Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, dc, fear itself, flashpoint, marvel, MVL

FearPoint ItselFlash – Vital Statistics

Published Fri, 22 Apr 2011 12:54:37 -0500

Last updated Fri, 22 Apr 2011 16:36:11 -0500

So I've been talking to retailers. Quite a few of them. Asking them how they've been ordering the first issues of both Marvel and DC's big summer crossover titles, Fear Itself and Flashpoint.

It's not pretending to be a comprehensive study. It's probably not that representative. But the gap in figures looks beyond any reasonable error of margin.

Fear Itself is ahead of Flashpoint by a significant degree.

Indeed, if my figures are accurate, I'd be surprised if Flashpoint #1 comes anywhere near to that psychologically important ICV2 100,000 estimated figure. While Fear Itself #1 should have no problem.

This comes as DC releases a series of quotes by creators working on the spinoff series that seem to work things up to a lather. Including Peter Milligan's concluding "FLASHPOINT will be one of those game-changing, epoch-defining events that people will talk about for years to come. Those who weren't a part of it at the time will lie and say they were, and wish they had been. So why set yourself up to be a liar?

It seems that Fear Itself did a better job of selling itself to consumers and retailers than Flashpoint has to date. Of course, on publication and people actually reading this "epoch-defining event", this may change.

But so much about comic book events these days are about hype, convincing people to dive in, sight unseen. And despite neither event getting over exactly what their respective stories were really about, Fear Itself seems to have performed better in terms of hype.

For now.

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