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Friday, July 22, 2011

The Fight to Save the Comic Book

This week as Comic-Con 2011 rages on with crowds bigger than could have ever been imagined twenty years ago, the Hollywood Reporter Weekly spoke to DC Comics Co-Publishers Dan DiDio & Jim Lee about their fight to save the very industry that birthed comic conventions.

"As the publishing industry suffers, DC has made the risky decision to reboot its entire line of books, including the amphibious superhero."


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First off, congrats to the Hollywood Reporter for getting Aquaman's physiological nature correct and for scoring the exclusive preview of the breath-taking Ivan Reis & Joe Prado pages we featured on the Shrine last evening. It is so awesome to see Aquaman prominently featured in such an influential magazine (everyone who is anyone in Hollywood reads it, we are told!). Jim & Dan could have just as easily brought Superman or Batman art with them so the fact that they chose Aquaman speaks volumes about DC's new support for the character.

Highlights of the article include:
  • In the 1980s, a hit book could sell more than 500,000 copies; now a comic is considered a success if it scores one-tenth of that.
  • This is moving forward--there's no looking back here, from our standpoint. This is who we are, and we're defining the company for the future. - Dan Didio on the New 52
  • Geoff (Johns) has dived into the grandeur of the character while addressing that he's been a running joke. It's going to have humor and majesty. - Jim Lee on Aquaman
The Reporter deftly follows up Mr. Lee's description by adding "And, if all goes well, buoyancy." Nicely put and we couldn't agree more!

The special Comic-Con edition of
THR pictured above is over-sized, features the aforementioned Aquaman artwork on high-quality, glossy paper and we are told it is simply beautiful. If you are interested in purchasing the issue, here is the link: The Hollywood Reporter.

4 comments:

Russell said...

who is this supposed to be on the cover? I'm confused.

rob! said...

I think that's supposed to be Jon Favreau, but I could be wrong. Its a take-off of the movie poster to Ralph Bakshi's Wizards.

wich2 said...

The "Big Changes" are basically a matter of rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic...

Tempest127 said...

Yes, that's Jon Favreau on the cover---he edited this entire special edition of the Hollywood Reporter just for this year's Comic-Con. I was so happy to open this issue last night and see the Aquaman art---how cool is that?! I'm still at the convention, so I haven't had a chance to scan anything or download photos, but there's been a LOT of Aquaman representation here in SD!