Joss Whedon

JUNE 2004 NUMBERS FROM DIAMOND

revised 6:45 am 7/19/04

Diamond has released the actual data and market share for product which shipped in June, and a newcomer has claimed the #1 slot - DC’s Identity Crisis #1, the publisher’s heavily-promoted summer event by Brad Meltzer and Rags Morales. While Diamond releases no actual numbers, industry estimates place the first issue of the miniseries in the neighborhood of 215,000-220,000 copies.

DC also held on to the #2 slot, with Superman #206, however, the publisher’s normal other Top 10 entry, Superman/Batman wasn’t present, due to the book’s scheduling difficulties, which resulted in no new issue shipping in June.

Also, just as variant covers helped goose the numbers of the chart-topping comics in May, DC offered limited returnability on Identity Crisis #1, allowing retailers to lower the risk on ordering more copies.

Running down the Top 25, Marvel held 20 spots, while DC held 5, a gain of two for Marvel and loss of two for DC compared to May.

The Top 25 comic titles for June were:

1) Identity Crisis #1
2) Superman #206
3) Astonishing X-Men #2
4) Ultimate Spider-Man #60
5) Ultimate Spider-Man #61
6) Ultimate Fantastic Four #6
7) Ultimate Fantastic Four #7
8) Uncanny X-Men #445
9) X-Men #158
10) Ultimate Fantastic Four #8
11) Ultimate X-Men #47
12) Ultimate X-Men #48
13) Amazing Spider-Man #509
14) Wolverine: The End #4
15) Marvel Knights Spider-Man #3
16) Amazing Spider-Man #508
17) JLA #100
18) Batman #629
19) Wolverine #16
20) Teen Titans #12
21) Amazing Fantasy #1
22) Excalibur #2
23) New X-Men #2
24) Avengers #84
25) Daredevil #61

All told, the Top 25 spun out as relatively normal, aside from the addition of Identity Crisis #1 and three issues of Ultimate Fantastic Four, which pushed titles down roughly four slots from what was becoming their regular slots. Most notable in the Top 25 is the debut of Amazing Fantasy #1, by Fiona Avery and Mark Brooks, which introduced a new “Spider-Girl” character to the present-day Marvel Universe. Though, as with New X-Men #1 in May, Amazing Fantasy #1 was connected to a variant - the "Arachno-Man" variant issue of Ultimate Spider-Man #54, that is, the more copies of AF #1 ordered, the more copies of USM #54 they were able to qualify for ordering.

Additionally, Superman #206 again shipped with a 50/50 variant cover, half by Michael Turner, half by Jim Lee.

The move by Marvel on AF #1, as well as the variant on Superman #206 and the returnability of Identity Crisis #1 all have the same goal - get more copies of specific comics into shops, which they seem to be doing well. However, the proof will always be int eh pudding the month the specialness stops - that is, Amazing Fantasy #2, Identity Crisis #2, or the month the variant covers on Superman stop. Conventional wisdom points to the idea that, if more copies of a book are in a store, more readers will pick it up, allowing for more copies to continue to be ordered once the incentive stops.

But - as many will point out, that in and of itself is a trick. If an book with a variant or tied to an incentive is seen as a slow seller or even "unsellable" by a retailer, they are likely to slash orders as soon as the incentive is gone, leaving the market (and armchair quaterbacks) with numbers on first issues that are significantly inflated, and dropoffs between #1 and #2 issues that look worse than they are.

Back to the charts, of the X-Men reloads, Uncanny X-Men and X-Men remained high is they usually do, but notable was New X-Men #2, which stayed in the Top 25 after debuting at #14 last month (though copies of New X-Men #1 were tied to how many incentive covers of Astonishing X-Men #1 retailers could order).

The final pre-“Disassembled” issue of Avengers managed to stay in the Top 25, though Brian Bendis has posted a report that, given the numbers he’s seen, that Avengers #500 will be one of the top books for July.

Marvel Knights Spider-Man #3’s ranking is slightly odd, given the talent on the title (Mark Millar and Terry & Rachel Dodson). It’s #15 ranking in June reflects losing 10 percentage points in index numbers from May - a noticeable drop, given the historical performance of Millar’s other Marvel work.

Other titles of note in the Top 100:

The first non-Marvel, non-DC book in the lineup: Conan #5 at #26, keeping the barbarian’s place from the previous month, and overall, a very good showing for a non-spandex title.

Astonishing X-Men #1: Director’s Cut came in at #33.
Identity Disc #1 debuted at #35.
Doom Patrol #1 debuted at #46
District X #2 ranked at #53, down from #35 the month before.
Firestorm #2 ranked at #56, down from #34 for its debut.
DC’s Sam Kieth Batman project, Scratch #1 made an impressive showing at #66.
Spider-Man/Doctor Octopus: Year One #1 debuted at #74.
Mary Jane #1 came in at #77, while Witches #1 ranked at #80.
Ex Machina #1 landed at #81 - a very strong showing for a Wildstorm non-Authority related debut.

Spider-Girl’s new costume helped her land at #102 for June’s #75.
Vertigo’s The Witching #1 landed at #121.
John Romita’s Gray Area ranked at #138 for its debut issue.
Sleeper Season Two #1 came in at #145.

The Top 10 graphic novels for June were:

1) Ultimate Spider-Man vol 9: Ultimate Six
2) Essential Spider-Man vol 6
3) Walt Disney’s Vacation Parade
4) Dark Horse Book of Witchcraft
5) Hellsing vol 3
6) Batman Illustrated by Neal Adams vol 2
7) Spider-Man 2 Movie
8) Catwoman Nine Lives of a Feline Fatale
9) Rurouni Kenshin vol 5
10) Donald Duck Adventures vol 6

Despite not landing the #1 book, Marvel landed as the #1 publisher in both dollar and unit share again in June, trumping DC 37.25% to 28.02% in dollar share; and leading by nearly 15 points in units: 40.56% to DC’s 26.21%.

Dark Horse, Image, and Tokyopop rounded out the top 5 publishers.