what happend to the other companies?

[nubly]

i dont know where to ask this but i was wondering what happend to some of the other companies that used to produce good comics? valiant, defiant and cross gen

[Cei-U!]

They all went bankrupt or otherwise out of business. Somebody else will have to provide the specifics.

Cei-U!
I summon the vague answer!

[dr_cyclops]

I have no specifics, I'm just worried the comics market itself. I expect to see more "comic shop" going out of business, and small companies disappearing. The 90s glut is over.

[Reptisaurus!]

Since we're (sort of) on topic?

Whatever happened to Harvey? Casper and Richie Rich had HUGE media saturation and popular recognition. Howcome Archie survived when Harvey didn't?

[hondobrode]

Ok, big breath.

Valiant was one of my all-time fav companies. Sales were dwindling and Acclaim Entertainment, now bankrupt, thought they could publish comics, maybe get some media properties going (movies, tv, etc), toys, collectibles, and of course, video games. The strategy should have worked. They had a big hit with Turok, and the sequel, but the third or fourth game didn't do nearly as well as they projected and the company had a lot riding on it, besides some other games not doing as well as they hoped. I really thought Acclaim had a great strategy, but they botched the execution, the losers. I can't remember the name of the guy that just bought the rights to the Valiant characters and the characters created at Acclaim, but he's planning on putting them back out there. I recall seeing a funky new sketch of Solar a few years ago, though he, Turok, and Magnus won't be including as they are actually Gold Key characters that Valiant leased out. I can't remember the name of the company that owns them now, tho they have leased the Magnus character to Dark Horse for the reprint rights and to iBooks for new adventures. I know the Valiant characters won't be as big as they were at one time, but I'll definitely be waiting to see what happens with them. I would say they were my all time fav universe.

Defiant - Shooter started this with an investor after he was fired from Valiant. I always think of it as kind of the Earth-2 Valiant, because I thought they were kind of similar in tone. Some of the concepts were cool I thought, like Warriors of Plasm, Charlemagne, and that Ditko-type guy that fought metaphysical baddies kind of like Dr Strange. That was called Dark Dominion. That collapsed just as their big company wide event was going to launch : Schism. Shooter then went on to produce Broadway Comics with Saturday Night Live producer Loren Michaels. It bombed bombed bombed. None of that looked good to me. It looked like all T & A pretty poorly done. Word was that he and Chuck Rozanski of Mile High were going to do a book together but it never happened. I'd still like to see Shooter do something. His Solar was great; one of my all-time favs along with Valiant's big event, Unity. It was the best since Crisis and remains so in my book. Shooter did start Unity 2000, the sequel to Unity that Acclaim published for 3 issues with art by Jim Starlin. It was going to unite the original Valiant Universe and the Acclaim versions and kind of be a crisis thing. I was liking it but the company didn't finish it to # 6 like was projected :(

CrossGen - I didn't follow them. Lots of people did. Real pretty stuff. The stuff they put out at the end was the best : the non-Sigilverse titles, like Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, Abadazad, El Cazador, Brath, etc. They had lots of money and blew lots of money. Bankrupt but returning under another name. The characters have all been sold to Disney's storybook division and will probably never be seen again unless Disney decides to publish comics again. Oh yeah, they are going to now that I recall, but more European style stuff, not the CG, except for Abadazad, which they want to really get behind with creators DeMatties and Ploog.

Harvey - I'm kind of fuzzy on this one, but they just pulled the plug. They had been in business a long time. They sold the facilities to Matt Groening for his company, Bongo, in L.A. I'll bet someone could reprint the old Harvey comics, sell em for $ 1 ea and have a nice little niche. I never bought em but my brother did and they were fun to read. It's amazing that fairly well known characters like Richie Rich, Lil Devil, Sad Sack, Wendy the Good Little Witch, etc are not being utilized at all !

whew !

[nweathington]

Harvey is still around... sort of. The company that owns their properties seems to be entirely focused on animation/live-action TV, movies, and direct-to-dvds, with no interest at all in comics.

[Rob Imes]

You can also find Harvey characters on various non-comic items. I recall seeing a Casper coloring book last year or so. I felt like buying it just because it was a new Casper book! Hot Stuff's image appears on various non-comic items, too. Harvey got out of the comics biz in the mid-1990s if I recall right. They tried doing a magazine but it didn't last long.

Why is Archie still publishing comics while Harvey is not? Perhaps Archie's highly-visible (at grocery store checkouts) digest comics are the key. They might be keeping the company profitable enough to keep the regular comics line going as a source for future digest material.

[hondobrode]

Archie is not only still alive, but fairly strong. My understanding is that their numbers are very solid for the digests that are right there at the check out stands all over America. They did not follow the fanboy mentality of the direct market and instead focused on keeping their newsstand distribution. I think in retrospect it was a very good move. In fact, in the last year or so, DC has announced some sort of arrangement where they will work together cooperatively on distribution and advertising IIRC.