Category: News

Marvel’s 4th quarter

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

Here’s the good news: Marvel’s publishing segment ended 2006 on a strong note with sales up 22% to $28.6 million and operating income ahead 35% to $11.6 million in the fourth quarter. For the full year, operating income rose 21% to $44.1 million, on a 17% sales increase to $108.5 million.

Trade paperbacks and hardcovers sold into both the book channel and the direct market led the gains. In the fourth quarter, comic book sales were bolstered by sales associated with Civil War. Sales also benefited from a strong increase in custom publishing sales. Marvel said that for 2007 it expects modest top-line and bottom-line growth from the publishing division.

And if all Marvel made its money from was its publishing arm, that would be great. However, Marvel makes the vast amount of its income from licensing — and here, it got clobbered. Its fourth-quarter net sales were $25.5 million, down from $81.7 million the year-ago period.

All told, Marvel Entertainment’s fourth-quarter net income dropped to $11.7 million, or 14 cents per share, from $25.9 million, or 26 cents per share, last year.

This has led to the stock price getting hammered: Shares of the Marvel closed Monday down 95 cents, or 3.1%, at $29.96, with a further drop on Tuesday of $1.63, or 5.4%, to close at $28.33.

Attack of the chicken head!

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

Being married to a freelancer often has its perks, and one of the more delightful ones occurred last Thursday night, as we were invited to DC Comics’ editorial-freelance dinner to kick off the NYCC.  This was a great way to meet folks like Gail Simone who, as it turned out, we never saw for the rest of the weekend. 

Trish Mulvihill has lots of photos at her blog, but we especially wanted to note the appearance of the chicken heads.  Originally part of the platter presentation for the wonderful Asian feast prepared by our host, the chicken heads soon took on a life of their own.  As we (who should have known better) didn’t bring our camera to the event, the photos below are courtesy of Harvey Richards, who shared our table along with Gail and her beau Scott, Rags Morales, and Dan DiDio. (more…)

Miller time for G4

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

miller-1089159This coming Sunday, March 4, the gamer channel G4 will be airing the fourth episode in its Icons series, this time featuring a look at Frank Miller.  The episode "focuses on Miller’s work over the years as a creator of popular comic books, characters and graphic novels, many of which have and are being adapted for feature films."  Miller will also discuss his next movie, an adaptation of Will Eisner’s The Spirit. Set those DVRs for 11 PM Eastern time!

Dennis O’Neil: Heroes and Villains

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

dennyoneil1005-1920411When writer John Broome, artist Gil Kane, and the real villain, editor Julius Schwartz, reinvented the Green Lantern in 1959, they were corrupting the youth of America, or at least the comics reading segment thereof, by promoting authoritarian attitudes and glorifying barely disguised fascism.

Weren’t they?

I mean, didn’t we agree, in last week’s installment of this feature, that Green Lantern was changed from a guy with magical powers derived from a lantern and a ring, a bit of a loner, not unlike Aladdin, into a guy with superscientific gimmickry who gave unquestioning obedience to his masters, the self-styled Guardians of the Galaxy? A member of a uniformed corps?

Well, maybe not.

(more…)

ComicMix Podcast #7 arrives!

Neal Adams tells Mike Raub about teaming up with Frank Miller on a Batman mini-series, we uncover the roots of the Suicide Squad, our Timeline stops on 1968, Walter Cronkite talks parallel history, and new releases are exposed!

You can here all the thrills by pressing the play button, right here:

(more…)

GL political followup

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

Those of us who frequent the liberal end of the political blogosphere got a real kick out of A-list blogger and comics fan Matt Yglesias’ post The Green Lantern Theory of Geopolitics on the group blog TPM Café.

Of course, Denny O’Neil responded in his column last week here on ComicMix, and now Matt has since followed up on his own blog (of particular amusement is that post’s comment section).  Will this be the last word on the subject?  Check out Denny’s next column, available mid-day Tuesday, right here.

Vitriol across the ocean

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

Budgie calls our attention to another anti-comics screed from the (London) Times Online entertainment columnist Kevin Maher, this time writing about the TV series Heroes.  Not only does Maher begin his article with a "Holy fill-in-the-blank, Batman!" cliché, but his entire point is about how "there are no subjects and no areas of modern life that cannot be infected by the inane juvenilia of comic-book lore," emphasis ours.  What, did Superman disintegrate his teddy bear when he was a kid or something?  Budgie assures us this contempt is nothing new for Maher, whose bias ought to make his editors think twice about assigning him to write about anything remotely comic-related.

Vess recalls art

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

vess-4295870Charles Vess is preparing to mount an exhibition of his Stardust art this summer in the premium exhibition space at the William King Regional Arts Center, and to that end has put out a call for sold art: "I’m looking for various pieces of Stardust original art that I’ve sold over the years and would like to borrow that art back for this show. The names of the donors will be included in various publications concerning the exhibit as well as being on the identifying labels themselves."  More details at Vess’ blog.

NYCC wrapups

  • News
  • February 27, 2007

Folks are still recovering from this past weekend’s New York Comic Con, which garnered over 40,000 unique attendees according to ICv2. 

nycc-2633338

"The trade day on Friday set new records for retailer, librarian, press, and other trade attendees," which meant pretty much anyone with a pro badge, and since pros are an integral part of any comic convention (and the con itself never asked for proof of professional credentials so one assumes there were a number of non-pros there too) this trade-day "record" isn’t all that surprising.  ICv2 also notes, "Artist alley space was off the main floor, but was jammed throughout the show, due not only to the appeal of the wide range of talent, but also to the fact that access to the autographing and gaming areas required passage through the ‘alley.’"  One hopes this layout will change next year when con space doubles again.

Some nice overview reports from attendees:

ICv2 also reports on the winners in Saturday’s American Anime Awards.

Authenticating real history

  • News
  • February 26, 2007

authist-copy-7614437Jessa from Bookslut pointed to one of the archives at the Authentic History Center, specifically Treasure Chest’s This Godless Communism produced by the Catholic Guild (and with an introduction by J. Edgar Hoover herself!).  This link led to much trepidation about time suckage, as the AHC has some really fascinating stuff.  You can peruse WWII military cartoons, comics about atomic energy, a really wrong Howdy Doody cover… a great way to kill a few spare hours!  Highly recommended, and adding stuff all the time.

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