Sales Estimates for September, 2012 - DC Comics Zero Month Scores Big

[CBR News]

Marvel's penultimate "AvX" chapter took the number one position, but DC Comics' zero month issues dominated the rest of September's Top ten slots, leading the publisher to overall sales dominance for the month.


Full article here.

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

I'm actually somewhat surprised that Talon launched higher than the Zero issues for Nightwing, Batgirl and Wonder Woman.

[DebkoX]

I'm not surprised with the figures to be honest, I mean, the '0' issues looked fab.

[Timmy]

Hated Zero Month. I liked the issues the series that I buy produced (Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Animal Man, Swamp Thing, Earth 2) put out. There was no reason for the labeling of it and interrupting storylines. Flashback issues happen all of the time, leave it up to the writers to use them when they want to.

[BrotherUnitNo_4]

I'm not surprised with the figures to be honest, I mean, the '0' issues looked fab.

Oh I'm not surprised by the overall performance in the least, but for me zero month just further emphasizes how gimmick-driven the industry is. Gains of this magnitude (10-15%) aren't natural month-to-month in the industry on a line of 52 books. Nobody could convince me otherwise.

Uncanny Avengers is gearing up to be the second highest-selling book of the year with 300K+ books on stands. Do I think that's legitimate interest in the product? No. I don't. It's driven by retailer incentives and a truckload of variants. Does it get more product on stands? Sure. But who's really reading all of those issues?

[Jim Thompson]

Marvel's penultimate "AvX" chapter took the number one position, but DC Comics' zero month issues dominated the rest of September's Top ten slots, leading the publisher to overall sales dominance for the month.


Full article here.

Quite the good month for DC! Clearly they are on the right track!

[cgh]

Earth 2 is in 9th spot? That's wonderful news.

Also:

Batman: up (by 25%!)
Wonder Woman: up
Dial H: up
Batwoman: up

Etc. A lot of quality comics there.

On a non-DC note, I am disappointed in the low Prophet sales. I guess such a Euro-style comic isn't to American tastes.

[aleph]

On a non-DC note, I am disappointed in the low Prophet sales. I guess such a Euro-style comic isn't to American tastes.

I discovered Prophet recently and I've been hooked. Kinda wish more people enjoyed works like these with the big ideas, crazy worlds and meditative plotting. If they had extra money they should pump it in for Marketing. Even putting ads in the unlikeliest places could win the unlikeliest fans.

Right now, I'm just hoping its run doesn't end soon.

[cgh]

I discovered Prophet recently and I've been hooked. Kinda wish more people enjoyed works like these with the big ideas, crazy worlds and meditative plotting. If they had extra money they should pump it in for Marketing. Even putting ads in the unlikeliest places could win the unlikeliest fans.

Right now, I'm just hoping its run doesn't end soon.

Me too, but those are some low sales, man. If it was written in French and published in Belgium, it would probably sell in the tens of thousands. That detached, mind-expanding "woaaahhh dude" style just isn't the way Americans tell stories, although the CBR reviewers sure love it - I think it's the only comic I've ever seen where every single reviewed issue got at least 4/5 stars.

[Volkditty]

Earth 2 is in 9th spot? That's wonderful news.

Still too low!

[Jim Thompson]

Still too low!

Gaining. Better than going the other way.

[TheDarkNut]

Earty-2 is excellent, so glad it made it to top 10.

[Brave Sir Robbin]

Still too low!

But if you give an honest look at who is ahead of Earth 2:

Batman
Justice League
Green Lantern
Detective Comics
Action Comics
Batman: the Dark Knight
DC Batman and Robin

You are getting into the realm of DC's heaviest hitters. Batman sells, and sells big. With the attention the 0 issues got, I think it is expected that a lot of Batman books would be at the top with Justice League, Green Lantern and Superman. The fact that Earth 2 is right there is pretty huge for a fairly new book.

[new_onslaught]

I want to ask all the Earth-2 lovers, don't you have a problem with Robinson's dialogue? I'll be getting this book 'til #6 but after that I'm dropping due to the dialogue. The plot and art are great but I can't stand the dialogue. Honestly I'm not trolling, just curious.

[Calvin Government]

Hated Zero Month. I liked the issues the series that I buy produced (Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Animal Man, Swamp Thing, Earth 2) put out. There was no reason for the labeling of it and interrupting storylines. Flashback issues happen all of the time, leave it up to the writers to use them when they want to.

Same here. At best, it offered up little one-shot stories that filled in some blank bits in the past and told compelling stories (Wonder Woman, Action Comics). At its worst, it was a waste of time and money, lazily put together (Swamp Thing). But even at its best, it's still just kind of awkwardly crammed in there. It's just another gimmick-driven stunt in the era of the Superstar Editor (90s were the superstar artists; 00's were the superstar writers; looks like the 10s will be the superstar editors... god save us all). I dropped about 75% of my DC books after Zero Month.

Me too, but those are some low sales, man. If it was written in French and published in Belgium, it would probably sell in the tens of thousands. That detached, mind-expanding "woaaahhh dude" style just isn't the way Americans tell stories, although the CBR reviewers sure love it - I think it's the only comic I've ever seen where every single reviewed issue got at least 4/5 stars.

If you think Prophet is selling poorly, pity the fans of Image's other fantastic relaunch, Glory. Those don't even chart half the time, despite being generally very good. Prophet might be my favorite ongoing right now, though, so I sincerely hope it picks up readers, Walking Dead-style.