Seriously, for the rest of us, what has been lost? 15-20min reading a really cool comic for the month? Seriously… is that worth all the angst and BS getting thrown around? Grow the f*** up people!

Retailers I can understand. Many comic book shop (esp the smaller ones) work with smaller margins of safety and crossovers like this can be a risk. While I’m sure Civil War is going gang-busters at the cash register, it makes life more difficult for them when, not one, but a whole LOT, of titles get moved around.

Personally, i welcome the delay. I seriously would HATE to have a fill-in at this point. McNiven (and the whole team) are producing some of the best comic art I have seen in years and I want to be able to re-read Civil War for years to come without interuption.

And kudos to Marvel for the way they’ve handled it. I think the level of response shows that the big M are actually listening and thinking about the effect this has outside their own walls.

So - McNiven - please deliver so kick ass shit when the book hits the shelves!

Sometimes it’s just like all the fanboys lurk on the net looking for something to bitch about…

Alternatively, it’s because too many of them are?
Online, we’re getting the articulate, engaged retailers that do try to diversify, draw in new people and promote comics as a whole. Unfortunately, the majority of shops _seems_ to be filthy dungeons run by unkempt retards that will laugh at you it you come to them asking for anything other than the latest hit from the big 2 or are insufficiently schooled in decades of Green Latern lore.
While Marvel’s treatment of retailers is shameful, many of them seem to be aggravating the situation for themselves by relying too much on the hardened fanboy sale.

(I refuse to call them creators, they’re content managers – Bryan O’Malley is a creator, Brian Wood or Ted Naifeh are creators, for they actually create new things and not merely do fan fiction on a commercial scale with things that were created a gazillion years ago)

to HUGE events that are all inter-locked.

Now, on PAPER, this is great strategic thinking: publish things that hopes to FORCE the core audience to buy stuff all over. In the end, yes, we have all had that debate, it will hurt the industry as a whole, but “we are just giving customers what they want” – like Ford did with the Ford Fuck-You-SUVs.

From afar, this almost looks to me like the DM retailers are forced peddlers of a duopoly, when 82 percent of all the merchandise comes from only two sources. Not that there isn’t good product coming from them, but when something like this little CW fiasco affects the bottom line of retailers, I have to ask the retailers something…and I’m not being glib here.

Why not try to diversify a lot more? I do realise that this is a big risk, but when there are numerous other products from other publishers out there, the chance of being led around with a doggie collar by the Big Two diminishes.

Again, from afar it looks to me like retailers are not being treated like businesses but rather like fanboys, which could be seen as a direct consequence of the monlithic system.

Shop owners are gatekeepers, in my mind and they can influence customers to a certain point, unless everything has already been pre-ordered through PREVIEWS lists, which then turns the shop only into a pick-up point. When that happens, sorry boys and girls, you are already pwned.

I was lucky enough to have had a truly great comic book shop in Nuremberg that was incredibly diversified and gave me great recommendations from outside that duopoly, like Courtney Cumrin, Scott Pilgrim, Powers (now part of Marvel’s Icon, I know) and other things that I much rather spend my money on these days.

And I’m sure there must be others like me, and perhaps we are the group that can be targeted. I would LIKE to buy more comic books than I currently do, because as a medium comics have great strengths and few weaknesses, but I REFUSE to spend money on superhero crossover megalomaniac things.

LOL… my goodness, I start sounding like Bill Maher: “find the hidden mainstream majority! And now it’s time for NEW RULES…”

Perhaps it is time, though, for some new rules…

-B

I’m only two pages into this, but the one thing that both Hitch and Millar are forgetting is the problem is not Civil War being late. It’s the fact that Marvel has to push back a number of MONTHLY books to match Civil War’s schedule. That’s the problem.
–

It’s also their CHOICE. Marvel had the choice to get a fill-in or even a little help. Mark and Steve both expected it by this stage and were okay with it. NOBODY on the creative end of MCW asked Marvel to do what they have done. This came from Marvel because of how they feel about it and because THEY want Mark and Steve together until the end. McN isn’t drastically behind and they gave him some breathing room to sneak past the finish. Great. Hoorah.

On a world scale of events this really shouldn’t register on your give-a-shit-o’metres. Why not all go out and lose your virginity or something?

Hitchy

Why am I even posting? Good god, a moment of clarity!
–

Because it isn’t just one title that is being affected — it is the entire line. Regular bread&butter books like ASM and FF, new launches like PWJ and THOR and the new AVENGERS title…. there is a cascade affect down the line.

Further, a certain percentage of this project’s readers are “the lapsed” coming back to check out the Marvel U — these are readers who have a more tentative relationship with comics right now; they’re not yet wholly sold on “coming back for good”. This kind of SNAFU makes comics look far less attractive to these customers.

In the grander scheme, this isn’t a “work for the ages” — I’m sure the ultimate TP will be an OK seller, but I think the sales relationship between periodical and collection to probably end up being something like DEATH OF SUPERMAN. That sold millions in its day, but it’s not exactly a mega-seller ten+ years gone. So, whether or not the artist gets a fill-in or not is not the same kind of epic decision as it would be for, say, WATCHMEN

-B

There are quite a few number crunching retailers that will tell you late books DO hurt sales. Or at the very least, hurts sell through - which publishers don’t see.

There are rare exceptions to this. I think Warren Ellis’ books apply. But very few creators have the fan following of Warren Ellis.

Current trends show the major events have effectively put the eggs into fewer baskets. Publishers are doing them in part to stop people from waiting for the trade. So when a publisher gears a storyline to get people hooked on the monthly serial, tie it in with the rest of their books so they’ll have to be bought and read to understand what’s going on, then put major media promotion behind it to also get a lot of casual and relapsed buyers are picking it up… then drop the ball on the schedual, I can see why they are screaming for heads. It’s like they’ve been set up to fail. The comic industry has a history of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory and it appears to be happening again with Civil War.

Despite what Hitch says, the majority of the revenue for the DM retailers is still monthly comic books. When you fuck with that, it’s no surprise retailers are going to get pissed. Just because Watchmen and DKR was late, doesn’t give publishers carte blanche to solicit titles knowing full well they won’t meet that date.

There is a thing called planning ahead. I’m beginning to wonder if Marvel has some cash flow issues. They don’t want to pay creators to do months of work before soliciting. They avoid it like cats avoid dogs and would rather leave money on the table in lost sales than do it.

Imagine if Watchmen and DKR was planned ahead? We’d still get the same book and it would have come out on time for the monthly readers. More money would have been made, not less. I think that is the goal we should be pushing the industry towards.

I suspect the major publishers care more about their marketshare though. They’d rather spread their cash flow out thin and put out more titles instead of planning ahead, doing fewer books and having them all come out on time.

In the end, it will be interesting to see what affect this has on Marvel’s sales for the titles affected. Making those books returnable would be really telling. Retailers are going to cut some, but figuring out how much to cut is really a crapshoot.

Marvel better make good with retailers!

But again: Shouldn’t the fans’ priority be the quality of the work? Are they obligated to stop buying comics they like because of business concerns? Or — just to carry it a little farther — should they run out to demand a CIVIL WAR with multiple artists instead of a steady creative team?

I’m aware that there are other ramifications, of course! But you see what I mean…

Best,
Stuart

The missed issues — 10 issues of Cap instead of 12 in a year, say — IS a revenue problem for stores, but if they can’t make that up by selling more copies of, say, FUN HOME, then they deserve what they get.

Yes that was a joke.

But why should readers not “forgive” Marvel if it means a really good, steady creative team will finish this series without fill-ins? Are fans obligated to take up a crusade on behalf of (some) retailers? Shouldn’t they be more concerned with whether or not the stories and art are good?

I see a lot of running around (and this site is a lot better than some!) looking for someone to blame — as though SOMEONE’S GOT TO PAY whenever something like this happens. It really strikes me as an overreaction.

Best,
Stuart

Even so, it makes it difficult to make any sort of prediction of sales patterns and if as many Marvel titles end up delayed as it appears will at the moment it becomes almost impossible to predict cash flow. Civil War being late is really not that big a hit, but no Amazing Spider-man, Fantastic Four, Captain America, Iron Man, and who knows what else makes planning that much more difficult. And based on the past couple months of Civil War tie-ins, what we will see is books getting released in chunks as soon as they won’t spoil the big reveals, creating seriously imbalanced weeks in which mid-tier titles will take a hit.

All that said, I prefer the delay if it means a stronger product to sell as a trade next year because that’s our bread and butter.

And I have to mention that this announcement was accompanied by the announcement that all 7 issues of Civil War would feature 1:75 sketch variants, which will continue to inflate sell-in though not sell through numbers.

And yes, Elayne, you do remember some delays on Watchmen. I remember it really only being the last two - three issues that ran one, two, and or three months late. (I think I remember #12 being two or three months late, which was still better than the Camelot 3000 track record. No, I haven’t forgotten. Sorry.)

I asked my retailer about this today. His response was, “Well, it’ll sting, but at least I don’t rely too heavily on Marvel.” Personally, I don’t have a horse in this race.

I don’t put the blame on Millar or McNiven. The blame belongs on Joe Quesada and his editorial staff. It’s poor planning all the way around. This type of behavior would stop if more people stopped buying late books, but that’s too much to ask I guess

Yes, and since Marvel has never been late before, retailers had no way of knowing how foolish it was to put all their eggs in Marvel’s basket. Marvel in Late Comics Shocker!