Marc-Oliver Frisch writes: Many of DC Comics’ ongoing problems throughout 2007 persisted in November. With Justice League of America, Justice Society of America and Green Lantern, the publisher’s three best-selling titles on the October chart all failed to come out. The year-long, weekly Countdown to Final Crisis, dragging along a deluge of spin-off titles and producing another major commercial dud with the debut of the Salvation Run limited series, continues to underwhelm as the “spine” of the DC Universe line. And, once again, the most favorable thing you can say about the majority of periodicals released under the publisher’s Vertigo and WildStorm imprints is that they exist.
Still, there also are some glimmers of hope for DC on the November charts. Most notably, the “Resurrection of Ra’s al Ghul” crossover running through four Batman-related books shows signs of being a hit with retailers. And, despite the failing WildStorm Universe line, November was actually a great month for the WildStorm imprint, thanks to the release of the highly successful Heroes and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier hardcover books. Even in terms of periodicals, WildStorm seems to have landed a rare hit in November, though, with the debut of the videogame adaptation World of WarCraft.
In other news, November saw the launch of Batman and the Outsiders - delayed from October due to a last-minute, wholesale creative team exchange - as well as the arrival of new creative teams on Wonder Woman and Supergirl. The number of periodicals released by DC was a little lower than in October, but remained higher than in any other previous month since the beginning of the available direct market charts. The publisher’s average periodical sales kept going down, meanwhile, with a slight increase for Vertigo (thanks to an issue of Y: The Last Man) and a significant increase for WildStorm. See below for the details.
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