Marvel Leads Comic Sales for March 2014

StewShearerOld

Geekdad News Writer
Jan 5, 2013
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Marvel Leads Comic Sales for March 2014



While DC Comics captured prominent positions in the sales charts, Marvel came out on top with roughly 10 percent more of the month's dollar and unit shares.

Diamond Comics Distributors has released its list (compiled from the sales data of 3,500 plus comic shops) of its top products for March 2014 and the month apparently came up Marvel. The comic publisher led all of its competition with a 34.31 percent dollar share and a 38.17 percent unit share. The company's success included five books on the distributor's list of top 10 selling comics as well.

Following up close in a respectable (and not unexpected) second was DC Comics which claimed 25.94 percent dollar share and 29.02 percent unit share. DC had particular success with Scott Snyder's ongoing Batman book which continued its Year Zero arc which, similar to Frank Miller's Year One story, follows Batman during the opening days of his career. DC, in fact, actually managed to capture the first four slots on of the top 10 comics list with Superman Unchained, Forever Evil and Sandman Overture following behind Snyder's Batman.

The remainder of the month's sales were split among smaller publishers with only Image, Dark Horse and IDW breaking 5 percent. Image in particular had a strong month, especially in the trade paperback category where the latest volume of Robert Kirkman's The Walking Dead flew off of retail shelves and captured the number one sales spot.

All in all, the month's results aren't much of a surprise. Some might be a bit perplexed as to why DC took second place considering the fact that it enjoyed some considerable success on the comics bestseller's list (not to mention the trade and toys categories). That said, Marvel's own selection for the month included several new and anticipated releases from its ongoing Now initiative which, in addition to its many other popular titles, likely helped push it to the top.

Source: <a href=http://www.diamondcomics.com/Home/1/1/3/597?articleID=131255>Diamond Comics


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Vault101

I'm in your mind fuzz
Sep 26, 2010
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I read that as marvel leads comic sans

As on they adopted it as their main font or something

Eather way it's still marvel and DC...glad to see there's still not a bad share with the others...superheroes are so trite..
 

Saltyk

Sane among the insane.
Sep 12, 2010
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I suspect this has a bit to do with the most effective advertising in history. The Marvel movies. They probably inspired many a viewer to pick up some of the comics.
 

Baron_BJ

Tired. Cold. Bored.
Nov 13, 2009
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I'm confused, why is this news? Marvel always beats out DC by a pretty decent margin (except when the New 52 began and they edged them out for a few months before returning to normal), then comes in Image, followed by Dark Horse and IDW. This is one of the most typical sales charts I've ever seen.
 

Radeonx

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Apr 26, 2009
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Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
 

Ieyke

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Jul 24, 2008
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Radeonx said:
Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
Yep.
DC has occasionally had its moments in the past, but it has become a real abyss of shit since New 52 started.
 

VoidWanderer

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Sep 17, 2011
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'And to day in, No duh!, news...'

This is hardly a surprise given that Superheroes are the new 'fairy-tales'...
 

Vivi22

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Aug 22, 2010
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Ieyke said:
Radeonx said:
Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
Yep.
DC has occasionally had its moments in the past, but it has become a real abyss of shit since New 52 started.
Haven't they though. With the exception of a very small handful of titles the whole New 52 business has been absolutely awful on every level. And even those titles that are good are hampered by the fact that they're still tied to the New 52 continuity which is a god awful mess that makes even less sense than the decades of convoluted horse shit they had before.
 

GiantRaven

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Radeonx said:
Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
Perhaps in superhero comics, but generally indie publishers whoop Marvel's arse in terms of interesting and varied content.

Ieyke said:
Yep.
DC has occasionally had its moments in the past, but it has become a real abyss of shit since New 52 started.
Thankfully Green Arrow is fantastic, and that's all that really matters.

Animal Man and Wonder Woman are pretty sweet as well. Other than those few books though, there's a whole load of tripe floating around.
 

Karthak

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Feb 8, 2010
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Vivi22 said:
Ieyke said:
Radeonx said:
Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
Yep.
DC has occasionally had its moments in the past, but it has become a real abyss of shit since New 52 started.
Haven't they though. With the exception of a very small handful of titles the whole New 52 business has been absolutely awful on every level. And even those titles that are good are hampered by the fact that they're still tied to the New 52 continuity which is a god awful mess that makes even less sense than the decades of convoluted horse shit they had before.
Why exactly has the new 52 been so horrible? I don't really read any DC comics anymore (those geniuses cancelled Secret Six), so pretty much the only thing I've heard about the reboot involves homophobia and dubious portrayals of female characters.
 

spartandude

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Saltyk said:
I suspect this has a bit to do with the most effective advertising in history. The Marvel movies. They probably inspired many a viewer to pick up some of the comics.
Pretty much this, last week i picked up some Guardians of the Galaxy just to get an idea of the setting for when i watch the movie.
 

Nadia Castle

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May 21, 2012
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The only series from either of the big two I've been consistently buying is 'The Superior Spider-man', and now that's coming to a close I'll probably drop it. The licensed properties put out by IDW and the image series are just far more entertaining than anything they're doing with Superheroes at the moment which still stubbornly seem to be stepping stones between 'events'.

All that said it's not surprising Marvel continues to outshine DC which still tries to turn everyone into Batman. If it there were a few more titles like 'Batman 66' or 'Adventures of Superman' with their goofy aesthetics and complete lack of continuity I'd happily jump aboard again.
 

spartandude

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Nov 24, 2009
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Vivi22 said:
Ieyke said:
Radeonx said:
Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
Yep.
DC has occasionally had its moments in the past, but it has become a real abyss of shit since New 52 started.
Haven't they though. With the exception of a very small handful of titles the whole New 52 business has been absolutely awful on every level. And even those titles that are good are hampered by the fact that they're still tied to the New 52 continuity which is a god awful mess that makes even less sense than the decades of convoluted horse shit they had before.
Ok im not really into comics, i rarely read em and when i do its usually marvel because DC has almost nothing that interests me, but what is this New 52 stuff?
 

scotth266

Wait when did I get a sub
Jan 10, 2009
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spartandude said:
Ok im not really into comics, i rarely read em and when i do its usually marvel because DC has almost nothing that interests me, but what is this New 52 stuff?
DC rebooted their universe (as they do every few couple of years) in order to let new creative teams take on books/unfuck continuity/bring characters back to life.

The new run was called The New 52 because there were initially 52 books being printed.

EDIT: Some books weren't completely rebooted though. Green Lantern for instance continued from where the last team left off.
 

Ieyke

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Jul 24, 2008
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I like DC's characters well enough, but everything else about DC I pretty much hate.
Their constant rebooting of their universe means continuity and any meaningful investment in the characters is impossible because it's all gets invalidated when they throw the universe out the window.
And then when they throw it out the window to reboot with New 52 and it's just totally WORSE....WTF?
It's just a mess.
Characters aren't who they used to be.
Certain characters just don't exist anymore.
Other characters have random stuff that stayed the same....except that half of the related continuity becomes impossible due to all the other changes when you give it an ounce of thought.
A lot of character designs got slightly better, but several got WAAAY worse.
The a bunch of homophobic and sexist BS.
Plots that resolve is stupid or meaningless ways.
etc.

This is why I love Marvel.
They have the 616 universe.
616 never goes anywhere.
Marvel's not afraid to nudge around a couple details if something got a little out of whack to keep the bigger picture in tact.
If Marvel has a crazy idea where they want to reinvent all the characters they just create a whole separate new universe, like the Ultimates universe, and they play around in that sandbox, and leave the mighty 616 sandcastle undisturbed.
If they think an alternate universe character is just REALLY cool, they occasionally port him over into the main 616.
Marvel has reality-hopping superheroes who get to explore these different worlds.
They can cross-over their own characters without wrecking continuity.

The DCAU is, and probably always will be, the best version of the DC universe, because it's consistent and solid all the way through. It lets the characters be who they are and develop throughout the story without worrying about the universe getting erased and having to deal with a rebooted Superman who kills people or whatever.
 

Radeonx

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GiantRaven said:
Radeonx said:
Good. Marvel is by far the best comic book company, and they deserve to be at the top.
Perhaps in superhero comics, but generally indie publishers whoop Marvel's arse in terms of interesting and varied content.
Well yeah, but I meant in relation to the other companies on this list.