shipping is so annoying because it cuts your monthly budget, even when you did not add any new title to your “list”.
But, apparently, from what we can see of Marvel’s floppy policy, they just don’t care about floppy readers at all.
Which is a bad move: how many times do floppy readers think “well, I’ll get in in trade paperback format” and then forget about it later? Or finally buy it, but second handed, because it’s cheaper?

GOH doesnt have every corner. Legends characters should be in it too.

And the Ben Skywalker game should still be made.

#GiveUsLegends

I’m a huge Uncharted fan, so this Henning/Visceral game should be pretty awesome. 2018 though…

Actually, Douglas Adams was born on March 11th, May 25th became Towel Day a few weeks after his death in 2001

Still just Disney rip off. Stick to the original EU instead.

Looks very much aimed at the Twilight/Hunger Games/Insurgent teen girl audience. But I’ll probably see it anyway.

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So very excited for Son of Satan Classic!!! I’m attempting (slowly) to get nice copies of all the single issues, but this collection will be awesome!

Also, Sensational She-Hulk by John Byrne! Classic! Love that run!

I wonder if they are being optimistic with the “Vol 1” designations for things like Hyperion and Nighthawk…

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[…] Original article: Preview: How C-3PO Became The Red Arm Droid — The Beat […]

WHAT THE HELL, PEOPLE. Sigh.

12/15 Weirdworld #1 – 30,288
01/16 Weirdworld #2 – 17,759 (-41.4%)

This book is so excellent. It’s honestly better than a zillion tons of the other crap Marvel is putting out right now, but alas, that never seems to matter. It isn’t an event title (wait, aren’t fans tired of those?! Until there isn’t one, then they whine they need one!) and no one dies (only to return six months later) so I guess there are no reason to buy it. Great art, wow story? Eh, I’ll wait for Civil War 3, please.

Fans are a fickle lot. They complain about event books, but hate when they don’t have one to complain about. They hate cheesy death announcements, and then help sell the book into the six figures! And do we need to at least give Marvel some props for attempting to put out niche books and see what would stick? Apparently, nothing. For that, again, I blame the fanboys (and girls.) I mean, how many times does everyone also complain about all the Spider/Bat/Super/Wonder books out there in comics land? But whenever the big two attempt something new, no one buys them. I’ve heard this complaint so many times it makes my ears bleed. It’s like we all literally ignore the complaining we aim towards comics on a daily basis. It’s maddening! I want something diverse, unique, cool! But when I’m given it, I’m gonna whine and want the same tried and true I’ve gotten the last umpteen years! No one wins, no one wins…

Spidey/Deadpool is ongoing? Okay. Looking forward to seeing what the sales drop to when Kelly and McGuiness leave the book within six issues.

@Nathan Aaron – one thing to bear in mind is that the people who say they want things probably really do want them and buy them – it’s just that there are a whole lot more people who aren’t saying anything at all but they are buying the opposite of what the first group wants.

Nathan Aaron, what did you think of G0dland, and Bitch Planet? Have you read Shark-Man? What about Bendis/Gaydos’s Alias? Have heard of Joe Sacco? Or that run by Lutes, Unstable Molecules? What do you think SLAM!-c’mere, do you want to see me make this pencil disappear….? Just only spend on the stuff that counts; stop buying the repetitive crap, unless you are at a used book store, or a flea market, or at a serious discount.

‘Comic Books’ are too small, and flimsy, and look like they are strictly for kids any way -it would be cool if there were more ‘Rollingstone’ sized magazine like sequential anthologies. People would spend on that as much as they wait in lines for a cheap Tshirt from China that has a trendy brand name on it. Americans love to be pretentious, spending, bigots that would love to show off their Punisher *magbook* if it was done right, if it looked cool, and functioned sequentially in a way that was bad ass… for example.

Hey Nathan Aaron, FYI:

It Will Never Love You Back: Marvel Entertainment, Ike Perlmutter, and Why the Corporation Cannot Be Your Friend
by Charlotte Finn February 1, 2016 12:00 PM
http://comicsalliance.com/ike-perlmutter-marvel-entertainment-consumers-and-corporations/

Read More: Marvel, Perlmutter, And Why Corporations Aren’t Your Friend | http://comicsalliance.com/ike-perlmutter-marvel-entertainment-consumers-and-corporations/?trackback=tsmclip

Why I’m Boycotting Marvel Comics
by J.A. Micheline August 4, 2015 2:00 PM
http://comicsalliance.com/marvel-boycott-axel-alonso/

Read More: “Why I’m Boycotting Marvel Comics” | http://comicsalliance.com/marvel-boycott-axel-alonso/?trackback=tsmclip

Nathan, perhaps start a petition to boycott -what do you want to boycott today, NAy? NAy?

Hey Nathan Aaron, FYI:

It Will Never Love You Back: Marvel Entertainment, Ike Perlmutter, and Why the Corporation Cannot Be Your Friend
by Charlotte Finn February 1, 2016 12:00 PM

Why I’m Boycotting Marvel Comics
by J.A. Micheline August 4, 2015 2:00 PM

Nathan, perhaps start a petition to boycott -what do you want to boycott today, NAy? NAy?

Marvel makes comics starring Marvel characters. People who read Marvel Comics usually want to read about Spider-Man, the X-Men, the Avengers, etc… A lot of what they are publishing nowadays is chasing away the loyal fan who just wants to read about their favorite characters. Yeah there’s room for Weirdworld but if fan’s aren’t buying the A-List books (excluding Star Wars) you can’t expect sales for B and C level titles to be great. Marvel, for the last decade, have invested more on the names under the title than the title itself. That makes for creator loyalty, not brand loyalty. Why read a Marvel book trying to be an Image book when you can just read an Image book?

FWIW, with DC and Marvel both putting out so many new series all the time (including renumbered ones), I’m not sure it’s possible for any series to “stabilize” for long.

About Star Wars sales, maybe we should also consider that the book started with John Cassaday on art and covers, and now it’s Deoadato or Leinil Yu. All of them are A list artists sure, but well, some are more A than others. I personally stopped after Immonen’s arc, maybe some other readers did. Looking forward to know who will be the next artist. Maybe they’ll be back on major ones, or slightly slipping on the B list ones.

Also, the fact the comics didn’t gain any new buyers (and worse, lost buyers) since the movie is out is not a good sign. Maybe the star wars mania is a already a bit passé, Marvel was definitely wise to launch the book nearly two years before the movie, but they’ve got to find another big hit now. It won’t be Star Wars for a while, at least not before the next movie – so a long while – and even then, it will never come back to those first issues sales.

@Nathan
The way I see it, Events and big names are creating a lot of static through which even very good titles have a hard time emerging. Maybe Marvel ought to create a Vertigo-like imprint for all the odd ones out to find a nest.

“That’s a nice improvement over the previous floppy sales level of this TPB juggernaut, and better than its previous volume #2 sales level ! I will not wait any longer and make it a win !”

Well, I guess you’ll change your mind with the sales of number 3 in january that seems to have fallen to the 32.000 mark. If the fall don’t stop quickly, it’ll end with really lower numbers than the previous volume.

Indeed, that was one of the biggest shock of January top300! And I indeed changed my mind and took back my W vote, you are absolutly right – I wrote it yesterday :p

Hey, another excessively negative piece. Must be another month.

Proably something I ate. It’s still struck. Wait for January, it’s even worse.
Eh, 4 win, 15 Fail, that’s probably better than what DC did or will do :p

I think the issue here is the premise that books that had < 1 years runs, ended just a few months ago,and relaunched with the same creative team, should magically do better or deemed failures if they fall back to their previous numbers.

Marvel could also be perfectly happy with that :: they just sold more comics, period, of everyone (and I mean all of them) of there books at least for a month or two.

@Brian – seems like a pretty reasonable barometer for determining failure.

@David – I don’t know why Marvel would be perfectly happy with that. They sold a a few copies of a lot of books. That’s a rather resource-intensive way to “win” the sales charts. Takes burning through a lot of talent, promoting a ton of low-selling books, pissing off retail partners, etc.

In before Dan Slott shows up to argue how Spider-man’s sales are actually a success by means of copious amounts of spin.

@Zach “Pissing off retail partners” (and fans too I should add), is probably the baddest part of it, true.
But as long as the same fans and retail partners are still buying number ones like crazy, they just have (we just have) what they (we) deserve.

Like Xavier said – most of those new books are back the way they were before the relaunch, but in the meantime they sold X times more comics with a new number one, and still some more with a new number two, and even a bit left on a new number three. And that means a lot lot lot more money and comics sold at the end, much much more than if they would have kept the numbering going on.
It’s still the same book, the same heroes, sometimes the same artists than before, but for at least for three months, it sold like pancakes.

I know you will say “in the long term”. But honestly, let’s stop fooling ourselves : in the long term there will be still Spider-Man, Avengers and Deadpool comics, whereas a number 334 or a new number 1. It’s just that the new number 1 sells way better than 334. For how long will it work ? That is the question, but for now it’s still working, and working really well.

Crossovers and variants seems more of a problem, really.

(oh, and like Xavier, I’m french too, so I hope my english is ok !)

It’s pretty obvious to me from reading these columns that most fans, in spite of what the world thinks, generally want the characters they’ve been used to for years. Sam Wilson as Cap is bombing badly. It’s actually a pretty decent read, but you’d never know it by the sales numbers. Cue the return of Steve Rogers to the role just in time for the movie in May.

If you take away what makes a character popular, it takes away readers who were drawn to what made the character popular in the first place. Superior Iron Man didn’t sell very well. I really think part of the reason was the altered outfit and Tony’s even more arrogant and overbearing than usual personality. I’d say that’s one reason that the all new, all PC Avengers crashed between the first and second issue. To most people, the Avengers are Steve Rogers, Tony Stark, etc., not Jane Foster Thor, Kid Nova and “Ms. Marvel”. Such a title might get critical acclaim, but that doesn’t always translate to sales. Same premise of movies and tv shows that don’t translate into box office and ratings. “Steve Jobs” is an example of a recent film that was almost universally acclaimed, but bombed at the box office.

Too bad really, that people don’t want to try new things. I think the Howling Commandos, Squadron Supreme and especially Red Wolf are all good reads. I don’t expect any of them to make it past issue 12 at this rate.

If Marvel and DC want to right their ships, they probably need to wise up and go back to the tried and true. It’s been worse at DC: when they did the reboot that gave us Emo Superman, Amazon rape culture Wonder Woman and the like, it looked like it would work at first, given the sales numbers. However, five years on it just doesn’t have the lasting appeal of the original versions. Perhaps Rebirth will start to fix that.

It’s true, Nikki was a dream to work with! And she came all the way from Austin to San Antonio to do it, too!

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I think that label is the LucasFilm arm of Disney Press/DBG, Disney’s internal publishing division. Looks fantastic to me!

[…] Marvel has been having great success with their line of Star Wars comics over the past year, but it seems the latest Star Wars comic isn’t actually coming from Marvel. Instead, this coming March, Lusasfilm Press will release a brand new graphic novel adaptation of the original trilogy, all told as one big story. I’m not sure who the artist is, but it is definitely in a more cartoony style than the Marvel books, making me think this is aimed at younger readers. You can see the A New Hope-themed cover below: [Comics Beat] […]

This isn’t even the first “remake” of the star wars trilogy in comics.

In the 90’s (or early 2000’s) Dark Horse put out a manga style series of adaptations of the classic trilogy.

I’ve heard that Abrams was heavily involved in the story arc for all three, yeah. This does get weirder and weirder the more news comes out, though. OR maybe not weird, because it’s the same story we’ve been hearing from Disney-owner franchises now for a while.

I suspect it’s less a question of the new characters as a whole and more a question of WHICH hew characters– everything we’ve heard out of marketing is this whole travesty about them thinking Rey toys wouldn’t sell well, and expecting Kylo Ren to be the breakout hit. So they are most likely retooling what was going to be a whiny white boy villaiin redemption story into something more about the characters people actually liked. There’s also some speculation that people were SO fond of the idea of Poe as gay or bisexual that they may be rewriting his character slightly to make what Oscar Isaacs already admitted to doing under the radar more explicitly part of his character. I’m still not sure I believe Disney would do that, but here’s to hoping?

Anyway, even if it’s about assuming Darth Whiny was going to be the breakout character, I agree with you that it really says so much about what Disney still assumes about their market/demographic. And it’s kind of pathetic because I don’t remember ever having trouble finding Leia toys in the 80s. This divisiveness in gendered marketing and ideas about what audiences are supposed to like is killing good storytelling.

“These “rewrite” rumors make it sound like the plot for the whole trilogy wasn’t entirely set in stone when TFA was made, which would just be….stupid.”

It may be stupid, but that’s par for the course. While “Revenge” of the Jedi was being planned during the filming of ESB, there was no script. There wasn’t even a second Death Star yet. Even for the prequels Lucas didn’t plan out the story past the film he was working on at a time. Sure, there were basic ideas, plus some narrative elements that were a given (spoiler: Anakin becomes Darth Vader!), but there was definitely no script for each film until after the previous film was finished.

In March of 2000, just three months before the start of principal photography, Lucas finally completed his ROUGH DRAFT for Episode 2. That was almost a year after Episode 1 came out. Episode 3 did have more advance planning, but the summer after Episode 2 came out he still hadn’t settled on the final plot. He did film one scene, the scene on Tatooine at the very end of Episode 3, during filming of Episode 2, but that’s really the only story element that was figured out beforehand. Everything else that was planned in advance was art department stuff: ships, costumes, battles, locations.

Lucasfilm clearly has a grand outline for these next films. And they clearly have at least a draft or two of Episode 8. But them not having a final SHOOTING script until after the last film is released is not out of the ordinary.

Yeah, I think you might be misunderstanding how the scripting process works. Obviously, they knew the new characters were going to be popular. I doubt this is about Rey and Finn. It’s more about how large a role to give, say, Phasma. She was a huge fan favorite who didn’t really get a lot of time in the first film. So maybe they’ve decided to give her an actual character arc, rather than just have her play a generic baddie. Or maybe they’re struggling with where to go with Poe as a potential romantic lead. Remember, Poe wasn’t even originally supposed to survive the first film. The idea that the whole Finn/Poe romance would become a huge fan favorite was probably not on anyone’s radar. Now, they have to decide whether to play that up, or to go some other direction. But they’re definitely going to want to capitalize on Oscar Isaac’s status as “the Internet’s boyfriend” and build up his part in the next two movies. I doubt that the basic shape of Rey-Finn-Kylo will change much. It’s the other breakout characters that they have to look out how best to use.

“…and filming hasn’t even begun.”

This actually isn’t accurate.SHooting had actually started on this back in September. Principle actors were supposed to report to start shooting this month, which obviously has been pushed back now.

I agree with Niska and think the retooling has less to do with the leads and more to do with other characters. I also think DIsney/Lucasfilm was likely very conservative with what they initially gave RIan Johnson to work with as far as budget and production, and are likely telling him now to go for broke. I also think the huge opening of episode VII and only having an AVatar sequel to contend with as opposed to tentpole movies every week off three months has a lot more to do with them moving the date than the script re-writes.

I’ve been anxious since JJ was announced for the project. Endings are not his strong suit (Lost, Super 8). I’ve simply not found myself feeling like any real resolution has been effected by the end of his stories, and see plenty of missed chances (esp. with the Star Trek films). He builds MASSIVELY HUGE, lush stories though, so if someone else is taking his placement and taking a Happy Gilmore style swing at it, I could definitely be ok with that.

There was recently some interviews with Gary Kurtz, who worked on A New Hope & Empire before parting ways for Return of the Jedi. He mentioned that the first draft of Return of the Jedi didn’t even have the second Death Star. That they were looking to kill off Han Solo in the middle of the movie and that it would be a lot darker. However, after how dark Empire got, Lucas wanted Jedi to be less serious and “more rollercoaster ride”. Gary Kurtz didn’t like the direction they were going and so he left.

I imagine with such an important franchise that there has been a lot of talk about where these 3 movies are going storywise. I doubt they would have been limited to just the single movie. Gwendoline Christie has talked about her character Captain Phasma being in all 3 movies and having a story arc. That said, the plan can and obviously will change just as it did with the original trilogy.

“JUST WHO IS RUNNING THIS FRANCHISE.”

From what I’ve read, Kathleen Kennedy is in charge. She’s overseeing the episodes, much like the showrunner on a TV series, as directors come and go.

So apparently they’ve found that a December release date works pretty well, financially?

Are there any other potential Marvel readers like me? I like strong stories that carry on from issue to issue, I like well drawn art. I like to buy a comic, read it, and then buy the new issue of that same title the next month. I don’t want to have the complete Marvel Universe dashing in and out of ‘my’ comic, and I don’t want to have to restart a series every 6 months when it’s been rebooted. Now if Marvel was to do that, THAT would be all new and all different!!

Your not alone AL

Marvel has been doing crossovers and guest stars in issues since the 60s.

If you want to ‘diversify’ your characters to expand your market base, then Disney/Marvel needs to totally rehaul/revamp/re-do their marketing. -You can not say you want diverse characters, and then keep printing these seemingly over priced pamphlet-sized tiny ‘comic books’ to people who are outside the bounds of the traditional comic book marketing models. Just being owned by megamultinational corporate foreign entity Disney, and having female, or black versions of male characters is not going to cut it -it will, and does, look transparent, and like an adult trying to look cool… Alonso almost has it, but there should be more ‘NuMarvel’, and magainze sized anthologies, as wells as contributions to magazines/websites like Playboy, ComedyCentral, Vice, and also StarTalk, and the BBC for web comics to programs that run either one-shot shows, and more quality ‘adult’ animated programs/shows… You cannot expect new female, muslim, latino, and African American markets to enter the ‘traditional comic book shop’ or book store -maybe a used book store for cheaper graphic novels, but that’s it… Yuuup, thaz whum’sayn Yo…

pLEASE nOTE Disney/Marvel : I swear to Galactus, you print some quality ‘magazine-sized’ books, or coffee table type bound, or nice quality trade paperback wider/larger-sized volumes of anthologies, and compilations of characters/stories that people can request, then madams/sirs you will be thanking me all the way to the bank, and back again. The immediate pretentious ‘nifty’ value of this can be projected onto all kinds of cultures, scenes, ways of life, as well as the collector’s value of limited first prints, and extras like maps, diagrams, sketches, and pop-up, pop-out, cut our and hang up whatevers… Expand the sequential story telling medium in the USA to things outside the small pamphlets that are over-priced and filled with advertisements…

Except that this movie (TFA) is really well done. The actors are great, the story is good, the CGI is 21st century, there is no input from George ‘franchise killer’ Lucas and, wait for it…. Jar Jar is nowhere to be seen!!!

If you don’t know why the bad guys are on that planet in the beginning then you clearly weren’t paying attention to the movie

swing and a miss, or something

No, it’s a retread of the original Star Wars. A pretty shameless one, but it seems to be working.

“Except that this movie (TFA) is really well done.”

Except that wasn’t the focus of the article. Oops.

Was someone actually paid to write that?

Here a more interesting topic. What does it say about the future of movies and movie-making that the 3 biggest box office successes (not adjusted for inflation) are films where a high level of skill was applied to utterly formulaic melodramas?

Mike

What it says is that TV is the future of the medium. Because hollywood’s photocopiers must sooner or later run out of toner.

The point is, those that argue that TFA is lifted from the original star wars would be just as reasonable in saying that it was lifted from the Phantom Menace. This satirical article is highlighting the manipulation and cherry picking that needs to be made in satisfying the former argument by using it to equate phantom menace, which people do not complain about being too similar to the originals (they complain about other things) to the new movie.

Or you could look at it like this.

Random droid with important map installed in it, wonders a sandy planet.
Main character happens to find said droid
Main characters flee an attack in a “piece of junk/garbage” spaceship that just so happens to be the Millennium Falcon.
Bad guys have a Death Star, an Emperor/Supreme Leader and main bad guy who wears a back, helmet like mask. Which is totally fine cuz we already we already who his super favorite sith lord is in the trailer
Main characters meet up with rebel’s / resistance, and find out that said death star has a weak point and plan an attack with x-wings. at least Naboo fighters where new.
One of the main characters is killed by one of the main bad guys as the main character looks on and shout’s “Nooooooo”….. Oh wait Obi Wan did that when Qui-Gon got killed.. Nah Obi Wan was killed and Luke shouted Nooooo… or did Darth Vader say it in III? such confusion.
Death Star blows up Alderaan and a bunch of other planets cuz the new Death Star is a planet, that absorbs mass from stars so it can shoot cause something or whatever.
Death Star gets blown up.

I think rhyming was what Lucas called it when he made his prequels, they mirror a lot on the originals. Personally I just thought this film had more of a IV vibe going put that’s just me.

It all just boils down to a certain point of view, point of view? point of view.

“The point is, those that argue that TFA is lifted from the original star wars would be just as reasonable in saying that it was lifted from the Phantom Menace.”

That’s a stupid point because it’s NOT TRUE.

The similarities with the original Star Wars are clear and concrete, both plot-wise and in the emotional beats of the story. The comparisons made with Phantom Menace in the article are vague and obtuse to the point of being ridiculous. For example…

“They need to find a new ship or repair parts so they can get off this planet”
.
The reason why they go to Maz Kanata’s planet in TFA has nothing to do with they they go to Tatooine in the Phantom Menace. Literally. Nothing.

Again, did someone get paid to write that?

Mike