Comment: The Expanding Universe

Finally recovered from bankruptcy, Marvel seems determined to prove what rude health its in as it fills the shelves with new X-Men series and invites creators from India and Japan to add to its line-up. Alex de Campi takes count.
28 June 2004

UBU AT STALINGRAD

In Alfred Jarry's play UBU ROI, there is a single actor who represents The Entire Russian Army. Of late, Marvel seems to imagine that, if they launch enough titles, they can act as The Entire US Comic Industry. Marvel has had a very good run lately, and is pursuing its sales lead (43% of the US direct comic market, by May's volume numbers, and 8 of the top 10 titles) aggressively. Last week Marvel also launched a re-vamp of its website, which is now light years better looking and more user-friendly. Part of Marvel's new aggressiveness might be because Marvel just became debt-free for the first time since its 1998 filing for Chapter 11. Mazel tov, Marvel. It must feel good.

Now let's look at the onslaught of new titles recently launched or solicited. May's X-Men Reload kicked off brilliantly, with Joss Whedon and John Cassaday's ASTONISHING X-MEN #1 the highest-selling comic in America, with 209,000 copies sold. The first Claremont/Davis UNCANNY X-MEN sold an extra 26,000 copies over Austen's last issue in April, and moved up the rankings from 14 to 5. X-MEN (formerly NEW X-MEN) sold about the same as the end of Grant Morrison's run (Morrison's last issue sold 117,000 copies; Austen's May issue sold 107,000).

I suppose it just goes to show that on a big franchise, the title is all. Unless they're uber-stars like Joss Whedon or Jim Lee, artists and writers don't seem to matter that much. They didn't to me when I was a kid. When I was 11 years old and buying X-MEN, I could go into nerdy, ridiculous depths about the details of Wolverine's back story, but I don't think I could have told you who the writer of the series was. I hope this means I was an unusually ignorant child, but I doubt it.

Of the new titles, NEW X-MEN (the renamed NEW MUTANTS - confused yet?) debuted at 14. This auspicious start may have been due to retailers being told they had to order high numbers of NEW X-MEN in order to qualify for one of the ASTONISHING variant covers. We'll see if there's a big drop in June numbers, or you can find out for yourself - are there still massive stacks of NEW X-MEN #1 on your retailer's shelves?

Chris Claremont and Aaron Lopresti's EXCALIBUR #1 sold 76,000 copies and debuted at 16, while David Hine and Lan Medina's DISTRICT X came in at 35, well above established titles like EXILES. It's not all rosy news for the X-office, however: it has been announced EMMA FROST is being cancelled in the next six months. But, like the Russian Army, when one X title falls, two rush in to take its place. Solicited for September are new GAMBIT, MADROX, ROGUE and NIGHTCRAWLER series, among others. And let's not forget X-FORCE.

Aside from the soon-to-be-cancelled X-STATIX, even the lowliest X title, WEAPON X, outsold everything published by Vertigo and Wildstorm.

The march of shelf saturation continues apace in other parts of Marvel, with the Marvel Age series aimed at young kids, miniseries like THOR: SON OF ASGARD (number 99 on the sales list, selling around Vertigo levels: 23,000 copies) becoming ongoings, and the five 2099 one-shots, which celebrates the 100th anniversary of Marvel Knights, even though they won't really be Marvel Knights titles, they won't relate to the old 2099, and MK was founded in 1998, not 1999.

MEANWHILE, ON THE ASIAN FRONT...

Most of the media coverage recently has been on the initial success of X-Men: Reload. But my attention was captivated by two little announcements, one on ICV2 and one in The Times of India, on new Marvel directions.

First, SPIDER-MAN INDIA, a miniseries to be co-produced by Marvel and its South Asian licencee, Gotham Entertainment. You can read more about it in Matthew Craig's article, World Wide Web. The comic will be released in India to coincide with the opening of the SPIDER MAN 2 film, and Marvel states they will publish it in North America at some point in the future.

Admittedly, Spidey India's costume looks a bit designed-by-committee, with a dhoti tacked onto the bottom of his normal threads, but for me this is still probably the most exciting thing Marvel has done this year. India is a massive market, and if this project takes off, it could be the surprise hit of the year for the publisher. The four-part series is written and drawn by Gotham Studios creative chief Jeevan K Jang.

Also, Marvel editor (and former manga publisher) CB Cebulski posted on an anime forum that Japanese manga superstars Clamp are working on a project for Marvel Comics. There was little further information, other than it would be a character who is not normally associated with Clamp - I'm assuming it's an X-character.

For those of you who are not manga fans, Clamp are a four person collective who have published fantastically successful shoujo (girl-focused) manga series that incorporate significant science fiction and fantasy elements: CHOBITS, ANGELIC LAYER, TSUBASA, WISH, and CARDCAPTOR SAKURA. Nearly all of their manga are available in the US from Tokyopop. I'm really looking forward to seeing what Clamp come up with, and whether Marvel publish it in US format or tankubon format.

This took some attention away from DC's detailed announcement of its own manga line, CMX. One wonders what was wrong with the letters "DC", but there you go. I was quite pleased to see FROM EROICA WITH LOVE being one of their first three translations to be launched. As well as being a really fun superthief versus law story, Eroica was one of the first big yaoi/shonen-ai (gay themed) manga, and it shows DC has guts - and that CMX editor Jake Tarbox, previously at Raijin magazine, knows his stuff.

THE ANCIENT ZEN ART OF SAYING NO

While Marvel went from strength to strength this week, CrossGen finally admitted it was even weaker than expected, filing for Chapter 11 with unsecured debts of over $3m. A lot of artists and writers have now realised, with terrifying finality, that they will never now be paid by CrossGen. Well, duh, say the cynics. The signs have been as clear as day since last summer. Anyone who kept on working for CrossGen in the hope of delayed payment was clearly deluding themselves.

It all looks so clear to outsiders. But, you see, the hardest thing in the world for a freelancer to do is to say no. Deep in the heart of nearly every freelancer lurks the black fear that if they turn down a job, or get difficult about late payment, they will never be offered any other work, ever.

A friend is convinced that, because he refused a gig drawing a miniseries for one of the smaller publishers, that publisher will never offer him anything again. He turned down the miniseries because he was too busy on other things, and the publisher was unwilling to delay it by two months. Should he have just said yes, and turned in his pages late, or rushed them and ended up with a sub-standard job? The temptation to always say yes is almost overwhelming.

Also, most freelancers are honourable and loyal people, and they expect their corporate employers to be the same. Most of the time they are. But then there's Mark Alessi. As you go about your business this week, and casually drop $3 on a comic or a Starbucks coffee, spare a thought for Luke Ross and Fabrizio Fiorentino, two creators in CrossGen's top 20 unsecured creditors list, each owed over $16,000 by Alessi's company. A year's salary, or near as dammit. And it looks as if CrossGen has managed to hold the intellectual property in another company, so that creators won't even be able to walk away with the rights to the titles they were working on as compensation.

Alex de Campi is a comics writer whose projects include the Eisner-nominated SMOKE with Igor Kordey and the forthcoming KAT & MOUSE with Federica Manfredi.

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