By MATT SCHORR
The Superman Homepage announced this week the results of a poll it recently held. It posted visitors to the site with a simple question: “If you’re not a comic book reader, why not?”
Naturally, the majority of visitors chose the “I am a comic book reader” option. That shouldn’t be too surprising. After all, it’s a website dedicated to one of comics’ most well-known characters. It stands to reason most visitors would be comic book readers, a whopping 65 percent of the votes in total.
However, there was a handful that said they weren’t. The two top vote-getting options were “They’re too expensive” and “I used to but lost interest.” And “I lost interest” narrowly came out ahead with 13 percent of the votes.
Please?
Steve Younis, the site’s owner and operator, said it was interesting that those lapsed readers weren’t enticed by DC Comics new line of #1 issues. Amidst much fanfare, the company unleashed 52 new titles in September. Long running series like Action Comics and Detective Comics were reset, while many continuities and storylines were totally rebooted in favor of more contemporary themes. And yet, this poll, taken just two months afterward, would suggest several consumers didn’t much care.
“I also find it interesting that the second most selected reason for not reading comic books was that they are too expensive,” Younis said on the site. “Most comic books from DC are now $2.99. You can wait a month and get them for $1.99. I wonder how much cheaper they’d have to get for these respondents to consider them value for their money?”
Those who chose “too expensive” came in just behind those who lost interest, with 12 percent of the vote. Other responses included “I don’t have the time,” with three percent, and “Other” with seven.
I wouldn’t go so far as to suggest these are hard numbers to gauge an entire customer by (I don’t think SupermanHomepage.com even managed to get 200 votes in all), but it’s definitely food for thought. Sure, DC saw sales spike for the “New 52,” but has that momentum been maintained? I’ve read several of the new series, and while they’re certainly good, they don’t really offer anything new or fresh. Detective Comics #1 opened with Batman tracking down the Joker…hardly unexplored territory. Wonder Woman’s reboot started with the Amazonian battling monsters and such from Greek mythology…kind of been done before. Justice League #2 has Batman fighting Superman…didn’t Frank Miller do that over twenty years ago?
The Superman titles, meanwhile, actually did start off with some interesting new ideas. In Action Comics, The Man of Steel is a young crusader and a bit of a smartass, much like he was in the 1930s. In Superman #1, the Daily Planet is demolished in favor of television and digital media.
Now that’s a relaunch. I don’t know successful it’s been, but kudos to DC for having some serious balls with one of their central characters on this one.
But still and all, the ultimate question is…is the reboot working?
In the short-term, yes. Newsarama reported in September that Justice League #1 saw first printings exceeding 200,00 copies to retailers. It was also the bestselling direct market title in 2011 and the highest first printing of any DC Comics title since Justice League of America #1 in 2006.
Other issues also fared well. Batman, Flash, Green Lantern and Superman all had print runs with more than 100,000. Not bad, but how are things faring now? How was October in respect to September?
DC isn’t talking, which some would say speaks volumes. Everything’s speculative at this point, so I won’t suggest it means the whole thing was a flop. It wasn’t.
I just question its effectiveness at drawing in and keeping new readers. Apart from Superman and a few others, most of the new DC universe isn’t much different than the old one. Hal Jordan is still the central Green Lantern (just like he was fifty years ago). Batman is still aided by his newfound son Damien as the current Robin (just like he was before everything was supposed to change in Flashpoint).
If nothing’s different, how can you expect to get new readers?
**I should note that this will likely be my last column for the Freakin’ Awesome Network. I hope everyone has enjoyed reading my columns as much as I’ve enjoyed writing them. All the best, and please wish me well in my future endeavors. :)
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