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Bleeding Cool Bestseller List – 8th January 2017 – "Nervous On How Badly Marvel Numbers Are Going To Drop Again"

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This is the Top Ten Bleeding Cool Bestseller List, as compiled by a number of comic stores from their sales on Wednesday and Thursday. It measures what are known as the "Wednesday Warriors", those who can't wait to the weekend to get this week's comics. We salute you, and the keenness you bring to your passion.

And as The Walking Dead outsells every Marvel title, even the fantastic USAvengers #1, Marvel put Batman, Justice League  Vs Suicide Squad and Justice League into the top three…. when it comes to boots on the ground, DC continue to outperform.

  1. Batman #14
  2. Justice League #12
  3. Justice League Vs Suicide Squad #3
  4. Walking Dead #162
  5. Superman #14
  6. Nightwing #12
  7. Harley Quinn #11
  8. USAvengers #1
  9. Green Lanterns #14
  10. Deadpool The Duck #1

Thanks to the following retailers

Who had this to say,

Marvel manages to get one book into our store's Top Ten today–and it's the one Marvel title that stars the legacy version of the hero rather than the replacement version (Unworthy Thor). Otherwise, it's eight DC titles and one Image (Saga) for our Top Ten this week. I really miss the days when Marvel published books that readers enjoyed…

Strong interest in 1990s DC's–Superman, Action, Batman, Flash, and Justice League. Also a renewed interest in 1990s Captain America from folks who miss the days when he was an admirable hero.

SOOOO…US Avengers was #1. I assume that Marvel put out a ton of covers to show that the book could make enough money to keep it going until next year….Worlds Avengers #1 same time next year !!!. The rest of the books did really well since it was a light week…thanks publishers.

Seven to Eternity is moving with any printing…which is always a good sign. X-Men,X-Force and Wolverine back-issues are also moving in droves.

Not a great way to start the new year. Sales were typical January sales. Justice League vs Suicide Squad 3 takes the top spot. The weekly release is great. Old Man Logan is the only Marvel book to make it into the top ten. I say this because it is now really a big concern. Marvel sales keep falling in store. I kept thinking they could go no lower but they have every month. I figured Marvel would figure out that they are having their own "DC You" freefall and start correcting it. After reading the previews for March and seeing nothing really exciting from Marvel I am now worried. Man Thing is getting his own title? The current market will not support it.

Flash back issues have been popular. The 1990s Wally West series. Biggest surprise for back issues was Final Crisis and its tie ends being bought out.

It's another week with no Marvel books in our top 10 or even 13 at FFF. Justice League vs Suicide Squad is this week's top book for us, followed by Batman, Justice League, Walking Dead, Superman, Saga, Harley, Green Lanterns, Green Arrow and JL Atom. We then have 3 MORE DC books, Nightwing, Aquaman and Injustice before we see our first Marvel books at spots 14 and 15: Avengers and US Avengers. Then even Death of Hawkman just barely beat out Unworthy Thor, Champions, Moon Knight, Nova and Old Man Logan for us. I swear I'm not slapping Marvel Comics out of people's hands and I would LOVE to sell more Marvel, but it's just not happening and even their most hardcore Marvel Zombies have hit their breaking point, or just can't afford to even try their titles right now, much less keep buying them.

Unstoppable Wasp 1 (Unstartable?) sold less copies so far than we sold of the first Rebirth TPBs: Superman and Green Arrow this week. It's a shame, because I like the writer of that book from his work on Princeless, and the premise seems interesting (even if Wasp seems not to not know how acronyms work), but not every new character or minor character needs their own book, and this book's early reaction is proof of that. I don't think there's a market for the actual Wasp character to support her own book, so this Wasp, who seems shoehorned into continuity is definitely not what fans are demanding. As a kid, I really liked USAgent, he was one of my favorite characters. But Marvel didn't cancel Captain America to try to put out a USAgent book instead, because it would have sold 10% as many copies as Cap. Not sure why Marvel seems to think a Wasp book or Slapstick is a better plan than bringing back the Fantastic Four or Wolverine. Good luck with that.

With Marvel dropping the digital codes, I don't think it will have a big effect in my store, but I hear some other retailers saying they think it will really hurt their Marvel sales since it was at least a little easier to justify Marvel's higher price point with the digital copy of the same issue. I doubt they'll drop their prices without it and it may make readers who are excited about digital copies think twice about buying Marvel books without the perceived extra value trying to justify their higher price point.

I've been saying for years that Marvel needs "less books, better and cheaper books" but they don't seem to want to move in that direction, even though that's where today's sales are obviously telling them to go. When Deadpool sales on all his books are way lower than they were 6 months ago, even on the main book, it seems weird that Marvel keeps trying to find ways to kill their golden goose. The market may or may not support 1 Iron Fist series, but it definitely doesn't need 3.

We also set up our display of our top 50 bestselling TPBs of the year and there are only 6 Marvel books in there and half of those are Star Wars! So it's not like Marvel is making up sales in trades (at least not in comic stores, I'm sure they're selling a lot on Amazon and decent numbers in bookstores). Saga Volume 1 is our bestselling book for the year for the second year in a row with over 100 copies sold at our store, and all 6 volumes of Saga are accounted for in our top 20 taking up spots 1, 2, 7, 9, 12 and 17. Marvel's top books for us were Darth Vader 1 (11), Civil War (14), Darth Vader 2 (26), Star Wars 1 (31), Old Man Logan (36), and Deadpool Vol 1: Dead Presidents (37). The rest of our list was a lot of DC like Killing Joke, New 52 Batman, Harley, Flashpoint, Injustice, Hush, Suicide Squad, Preacher, Y, Fables, Image like Walking Dead, Paper Girls, Rat Queens, I Hate Fairyland, Wytches, Monstress, Wicked & Divine, Chew and indy books like Rick & Morty, Invader Zim, Steven Universe, Lady Mechanika, Locke & Key, One Punch Man, Attack on Titan, and more. The Rebirth TPBs are off to a good start, so we will see how they do these next few months.

We sold a bunch of cheap issues of old DC, Marvel and indy horror books like Ghost Manor, Secrets of Haunted House, some Man Thing and other late 70's and early 80's books. Also sold a bit of cheap reader copies of Archie, Hot Stuff, Richie Rich and more. Still moving tons of Rebirth sets or almost full sets of main titles like Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lanterns, JL and more.

Always moving older Walking Dead copies and sold an Uncanny X-Men 266 for $100 this week. Moving decent amount of recent Saga from the last year or so, and surprisingly, still more random cheap FF, Cap, Spidey, Batman and Action Comics to kids spending Christmas money for $2 or $3 reader copies! Lots of kids like to buy back issues rather than new comics. Maybe because the covers were actually representative of what's inside instead of just a static image of the lead character?

Events, Number #1's and Variants is this week's story… Oh and Batman, never forget Batman.

Solid week with lots of strong books – Marvel does not help matters with convincing people to drop buying 'physical' books since they no longer come with a digital back-up (but still cost a $1 more than DC Comics).

Nervous on how badly MARVEL numbers are going to drop again. Can't seem to cut fast enough.

Great week for back issue sales.  Image trades took the top spot for our sales this week.  Star Wars comics had a Big push this week.


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Rich JohnstonAbout Rich Johnston

Founder of Bleeding Cool. The longest-serving digital news reporter in the world, since 1992. Author of The Flying Friar, Holed Up, The Avengefuls, Doctor Who: Room With A Deja Vu, The Many Murders Of Miss Cranbourne, Chase Variant. Lives in South-West London, works from Blacks on Dean Street, shops at Piranha Comics. Father of two. Political cartoonist.
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