# Marvel could publish DC.



## LuisCarlos17f (Feb 28, 2020)

AT&T Closing DC Comics If '5G' Fails Says Ethan Van Sciver | [current-page:pager]Cosmic Book News
					

Following the news of the exit of Dan DiDio, it's being said that AT&T will close down DC Comics if its upcoming 5G event fails.




					cosmicbook.news
				




*AT&T CLOSING DC COMICS IF '5G' FAILS SAYS ETHAN VAN SCIVER*










						Marvel Rumored to Take Over DC Comics
					

A new rumor suggests ATT will sell DC Comics to Marvel, combining the biggest superhero entertainment companies.




					ourcommunitynow.com
				




*Marvel Rumored to Take Over DC Comics*









						There’s a Rumor that Marvel is Taking Over DC Comics
					

There have been some serious rumors throughout the past couple of years when it comes to the DC and Marvel universes, but this one delivered by Christian Bone of We Got This Covered is one that needs to be examined fully before being taken as gospel since it’s more than just a game-changer. When...




					www.tvovermind.com
				




*There’s a Rumor that Marvel is Taking Over DC Comics*









						Marvel Rumored To Take Over DC Comics
					

A big rumor has hit the net that in the wake of AT&T firing Dan DiDio, that Marvel and Kevin Feige may take over DC Comics.




					cosmicbook.news
				




*MARVEL RUMORED TO TAKE OVER DC COMICS*

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Of course I doubt AT&T to sell Superman & cia when they are a very brand, even one of the main icones of the American culture. But something is happening. We, the Spanish people loves sayings and one is "to troubled river, fisherman's profit". This could be a great opportunity for Marvel/Disney, not to get the rights, but at least some licence agremeent, something like Hasbro with Disney, or IDW comics with Hasbro. Marvel could be allowed to publish their own version of DC superheroes or even theses as "guest artists" in the cinematic marvel universe.


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## Tonguez (Feb 28, 2020)

Disney is getting to the point of owning all our childhood anyway, so a permanent Marvel DC crossover event was kinda inevitable , especailly with WB botching the DC Movie Universe 

btw does Disney own Capcom?


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## LuisCarlos17f (Feb 28, 2020)

Disney could buy some videogame studio, but my opinion is they would rather licencing with different companies. There is a Marvel vs Capcom, but also Kingdom Hearts saga by Square Enix.

I wonder about some new lincecing agreement between Hasbro and Capcom, but that is other matter.

In the past DC and Marvel could be together.









						The Story Behind The Time Marvel Almost Bought DC Comics
					

In a new 'One-Shot' web short, Variant Comics has put together a two-minute presentation about a [...]




					comicbook.com
				












						How Marvel almost Ended up Owning DC Comics Superman, Batman & More — GeekTyrant
					

Can you imagine a world in which  Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman  and  Green Lantern  belonged to the Marvel Universe? Apparently it actually almost happened! one of Marvel's most controversial editors,  Jim Shooter , revealed that Marvel almost bought a bunch of these DC comics superhero properties




					geektyrant.com
				




---

I am afair now it is a good age for superheroe franchises and for comics, but not for superheroes comics. 

Other matter is a thorn for the superheroes too invulnerable and these aren't so easy to be adapted into videogames. I don't refer to Batman or Spiderman, but those "bulletproof skinned" superheroes, as Superman. 

My suggestion to test the reaction by the public is a Lego: Mavel vs DC videogame, and some toys (by Hasbro?). And a horror crossovers about black laterns vs marvel zombies. Those can feel their rage and their hunger as variant of greed, but they don't tear out the hearts... but the brains to "gather".


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## DwarfHammer (Feb 28, 2020)

I think the time for superhero movies is over and DC missed the boat. Maybe in another 20 years. Time for something new.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Feb 28, 2020)

The public, the fandom, has changed, but this doesn't mean the end of the superheroe franchises. The teleseries with DC superheroes still can work. Thanks theses Green Arrow, Flash or Batwoman may be known by no-American + no-Fandom. 

Maybe we can agree "bulletproof" superheroes aren't very popular now because they are too perfect, and boring like the Mary Sue characters. Where is the challenge? If you know Superman is going to save the day only with the superpowers then the story is boring. Supergirl not only is on air yet but also Superman & Lois is going to be its spin-off.  

The videogames "Injustice" teach us DC Universe can be used to create really good stories in the right writter's hands. 

And the superheroes are a great potential gold mine among the roleplayers because a great section of the fandom would like to play stories with characters created by them.

---

*Time Warner May Sell Warner Bros & DC if AT&T Merger Fails*









						Time Warner May Sell WB/DC if AT&T Merger Fails
					

Time Warner might be splitting up




					screenrant.com


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## Urriak Uruk (Feb 28, 2020)

DwarfHammer said:


> I think the time for superhero movies is over and DC missed the boat. Maybe in another 20 years. Time for something new.




You know that the last Avengers movie is the highest grossing movie of all time? And it came out last year?

More on topic, I'm hoping this is untrue. The consolidation of film and media under Disney is deeply troubling, especially if you look at how Disney has been scrubbing anything remotely controversial from its newest releases.


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## DwarfHammer (Feb 28, 2020)

Urriak Uruk said:


> You know that the last Avengers movie is the highest grossing movie of all time? And it came out last year?
> 
> More on topic, I'm hoping this is untrue. The consolidation of film and media under Disney is deeply troubling, especially if you look at how Disney has been scrubbing anything remotely controversial from its newest releases.



Yes I am aware of that. Loved the movies. I think they have peaked.


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## Legatus Legionis (Feb 29, 2020)

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## LuisCarlos17f (Feb 29, 2020)

Maybe a licencing for the paper printed editions to other publisher, for example IDW comics or Dynamite Enternaiment. Any future crossover? They should agreee about profits with merchandicing, like toys or videogames, or a cartoon adaptation.

Or if the future are the streaming service media... why not interactive comics to be readen on screen?


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## Rikka66 (Feb 29, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Maybe a licencing for the paper printed editions to other publisher, for example IDW comics or Dynamite Enternaiment. Any future crossover? They should agreee about profits with merchandicing, like toys or videogames, or a cartoon adaptation.
> 
> Or if the future are the streaming service media... why not interactive comics to be readen on screen?




There wouldn't be any discussion about merchandising or cartoons.  Much like the movies, that's entirely separate world they aren't giving up.



DwarfHammer said:


> Yes I am aware of that. Loved the movies. I think they have peaked.




I get that, but that a different matter from them missing the boat if they each keep making a billion dollars each.


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## Truth Seeker (Feb 29, 2020)

Not going to happen...


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## Mercurius (Mar 1, 2020)




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## Zardnaar (Mar 2, 2020)

Rikka66 said:


> There wouldn't be any discussion about merchandising or cartoons.  Much like the movies, that's entirely separate world they aren't giving up.
> 
> 
> 
> I get that, but that a different matter from them missing the boat if they each keep making a billion dollars each.




They don't make a billion though after cinema cut.

At 20 billion to buy the DECU they would have to make around 30 Force Awakens (2 billion box office, 700 million profit).

So at that price tag it's not worth it. Real value if DCU is probably more like 4 billion similar to Star Wars which has averaged a billion a movie.

 Comics not worth that much nowdays.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 2, 2020)

Universe DC is a too important brand to be rejected, but maybe we are in the last years of superheroes paper-printed comic industry. My own opinion is there is a open door for future new intercompany crossovers, at least to test the reaction of the public. Then maybe the next step could be a crossover, but not in comic, but a toys, videogames or an animation title. Who would buy this? Speculators, of course, because this would be like a limited edition for collectors. 

The final step would be allowing a "DC miniverse" within Marvel. 

The value of the comic publishers is these are "laboratories of ideas", with a lower economic risk to test new ideas about stories later to be adapted to the media or videogames.

* Other possibility would be AT&T buying Disney, or al least a great pack of shares of stock. They shouldn't worry about renegotiating the profit sharing.


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## Truth Seeker (Mar 2, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> *Universe DC is a too important brand to be rejected, but maybe we are in the last years of superheroes paper-printed comic industry*. My own opinion is there is a open door for future new intercompany crossovers, at least to test the reaction of the public. Then maybe the next step could be a crossover, but not in comic, but a toys, videogames or an animation title. Who would buy this? Speculators, of course, because this would be like a limited edition for collectors.
> 
> The final step would be allowing a "DC miniverse" within Marvel.
> 
> ...




AT&T has no patience or understanding to what DC Comics is, their shareholders are holding their feet to the fire on the massive combination debt with TW and them. The comic side has never reached past a billion dollars in revenue yearly and it never will. Despite what gimmicks being pulled by DC Comics to remain viable to the board _AT&T mainly_ will not be enough. TW has the movie and tv IPS, which can bring in millions,  hundred of millions...which surpasses the comic book profit margins with ease, as long the story is done right. That part will survive, the paper side....is declining and that slide has not stop.

AT&T buying Disney?

ROFL!!!!


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## Rikka66 (Mar 2, 2020)

Zardnaar said:


> They don't make a billion though after cinema cut.
> 
> At 20 billion to buy the DECU they would have to make around 30 Force Awakens (2 billion box office, 700 million profit).
> 
> ...




I don't think I was referring to anyone buying it with the post you quoted. But I do agree with everything you say here.


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## Urriak Uruk (Mar 2, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Universe DC is a too important brand to be rejected, but maybe we are in the last years of superheroes paper-printed comic industry. My own opinion is there is a open door for future new intercompany crossovers, at least to test the reaction of the public. Then maybe the next step could be a crossover, but not in comic, but a toys, videogames or an animation title. Who would buy this? Speculators, of course, because this would be like a limited edition for collectors.
> 
> The final step would be allowing a "DC miniverse" within Marvel.
> 
> ...




Do I think Disney could buy DC Comics? Sure. Why not, AT&T probably doesn't care much about the comic publisher, it doesn't make that much money in bulk so I don't think AT&T cares much.

But licensing for other media and comic publishing are not the same thing. Disney owns comics for Spider-Man, X-Men, Deadpool, every Marvel character. But the films rights to all the characters were largely divided among different studios for a very long time, and even after Disney bought 20th Century Fox, Disney still doesn't have the rights to a Spider-Man movie. They have to negotiate contracts with Sony to make them.

AT&T will *never *give up the film rights to DC Comics, even if the movies are tanking (and they're not, Joker was a very profitable film for them recently). So this conversation is largely moot right now.


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## Umbran (Mar 2, 2020)

Zardnaar said:


> At 20 billion to buy the DECU they would have to make around 30 Force Awakens (2 billion box office, 700 million profit).




In 2019, Disney made about $11 Billion in studio entertainment.  They made about $24 billion from their media networks, and $26 billion from parks, experiences, and products.

If you are only relying on the box office revenue to make money, you are missing the point of owning an IP.


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## Zardnaar (Mar 2, 2020)

Umbran said:


> In 2019, Disney made about $11 Billion in studio entertainment.  They made about $24 billion from their media networks, and $26 billion from parks, experiences, and products.
> 
> If you are only relying on the box office revenue to make money, you are missing the point of owning an IP.




 That's Disney though. They gave what 4 major studios, theme parks etc.

 If you had 20 billion to buy the DCU I don't think you would get your money back on it anytime soon. 

Hell Star Wars got better Box office, spent a billion in the theme park, and has better tie in merch sakes than anything DCU pulled off. 

 Say Disney bought it it would've smaller than marvel and just a fraction of Disney's overall revenue. 

 At 20 billion I wouldn't buy it I would buy something else. Star Wars makes more money and Disney got that for 4 billion.


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## Urriak Uruk (Mar 2, 2020)

Zardnaar said:


> That's Disney though. They gave what 4 major studios, theme parks etc.
> 
> If you had 20 billion to buy the DCU I don't think you would get your money back on it anytime soon.
> 
> ...









						List of highest-grossing media franchises - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org
				




To be clear, the properties are worth a lot of money; Batman has made $28 billion, and Superman $11.4 billion. But you are absolutely correct that buying it for $20 billion is pretty absurd.


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## Eyes of Nine (Mar 3, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Universe DC is a too important brand to be rejected, but maybe we are in the last years of superheroes paper-printed comic industry.




THIS.


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## Ashrym (Mar 3, 2020)

My understanding was publishing was being considered to be shut down and licenced out but movies, TV, and merchandizing would not because those are profitable.  The IP is valuable.

Many of the arricles are clickbait the doesn't represent the whole story.

I'm more interested in Dan Didio's termination and what the upcoming direction will be.

Also, Jim Lee indicated DC was not likely to be sold.






						Newsarama | GamesRadar+
					






					www.newsarama.com


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## Legatus Legionis (Mar 3, 2020)

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## Zardnaar (Mar 3, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> Don't know if 5G (or the fifth generation reboot) is going to work.
> 
> I heard that if that fails, DC publishing would be just doing its back catalogue (omnibus) in printed.  Any new storied would be e-comics.
> 
> ...




 That would be Moronic. DC comics don't interest me at all but I suppose I'm a casual Batman fan. Casual meaning I liked the Tim Burton ones and Dark Knight Trilogy. 

 But yeah Batman is Bruce Wayne, Superman is Clark Kent and Dianna is Wonder Women. 

 Replacing Batman maybe, stupid idea but the other 2 would be difficult.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 3, 2020)

I have searched news and I have readen something about 5G will not be a reboot. 

I remember the origin of the group "Infinity Inc" was a "second generation" from a parallel world, but after they did a brutal retcon. 

We can agree DC will not be sold to Marvel, and this wouldn't like a licencing agreemet if they can't use new characters, or only Time Warner can make an animated adaptation based in some of those new stories.

If AT&T wanted to buy stock exchange packages it would rather to be secret to avoid the price increase. 

My own suggestion is for the future "secret crisis" event is to create a new "elseworld", a new universe where DC and Marvel characters are together, but the planet is totally different (continents, nations, History). After the event this "pocket universe" would become public domain (but the main characters from the original comics) to be used for fan-fiction by the fandom.


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## Ashrym (Mar 3, 2020)

Zardnaar said:


> That would be Moronic. DC comics don't interest me at all but I suppose I'm a casual Batman fan. Casual meaning I liked the Tim Burton ones and Dark Knight Trilogy.
> 
> But yeah Batman is Bruce Wayne, Superman is Clark Kent and Dianna is Wonder Women.
> 
> Replacing Batman maybe, stupid idea but the other 2 would be difficult.




That might have been part of the issue.  Didio was pushing for his "5G" soft reboot while Tinion wanted it left out of his writing.  it sounded like there was some conflict going on.  Changing comics causes issues tied up in other media and merchandising as well.



LuisCarlos17f said:


> I have searched news and I have readen something about 5G will not be a reboot.
> 
> I remember the origin of the group "Infinity Inc" was a "second generation" from a parallel world, but after they did a brutal retcon.
> 
> ...




More like the Young Justice cartoon, I think.  Aqualad is getting set up to replace Aquaman, for example.  Rebirth wasn't supposed to be a reboot either but Manhattan altered reality a lot in the recent Doomsday Clock reboot and Perpetua appears to have reset most of reality (which also seems to have been ignored?) in the Justice League comics at the end of Doomwar.  I'm not yet that clear on that part.

One of the rumors is that Batman is being replaced while Bruce Wayne steps down.  This has been done multiple times in the past such when his back was broken (replaced by Azrael), when Darkseid sanctioned him (replaced by Dick Grayson), after he lost his memory and Jim Gordon replaced him, or the future with Terry McGinnis.  It inevitably leads back to Bruce Wayne.

Didio's reasoning behind the changes was to create an entry point for new readers but I think I would like to see some statistics to back up that claim.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 3, 2020)

The hook for the new readers are the media titles: toys, videogames, cartoons, movies and teleseries. But today superheroes titles are too mature or too childish. And too powerful superheroes are as boring as those perfection Mary Sue from the fan-fiction. 

And in the videogames the coherence with the continuity has to be sacrificied for the gameplay. If you play with Superman you can be defeated by Catwoman.


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## Zardnaar (Mar 3, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> The hook for the new readers are the media titles: toys, videogames, cartoons, movies and teleseries. But today superheroes titles are too mature or too childish. And too powerful superheroes are as boring as those perfection Mary Sue from the fan-fiction.
> 
> And in the videogames the coherence with the continuity has to be sacrificied for the gameplay. If you play with Superman you can be defeated by Catwoman.




I've never liked Superman that much. Two red, white and blue, to over the top, to goody two shoes, to boring. Also liked the 90s Blade movies. 

Spiderman eh take it or leave it.


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## Legatus Legionis (Mar 4, 2020)

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## GreyLord (Mar 4, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> When The New 52 came out, the Batman titles were left unchanged, while all the others were effective.




Not exactly. I found the New 52 a good point to jump off of Batman comics due to the changes.

Before it, Dick Grayson was Batman.  Bruce was going to allow him to stay Batman, at least in Gotham City.  Bruce also was going to have other individuals act in the role of Batman in other cities via Batman Inc. where they would assume the role of Batman.  Bruce would oversee all of it as the Primary Batman.

I actually liked the idea.  It opened the door for many other comicbooks should they have allowed it.

Instead, they changed it so Dick Grayson became Nightwing again and did not stay Batman, and Bruce became Batman over Gotham once more.  Also, it was only like (5 years I think) since the beginning, rather than the longer time period prior to the New 52.

Haven't kept up with Batman since except via the animated films.  It's gotten silly from what I've seen from Bad Blood.  Catwoman pregnant is even sillier.  

I think Didio created spurts of great sales for brief moments with his constant 'events' and reboots, but ultimately with all these things got away from the core of what the superheroes really were and instead ultimately lost more over time than they actually gained in readership.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 4, 2020)

Do you know the expression "jumping the shark"? I am afair this is happening when we see an abuse of radical changes. 

Today the superheroes are very famous. In Spain Batman was practically unknown (but among comics fans) among the main public until the first Tim Burton's movie. And some marvel characters famous only thanks from 60's children cartoons. These are good years for the comic industry, but not for the paper-printed superheroes comics. Not only DC but also Marvel is making more money with the merchadicing.

The future of the superheroe franchises are linked with the media, cartoons and action pictures, but also the videogames, and too powerful superhumans aren't easy to be adapted, worse if we want crossovers with different power levels. 

* Really I would like a Marvel vs DC tabletop role-playing compatible with D&D, altought characters have to be nerfed when they are too powerful (sorry Superman and Hulk).


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## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 19, 2020)

Sorry for this little necromancy but I would like to ask some question. 

I have read about Apple Inc could buy Disney, at least somebody has adviced this is the best time to do it. Apple Inc has got good relations with Disney, but also with AT&T, owners of Time Warner/DC Enternaiment.


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## Zardnaar (Mar 19, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Sorry for this little necromancy but I would like to ask some question.
> 
> I have read about Apple Inc could buy Disney, at least somebody has adviced this is the best time to do it. Apple Inc has got good relations with Disney, but also with AT&T, owners of Time Warner/DC Enternaiment.




Probably not. Apple can't really afford it and I don't think to many people are going to want to spend billions right now.

If they wait a bit Disney is gonna be a lot cheaper.

 Probably won't be a lot of iPhone sales in the near future.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Apr 6, 2020)

I have read some webs and some people want a new DC-Marvel crossover. And my opinion is this may be possible.

My suggestion is to create a new patchwork world, mixing the battleworld from the last Secret War event and the Telos/Blood Moon from the DC Event Convergence. And this world used as setting for a future TTRPG, at least by the fandom. This patchwork world would have got different "bubles" or kingdoms, one for be used by DC, other by Marvel, other by Hasbro (to sell toys based in the crossover event... and also an own TTRPG), and crossovers with 3PPs, for example videogames studios or manga-anime characters.


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## Legatus Legionis (Apr 6, 2020)

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## MoonSong (Apr 7, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> But with what is going one in comics and in movies right now, I don't think it would be the best time to colaborate.



Also, the industry is in complete hold. Diamond is a keystone of comic distribution, and from recent news they not only are closed for the quarantine, they have announced a payment plan for what they currently owe to publishers -and that sounds more like doing a bankruptcy on their own terms than a plan for a comeback-. No word on how many stores will survive or if Diamond itself will make it to the other side.

I'm hoping they do, but if that is not the case, then it is Comixology, Drive thru and Kickstarter for the foresable future.


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## MoonSong (Apr 18, 2020)

@LuisCarlos17f 

Look, some news:






						DC | GamesRadar+
					






					www.newsarama.com


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## Legatus Legionis (Apr 18, 2020)

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## MoonSong (Apr 19, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> Did they offer it to all, or did they exclude some?
> 
> I don't know.



At least you have access to one store. In my whole country there's only one store -ok, they have about five stores spread across the country, but they are a single business-  with access to Diamond to begin with, and they haven't announced a thing. It's possible they won't have any access to new comics until Diamond is back.

I'm surprised there hasn't been any reactions from other publishers.


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## Legatus Legionis (Apr 20, 2020)

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## MoonSong (Apr 20, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> I think they are in the same position as us.
> 
> Now that they got the news, I guess they have to have their lawyers talk to those two entities about terms, etc.
> 
> Maybe in the nest few days we might get something more.



This was making the rounds. It is not from a publisher, but a retailer, and he isn't happy.


Now that I think of it, wasn't @FitzTheRuke a shop owner too?


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 20, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> Now that I think of it, wasn't @FitzTheRuke a shop owner too?




I am indeed. Let me catch up on this thread and see what I think...

(Caught up Edit The original premise is absolute bull. EVS and his comics-gaters spend a lot of time on wishful thinking. The rumour that Marvel will Buy DC or the other way around has been going on since the 70's, every time either company does anything at all. It's almost certainly never going to happen.

Brian Hibbs is a smart, if grumpy, man and he usually knows what he's talking about. He sometimes presents it in an offensive, reactionary way, so he ruffles feathers.

As far as my opinion on what the future holds... DC should have waited a few more weeks. Diamond will start rolling out the held books slowly mid-May with things probably not going back to "normal" until July or August. Hopefully things won't go back to normal exactly - the market has been flooded for awhile and could use with less, better books. I hope they come up with a few compelling things to fit in there as an exciting "welcome back". A new Marvel vs DC may be gimmicky, but it might be just the fun, stupid thing we all need after this terror we've all been through.

Does anyone have any questions for me? I'd be happy to answer anything you're curious about. I've been a retailer for 27 years, so I've been through ups and downs before. (Nothing quite like this, of course.)


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## MoonSong (Apr 20, 2020)

DC claimed Diamond orders were canceled, Diamond says something different









						Diamond Talks DC Comics - "All Orders Still In Our System"
					

Diamond Comic Distributors is answering questions regarding comic book retailers and their orders for various DC Comics titles.



					bleedingcool.com
				






FitzTheRuke said:


> Does anyone have any questions for me? I'd be happy to answer anything you're curious about. I've been a retailer for 27 years, so I've been through ups and downs before. (Nothing quite like this, of course.)



I have a huge doubt. I keep seeing this term thrown around, but I have no idea what it means. What's an FOC? 

Also this might be slightly off topic, but how hard was for you to get a Diamond account?


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 20, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> 1) I have a huge doubt. I keep seeing this term thrown around, but I have no idea what it means. What's an FOC?
> 2) Also this might be slightly off topic, but how hard was for you to get a Diamond account?




1) FOC is Final Order Cut-off. About 4 weeks before stuff from the bigger publishers ship (they've added more publishers over the years - even ones the size of Oni and Zenoscope are on there now, just not the tiny ones) we get a chance to knock our orders up or down. 

I've noticed a lot lately that they haven't been honouring a lot of the "upped" orders on hot books - which is weird, because knocking our orders UP is the only way the FOC is worthwhile for the publishers, so you'd think they'd want to do it. (Also, the whole point was supposed to be that the FOC occurs before they set the print-run, so they shouldn't be caught short. I'm not sure what's been going on there.

2) I was in business for a few years before Marvel started a distribution war that led to Diamond's monopoly. When I started, there was a Capital City Distribution warehouse not terribly far from my store, while Diamond's was about a 45 minute drive. So I didn't have a Diamond Account until Marvel went exclusive with Heroes World (which they owned before nearly going bankrupt) and DC chose to go exclusive with Diamond in response. This led to Capital City going under, which then Diamond bought. I can't remember if I'd already gotten myself a Diamond Account (to get DC) or if it all happened so quickly that Diamond bought Capital City that my account just switch with that. This was '95 or '96? Long time ago. Wasn't hard back then, as far as I know. It was harder in the oughts.

If you're interested in it, I doubt it will be all that hard in the near future. They will be desperately looking to replace stores that have gone under, and the publishers (good ones like Image and Boom) will often offer quite a bit of credit on backstock to a new account. Free stuff to get you started. More stores is good for everyone, believe it or not. (The only exception I could think of would be if you open right near another store and start a war that no one wins, but that would be a weird thing to do). Otherwise a store one town over? Good for the whole business. No reason you can't be friends with your neighbouring stores. Most of the ones I know would be happy to help a new guy out. (Within reason, obviously).


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## Legatus Legionis (Apr 21, 2020)

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## MoonSong (Apr 23, 2020)

FitzTheRuke said:


> If you're interested in it, I doubt it will be all that hard in the near future. They will be desperately looking to replace stores that have gone under, and the publishers (good ones like Image and Boom) will often offer quite a bit of credit on backstock to a new account. Free stuff to get you started. More stores is good for everyone, believe it or not. (The only exception I could think of would be if you open right near another store and start a war that no one wins, but that would be a weird thing to do). Otherwise a store one town over? Good for the whole business. No reason you can't be friends with your neighbouring stores. Most of the ones I know would be happy to help a new guy out. (Within reason, obviously).




There's only one Diamond store in the whole country as far as I know. I knew of another store in the same city, but I haven't been in that neighborhood in years and I don't know if it is still around and I only saw them selling back issue as collector items. I heard of another store in the same city, but I'm not sure if they are into the new comics business. There's certainly physical room for another one -I live in a huge city that spans across state lines-, it would depend on whether there is enough market and how small am I allowed to go -can you go with say four-five titles a week to get started?- with what I have in mind it would take about five or six dedicated customers in the first months to get things running.



Legatus_Legionis said:


> I agree with @FitzTheRuke part of the job is to help expand the industry, make it healthy again.
> 
> As part of customer service, I have/had the manager call another store if they have the specific item they are currently out of (don't know if they can get back instock).
> 
> ...




Tell me about back issues. I just received a box of back issues, from my "local" store. I'm doing my part to help them, specially if it is cheap. Funny how I haven't bought new comics from them since April of 2009, and the last time I was physically there I only bought some old indie comics. I like them a lot because it is one of the only places where I can find older indie comics made by local creators. Is that or hoping the individual authors are still touring the convention circuit with enough back issues at hand. 

There are other stores, but they seem to sell a very random assortment of back issue, there is not order nor any guidance to what they sell. I'm not even sure if they sell anything of it at all. It is all very arbitrary. For example, I've been trying to complete the Dan Jurgens run on a certain book, but nobody even knows or is informed enough to do this referral process -I'm starting to consider if it would be easier to settle for the digital version in Comixology with all the risks that it entails-. If you want to collect comics in here you are flying blind and hoping you just happen to find what you are looking for. If I got into this business, I would have to make sure to educate the public, hold coherent back issue catalogs, and provide a lot of guidance, and to help the local scene. Also to spend money on advertising.


----------



## FitzTheRuke (Apr 23, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> 1) There's only one Diamond store in the whole country as far as I know.
> 2) I live in a huge city that spans across state lines-, it would depend on whether there is enough market and how small am I allowed to go -can you go with say four-five titles a week to get started?
> 3) with what I have in mind it would take about five or six dedicated customers in the first months to get things running.
> 4) Tell me about back issues.
> ...




1) I assume you mean county (if you're talking about Retail Stores with Diamond Accounts). If you mean where the Distributor is, yeah, Diamond consolidated down to a main hub at some point. I'm on the west coast of Canada, and I get my comics from Plattsburg New York. It's a strange way to do it (especially when most of the comics are printed in Quebec - they start in Canada, return to the USA, and then come back to Canada. They're shipped in trucks that cross the Rocky Mountains to get to me. Sometimes in winter the trucks get stuck in snow, and the books arrive, not frozen because they've got no moisture, but very very cold. Where I am it barely ever snows (unlike a lot of Canada, or eastern states), so it's kind of strange to get frozen comics. I digress.

2) It sounds like you have reasonable expectations. That's a good thing - gives you a leg-up on a lot of people who give this a try. There are minimum orders you'll have to meet (I'm not sure what they are ATM, but they're probably a bit bigger than you'd like.) but you can try to keep things as small as possible. (That would be smart). Again, some of the publishers will get you started with credit on their stuff.

3) Juggling pull-files and curating recommended reading lists is an art. You need to understand your customer's taste better than they do. Communication is everything. Get them to tell you what they like, what they don't like, and get a feel for it. Your own taste has to take a back seat. The best way to do that is to learn to love everything, as best you can, for what it is, so that if someone likes it, you can appreciate what they like about it, even if it's not your taste. At the same time, it's important to have good taste, and recommend good stuff. And be honest.

4) I carry one of the biggest back-issue bins in my area. I also have good prices. I don't call a book "near mint" when it's only "fine". I buy back issues from walk-ins at a very honest, very structured system: Comics printed before 1983 and Key issues from after (first appearances and such) I appraise at the price I plan to put on them. I give the seller 1/3 of that. If they want to sell the rest (I don't like to cherry-pick collections and leave people with crap) - I give them 5-25 cents each (usually averages to 10 cents, or $25 a long box) for the rest. I tell them this up front, and I don't "cheat". This actually takes awhile, so people need to drop the collection off and trust that I will call them with my offer in a day or two. All of this is honest and up front. It's the best way to be fair to the seller and to yourself.

5) Yes. I might be a little OCD. Customers always marvel at how organised my store is. I obsessively keep it in order, alphabetical, neumerical, signs, labels, etc. I never understand stores with comics everywhere so no one can find anything. You've got to do the extra work. Owning a store is not sitting around reading comics and chatting with other nerds. (You get to do that, but only when the work is done).

6) I don't know about that. I mean, yeah, get the word out as best you can, at least at first. I stopped spending money on advertising years ago. It never seemed to do anything, and I've seen no difference, but then, I've been there for 27 years. People google "comic store in my area" and they will get my store. That's free. Not much else helps. But you may know more about how advertising works than I do. Just be careful to use it smartly. Everyone will try to sell you advertising that won't work for you. You need to know what will work.

Another note I'll give you is, location is everything. Look for a place that has the right ratio of visibility (and accessibility - parking, transit, etc) with as cheap a lease as you can find. This is not easy, and very important. There's a reason that a lot of comic stores are (let's say) rustic. Just don't be dirty. There's a mom-and-pop charm to a worn-down building, but obviously don't get a dump. I don't know how malls are where you are, but where I am, they are dying and they're very expensive. I would avoid them, in spite of the foot-traffic, unless you know one that's still bustling and low-rent, but I can't imagine that being the case.

EDIT: Oh, and carry Magic Cards and D&D books. They take up very little space for their $.


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## MoonSong (Apr 24, 2020)

FitzTheRuke said:


> 1) I assume you mean county (if you're talking about Retail Stores with Diamond Accounts). If you mean where the Distributor is, yeah, Diamond consolidated down to a main hub at some point. I'm on the west coast of Canada, and I get my comics from Plattsburg New York. It's a strange way to do it (especially when most of the comics are printed in Quebec - they start in Canada, return to the USA, and then come back to Canada. They're shipped in trucks that cross the Rocky Mountains to get to me. Sometimes in winter the trucks get stuck in snow, and the books arrive, not frozen because they've got no moisture, but very very cold. Where I am it barely ever snows (unlike a lot of Canada, or eastern states), so it's kind of strange to get frozen comics. I digress.




Nop, I mean country. I'm sure Canada has a few dozen stores already, but here on the other end of North America  things aren't as simple. Part of it is the language barrier, part of it is that the part of the country with the biggest chance of English proficiency is close enough to casually go shopping to the US. But essentially there is only three stores big enough to regularly ship across the country. Only one of them actively promotes new comics -and I know for sure they are a Diamond store-. The others, I'm not so sure with the focus on collectibles and pricey back issue, they could be Diamond too, but their business model can be satisfied by buying from -say- Midtown. Too bad quarantine came before I got to set foot on either. (But I'm almost sure that they aren't Diamond, because all other small comic stores focus on pricey back issue and don't get their stock from Diamond)

Muddying the waters is the fact that we have a few local publishers that have taken turns to republish Marvel, DC, Image and Dark Horse. Traditionally it was an old one called Vid that had a good distribution network, it was the one that had the license when Death of Superman and Clone Saga happened, and only lost Marvel by the late 2000's, but sadly lost DC too by the time of New 52. It went broke and was reborn as Kamite and only keeps Dark Horse and a few manga. Currently the DC and Marvel License is held by a publisher called Smash. Most manga is republished by the local branch of Panini. These comics are only 50 to 75% cheaper than new comics and are one or more years behind. You can find Smash comics in Walmart and Newstands though.    




> 2) It sounds like you have reasonable expectations. That's a good thing - gives you a leg-up on a lot of people who give this a try. There are minimum orders you'll have to meet (I'm not sure what they are ATM, but they're probably a bit bigger than you'd like.) but you can try to keep things as small as possible. (That would be smart). Again, some of the publishers will get you started with credit on their stuff.




Hopefully, I think that if I could focus on twenty or so titles per month, and then rely on prepaid pre-sales for the rest. Then have key back issue for conventions. -There are about six to seven major conventions every year in my City-, I could have a healthy business model. These have to be the right numbers or it might not be feasible.



> 3) Juggling pull-files and curating recommended reading lists is an art. You need to understand your customer's taste better than they do. Communication is everything. Get them to tell you what they like, what they don't like, and get a feel for it. Your own taste has to take a back seat. The best way to do that is to learn to love everything, as best you can, for what it is, so that if someone likes it, you can appreciate what they like about it, even if it's not your taste. At the same time, it's important to have good taste, and recommend good stuff. And be honest.




This is cool advice.



> 4) I carry one of the biggest back-issue bins in my area. I also have good prices. I don't call a book "near mint" when it's only "fine". I buy back issues from walk-ins at a very honest, very structured system: Comics printed before 1983 and Key issues from after (first appearances and such) I appraise at the price I plan to put on them. I give the seller 1/3 of that. If they want to sell the rest (I don't like to cherry-pick collections and leave people with crap) - I give them 5-25 cents each (usually averages to 10 cents, or $25 a long box) for the rest. I tell them this up front, and I don't "cheat". This actually takes awhile, so people need to drop the collection off and trust that I will call them with my offer in a day or two. All of this is honest and up front. It's the best way to be fair to the seller and to yourself.




On back issue, I think that it isn't as important in here. There's a lot of focus in what is in "now", and from experience back issue is important to help sell the new stuff, but not worth as much by itself. I've seen key issues and and silver age comics priced at $80+ dollars sit for years in shelves pretty much untouched while multiple people shill those amounts to get a full storyline at once.



> 5) Yes. I might be a little OCD. Customers always marvel at how organised my store is. I obsessively keep it in order, alphabetical, neumerical, signs, labels, etc. I never understand stores with comics everywhere so no one can find anything. You've got to do the extra work. Owning a store is not sitting around reading comics and chatting with other nerds. (You get to do that, but only when the work is done).




I love to sort and organize too. I think it is very important that comics get sorted properly. Perhaps even going so far as to have back issues with a full story together or very close to each other. Also maybe polybag each and all individual comics, it always bothered me that new comics were always sold bare and vulnerable. while old and discounted ones were polybagged and pristine.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Apr 24, 2020)

FitzTheRuke said:


> EDIT: Oh, and carry Magic Cards and D&D books. They take up very little space for their $.




Which is probably why you are here


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## Eyes of Nine (Apr 24, 2020)

FitzTheRuke said:


> 1) FOC is Final Order Cut-off. About 4 weeks before stuff from the bigger publishers ship (they've added more publishers over the years - even ones the size of Oni and Zenoscope are on there now, just not the tiny ones) we get a chance to knock our orders up or down.
> 
> I've noticed a lot lately that they haven't been honouring a lot of the "upped" orders on hot books - which is weird, because knocking our orders UP is the only way the FOC is worthwhile for the publishers, so you'd think they'd want to do it. (Also, the whole point was supposed to be that the FOC occurs before they set the print-run, so they shouldn't be caught short. I'm not sure what's been going on there.
> 
> ...




I started in retail in 1989 or so. Worked in, managed, and then owned my own comic/game store until July 31 2006, when I got out. I have memories of going to the Capital City warehouse in Cerritos CA to pick up my books from them. Then came Heroes World debacle and all that came after.

I do like the idea of Diamond monopoly being broken; but I don't think going with Midtown and DCBS is the right approach simply due to their "Discount off MSRP" marketing model. I would have rather they went with Lone Star as they have always been pretty standup.


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 25, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> Nope, I mean country. I'm sure Canada has a few dozen stores already, but here on the other end of North America  things aren't as simple.




Canada's a big place. I would assume hundreds of stores. I think I understand where you are now!



MoonSong said:


> Traditionally it was an old one called Vid that had a good distribution network, it was the one that had the license when Death of Superman and Clone Saga happened, and only lost Marvel by the late 2000's, but sadly lost DC too by the time of New 52. It went broke and was reborn as Kamite and only keeps Dark Horse and a few manga. Currently the DC and Marvel License is held by a publisher called Smash. Most manga is republished by the local branch of Panini. These comics are only 50 to 75% cheaper than new comics and are one or more years behind. You can find Smash comics in Walmart and Newstands though.




Interesting. Thanks for sharing a brief history!



MoonSong said:


> Hopefully, I think that if I could focus on twenty or so titles per month, and then rely on prepaid pre-sales for the rest. Then have key back issue for conventions. -There are about six to seven major conventions every year in my City-, I could have a healthy business model. These have to be the right numbers or it might not be feasible.




That sounds like a reasonable plan. 



MoonSong said:


> On back issue, I think that it isn't as important in here. There's a lot of focus in what is in "now", and from experience back issue is important to help sell the new stuff, but not worth as much by itself. I've seen key issues and and silver age comics priced at $80+ dollars sit for years in shelves pretty much untouched while multiple people shill those amounts to get a full storyline at once.




Back Issues are hard for a lot of stores. I've spent three decades building customers for them. I find that $40-$80 back issues are the hardest to sell. Too expensive for a casual collector, not expensive enough for a serious collector. (I can sell a $1000 back issue in five minutes with multiple takers.)



MoonSong said:


> I love to sort and organize too. I think it is very important that comics get sorted properly. Perhaps even going so far as to have back issues with a full story together or very close to each other. Also maybe polybag each and all individual comics, it always bothered me that new comics were always sold bare and vulnerable. while old and discounted ones were polybagged and pristine.




You can bag stuff, sure. I usually do it when people bring 'em up to the counter, on new comics. Some people don't care about bags.



Eyes of Nine said:


> Which is probably why you are here




You mean here on ENWorld? True, but also I was crazy into D&D long before I had a store. I can play Magic, but mostly I just sell it. 



Eyes of Nine said:


> I do like the idea of Diamond monopoly being broken; but I don't think going with Midtown and DCBS is the right approach simply due to their "Discount off MSRP" marketing model. I would have rather they went with Lone Star as they have always been pretty standup.




I don't know much about American mail order stores - they're just not on my radar. But I'm completely with you regarding deep discounters - I think it's the bane of all. I get why late stage capitalism has got us here, but I don't think it's sustainable for anyone. DC has made a huge mistake. (They still won't be bought out by Marvel, though!)


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## Legatus Legionis (Apr 25, 2020)

.


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 26, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> Also for me, as I am a collector (not an investor), having it in a CGC is worthless to me.




I loathe CGC and everything it stands for. My store doesn't carry anything CGC'd. I have no problem with collectors who like it, I just don't agree.


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## MoonSong (Apr 27, 2020)

Quick updates on the drama. 

Diamond puts Monday as FOC for May 26th.








						Diamond Tells Retailers to Complete New DC FOC By Monday Night
					

Diamond tells retailers they must complete new DC Comics FOC by Monday night - those who aren't getting them by other means.



					bleedingcool.com
				




They also stopped Featuring DC Titles on their site








						Diamond Removes GEM from Three Jokers and Other DC Comics
					

Diamond Comics has removed the GEM and Spotlight tags from DC Comics titles in recent Previews listings, includng Three Jokers #1.



					bleedingcool.com
				




A North Carolina store pledges allegiance to Diamond.








						Alan Gill Boycotts New DC Comics Distributors in Favour of Diamond
					

Alan Gill of Ultimate Comics in North Carolina has announced that he is to boycott the new distributors of DC Comics in favor of Diamond.



					bleedingcool.com
				




Meanwhile, the first round of new comics has already arrived to stores. It came bubblewrapped 








						DC Comics Arrive In Stores - In Bubble Wrap
					

DC Comics titles have arrived in comic book stores courresy of Lunar distribition for sale on Tuesday - or earlier if no one stops them.



					bleedingcool.com
				






Legatus_Legionis said:


> My City in Canada had a dozen+ comic book stores in the last decade. And we are not the big "3" (Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver).
> 
> We also have one location that deals ONLY with back issues.
> 
> And outside of the conventions, we have two former stores that for 3 or 4 times a year has a sale/bazaar.



Take into account my country is a smaller market. It is structured in this way from cheaper to most expensive:

Redistributors.- They look like Newstands, except they sell old stuff that the journal and magazine industry couldn't sell on the first round. They sell older reprints. 

Smash Packs.- They sometimes show up in Walmart and other supermarkets. These are blind packed random old reprints. A little more expensive that looking at a redistributor, but the blind packs protect the comics.

Newstands/Walmart.- They sell "new" reprints. These are roughly one year behind new comics. 

Sanborns.- This is a trditional library-coffeeshop hybrid, that nowadays has expanded and turned into a department store. They have been around since forever and the one reliable place to find reprints. During the early nineties, they were the only place where you could find American comic books. They are usually the first place where you can find new books, that includes translated Trade Paperbacks of comics. 

Up to this point, we are talking exclusively translated reprints, they come and go and follow the traditional book and periodical structure. Then we have:

Flea market.- They sell random incoherent back issue. These sellers are scattered everywhere at random spots near plazas and other open markets. You can find a mix of translations and some original Back issue. These are the bottom.    

"Low level", Comic shops.- Extremely small locals, with one or two racks worth of comics. They sell mostly trade paperbacks and sometimes pricey back issue. Their inventory tends to be limited and very random. Comic books are still a side business to their main focus on Manga by Panini and anime figurines.

Convention sellers.- They have a bigger inventory, but it still consists of odd back issue and trade paperbacks.    

"High level" Comic shops.- A handful of them exist, they are more traditional looking, and have more recent books. I haven't checked all of them in person, so I'm not sure if they actually sell new comics or every thing they have is technically back issue -one or two weeks old back issue but still back issue-. They aggressively promote very pricey books. The ones I've been could actually function by getting their books from a reseller -Like midtown-, or even possibly directly from the following:

The Palace.- Not the real name of the store, but it is similar. This is the one store in the country that actually works like a traditional comic book store with clear delimitation for new comics, organized back issue and a whole different space for trade paperbacks. And these are new comics straight from Diamond, they are the only place I've seen do stuff like Free Comic Book Day and previews. I mean they actually give away the comics for comic book day! (Everybody else sells those as pricey back issue).  

I'm not discounting the existence of other traditional comic book stores in the northern states in the country, but it is definitely way cheaper to cross the border to the US and get stuff second hand than to set up a store the right way. -In fact the very first comic book convention happened in 1993 in a small restaurant in Monterrey, everything on sale there had been brought from the states-. Everybody else does back issue only.



Legatus_Legionis said:


> As a collector, I find that I spend year over year between new and back issues are about 50-50.
> 
> And yes, I have purchased comics in the last few years that are in the $50-$100 range. If it is something I am missing and the grade/price is right, then yes, I will buy it.
> 
> But if it is one I do not need, then it does not matter the grade/price. It is only worth as much as a customer is willing to pay for it.



Yep, if it is cheaper to buy a TP, I'll buy a TP. Like I said, I'm not sure if all of the above sellers I mentioned before even make money from them. They command a heavy premium.  




Legatus_Legionis said:


> Also for me, as I am a collector (not an investor), having it in a CGC is worthless to me. I want to read the issue. I also want to read a bunch in a row. So if I am missing one issue in a run of 40, I will wait till I get the missing issue then read the whole thing through once.





FitzTheRuke said:


> I loathe CGC and everything it stands for. My store doesn't carry anything CGC'd. I have no problem with collectors who like it, I just don't agree.



Indeed, I see no point on having a slated comic that nobody can read. It could work on trading cards, but on a book?



Legatus_Legionis said:


> But with the way the comic industry is now, I find alot of the talk is not about if Marvel should buy DC, or vice versa, but rather if both IP will try to divest the publication aspect (much like Disney does not print their own comics, but has a licenses do it).
> 
> I just hope that if that is the case, it will be as a "license whole catalogue to one entity" to publish, and not to license out character by character (much like how the movie rights were sold at one time).
> 
> That would be horrible if one had the rights to do Batman comics, and another had the rights to print Superman comics, and having both together in a Justice League title can not happen.



I see Marvel as more vulnerable to this. Disney has had a terrible year so far, and the MCU seems to be heading into a lull with only one good movie on the horizon -Black Widow-, everything else doesn't seem as exciting. And they have ground to a halt. Even when they return, we can look forward to ... a sword-based Xmen crossover?

DC -maybe- could -hope to- save itself. They are doing everything in their power to sell stuff -and opened up a Pandora's Box in the process-. I've heard some of their Digital Only comics are very good, and they have some interesting stories coming up. (Three Jokers! Batman 92! the Conclusion of Dark Knights Metal, hopefully them fixing Nightwing, more Amethyst!, even 5G?)

Ok, I could be biased. After all I'm not that interested in modern Marvel and I'm not up to date on news. but they have a confusing line that resembles nothing on the movies. DC has more uniformity on how they work across media.


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 27, 2020)

While I am a fan of both companies when it comes to characters, I am _slightly_ more a Marvel Universe fan, but as a retailer, I normally prefer DC. They are a much better business partner. Usually. They picked the absolute worst time in history to start a distribution war.


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## MoonSong (Apr 27, 2020)

FitzTheRuke said:


> They picked the absolute worst time in history to start a distribution war.



I can't blame them though. Diamond looked like it was not going to come back, and, with AT&T's shadow looming over DC, they needed to generate revenue to save themselves. The result is kind of like setting the house on fire to keep yourself warm and avoid freezing to death. But hey, competition is good?


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 27, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> I can't blame them though. Diamond looked like it was not going to come back, and, with AT&T's shadow looming over DC, they needed to generate revenue to save themselves. The result is kind of like setting the house on fire to keep yourself warm and avoid freezing to death. But hey, competition is good?




Well, they didn't _need_ to generate revenue, really. You could run all of DC's publishing for a fraction of a fraction of a piece of a Warner Bros film, and they put _those_ on hold with no problems. People just need to be patient. Also, Diamond didn't stop shipping comics because they felt like it, the comic book industry _asked_ them to, because if a lot of us can't even open, we don't need new stock. Diamond defaulting on paying publishers after only one week of being closed was a bit of a surprise, sure, but it was never in doubt that they would start shipping again as soon as it was reasonable. (It could be argued that May 20, which will be the first new comic day, is still a little _early_ for most states, but I think _my_ store will be about ready for new stuff by then, so it suits me.)

Speaking of which, I ordered the first week of DCs from their new distributor because I thought at the time that I wouldn't otherwise be able to get them, but now that I know that I will get the rest from Diamond on May 20, I'm happy to wait, and I would have done if DC hadn't lied and said that "all orders from Diamond are cancelled."


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Apr 27, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> Take into account my country is a smaller market.



How come you don't just say what country you are in? Just curious.


----------



## MoonSong (Apr 28, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> How come you don't just say what country you are in? Just curious.



I'm afraid I'll end up jinxing it. Kind of like not wanting to say Macbeth out loud in a theater. I have the impending fear that if I say the word,  I'll end up pigeonholed into being a token and then people won't care about my individuality anymore.
I always default to "The heart of the moon" which is a rough translation of the meaning of the name. (A more accurate one is "The bellybutton of the Moon"). And, well it is kind of obvious, there's only so many countries that are next to the USA in North America and are not named Canada (Just the one).


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## FitzTheRuke (Apr 28, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> There's only so many countries that are next to the USA in North America and are not named Canada (Just the one).




I played along when I figured it out by also not mentioning it. I kind of get it. I've talked about owning my store, but I generally only name it in private messages. It's one of those strange things that goes along with the anonymous nature of message boards. I'm not against anyone here knowing who I am or where I'm from, but it's part of the whole experience here that I'm just Fitz. (Not actually my name).

In your case it doesn't help that American popular media tends to take jabs at your country. (Mine too, to a lesser extent, when they even remember that we exist.)


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Apr 28, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> ...there's only so many countries that are next to the USA in North America and are not named Canada (Just the one).




I mean, _technically_ St. Pierre/Miquelon is part of France; and might be considered "adjacent" to the US...

@MoonSong love your breakdown of all the different venues someone could get graphic fiction in your country. I didn't realize it was so fractured! Do people there love graphic fiction? Any home brewed material? I know Spain has a ton of great stuff...


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## LuisCarlos17f (Apr 28, 2020)

In Spain the comics shops are in the big cities, and geek/fanboys aren't common in the little towns. And now the comic shops are closed because the quarentene for the epidemic is not going to end soon.

Years ago the satiric cartoon magazine "El Jueves" (the Thusday), our own Charlie Hebo, was very popular, but now it's not cool, but only toxic, and very rude, propaganda. Without money from the state it had closed time ago.

Years ago some characters from kid-friendly cartoons were very popular, but today most of them are forgotten by the new generations. Some Spanish "action heroes" (Roberto Alcazar y Pedrin, Capitán Trueno, el Guerrero del Antifaz) were also very famous but now they are almost unknown among youngest generations. There was an action-movie based in a Spanish parody of Superman, Superlopez, but this has fallen in the oblivion, like the action movies of "Mortadelo Y Filemon", maybe the most popular Spanish cartoon franchise.

They most of Spanish fandom would rather manga. Dragon Ball and Naruto are more popular than DC superheroes, I would dare to say. And I guess thanks the 60's children cartoon but Marvel is more popular than DC. From the rest of Europe here Tintin and Axteris the Gaul are the most famous.


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## MoonSong (Apr 28, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> @MoonSong love your breakdown of all the different venues someone could get graphic fiction in your country. I didn't realize it was so fractured! Do people there love graphic fiction? Any home brewed material? I know Spain has a ton of great stuff...



I could write a book on the subject. -I might have or might do...-. Some highlights:

Back in the golden age there were daily anthologies with ongoing series that predated soap operas. In fact one writer managed to keep the rights to her creations and was lated adapted into actual soap operas. She's behind the infamous Memin Pinguin. Which started in the golden age, but everything that is currently reprinted dates from the silver age. I don't know which house is currently reprinting this character.








						Memín Pinguín - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org
				




From the silver age, we had characters such as Kaliman, which started as a radio show, then moved to comics and had two films made. It currently receives new material from Kamite






Another Golden age book in eternal circculation is La Familia Burron





Now the interesting bits. From the early nineties we got Karmatron and los transformables. It is notorious that the original run is long out of print and the author decided to start over in the late 2000s






Now I want to tell you about two characters that are important on the convention circuit. First we have El Bulbo, he started as a mascot to the Conque convention. The author is still active, but mostly on the web:








						El Bulbo: Cult Hero
					

This bright little guy's name is El Bulbo. He is Mexico City's most powerful superhero. He's been there for every crisis this great metropolis has faced. Except... he no longer wants to do it. He can't handle the guilt from all the destruction that follows him after every encounter with the...




					www.webtoons.com
				




The other character is "El Monito", part character and part avatar of his creator, the late Ruben Armenta.  He wasn't the most talented of artists, but he had a lot of heart and was a beacon of the community. Many artists collaborated with him, and he impulsed them to collaboration. (Why is he next to the Thing? Because that's the name of a convention, la Mole -the local name of the Thing-).





After the Death of Superman there was a boom of indie content. There are a lot of characters from that era. character such as Tetsuko la chica de acero, Siniestro cazador de Demonios, and antologies like Balam Comics. But the most successful new character was Meteorix, which managed to be in the newstands for over 90 numbers:






No other new comic has managed that.  It ran from 2000 to 2007. By 2012 there were some comics in the newstands like Angel Caido, Aventuras Enmascaradas and overall SoulKeepers. Which managed a good run of about 18 numbers in two volumes





The boom came to an end when in 2012 Vid went out of business -Vid stores where the most important distribution channel for national content- and DC made new 52 and gave rights to a new publishing house -which was likely behind vid going out of business- these new 13 spots every week crowded out the new comics in newsstands -space on newsstands is at a premium-. 

There was still a nationals only convention every year for a couple of years now, but it is gone now, and I haven't been to a convention in years, so I'm currently out of the loop.

Co-nationals in the web:

Pilli-Adventure





						Pilli Adventure
					






					pilli-adventure.com
				




Comic Roomies from Hell





						It's the End of the World as We Know It
					

CRFH An online comic strip. If you thought college was hell, wait till you meet your roommates




					www.crfh.net
				




Dream keeper Robin -This is a reboot of a series that was originally published on a magazine-








						Read Dream Keeper Robin | Tapas Web Comics
					

Your home for the world’s most exciting and diverse web comics and novels. Discover stories you’ll love from all genres, only on Tapas!




					tapas.io
				




Power Nap





						GUTHRUM - Freelance Barbarian
					

GUTHRUM - Freelance Barbarian - a satirical fantasy online graphic novel



					powernapcomic.com
				




Prometidas a Domicilio -Spanish only-








						Read Prometidas a Domicilio | Tapas Web Comics
					

Your home for the world’s most exciting and diverse web comics and novels. Discover stories you’ll love from all genres, only on Tapas!




					tapas.io


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Apr 28, 2020)

It is the first time I know those comics. They are Spanish language but not published in Spain.


----------



## Bohandas (Apr 28, 2020)

The Disney corporation needs to be broken up and scattered to the four winds. They're too big.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Apr 28, 2020)

Although Disney was divides into different parts, the true bosses would be together. It would work like a cartel or oligarchy. 

And the people tires when somebody becomes too popular and then "old-fashion", because they want always new things.

And the fandom love the franchises, the characters, but not always the newest titles. Today people buy lot of graphic novels, but the young adult would rather novels, for example supernatural romance some years ago, teenage would rather videogames, and children cartoons. These may be good years for superheroes franchises, but not for printed paper version of comic about superheroes.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Apr 28, 2020)

MoonSong said:


> Now the interesting bits. From the early nineties we got Karmatron and los transformables. It is notorious that the original run is long out of print and the author decided to start over in the late 2000s




Karmatron looks like a mashup between Elfquest and Shogun Warriors...


----------



## MoonSong (Apr 29, 2020)

Eyes of Nine said:


> Karmatron looks like a mashup between Elfquest and Shogun Warriors...




It has transformers too...


----------



## MoonSong (Apr 29, 2020)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> It is the first time I know those comics. They are Spanish language but not published in Spain.



I never considered how far they would have reached. I thought you'd know at least Memin Pinguin since it was published all over Latin America, and it was the subject of a controversy with the US:








						Mexico comic book draws racism charges in Houston
					

Beloved by Mexicans for his dim wits, street smarts and playful disposition, long-running...




					www.chron.com
				




Please tell me you know Condorito and Mafalda...(Both of South American origin...)


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Jun 12, 2020)

(I think it's better to be added here than starting a new thread).









						AT&T Reportedly Looking to Sell Warner Bros' Gaming Division; EA, Activision, and More Interested
					

AT&T is reportedly looking to sell Warner Bros' gaming division, with companies like EA, [...]




					comicbook.com
				




*AT&T Reportedly Looking to Sell Warner Bros' Gaming Division; EA, Activision, and More Interested*









						AT&T seeks sale for Warner gaming unit, could fetch about $4 billion, sources say
					

AT&T is discussing selling its Warner Bros. gaming unit with Take-Two Interactive, Electronic Arts and Activision Blizzard in a deal that could net the wireless giant about $4 billion, according to sources familiar with the matter.




					www.cnbc.com
				




---

I don't understand. Aren't they making money with Mortal Kombat?


----------



## Legatus Legionis (Jun 12, 2020)

.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Jun 13, 2020)

I think still it may be possible. DC would keep the IPs, we can agree about this, and the comics would be a licencing, something like Hasbro or Disney/Star Wars with IDW Publishing. The first step to test the reaction of the fandom, I guess, would be a new crossover.

Other option could be a new sub-universe with a different power limits to allow be adapted into videogames.


----------



## MoonSong (Jun 14, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> If they can find someone to purchase a license to print them, that is money for nothing to them. But the price has to be right, or they will just sell the publication rights away or shut the publishing side down, and hope all the collectors of DC comics will want to have a temporary digital viewing of them.



I don't think they will ever sell the DC publication rights. Licensing them is a possibility, but I doubt they would get rid of the characters, stories and plots. They are very important IP that is currently generating money just by being held on to without having to do a thing. Overseas reprinting licenses are a thing, and reprints of key books like the killing joke, watchmen, death of superman and crisis on infinite earths are still selling well every year, these are evergreen.

Selling the publication rights also means selling the control over the underlying IP. Movies, Tv shows, games, and park rides are all derivatives of an original IP that is in comic book form way back when neither of these media existed. The only reason Warner can exploit and sell and license these right now is because they own the right to the original media. No more control over the original media means they won't be able to license rights over any new kind of media that might emerge in the future.

Worst case scenario would be no more new comics are ever produced, and Warner keeps selling digital back issue  and trade paper backs for another hundred years. On a better world, someone manages to pony up enough to purchase a license to make new comics and takes all of the risk. On the best of worlds, DC remains a thing, but in a reduced fashion, selling new stuff digitally and in weekly anthologies on Walmarts and maybe some grocery stores, maybe the direct market somehow manages to survive too.



LuisCarlos17f said:


> I think still it may be possible. DC would keep the IPs, we can agree about this, and the comics would be a licencing, something like Hasbro or Disney/Star Wars with IDW Publishing. The first step to test the reaction of the fandom, I guess, would be a new crossover.
> 
> Other option could be a new sub-universe with a different power limits to allow be adapted into videogames.



It remains to be seen if IDW manages to survive this year. They've had a couple of bad years and were hanging from a thread even before the current crisis. Image doesn't do licenses, and Marvel's continued existence relies on Disney Money. Maybe Dark Horse could hope to get the rights some day?

Speaking of all this, which publisher has the DC rights in Spain? I know it used to be Novaro and then Norma, but they lost rights at some point of the last decade?


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Jun 14, 2020)

In Spain the translator publisher is Normal Editorial









						Norma Editorial - Wikipedia
					






					en.wikipedia.org
				




And they are making money not only with the comics or the movies, also with the teleseries, cartoons, toys, videogames and maybe in a future with TTRPGs.


----------



## Urriak Uruk (Jun 14, 2020)

Back on topic, the original "rumor" (that DC Comics will start getting published by Marvel) is complete bull.

Could DC Comics get shuttered by AT&T? Sure. I can see that; comics might not be profitable in the future (I think it's way more likely they'll just restructure and publish fewer series in different formats, but full cancellation is possible).

But there's zero, ZERO possibility AT&T hands it to Marvel, even just comics publishing. They'll want to keep the licensing, the branding, the merchandise, and having shared ownership with the biggest media company in the world is a threat to that. No way does AT&T want to jeopardize its rights to Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman.

Comics may become unprofitable. But Batman alone has grossed $28 billion in media (second in super heroes to Spider Man, at $29 billion). So even if DC Comics ends, those characters aren't going anywhere.


----------



## Legatus Legionis (Jun 14, 2020)

.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Jun 14, 2020)

My opinion is the end of the old magazines of 24 or 48 pages may be near, but not the graphic novels. It would be like a miniserie is translated into other languange and it is in one tome as copilation. 

And you know manga still is sold. 

DC and Marvel don't like intercompany crossovers because later they have to agree again about to reprint new editions, or possible adaptation into other medias, for example toys, cartoons or videogames.


----------



## MoonSong (Jun 15, 2020)

Legatus_Legionis said:


> Not true.
> 
> Marvel sold the film rights to their characters decades ago, they still owned the IP, and right to print comics. To get the MCU to work, they had to start buying back the movie rights or how they would expire and them reverting back to Marvel by default.
> 
> ...




Let me explain myself. In the case of Donald Duck, it doesn't matter if Disney sells the rights to comics -and I'm pretty sure they only licensed them-. The underlying IP comes from the movies, so they control the underlying IP. However, in the case of DC characters, Superman and Batman come from comics, if AT&T Warner sells the rights to the comics, they are selling the underlying IP. Even if they keep the rights to all other media and products currently existing, they lose the chance of monetizing the characters on any new media emerging in the future, because every existing and future media adaptations are derivatives of the comics because the comics are the original media for them.

Selling is not the same as licensing. DC can license the rights to the comics as many times as they want -in fact they do, as I was commenting with LuisCarlos17f, in my country they licensed those to Smash while in Spain Norma is the Licensee-, but selling them means they lose the money from those licenses too.


----------



## bloodtide (Jun 21, 2020)

Has anyone pointed out the Full Circle effect?

You know that....once upon a time: DC did publish Marvel Comics!


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 2, 2021)

Please, forgive this necromancy:









						AT&T Reportedly Going To Let DC Comics Die, Might Sell It Off
					

The unstoppable rise of the internet has seen people lamenting the death of print media for close to two decades, but it hasn't happened yet, although sales of physical newspapers, books and magazines have dwindled significantly. However, comic books have largely been safe for the most part...




					wegotthiscovered.com
				












						AT&T Looking To Sell DC Comics To The Highest Bidder
					

It's being rumoured that AT&T is looking to sell DC Comics off to the highest bidder, which I think would be a huge mistake.




					www.small-screen.co.uk
				




We can agree AT&T wants to keep the copyright of the IPs/franchises, but a licencing agremeet may be possible. 

An intercompany crossover with Marvel is harder than in the past, but my opinion is that shouldn't be totally impossible.

I love speculation about future mergers and acquisitions but 2021 is not going to be the best year for AT&T/Warner/DC neither Disney, and something is happening what is will change all the entertainment industry forever. 

* My true wish is a d20 Marvel and d20 DC superheroes TTRPGs and both published by WotC. It can't be worse than Batman vs Black Panther in Fortnite: Batle Royal, or Terminator vs (Star Wars) stormtroopers.

* Sometime I have imagined a mangwha version of DC and Marvel Universe, where the cultivators, supreme martial artists with ki techniques could defeat superhumans. (Why not? In Injustice videogame Harley Quinn can defeat Supergirl).

* Some superheroes are too powerful to be easily adapted into videogames, and that today is a serious handicap for those franchises.


----------



## Urriak Uruk (Mar 2, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Please, forgive this necromancy:
> 
> 
> 
> ...




DC Comics may be sold one day, but it won't be sold to Marvel (and by extension, Disney). Warner Bros is owned by AT&T, and that company will not sell one of their best IPs to their strongest competitor, not in a million years.

More likely, they'll just close the comics business, or continue to downsize it. They won't give up the IPs of Batman and Wonder Woman, they're way too valuable for merchandising and films.


----------



## Umbran (Mar 2, 2021)

Urriak Uruk said:


> More likely, they'll just close the comics business, or continue to downsize it.




I'd guess the latter - DC becomes a bit of a legacy print.  Its scale too small to really concern the balance sheets, but sort of necessary to claim legitimacy for the movie IP.


----------



## embee (Mar 2, 2021)

The return of Amalgam Comics was prophesied as the beginning of the End Times.

Seriously, won't happen. Wouldn't clear antitrust.


----------



## Urriak Uruk (Mar 2, 2021)

Umbran said:


> I'd guess the latter - DC becomes a bit of a legacy print.  Its scale too small to really concern the balance sheets, but sort of necessary to claim legitimacy for the movie IP.




I agree here; they're already experimenting with this with their Black Label, and I suspect that this may become the only comics going forward. I'll add, they're also way better! I loved _Batman: White Knight_, for example.


----------



## Janx (Mar 2, 2021)

Or DC dies.  the free market has spoken.


----------



## MoonSong (Mar 2, 2021)

When I first heard of the rumors, I immediately thought of you @LuisCarlos17f . But aren't we a bit to late to the punchline? This is a couple of weeks old. I'm thinking they could potentially sell the publishing rights to a big company, perhaps Hasbro if they get the rights to making toys too? Hasbro is fresh off getting Power Rangers, perhaps they could be interested in getting Batman and co to?


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 2, 2021)

Sorry, but I didn't find that new until today.

When I said 2021 may be a horrible year for AT&T and Disney I mean something can happen, causing the crack of both companies, or at least the main CEOs to be replaced. Then they could be forced to licence with a third party, and this would allow a intercompany crossover event. 

 I doubt Warner wanted to lincece DC to IDW if this publishes Marvel comics. 

I also see the licencing can help to promote lesser knonwn characters, and we could find more skins after the miniserie Batman/Fortnite: Zero Point.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Mar 3, 2021)

MoonSong said:


> When I first heard of the rumors, I immediately thought of you @LuisCarlos17f . But aren't we a bit to late to the punchline? This is a couple of weeks old. I'm thinking they could potentially sell the publishing rights to a big company, perhaps Hasbro if they get the rights to making toys too? Hasbro is fresh off getting Power Rangers, perhaps they could be interested in getting Batman and co to?



Huh. Hasbro buying DC wasn't on my 2021 bingo card. But definitely would be cool I think. Based on how they have handled WotC, and based on AT&T's behavior, this would def be better for fans.


----------



## Umbran (Mar 3, 2021)

Janx said:


> Or DC dies.  the free market has spoken.




There's too much potentially to be made in the movies.  I think the comics being out of print will look really bad for the movies.  So, they'll prop up the comics as a loss leader so long as it pays.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 3, 2021)

We have to remember lots of DC animations worked well in the box-office, and the most of TV shows have got enough audence to the seasons to be renewed, and no-Marvel/Star Wars action-live Disney movies haven't been good blockbusters.

If Hasbro bought DC Disney wouldn't be happy. 

The first steps about a future acquisition shoould some intercopany crossovers to test the reaction by the fandom.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (Mar 3, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> If Hasbro bought DC Disney wouldn't be happy.



Does Hasbro have a licensing relationship with Disney? Maybe some toys somewhere? Or board games?


----------



## MGibster (Mar 4, 2021)

I'd rather Disney didn't own DC properties.  They own enough already.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Mar 4, 2021)

If Marvel bought DC...


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 26, 2021)

Robert Kirkman Rumored To Buy DC Comics | [current-page:pager]Cosmic Book News
					

It's claimed that The Walking Dead's Robert Kirkman is in talks with AT&T to purchase DC Comics, with Steve Geppi as well.




					cosmicbook.news
				




ROBERT KIRKMAN RUMORED TO BUY DC COMICS​
The deal, if it happens, would see DC Comics licensed out to where whoever got the license would be free to develop the characters as they wish, with AT&T free to adapt those stories if AT&T/WB wished to do so.

---

I guess AT&T and Disney will stop to publish paper comics and they will licence the franchises. Who would pay that money? I doubt the current comic publishers, neither a cinema producer company because it would be help the rivals. Mattel and Hasbro had got enough reasons, because those printed comics would be the hook to sell toys, the true target. Videogame studios would rather to start from zero with their own IPs with total creative freedom, and superheroes are hard to be adapted into videogames when they are too powerful.

My theory is something is going to happen, and this will affect all entertaiment industry, causing a lot of the changes in the chairs of the CEOs of many importants megacorporations.


----------



## Umbran (Mar 27, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> My theory is something is going to happen, and this will affect all entertaiment industry, causing a lot of the changes in the chairs of the CEOs of many importants megacorporations.




If the thing is sold, it is because it isn't actually worth all that much to the people who have it.  Thus, it isn't worth enough to cause much of an impact if it is sold.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 27, 2021)

Today lots of manga, I mean, paper printed editions, are published. Lots of readers would buy superheroes comics but.... the current fandom doesn't like very much the type of stories today are being published. Lots of readers don't feel welcome when they spend their money for a comic where the writter has got a different point of view about who are the good or the bad guys. The society of 2021 isn't like the generation who bought "Preacher" comics. And this is not only about comics, but also a growing reject against all Hollywood. Today the current potential fanboys don't feel identified with fictional characters who are too perfect, too handsome and never make mistakes. Today a gamer used to the shooter multiplayers who watchs a old far west movie can't believe the bad guys with a markmanship so horrible, even when old guns had got worse precision. And today other "indie" comic publishers are making enough money to survive at least, and some titles even have been adapted into action-live productions, for example Umbrella Academy or "the boys". Nor DC neither Marvel are selling the right product. 

My suggestion is to publish motion webcomics in internet, at least something like "demo" or free-to-play equivalent, and enough "family-friendly". Then if those characters start to become popular the fandom will buy merchandising products.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Apr 29, 2021)

Why doesn’t DC get a cash infusion by making its own cryptocurrency?   They could call it...*Bat*coin.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (May 5, 2021)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Why doesn’t DC get a cash infusion by making its own cryptocurrency?   They could call it...*Bat*coin.



...or _Krypto_currency.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (May 12, 2021)

Marvel vs. DC Game Rumored From NetherRealm | [current-page:pager]Cosmic Book News
					

Currently trending on Twitter is Marvel vs DC as it's rumored NetherRealm Studios, the company behind the cool Injustice fighting games, is developing a fighting game.




					cosmicbook.news
				




MARVEL VS. DC GAME RUMORED FROM NETHERREALM​
The _Marvel vs Capcom_ games were so so (I did like the first one), so maybe Disney is going to NetherRealm Studios to create a Marvel fighting game for them.

Regarding potential "conflict" between Disney and WB, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment did release the _LEGO Marvel_ game, so obviously, that isn't an issue, and I do believe Disney is now licensing out all its video games instead of creating them in-house.

The only possible issue I see is that we are assuming the Marvel fighting game would be similar to _Injustice_ and _Mortal Kombat_ and be mature or R-rated, but Disney doesn't seem to be about making Marvel products mature (except for _Deadpool_ 3).


----------



## Rikka66 (May 12, 2021)

I don't think anyone is assuming Marvel would be a Mortal Kombat level rating. Injustice is far from being a Mortal Kombat rating.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (May 12, 2021)

Pffft.  I want a cartoon character combat game.  Bugs Bunny Vs. Daffy Duck.  Roadrunner Vs. Wile E. Coyote.  Tom Vs Jerry.  Etc.


----------



## ccs (May 13, 2021)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Pffft.  I want a cartoon character combat game.  Bugs Bunny Vs. Daffy Duck.  Roadrunner Vs. Wile E. Coyote.  Tom Vs Jerry.  Etc.



The fatalities could be hilarious.


----------



## Disgruntled Hobbit (May 14, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Marvel vs. DC Game Rumored From NetherRealm | [current-page:pager]Cosmic Book News
> 
> 
> Currently trending on Twitter is Marvel vs DC as it's rumored NetherRealm Studios, the company behind the cool Injustice fighting games, is developing a fighting game.
> ...



Why do you keep linking that site? 
They're garbage. Nothing but wild rumors and wild speculation
It's not news. It's some rando's blog

This "rumor" is entirely based on a single tweet:
Which could mean a Marvel vs DC game
OR
Cause there was a MK vs DC game, it could be a MK vs Marvel. Or another game directed by Boon


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (May 14, 2021)

ccs said:


> The fatalities could be hilarious.



Falling anvils, TNT, gun backfires, mallets from nowhere...

Hell, a customizable “toon” combat/RPG game with NO licensed characters could probably be a hit.

(Just had a vision of a character ripping off Moon Roach’s signature killing move of dropping a several-hundred pound crescent moon on his targets...)


----------



## Rabulias (May 14, 2021)

You all do know about _Toon _(Toon (role-playing game) - Wikipedia) from Steve Jackson Games, right?


----------



## ccs (May 15, 2021)

Rabulias said:


> You all do know about _Toon _(Toon (role-playing game) - Wikipedia) from Steve Jackson Games, right?



Yes, & so what about it?  I want this as a Mortal Kombat style video game.


----------



## Rabulias (May 15, 2021)

ccs said:


> Yes, & so what about it?  I want this as a Mortal Kombat style video game.



I should have quoted Dannyalcatraz, as I was replying more directly to his yen for "a customizable “toon” combat/RPG game" and lost the thread that you were talking video games.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (May 17, 2021)

Could an AT&T and Discovery Merger Affect DC Comics?
					

The entertainment world feels like it's always in a state of flux, with powerhouse companies [...]




					comicbook.com
				




Could an AT&T and Discovery Merger Affect DC Comics?​








						AT&T Plans to Spin Off HBO and Other WarnerMedia Companies
					

AT&T is rumored to be spinning off WarnerMedia, including HBO, CNN, TBS and TNT, in a merger deal with Discovery, Inc.




					www.cbr.com
				




AT&T Plans to Spin Off HBO and Other WarnerMedia Companies​








						AT&T Is Preparing to Merge Media Assets With Discovery
					






					www.bloomberg.com
				




AT&T Is Preparing to Merge Media Assets With Discovery​


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (May 17, 2021)

Rabulias said:


> You all do know about _Toon _(Toon (role-playing game) - Wikipedia) from Steve Jackson Games, right?



Indeed!  Never picked it up, though.  In fact, I’ve never met a gamer in person who has.

I hear it can be fun in the right group.


----------



## Eyes of Nine (May 18, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Could an AT&T and Discovery Merger Affect DC Comics?
> 
> 
> The entertainment world feels like it's always in a state of flux, with powerhouse companies [...]
> ...



I don't follow the comics industry at all anymore, I am appreciating these links. (well, headlines, I don't care enough to actually go read the articles; but it's good to know the high level shenanigans)


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (May 18, 2021)

I love speculation about mergers and acquisitions but I notice I unknow what is happening behind the curtains. I love superheroes franchises but I don't trust those megacorporations that are using these for a "too agresive proselitism". I don't spend my money to read I have to feel ashamed and guilty, I need humildity and self-criticism because my point of view about certain threads is not the same than the author.

And now this is becoming like a soap-opera. 









						WarnerMedia Head Reportedly Negotiating Exit After Merger
					

Report says he was unaware of the Discovery deal.




					screenrant.com
				




WarnerMedia Head Reportedly Negotiating Exit After Merger​Jason Kilar is reportedly meeting with a legal team to work out his departure from WarnerMedia, after recently learning of the merger with Discovery.









						WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar Urges His Team “To Continue To Keep Focus,” Said To Have Hired Legal Team To Negotiate Exit After Just A Year At Helm
					

Jason Kilar expressed his “pride, passion and affection” for the WarnerMedia staff in a memo Monday and stressed “how important I believe it is in this moment for us to continue to keep our focus a…




					deadline.com
				




WarnerMedia CEO Jason Kilar Urges His Team “To Continue To Keep Focus,” Said To Have Hired Legal Team To Negotiate Exit After Just A Year At Helm​


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (May 21, 2021)

Seriously, I don't know or I can't safe what is going to happen in the future. I love those characters, but I don't feel confortable with the new titles where I am not wellcome if my point of view is not the same than the authors. They have lost lost of readers by fault of that "agressive proselitism". Parents are ready to buy toys of superheroes for their children, but comics, the things are different. 

At least I can say this disclaimer: if some day I tell Disney will break and bought by Hasbro, maybe I will be kidding. 









						DC Comics, WB Could Be Sold To Disney Joining Marvel
					

DC Comics and WB could actually become part of Marvel or at least come under the same umbrella at Disney according to a report.




					cosmicbook.news
				




DC, WB COULD BE SOLD TO DISNEY JOINING MARVEL​


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (May 21, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> I love speculation about mergers and acquisitions but I notice I unknow what is happening behind the curtains. I love superheroes franchises but I don't trust those megacorporations that are using these for a "too agresive proselitism". I don't spend my money to read I have to feel ashamed and guilty, I need humildity and self-criticism because my point of view about certain threads is not the same than the author.



That prosetlizing isn’t exactly new.  Most of the major characters of the Golden and Silver ages of comics were very progressive, at least in the context of their eras.  Sometimes, pointedly so.  I mean, early on in the first run of the Black Panther comic title, it was criticized for not having enough white pepole in it.  Soon after, they had a storyline in which Black Panther went after a bunch of guys in the KKK.


----------



## LuisCarlos17f (May 25, 2021)

If you read "Hey Kid, comics" you can get an idea for the golden age the artists weren't star as later, and they didn't feel valued by the bosses of the publisher houses. Other writters would rather earning money with their own books and novels.

I guess this will be the most reliable source:

The WarnerMedia-Discovery deal was structured to make a future sale easier



> Malone agreed to turn in those shares for common equity because he wanted to give a combined WarnerDiscovery flexibility _*to sell itself in the future -- most likely to a deep-pocketed technology company like Amazon or Apple or another media behemoth like *_*Disney*, according to a person familiar with the matter.




---

I wonder about the possibily of WarnerMedia becoming a "satellite company" with different inverstors and shareholders from other megacorporations.

Disney couldn't offer more money, but prestige and experencie to negotiate some parnetship or licencing, and in long-term this may be the most profitable option.

I don't know the anti-monopoly laws in USA but I have seen in the web statita.com the distribution of comic store sales in the United States in 4th quarter 2020 was 33.6% by Marvel and 29,99% by DC.


----------



## WayneLigon (May 26, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Today lots of manga, I mean, paper printed editions, are published. Lots of readers would buy superheroes comics but.... the current fandom doesn't like very much the type of stories today are being published. Lots of readers don't feel welcome when they spend their money for a comic where the writter has got a different point of view about who are the good or the bad guys. The society of 2021 isn't like the generation who bought "Preacher" comics. And this is not only about comics, but also a growing reject against all Hollywood. Today the current potential fanboys don't feel identified with fictional characters who are too perfect, too handsome and never make mistakes. Today a gamer used to the shooter multiplayers who watchs a old far west movie can't believe the bad guys with a markmanship so horrible, even when old guns had got worse precision. And today other "indie" comic publishers are making enough money to survive at least, and some titles even have been adapted into action-live productions, for example Umbrella Academy or "the boys". Nor DC neither Marvel are selling the right product.
> 
> My suggestion is to publish motion webcomics in internet, at least something like "demo" or free-to-play equivalent, and enough "family-friendly". Then if those characters start to become popular the fandom will buy merchandising products.



Sorry, but no..

Traditional Comic sales overall are on a slight but consistent uptick.  Marvel and DC still account for the lion's share of all those sales. No, Trad comics sales are not what they were like in, say, the 1970s (and probably never will be again regardless of what's done) but there are many other well-known factors contributing to that.

Comics shop sales of Traditional floppies (individual issues) are about half of trade paperback sales through the book trade. 

Nobody is dropping books because of 'proselytizing' except in the eager imaginations of some conservative pundits.

There's not some massive groundswell 'rejection of Hollywood' except in, again, those same fevered imaginations mentioned above. The overall industry of 'Hollywood' has, over the long run, a pretty good track record of separating people from their money by correctly reading trends and giving people what they want. Studios who consistently do badly at that don't survive. So, if you've noticed certain social and political trends in Hollywood movies, you can rest assured that more people than not want those same things because that's that Hollywood _does_.


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## Eyes of Nine (May 26, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> I don't know the anti-monopoly laws in USA but I have seen in the web statita.com the distribution of comic store sales in the United States in 4th quarter 2020 was 33.6% by Marvel and 29,99% by DC.



Wow, Marvel has come down. DC has almost always been in 2nd place in modern times, but there have been times when Marvel's been closer to 40%


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## LuisCarlos17f (May 26, 2021)

The cinema adwards gala (Oscars, Globe) lose watchers, and some teleseries started well but later they lost audence rating. Of course there is an "aggresive proselitism". Bobby Drake "Iceman" and Kitty Pride "Shadowcat" were straight were decades, but now they aren't. Let's suggest a checkup. Go to the fandom wiki of DC and Marvel and search "LGBT characters", and later "Christian characters" and "Catholic characters". What do you think? How many characters go to Sunday everysunday in a Hollywood production and not only weddings and funerals, and I mean not only Simpsons. In Top Gun 2 the Taiwanese flag has been banned. John Cena apologing and speaking Mandarin because he said Taiwan was an independient country. Do you remember the remake of "Red Dawn"? What about Richad Gere and Bai Ling after "The Red Corner"? How many times the communist have been the antagonists in a Hollywood production after Reagan age? Do you know what means "cheka" or "Holodomor"? How many times Hollywood mentioned McCarthy's witch-hunt, telling this was the "bad guy", or showing a no-good image about the anti-communists? When anybody has said George Lematire, the father or the theory of the big bang was a priest, or a Christian in a Hollywood production could talk about the fine turning of the universe with a scientific. What do you know about project Venona or operation mockbirding? Think about how Hollywood helped gay community to be tolerated and accepted. 

Hollywood has got a too great influence to be not used as a propaganda weapon in the cultural war. 

I guess maybe Warner/DC will become a corporate spin-off and this will acept work with Disney as a partner or a hired outsourcer company. This would be gradually. The first steps would be Disney working with Warner franchises, something like Sony movies with characters from Marvel comics. Why to sell the cash-cow when you could "rent" it and later this would become more valious? 









						Disney Reportedly Almost Bought Warner Bros. in 2016
					

In a land before Disney absorbed 20th Century Fox, the Mouse nearly made another major [...]




					comicbook.com
				



Disney Reportedly Almost Bought Warner Bros. in 2016​


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## Umbran (May 26, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Of course there is an "aggresive proselitism".




To bring this back around to comics... Marvel has always had a relevant socio-political message - Captain America was a hero created by two Jewish authors to fight Nazis.  The X-men (and mutants in general) have always been a thinly veiled analog for the LGTBQ community.  The list goes on.  Many of the old things weren't great by today's standards, but they were always making the effort, however clumsily.

So, let us not pretend that somehow, now, folks are being driven away by the message.  The message was always there.


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## Sithlord (May 26, 2021)

Umbran said:


> To bring this back around to comics... Marvel has always had a relevant socio-political message - Captain America was a hero created by two Jewish authors to fight Nazis.  The X-men (and mutants in general) have always been a thinly veiled analog for the LGTBQ community.  The list goes on.  Many of the old things weren't great by today's standards, but they were always making the effort, however clumsily.
> 
> So, let us not pretend that somehow, now, folks are being driven away by the message.  The message was always there.



The problem is when that relevant socio-political message becomes very different than their customer. And for that we will have to wait and see.


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## WayneLigon (May 30, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Think about how Hollywood helped gay community to be tolerated and accepted.



You say that like it's some kind of bad thing.


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## Disgruntled Hobbit (May 30, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> I don't know the anti-monopoly laws in USA but I have seen in the web statita.com the distribution of comic store sales in the United States in 4th quarter 2020 was 33.6% by Marvel and 29,99% by DC.



I don't think anti-Monopoly laws come into effect if you only have 33.6 percent of the market in specialty stores


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## Disgruntled Hobbit (May 30, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> The cinema adwards gala (Oscars, Globe) lose watchers, and some teleseries started well but later they lost audence rating. Of course there is an "aggresive proselitism". Bobby Drake "Iceman" and Kitty Pride "Shadowcat" were straight were decades, but now they aren't. Let's suggest a checkup. Go to the fandom wiki of DC and Marvel and search "LGBT characters", and later "Christian characters" and "Catholic characters". What do you think? How many characters go to Sunday everysunday in a Hollywood production and not only weddings and funerals, and I mean not only Simpsons. In Top Gun 2 the Taiwanese flag has been banned. John Cena apologing and speaking Mandarin because he said Taiwan was an independient country. Do you remember the remake of "Red Dawn"? What about Richad Gere and Bai Ling after "The Red Corner"? How many times the communist have been the antagonists in a Hollywood production after Reagan age? Do you know what means "cheka" or "Holodomor"? How many times Hollywood mentioned McCarthy's witch-hunt, telling this was the "bad guy", or showing a no-good image about the anti-communists? When anybody has said George Lematire, the father or the theory of the big bang was a priest, or a Christian in a Hollywood production could talk about the fine turning of the universe with a scientific. What do you know about project Venona or operation mockbirding? Think about how Hollywood helped gay community to be tolerated and accepted.
> 
> Hollywood has got a too great influence to be not used as a propaganda weapon in the cultural war.



The two are unrelated

Comics do their own thing because they're too small for the movie studios and corporate hireups to give a flip
Change in comics that reflect the movies aren't the movie studios saying "make Fury black and bring in Colson." It's the failing superhero comic industry desperately trying to boost sales by tying into the superhero media people are buying: films

Characters like Iceman or Pryde being made gay really comes down to the lack of diversity in comics, which was the result of them being published in the 1960s and 1970s and the audience's apathy to new characters
They can't make a series of new gay characters (who won't be forgotten in two years) so they make existing characters gay to reflect the realities of their audience and the world



> I guess maybe Warner/DC will become a corporate spin-off and this will acept work with Disney as a partner or a hired outsourcer company. This would be gradually. The first steps would be Disney working with Warner franchises, something like Sony movies with characters from Marvel comics. Why to sell the cash-cow when you could "rent" it and later this would become more valious?




Warner is owned by AT&T who shows no interest in selling, and is relying on DC properties to drive people to HBO and the CW
AT&T isn't going to give properties to a competitor like Disney and allow them to make more money


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## MoonSong (May 30, 2021)

Disgruntled Hobbit said:


> Warner is owned by AT&T who shows no interest in selling, and is relying on DC properties to drive people to HBO and the CW
> AT&T isn't going to give properties to a competitor like Disney and allow them to make more money



If you watched the news, AT&T is precisely preparing Warner for easy divesting. This fussion with Discovery means they will no longer mamage the day to day dealings of it, and allows them to easily sell it little by little.


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## Disgruntled Hobbit (May 30, 2021)

MoonSong said:


> If you watched the news, AT&T is precisely preparing Warner for easy divesting. This fussion with Discovery means they will no longer mamage the day to day dealings of it, and allows them to easily sell it little by little.



Divesting is probably the wrong word there
They're merging WarnerMedia with Discovery so they only have a single TV company with combined assets

They're not selling anything


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## Rabulias (May 30, 2021)

Disgruntled Hobbit said:


> The two are unrelated
> 
> Comics do their own thing because they're too small for the movie studios and corporate hireups to give a flip
> Change in comics that reflect the movies aren't the movie studios saying "make Fury black and bring in Colson." It's the failing superhero comic industry desperately trying to boost sales by tying into the superhero media people are buying: films



You may be correct about the motivations for introducing Phil Coulson into the comics universe, but the Nick Fury story is an unusual one. Back in 2002, when Marvel created the Ultimate universe in the comics (a reimagination of the mainstream Marvel universe), they not only decided to make Nick Fury a Black man, but they decided to base his appearance off of Samuel L. Jackson. When Marvel Studios started the films, they drew much inspiration from the Ultimate universe storylines and characters. The cinematic universe's Nick Fury has proved to be so popular (no surprise, there, IMO - it's SLJ!) that he is now the mainstream Marvel universe's Nick Fury. So it's a comics-to-film-to-comics path that winds its way through.


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## LuisCarlos17f (May 31, 2021)

Sorry, I didn't want to cause troubles with an off-topic, but I wanted to tell today lots of readers would rather manga because this doesn't causes suspects about be a propaganda weapon for you to feel ashamed and guilty if you don't support certain ideologies. If you really want to convice, then don't offend neither try to force the rest to agree you.

Usually when two companies are talking seriously about merger and acquisitions the discretion is total, no rumors until the official release. But this time the rumors have been more noisy than the previous. This sounds like trying to "provoke jealosy", the speech of "this is your last opportunity, if you don't love me now other girl will love me". This means the rumors are a warning about if the megacorporations don't show a good offer then Disney will win. And what if AT&T/Discovery ask too much and Disney couldn't or didn't pay it? The plan B would be working with Disney for crossovers and maybe corproductions. And who would buy those titles? For example the speculators, because intercompany crossovers are "rara avis", these aren't easy to reach deals.

If Disney buys DC will be the end of an age and the start of other. And nobody can safe if this will happen or not.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Jun 2, 2021)

This may be interesting, but not totally linked with this thread.









						Here are the next media mergers that make the most sense
					

There aren't many legacy media companies left to combine after this month's deals, but here are three potential combinations that make sense.




					www.cnbc.com
				




I think this is very important for Hasbro and WotC, because they are making money with Disney franchises, but other companies also have got interesting IPs. Hasbro also could reconsider who to be called for future productions of franchises from the Hasbroverse. There are deals with Netflix and Disney, and I guess Hasbro would rather to be enough independient to can ask the best offers in the deals.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Aug 14, 2021)

Sorry, almost off topic but I didn't want to start a new thread.

Wink, wink, nudge. DC, and not only Disney, notices the potential of D&D as franchise. I have suggested this type of mash-up for the superheroe comics and I add these would be fabulous as skins in Fortnite to promote the IPs. Seriously, Hasbro has to talk with DC about selling action figures.









						Dark Knights of Steel gives Superman a D&D style character sheet
					

In Dark Knights of Steel, Batman is active in a medieval fantasy world. Then a spaceship crashes down into it on route from a doomed world.




					www.geeknative.com
				




Dark Knights of Steel gives Superman a D&D style character sheet​








						Tom Taylor Goes Medieval in 'Dark Knights of Steel'
					

12-Issue Series Combines DC Superheroes and High Fantasy




					icv2.com
				




 “This is for the fans of Game of Thrones and Critical Role,”









						DC Announces a New Universe Melding Superheroes and Game of Thrones
					

Dark Knights of Steel by Tom Taylor and Yasmine Putri places heroes like Batman, Superman and Harley Quinn in a Game of Thrones-style world.




					www.cbr.com
				



DC Announces a New Universe Melding Superheroes and Game of Thrones​


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## Rabulias (Aug 14, 2021)

Is that last cover Wayne Reynolds' first comics work?

Edit: I did some Googling and I see he has done some work in British comics, so this might be his first US comics work.


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## MoonSong (Aug 14, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Sorry, almost off topic but I didn't want to start a new thread.



You could edit the title? You are the OP of this thread. 




LuisCarlos17f said:


> Seriously, Hasbro has to talk with DC about selling action figures.



I thought Spin master had the license right now. (I've also seen some figurines by Mattel I think.)


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## Urriak Uruk (Aug 14, 2021)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> Sorry, almost off topic but I didn't want to start a new thread.
> 
> Wink, wink, nudge. DC, and not only Disney, notices the potential of D&D as franchise. I have suggested this type of mash-up for the superheroe comics and I add these would be fabulous as skins in Fortnite to promote the IPs. Seriously, Hasbro has to talk with DC about selling action figures.
> 
> ...


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## LuisCarlos17f (Feb 18, 2022)

A "weather ballon"/gauge to test the fandom's reaction?









						Hero Initiative to Reprint Pérez's JLA/Avengers, But are Disney & WB Holding Them Back? - Bleeding Fool
					

For the first time in decades, the acclaimed JLA/Avengers crossover will be reprinted by Hero Initiative, a charity dedicated to helping comic book creators in medical or financial need. With this printing, Hero Initiative is honoring one of George Pérez seminal works and his long-time support...




					bleedingfool.com
				




Hero Initiative to Reprint Pérez’s JLA/Avengers, But are Disney & WB Holding Them Back?​


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## Umbran (Feb 18, 2022)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> A "weather ballon"/gauge to test the fandom's reaction?




No.  

George Pérez is a founding member, and sits on the board of, the Hero Initiative, a charity to support comics creators who are in medical and financial need.

Pérez announced in December that he has inoperable, stage 3 pancreatic cancer, and likely has 6 to 12 months to live.

This is a legitimate charity effort, not testing waters for a business deal.


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## LuisCarlos17f (Mar 3, 2022)

DC Comics Closes Offices | [current-page:pager]Cosmic Book News
					

The DC Comics disaster continues, as now it is revealed its swanky offices in Burbank are closing down.




					cosmicbook.news
				




DC COMICS DISASTER CONTINUES AS OFFICES CLOSE DOWN​
---

I guess DC comics will be mergerd with other division of WarnerDiscovery, but this will keep the franchises because today the IPs have got a great potential value. Then the most possible option is licencing other company, for example IDW, to publish the printed-paper comics. 

If Marvel publishes its own TTRPG with own system, why not DC following those same steps?

In this conditions DC shouldn't too ask too much in the hypotetical case of a future intercompany crossover to promote the IPs. Maybe this could become a jewel for the speculator market, being one of the last editions by DC.


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## Urriak Uruk (Mar 4, 2022)

LuisCarlos17f said:


> DC Comics Closes Offices | [current-page:pager]Cosmic Book News
> 
> 
> The DC Comics disaster continues, as now it is revealed its swanky offices in Burbank are closing down.
> ...




If you read the article, it says nothing about mergers. It may not even be downsizing, as it's essentially moving from set office spaces to a "hot desk" model. This is not entirely surprising, as with COVID I'm sure the offices in Burbank were being mostly unused as people shifted to a "work from home" schedule. I'm sure the company has been looking for ways to cut costs, and shifting to a hot desk model when your main offices have been unused for the past two years is a pretty easy move.

Anyway, seems like the headline is overlooking the impact of COVID on this decision.


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## Rabulias (Mar 4, 2022)

Urriak Uruk said:


> I'm sure the company has been looking for ways to cut costs, and shifting to a hot desk model when your main offices have been unused for the past two years is a pretty easy move.



I think there are a number of companies doing the same in the post-COVID era. They have seen that work can still get done and communication remain strong with work-from-home. The technology we have today facilitates this better than ever. Plus, many employees see it as benefit.


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## Urriak Uruk (Mar 4, 2022)

Rabulias said:


> I think there are a number of companies doing the same in the post-COVID era. They have seen that work can still get done and communication remain strong with work-from-home. The technology we have today facilitates this better than ever. Plus, many employees see it as benefit.




Indeed. There is some reversion now as COVID dies down, but the reversion is trending towards a "hybrid model" (and hot desks or one version of a hybrid model) where folks have a couple mandatory days per week in the office, options to come into the office, but a lot more flexibility with working at home.

It makes sense, as there are benefits to both in-office and at-home working, in both productivity and cost-cutting. I don't think most companies will entirely abandon an office, but there is a definite tilt to more flexibility for office-hours... a net benefit, I think!

Back to DC Comics, I think the move here may be misinterpreted. Yes comic sales are going down, but their going down for Marvel too, and of course the real value is in the IP and not comics (I mean, The Batman looks like it's going to be a big box office winner this weekend). So I believe the possibilities of crossovers/mergers remain fairly small.


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