However, it gets worse for DC Comics, as he writes, “DC had a pretty bad year, with their lowest sales since 2004 – down 25% from 2022 in the bookstore market – even with their highest ever number of titles in the total list. In 2023 they had only 14 titles in the Top 750; in 2013, ten years ago, they had 130. That is a huge and troubling drop – but maybe laying off nearly your entire sales and marketing team is not a great strategy for growth? If someone had been been making a concerted effort to dismantle DC Comics, they couldn’t have been more surgical – luckily, DC still has talented execs like Marie Javins, Jim Lee, Annie de Pies and the rest of the staff who have thwarted those plans. And from what we’re hearing, 2024 will see some more moves to reverse this concerning trend.”
I wouldn't hold my breath.
I get the comic industry has had declining sales going back a long time but giving the middle finger to actual fans, hiring women who hate comics to write, and believing there were waves of female fans just waiting to read comics.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. When I go to the comic store the manga section has all the women since Manga markets to a variety of audiences. Super hero comics have always and will always appeal to men generally speaking and the back issue section is the most popular for super hero comics. Eric July once said that marvel and dc execs need to go to a comic book store and see who actually buys them.
I used to have almost 20 comic subs through Midtown that were mailed to me monthly. Now I have zero subs and just buy older comics
Japan learnt the way to keep women from fucking up their manga:
You have a Yaoi section available along with muscular men doing sports, distracts them from going to our action plus gets their money lol.
And I remember a woman who actually was into comics saying that people don’t want slice of life stories with their super heroes. I can remember before giving up on modern comics super heroes sitting at the table discussing feelings.
Comics has always had a problem with, I believe the term was, speecifying? Where the characters talk about what they are doing rather than showing them do it. Them sitting around discussing feelings has always been a thing, and as long as its not the only thing they are doing it can lead to some nice setup to some plot later.
True, with good writing you can do that. I loved the dialogue between Punisher and Spider-Man when they would team up and debate their opposing philosophy. In the example I mentioned that was the only thing or current year commentary. Like the all new all different avengers a citizen mentions he misses the old avengers and is condemned as a racist. I liked the avengers due to the sci fi aspect and going into space. They took that away