Looks like bad news comes in droves. Hot on the heels of DC’s announcement that Omega Men, Doomed, and three other series have been cancelled, DC solicited the final issues of Digital First titles Batman ’66 and Sensation Comics featuring Wonder Woman. Both of these series will conclude in December, with Batman ’66 making it to a healthy 30 issues and Sensation […]
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Blog: PW -The Beat (Login to Add to MyJacketFlap)
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Greetings all! I come to you from Austin, Texas today, writing this in a dimly lit Hyatt hotel room. Let’s run down a few fun things that broke over the past 24 hours in the Entertainment world.
– Last night’s finale for The Walking Dead was surely another ratings smash, and will likely notch up another victory on par with Season 4’s 15.7 million viewer finale, Wrestlemania or no Wrestlemania. Those watching also got a taste of the upcoming spin-off series, (the unfortunately titled) Fear The Walking Dead, as AMC debuted a 15 second tease for the Los Angeles-based prequel:
The first season of the new series is set for six episodes, debuting this Summer, and there is already a second season commitment in place. Get ready for year-round zombie-based drama.
– Adam West and Burt Ward, while on a panel at Mad Monster Party in Charlotte, spilled the beans about a new project celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the 1966 Batman television series: an animated film! According to the pair, they’ll be reprising their iconic roles of Batman and Robin for (what is presumed to be a) direct to home media release in 2016.
Consequence of Sound got the footage of this surprising, yet very welcome announcement.
Did I ever tell you folks what a big fan I am of Jeff Parker‘s work on Batman ’66 and Batman: The Brave and the Bold?
– Lastly, hang onto your hats folks! We’ve got two fandoms converging this year, as the BBC has announced that Maisie Williams aka Arya Stark on Game of Thrones, will be appearing on Doctor Who this season/series.
In an announcement on the BBC website, showrunner Steven Moffat stated:
We’re thrilled to have Maisie Williams joining us on Doctor Who. It’s not possible to say too much about who or what she’s playing, but she is going to challenge the Doctor in very unexpected ways. This time he might just be out of his depth, and we know Maisie is going to give him exactly the right sort of hell.
Additionally, the same press release also detailed two more series episodes: “The Girl Who Died” written by new fan favorite Jamie Mathieson and Moffat and “The Woman Who Lived” by Catherine Tregenna (the first female writer of the Moffat era). Whether Williams will appear in those two episodes is not made clear based on this initial announcement.
That was…really too long an exchange of Twitters to digest for an article. I would have found a summary with one or two excerpted tweets more effective.
And, not to ignore the wider problem this article presents but enquiring minds (well, mine) want to know…will Batman ’66 and Sensation will continue to be released digitally, or will they be cancelled as well as the floppy reprints?
DC is still publishing comic books? ;)
Hi John,
Thanks for your comment. I got overzealous with the tweets– didn’t realize how long the conversation was because it seemed much shorter in my head! I’ve parred them down some.
According to solicits, the December issues for these titles will be the final issues for all formats. I will look into this further and clarify if I hear anything to the contrary.
I doubt that the Digital First comics will continue.
The numbers seem to have been calculated from “can we sell enough via digital + paper + graphic novel?”
If those numbers don’t add up to a profit, then it’s not going to continue with just one format.
In the old days, it was “newsstand + direct market + subscriptions”. Many marginal titles had better profits when newsstand copies were omitted (Ka-Zar, Micronauts, Moon Knight).
How well did DC market these new titles?
Why did Ms. Marvel become an overnight sensation, but not Prez?
I see the point TalesOfRacShade is making — I’m one of (I assume) many people who pick stuff up late, or purchase and then read late. I picked up a couple of the relaunched titles in June and didn’t get to reading any of them until Labor Day. (That’s what happens when your to-read pile is taller than the nightstand it sits on.) Now I’m going back to catch up on the ones I liked, but the damage has been done and the books that didn’t show strong interest by August will be canceled. Because most books simply don’t get a fighting chance, they’re often gone by the time their audience finds them.
It’s just the nature of the beast, though. I think it’s more of a general issue with monthly superhero comics and its sales channels than any bad decisions made at DC.
A lot of ground covered here:
Sad to see both Batman ’66 and Sensation Comics go. I bought both occasionally, but they were pretty confused packages.
The Batman book had the trappings of the TV show and good likenesses of the actors involved, but *unlike* the show it was played straight, not camp. So what audience was this for? I assume the nostalgia crowd (and in this day and age, that can’t be a very big crowd), but then it didn’t go all in. Sort of like putting on a production of Grease and taking out the songs. The stories were fine, but without the parody, it ended up being pretty mild (though the Kevin Smith/Ty Templeton mini with the Green Hornet was fun and the Len Wein/Harlan Ellison/Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez special was quite beautiful.)
Sensation Comics had a similar schizophrenic profile. Some of the best, accessible, all-ages Wonder Woman stories in a long time, unfortunately behind covers that often portrayed The Amazon Princess as a crazed warrior splattered with blood. I know covers in comics have a long history of not reflecting the exact contents, but I can’t imagine the audience for either one of those types of books being satisfied with that combination.
It makes me both sad and angry to hear these stories of sexual harassment behind the scenes. Especially when it involves people who are working on characters that are supposed to be heroes — examples of our best ideals, not our worst demons. DC, if this is going on, please get to the bottom of it and root it out. Not only for the sake of your workplace, but for Superman, Wonder Woman and all the other inspiring icons that the world looks up to.
And Torsten, I think Ms. Marvel had the advantage of a lot of media coverage outside of comics *and* being a superhero comic in the Marvel Universe. Prez is on its’ own in its’ own little corner of the world with no capes and tights.
The problem with DC is that they don’t give the smaller books a big marketing push. Although, I did notice that there was some attempt for The Omega Men with it having a big spread in the back pages for a month or two. Hopefully this is the kind of title that does alright in TPB and warrants a new miniseries in the not too distant future.
All of the Digital First titles have had limited lifespans, such as Adventures of Superman and Legends of the Dark Knight. Sensation had 48 digital weekly releases. That’s no small potatoes. After each one wraps up, a new one with a new character comes around the corner. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Flash or GL anthology Digital First series next up to bat.
For the record, Cullen Bunn confirmed on Twitter that “Lost Army” ends with issue six.
@Hardy: Ouch. So Lost Army wasn’t just cancelled; it was stealth cancelled. That must hit hard for the creators, to say nothing of readers who invested in the story.
Yeah, the Omega Men news hit me kind of hard, particularly after having been geared up for a twelve-issue run with a clearly laid out beginning, middle, and end. Add my voice to the choir of being cheated as a reader to be paying money for what will never be more than half a story.
And Alex DeCampi’s remarks just make me sad as a consumer. I loved Sensation Comics for its diverse storytelling, its introducing me to the work of a number of spectacular creators, and its being the iconic Wonder Woman book that I’ve felt had been missing from the stands since Gail Simone’s run on the title ended. (Azzarello and Chiang are a good “alternate” take, but separated from their storytelling, the N52 character is Generic Warrior Woman #49, not Wonder Woman.) Agreed with the poster who lamented the covers never matching the tone. That’s been a real sticking point for me with the book.
Basically, what made Sensation distinct is that between its covers, it was a feminist book. De Campi’s revelations about the Superman office at DC… I sincerely wish I could say I were surprised to hear her statements out loud. And it saddens me. The DiDio / Lee / Harras regime needs to topple. It feels to me like they set this new direction up for failure from the get-go, between the timing, the horrifyingly awful marketing, and now the company’s failure to see through on their own promises to their readers…
Is there any good news to come out of DC? I mean… Batgirl, Black Canary, and Doctor Fate are cool, and they’re still going. There’s that, right…?