Friday, July 16, 2010

Dan Didio Needs to Keep His Word and Fire Himself

In January of this year, recently demoted co-publisher of DC Comics Dan Didio took over as writer of The Outsiders series, a team of superheroes who do not fit the norms of the mainstream superhero community, namely the Justice League of America. But with half a year behind us, it's hard to categorize his efforts as anything but a failure. Just look at the numbers:


In March 2009, The Outsiders had monthly sales of roughly 28,000 copies, which was a typical sales figure for the title.

In the wake of Batman's apparent death in Final Crisis, a new team of Outsiders was created, and the title was "relaunched" to great success. Sales for the November release jumped to roughly 51,000.

Fast forward to June 2010, and Dan Didio's version of the book saw sales of a mere 18,000 copies.

So Didio not only lost every single one of the new readers who jumped on board for the post Final Crisis reboot, he's almost lost half of the traditional fan base as well, who you used to able to count on to pick up the title month in and month out.

When Didio was doing his press tour in November regarding his taking over of The Outsiders title he said "If I felt that the book was not achieving, I would not be on that book. As simple as that. I'd cancel myself."

Since it seems that once again, Dan Didio has lied to the loyal fans of the DC Universe. The only question left is will it be Jim Lee or Geoff Johns who has to go in and tell him he's fired.

1 comment:

  1. It is odd, because I can't see final crisis making people want to read more comic books. It seems like it would have the opposite effect. Though, Batman's death is a reason to tune in. But, yeah. those numbers suck and the title itself could go away with that kind of readership.

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