Posted in: Batman, Comics, DC Comics, Superman | Tagged: absolute, Absolute Batman, Absolute MArtian Manhunter, barbara gordon, firestorm, lunar, supergirl

Spine Damage On Absolute Batman #20 And Other DC Comics This Week

Spine Damage On Absolute Batman, Absolute Martian Manhunter, Barbara Gordon, Fury Of Firestorm, Supergirl and other DC Comics this week...

Last week, Bleeding Cool broke the news that DC Comics titles out this coming week were subject to a lot of damages. DC Comics had told retailers "Thank you to everyone who has made us aware of manufacturing defects that occurred on Absolute Batman #20, Absolute Martian Manhunter #11, and Barbara Gordon: Breakout #1. At the current stage, we are releasing these issues as originally intended with the existing copies, so please feel free to sell them beginning on May 13. We are investigating the defects and putting together plans for amelioration, and will provide a follow-up update early next week. Thank you for your patience as we work to resolve this as quickly as possible. We empathize with the position this situation has put you in, and we appreciate your continued support. Please don't hesitate to reach out if you have any questions."

Well, we had some questions of our own, and now it seems we have some answers. Most covers seem to have been damaged along the spine, and the cardstock variant covers for the titles are placed on top of the normal comics, including the normal cover, so they all have damage as well under the card, including the hundred-plus retailer exclusive covers… here's what a few folk who have their copies have been saying;

• Cryptex Comics posted "Hearing reports of widespread damages on cover A for Absolute Batman 20 along with other issues this week."
• Timestream Comics posted "Every single Cover A is damaged with creases. Even the Cover As underneath the card stocks are affected. Looks like the whole print run is garbage."
• Nostalgia Nightmares posted "From my personal experience and all of the other images I've seen from others, this is definitely a production issue and not a distributor issue. So I actually feel bad for the Lunar reps that are going to be bombarded with complaints come Monday."
• Vault 35 posted "All copies of Absolute Batman #20 came in damaged. Lunar apparently couldn't be bothered to respond to the issue until Monday. Absolutely inexcusable quality control from Lunar and DC though."
• Midcoast Comics posted "Hello folks! DC has alerted us of damages to their entire stock of Absolute Batman and potentially some other titles and sure enough, as you can see there are spine fractures on all of our Cover As. Some of the variants are saved. Im not sure what the right call to do is… we have reported all damages. But please stay tuned for what our plans are with the bad stock while we wait for them to make good on this. We may offer the books at a discount so people can at least read the story and then discount the restocks when they come in so you're not paying twice for the same book. Im not sure yet and waiting to see what sort of " make good " DC plans."
• Hot Dog Fiasco posted "All of our Absolute Batmans, Martian Manhunters, Barbara Gordons, and most of our Supergirl and Firestorm comics had the same type of damage. It looks like it happened during production. Our DC books were mixed in with Image and other publishers, none of their books had any damage. The cardstock variants look fine on the outside but opening them up revealed the same damage on the A cover below. I have an email out to Lunar that I don't expect to be seen until Monday. Normally I would just submit the damage claim, but if the replacement books have the same damage there isn't much point having them sent out and charging me for shipping again."
• Big Alpaca Comics posted "Not really sure what to do here, team. It seems the ENTIRE printing of Absolute Batman 20 AND Barbara Gordon are damaged. It's not just here, so it seems the whole production is damaged. Since @dccomics just puts a new wrap on A covers for variants, this damage is also present on any other cover of these books. We're waiting on guidance from @lunarfw on what to do and they're still waiting for DC. Edit: Absolute Martian Manhunter is suffering the same damage."
• Aubrey Ninja posted "DC moved to cheaper paper for the cover of their highest selling book and every copy is damaged. Can't make this up."
• Patrick John posted "This is not good. Absolute Batman #20 damages. The card stock variant covers also have damaged on the inside covers. I pre-order a bunch including exclusives and this has me concerned…

UPDATE: Another retailer writes, "These ' defects' are consistent with damages we have seen from Image Comics over the course of 2 or so years. In the past, we have had multiple issues of Escape, Department Of Truth, No Man's Land, Kaya, and other Image releases with those exact damages. I believe you did an article about a year or so ago, or more, where you reported massive damage to a Transformers issue that had shops in an uproar. In fact, all our issues of Department of Truth #37, the last issue of Undiscovered Country #36, and The Thing On The Doorstep #4 coming out on Wednesday have those same defects. Which to me means that it has been a printer issue for quite a while but hasn't gotten enough attention to be fixed until the biggest books in the Comicsphere are affected."

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