Posted in: Comics, Venom | Tagged: Comics, entertainment, marvel, venom, venom 150

Comic Store In Your Future – How Did Venom #150 Sell For You?

Rod Lamberti of Rodman Comics, writes weekly for Bleeding Cool. Find previous columns here.

On Thursday, June 22nd Marvel's Joe Taraborelli issued a press release headlined "Every Hero! Every Title! Every Story! Tomorrow, MARVEL LEGACY Changes the Comic Book Industry!"

Big hype for the next day's announcement.

The announcement? Homage variant covers. 52 Marvel titles in October. Yes, the number that people associate with DC. "The New 52"!

The creative teams on the 52 Marvel titles? Unannounced.

I was underwhelmed. Marvel next month is having Jim Lee's trading card art from the 1990s as their variant theme. Variant covers are not anything new, let alone changing the comic book industry.

It is hard to believe but, I am actually tired of harping on Marvel. I am just shocked that Marvel hasn't yet announced their big come back to greatness and gotten fans excited already. Their renumbering tactics has now changed. From first issues to higher numbers in an effort to hit higher issue milestones. Such as Venom did recently with issue 150. Though the problem is casual or new readers are confused. Meaning the previous 1 through 7 issues of Venom before issue 150 often times people think the previous seven issues was part of a different series. Just had that happen last Saturday. Which I understand since counting 1,2,3,4,5,6,7, then issue 150 does seem odd to say the least. Where Marvel rarely had a series past issue 12 now we are going to see high issue milestones though not the actual issue numbers leading up to it.

Venom 150 along with Uncanny X-Men 600 (where Marvel basically did the same thing as they did with Venom) did not sell that well here. It would help if people could see by buying or knowing issues 147, 148, 149, existed and have some excitement building up to an issue 150 instead of just 150 because the many previous series issue numbers add up to the number.

Marvel seems to be taking to many short cuts. Too much playing with a series numbering instead of focusing on getting people to read their comics. Renumbering and variant covers are not ways to get actual new readers reading comics.

Tell an entertaining story. Have a creative team that gets a lot of readers excited. No one has to "die". No hype "about how nothing will ever be the same". No over hype claiming something "changes the comic book industry!"

Put out comics that people feel are worth the cover price you charge for them. Get creative with the stories in between the covers.

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