The DC Universe is expand , in both the fictional and real humans . io9 lately utter to Centennial State - publisher Dan DiDio and Jim Lee about what sports fan can carry in the near future .
The publisher’snew imprints DC Ink and DC Zoomare aimed at building out offerings for two tier up ofyounger readers . DC Black Labelis assemble some of comics ’ good creators to recount single - volume stories that stand apart from the company ’s 80 - class publication history , in formats designed to bug into the bookstore market . This autumn , theDC Universe pullulate servicewill big bucks back - catalogue comics , community hub , and all - new TV show together on one platform .
It ’s far-famed that all of these decision are for initiative happening away from the comical workshop ecosystem . The internet of computer memory that sell funnies is still important to DC , but DiDio and Lee want to remain pushing their sub into new horizon . When I spoke to DiDio and Lee after a press breakfast last week at San Diego Comic - Con , they discussed the challenge of evolving how they tell and sell report . What play along is an edited and condense version of our conversation .
io9 : You guys are throwing a gang of dissimilar initiative out there , aimed at putting comics in different places and in front of potential new reader . The sense that I get hear to you hombre is that what DC Comics is competing against has shift . What would you say are the things you ’re press against in term of the future of this company ? What ’s the competition now ? And how are you attempt to equate , steal , or outstrip what they ’re doing ?
Jim Lee : I would say that it has n’t changed so much for us , in that when Diane Nelson put together DC Entertainment , there were dissimilar thing that we want to concentre on … I think it ’s lifelike for mainstream comics fans to see this contest between Marvel and DC and habituate our sales on the Diamond chart as the barometer of who ’s forward and who ’s behind .
But that only paints — I’m not plump to say “ small”—but that only paints a partial picture of the overall business , for us . And we ’ve been cognizant of that since day one . We ’ve always measured ourselves on a number of different metric function . We draw in , obviously , our mass grocery store sale , our individual issue sales , and we look at other opportunities for maturation . So I think our competition has always been ourselves , what we achieved the class before , and what still stay on to be done . We realize comics are still really not a mainstream market business enterprise . We do n’t see a heap of uplift when a movie goes out and sells a ton of ticket . We see the nip and tuck on the collect editions side , but the periodic business seems to be unfazed by that . So , why is that ? Are there elbow room to , again , solve the Rubik ’s Cube and come up with a solution to this ? So I cerebrate those are the things that we grapple with and challenge ourselves with .
Dan DiDio : It ’s suspect , there ’s a lot of what Jim said that I agree with 100 pct . The interesting thing about what ’s changed is that comics used to be a counterculture business organisation . And now it ’s a pop culture business , which is counter to being counterculture . So comedian was once a way to assail and create cloth for people who feel disenfranchised , and now it ’s being embraced by everyone . How do you go back to the core of what comic strip are and stay relevant , while a pile of hoi polloi are getting their rendition of our stories and characters from other medium ? It ’s important for us to constantly reward and reinvent and stay innovative . And again , we ’re a mark spiritualist and it is a matured business . But we still have to show a high storey of design — probably more than anything else to check that that we remind people of the relevancy of our grapheme and where the author material and inspiration come from .
io9 : Dan , you said something in your talk of the town that struck me—“We used to do it really well . ” I suppose “ it ” was bringing in young readers with the 80 - page giants , 100 - Sir Frederick Handley Page giants . What do you think has changed to make that a exposure ?
DiDio : I recollect a circumstances of things changed . I imagine the material senesce with its audience . You have a go at it , I always use the comparison between Harry Potter and The Simpsons . And we ’ve turned our stories and part into Harry Potters , meaning they ’re aging up with the fans . When you seem at The Simpsons , the audience age out and break through and the next age [ radical ] came in and they went through . That rhythm constantly replenish your audience because you ’re going after very finical demographics rather than age up with it .
Once you start to senesce your stories up , you start to get more parochial in what you produce because you ’re speaking to a very fussy fan base who ’s been with you from the beginning . And as that thing gets smaller , it becomes less inviting for the multitude who fall in . So what we ’ve arrest to do is find a way to rebuild our base , and I recall we did a well job of that when we did New 52 . We grow a lot of fresh voice in here . Where we failed is that we did n’t maintain edict in New 52 to remain fresh and new , and then we started to fall back into one-time habits , and then we became neither fish nor fowl . Not for a new consultation , not for the elderly audience .
Rebirth was build to restore the instauration of the current fan base , but we postulate to find ways to hand out . But now the taste , and the manner that younger referee read might be unlike . They might not be as concerned in the periodical comic that we create , but they are interested in the vivid novels . That ’s why we ’re going after the young grownup audience . That ’s one direction to do it . The antic will be , once you get those kids , to see whether or not they will come over to periodicals . It ’s also about finding a way to make periodicals to add them into the main line , too . And that ’s what [ place our comics in ] Walmart is about .
io9 : I have a daughter who ’s seven , and she’sall intoDC Superhero Girls . unmarried subject are n’t enough tarradiddle for her . She ’s like , “ When ’s the next one ? A MONTH ? ! ” And I ’m very emotional about DC Zoom for that reason , just because she ’s going to have more stuff to read . But speaking about those imprints , as you ’ve been talk to your creators working on those books , how different can they be ? You talked about maintaining body instead of continuity , so like , how unlike can they be if you still have that end goal of bringing them into your periodical occupation ?
Lee : I call up that ’s what we ’re going to happen out . You look at Melissa de la Cruz , she ’s doing a take on a Batman in high shoal who ’s half - Asian with a Catwoman who ’s Latina . I think what ’s exciting about this is , you know , it ’s the iconic character , but they ’re not exactly the same . You look at the Truth & Consequence Jack Hyde write up , it ’s Aqualad and it ’s a gay coming - of - old age story . These are dissimilar yield than what we have done traditionally in the mainstream book , so , I think it ’s exciting that refreshing voices are come in at the textile from a invigorated couple of eyes .
I guess that is part of the renewal process when you ’ve had characters who ’ve been around for 80 - plus yr The style you keep them modern-day is to continue that experimentation Dan was speak about . At DC , we talk about how indestructible these fictional character are , and we really do think that so we should n’t be hesitant about pushing them in new focus and seeing what really coolheaded things come out of that kind of experiment .
We ’re not just doing it in the YA business . We ’re constantly pushing all our creators to do things that have n’t been done before , because , I reckon there ’s nothing that upsets us more when we are constantly doing backward - looking homages to stories from X ago . Right ? We desire to honor the past tense by blazing unexampled lead going forward . That ’s the motto .
DiDio : I just want to reiterate one thing Jim say , which is really important . The court are all well and good but the problem we ’re in now is that everything is still in print . So you could always go back to the original material , the source of this all , and you could see it told in its purest mannequin . If you ’re doing watered down interpretation of the original , all you ’re doing is comparing to something it can never be better than .
io9 : You Guy talked aboutYoung Animal as a drink down - up depression . Does Vertigo being resurgent offset out the estimate of doing more pop - up impression ?
Lee : The answer is “ no , ” in that the protrude - up imprints really give us rigorous clusters of textile that tie together and reflect a certain point of view . But they ’re address pop - ups because they go as long the creator has the passion . Vertigo is a standing embossment . Vertigo will be there beyond —
io9 : Yeah , no , I was n’t attempt to conflate the two . The question was more in search of a definition of a pop - up imprint . You postulate it to be anchored by a sensibility or a individual ?
downwind : We ’re going to declare another pappa - up later today .
io9 : You ’re referring to Geoff Johns ’ new imprint ?
Didio : Yeah , so we ’ll be tattle about that —
downwind : I opine that was in the mechanical press release .
DiDio : We have other one we ’re looking at as well . And in some waysThe Sandman Universe booksare , in theory , a petty bit of a soda - up from Neil Gaiman .
Lee : You intend —
DiDio : Easy , cowman …
io9 : I want to speak about Batman # 50 a little bit . I ’ve seen reports that it sell well , despite all the outcry . Do you feel like there ’s anything youwould have done other than about the electronic messaging ? Because masses were expect an real wedding …
DiDio : I never expected an actual wedding .
downwind : But you knew what was going to happen !
io9 : There was a sense of treachery orbait - and - flip , on the part of some reader . How can you address that in a direction that does n’t necessarily make hoi polloi feel like they ’re taken for award ?
Lee : I ca n’t think of if they got married or not , but remember the Fantastic Four ? The wedding of Reed and Sue Richards ? I do n’t cognise if they got married at the end of it , but —
DiDio : They did .
downwind : They did ? Whenever I read wedding issue as a kid , it was always framed as a doubt of “ will it come about or not ? ” Like , “ villains allowing our heroes to live in happiness ? Is that something that could possibly bump ? ” And that was some of the feedback we were get from the fans before the issue even impress . Either “ oh my god , it ’s go to vote down me if [ Batman and Catwoman ] do n’t get married , ” or “ there ’s no way it will happen . ” So , I felt like other people shared that same “ would it chance or not ” sensitivity . It ’s like an offspring [ where ] we say two case are “ fighting to the death , ” right ? You ’re setting up this arithmetic mean , hype up this account , and then the intention of learn it is to find out what pass . Right ?
I believe we could have done a better line of work of parsing the word better . But , at the last of the day , we learn what the retail merchant said and we made the books returnable . Most of the comment we got back from the retailers was , “ we prize the support , we sold out . ” We recognise that we can classify the two . We can separate the sales from the info that was given , and whether they felt like they were consecrate all the information they needed to make the proper choices . It ’s almost immaterial whether they sold out or not ; I understand that ’s where they ’re coming from . From that standpoint , we ’re felicitous to make the books returnable and do an internal revaluation going forward . The questions are “ how do we message things like this ? ” and “ are there ways to make it exonerated ? ”
I ’ll tell you , I drew one of the variant cover version and it ’s Batman partake Catwoman in the rain . They ’re clearly crying . It ’s a sad image . And I even thought , “ Oh my God , am I giving it away ? Is it giving away too much ? ” I actually ran it by Tom and said , “ Hey , do you think this is tip our handwriting too much ? ” He was cool with it , but I felt for certain after that went out I was ease up away the narration . And so , again , it kind of evince you perhaps — for me , personally speak — we had a unsighted spot towards what was written and what I expected out of a chronicle like that , and I read that people do n’t apportion that same gunpoint of view …
DiDio : Yeah , I mean , I have a couple opinions on that . You asked about us taking the interview for granted ; actually , if you want to be perfectly honest , I guess the consultation took the history for grant . For me , it ’s about the journey . To explore the effect in the story .
We ’re not as interested in a marital Batman . We ’re interested in a story about a Batman who is previse being get hitched with , essay to live on a normal animation . We always go back to the Batman menage , the level of tragedy that ’s been cast off at them and what drives them . The most interesting thing that I heard was that , [ some fan ] require the wedding party to befall because they wanted Batman to be happy . I understand that but , to me , a felicitous Batman is the end of Batman . Our story is about the drama and the challenge he ’s present , and I think there ’s no greater report about a hero — about someone who puts his own personal interests aside in society to move on and help others . That ’s the hero ’s journeying . Batman ’s our not bad zep in so many ways . And it ’s important for him to understand that , and he ’s constantly putting the tragedy of his parent ’ deaths as a prompt force and a drive force , where he place the life of Bruce Wayne aside . We got a glance of his [ future ] life for a mo and a chance to see what it might appear like .
But the reality is , matrimonial Batman is an Elseworlds Batman , to me . You know ? They did that in Earth-2 . We ’ve done these stories . And people who anticipated that all said the same thing . Did you really think Superman was break to outride dead after Superman # 75 ? Where ’s the challenge there ? So , my standpoint is that , I think that Tom has a really long plan for Batman , he really does have a hundred issues figured out . And this is just part of that journeying . And it ’s a turning percentage point . That ’s what ’s authoritative . And a taradiddle is adjudicate , not by how that report is severalise , but how it effect succeeding stories . And the next story because of this moment I cerebrate are going to be much stronger because of how this yield played out rather than any other fashion it was run short to be told .
io9 : Do you know where he ’s heading , where the end point is ?
DiDio : I know where it is . We ’re still trying to reckon some of the piece out , but we know the canonic arcs of where this is .
io9 : Issue # 100 . I mean , bring out # 103 , which Tom King is aver would be the last take of this mega - arc . The last Sir Frederick Handley Page . Do you know what that is ?
DiDio : I have an estimation . But you know what ? What ’s great about the creative concern is that you have something that you ’re pointing to , but the journeying is really interesting and rather or afterwards the characters start to tell a story for you . And Tom ’s one of those kind of writers . He ’s keep abreast the path of the character . Those things evolve and alteration . There was a point where Catwoman was n’t going to hunt into Bruce , and then all of a sudden , she does . And these things just evolve , because you see where the potential is . And again , that account create potential , not boundary . That ’s why , from my standpoint , [ Batman # 50 ] reads as the logical decision of that artwork of the arc .
Dan DiDioDC ComicsDC EntertainmentDC UniverseSan Diego Comic - Con
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