DC Replaces Daniel Cherry III With Anne DePies As General Manager (bleedingcool.com)

A long standing Warners Bros and DC Comics executive, Anne DePies was announced in the new role by Pam Lifford, Warner Media Global Brands and Experiences to whom DePies will report. Previously DePies worked alongside Cherry and was recently Senior Vice President, Global Brands and Franchises, working across Warners before that.

DePies will be responsible for the operations, revenue, legal, marketing, brand management, and strategic planning of the DC business, with a special focus on driving DC's international and digital expansion. She will partner with Jim Lee, DC's Chief Creative Officer and Publisher on creative, talent, and editorial decisions to Support and drive DC'a aggressive story, character and digital plans along with continuing DC's commitment to the direct market comic book retailers.

Aggressive stories? This is the thing about killing off the Justice League, isn't it?

"Anne's deep knowledge and appreciation of the DC business, legacy and people will be invaluable in this new leadership role," said Pam Lifford, President WarnerMiedia Global Brands and Experiences. "She understands our fans, characters and stories, and alongside Jim will passionately build our DC publishing business to even greater heights" Lifford added.

And unlike Daniel, she has actually read a number of the comic books in question, which is a good start.

"I've worked with Anne for over a decade and what impresses me is that she gets the importance of story," said Jim Lee, DC Chief Creative Officer and Publisher. "She understands it is our foundation and she has literally woven it into our business plan which speaks volumes as to the future she envisions for DC. I'm super excited by this partnership and what is to come next."

Literally woven, Jim? With knitting needles and wool? What kind of business plans are these? And what will they fetch on eBay. But seriously, Anne, good luck with landing on the upcoming Bleeding Cool Top 100 Power List at the last minute.

A long standing Warners Bros and DC Comics executive, Anne DePies was announced in the new role by Pam Lifford, Warner Media Global Brands and Experiences to whom DePies will report. Previously DePies worked alongside Cherry and was recently Senior Vice President, Global Brands and Franchises, working across Warners before that.

DePies will be responsible for the operations, revenue, legal, marketing, brand management, and strategic planning of the DC business, with a special focus on driving DC's international and digital expansion. She will partner with Jim Lee, DC's Chief Creative Officer and Publisher on creative, talent, and editorial decisions to Support and drive DC'a aggressive story, character and digital plans along with continuing DC's commitment to the direct market comic book retailers.

Aggressive stories? This is the thing about killing off the Justice League, isn't it?

"Anne's deep knowledge and appreciation of the DC business, legacy and people will be invaluable in this new leadership role," said Pam Lifford, President WarnerMiedia Global Brands and Experiences. "She understands our fans, characters and stories, and alongside Jim will passionately build our DC publishing business to even greater heights" Lifford added.

And unlike Daniel, she has actually read a number of the comic books in question, which is a good start.

"I've worked with Anne for over a decade and what impresses me is that she gets the importance of story," said Jim Lee, DC Chief Creative Officer and Publisher. "She understands it is our foundation and she has literally woven it into our business plan which speaks volumes as to the future she envisions for DC. I'm super excited by this partnership and what is to come next."

Literally woven, Jim? With knitting needles and wool? What kind of business plans are these? And what will they fetch on eBay. But seriously, Anne, good luck with landing on the upcoming Bleeding Cool Top 100 Power List at the last minute.

 

Well considering he's writing the book it would be odd if he didn't promote it.

 

It's not a promotion so much as it is a correcting of misinformation.

 

I’m more likely to believe Taylor than a random YouTube channel, but at this point content across all media is so screwed up the only real indicator of success is whether you get to keep making more books. If the book keeps showing up in solicits month to month, then there’s a reason. None of these guys are doing things out of the kindness of their hearts.

To be more explicit, each book probably generates at least five data points: Direct Market sales, Graphic Novel sales, Digital sales, Streaking service interactions (like Marvel unlimited), and social media interactions.

Those data sets can be broken down further by region, age range, gender, etc.

So a responsible sales team would need to build a data driven model to weigh all those things and determine a books success or failure. Making it more challenging is that the data points all occur over a wide time stream. Direct Market, Digital, and Social Media data comes with each individual issue and can be looked at within days of release (or earlier for the preorder window). GN and streaming service data trails behind. Some of these will represent different units (streaming and social media interactions aren’t direct $ sales numbers), and some can correlate to individual issues, but not all (GN sales).

That’s a mess. And as an outsider I don’t have all that data, nor do I have their model. So the macro picture is this: did the book continue to be published and did the company stay afloat? The first gives me a clue what their internal model is saying. The second tells me if the internal model is any good.

 

You're not wrong from a big picture perspective, but this particular instance is a lot more simple than than. Son of Kal-El fell out of the December rankings because an issue wasn't released in December. It went from Nov. to Jan. Any website or commentator taking the book's absence from the December charts to crow about its failure is either A) intentionally running a grift or B) someone who doesn't do enough research into their own "news" to be considered a credible commentator in general.

 

DC Gives Away Tribal Tattoos For Wonder Woman's Trial of the Amazons



Gold - Themyscira (Diana, Hippolyta)
Blue - Bana Mighdall (Artemis)
Red - Esquecida (a new group - they live in South America, Yara Flor is one of them)

 

To quote one person I saw


"""""Statue Man
37 minutes ago
I would love to know the actual sales from the comic book stores to customers, Cause all the stores i have been to still has this comic collecting dust on the shelf. DC claims comics going to the stores is sales, which is is not. Show me the numbers of the comics going to customers and not collecting dust on the shelves.""""""

I think DC still has their comic returns policy if titles don't sell.....

They talk about great sales, but 10 years ago sales numbers like these would get a title cancelled. So their great sales aren't as great as they claimed. And if it wasn't a Batman book it likely wasn't in the top 10. Batman is one of the few things that sells well for them and even it's sales have dropped from several years ago.

As far as Tom Taylor's tweets....Why doesn't Tom tell us the sales numbers to prove us wrong? He does HAVE the numbers ....
That would be one way to prove what he says.

Based on the sales numbers actually reported it isn't selling great.

 

The title skipped a month, understand? An issue was not released in December, ergo there are NO sales numbers for an issue in December for anyone to report, ever. That's the reason why it's not in the December charts. Because it just wasn't available. We'll get the numbers for the first post-November issue of the title when the January sales numbers come out. But the month isn't over, so the sales numbers aren't compiled, yet.

 

Yes but I never referenced that book in anything I said or posted so it doesn't matter. The sales before it were low. I compared #1 issues and number #3, so that book's sales in December is moot as far as my point went.

The first book of Superman: Son of Kal-El only sold 68,800 issues back in July when it first debuted. That was good for the 17th best selling comic of the month.

The most recent data compiled by Comichron reveals that the book’s third issue only sold 34,000 copies in September. That was good for the 77th best selling comic of the month.

That 68,800 number for the first issue is even worse when you compare it to previous Superman #1 issues. When the series was rebooted when Brian Michael Bendis took over the title back in 2018 with a new Supeman #1, it sold 133,700 copies.

In June 2016, when DC relaunched their entire line with DC Rebirth, Superman Rebirth #1 sold 118,434 copies and Superman #1 sold 105,380 copies.

So he proved them wrong for an issue in December, the September sales still sucked and his #1 sold far less than previous reboot of the title 3 years ago. And also far less than the other reboot 5 years ago.

So it doesn't matter, I never reference or say anything about December in my previous post.

Sales are still down.

Comes off as deflection.

 

Well, the headline and premise of the BiC article you posted is that sales dropped off in Dec as a response to what happened in the November issue. So forgive me for thinking that was your point.

FWIW, #5 (Nov.) is the highest selling issue of the run so far, and it drove #s 1-4 back to print, so they're going to have higher sales data than your article could provide when all is said and done.

 

Maybe it would be better not to assume and just see what I said. I used it to back up my point, I didn't say I agreed with everything in it.

It had actual sales numbers in one article. So it was easier than tracking down months and years back of different sales.

Also you said it had more sales of earlier issues, if so prove it with numbers and documentation. What type of sales were they how many did they print? Did they print another 5 or 10,000? Even if they printed 10,000 sales are still down over all compared to older runs. How much they print and sell is the point. Are they printing lower runs due to lack of pre sales then having to print more later?

Again lets see the spread sheet, lets see hard details. Because the numbers we have currently don't show big sales of the run.

 

I would love to have a data driven conversation about whether a book is selling, but AFAIK only one of the data points is easily available publicly. It doesn’t tell the whole story. Heck, the market is changing and moving away from the direct market model so those numbers may not even be that important to DC.

I think that any “SALES ARE BAD” conversations are pretty useless. If the sales are bad the book will be cancelled or the creative team will be released. If neither of those happens, then the book justifies paying the team from month to month.

On the Marvel side there’s two great examples to point to. If you read the reactions online you’d be forced to conclude Hickman’s X-men revamp was a disaster. But Marvel decided they’d rather hang on to the new status quo rather than let Hickman finish. So something in the sales tells them to ignore the online comments and press ahead. They have been willing to cancel books in this new status quo, so it’s not just a blind devotion to Krakoa.

The other example is GotG. The three runs since Bendis have all been well received. DNA’s run was a critical darling and has become a cult classic. None of them (except Bendis’s run) survived even two years. DNA, Dugan, Cates, and Ewing all got booted and had their books cancelled before they got to 25 issues. Something in the sales numbers told Marvel these books were flops despite the critical response to them.

 

The other reason it's hard to tell is they reboot books every other year now. Even if they are doing well, sometimes they even keep the writer or the artist from the last run. Sometimes it's like Captain Marvel and you can tell it crashed and burned. it's on what now 8th reboot? There is obviously some secret reason they keep pushing the character, because sales wise it's been in the toilet for years. Other times it's hey new creative team on book that sold well lets reboot. But who can tell anymore. That's why you always hear me talking about outside factors like company firings, people quitting, and so on. I can only go on opinion and the few facts I have. I may be proven wrong, I may be proven right. All I know is the industry is a mess compared to 10 years ago and the signs I see and things I hear from people who work in comics and things I hear at conventions from professionals aren't looking or sounding good.

 

DC Celebrates George Perez

 

Dear God I need that Nightwing jacket in my life...

 

https://twitter.com/dccomics/status/1489025850586677249?s=21

We mourn the passing of Brian Augustyn. From his shepherding of talent to his editing on THE FLASH and masterful writing on essentially the first ELSEWORLDS title: BATMAN: GOTHAM BY GASLIGHT, his contributions to DC and the comic industry are immense, influential, and lasting.

 

Crap we lost another one.  

 

Exclusive: See Batman, Superman as raging dinosaurs in DC’s Jurassic League - Polygon

In the world of Jurassic League, Superman was still sent to Earth on a rocket ship from a dying planet. And he was still raised by humans. It’s just that he’s also a man-shaped brachiosaurus. Batman (rather, Batsaur, Gedeon clarifies for Polygon) is an allosaurus. Wonder Woman is a triceratops. The Joker is a dilophosaurus.

The whole thing comes from the minds of Gedeon (Venom, favorite dinosaur: mosasaurus) and writer Daniel Warren Johnson (Wonder Woman: Dead Earth, Beta Ray Bill: Argent Star, favorite dinosaur: velociraptor). Courtesy of DC Comics, Polygon can exclusively reveal Jurassic League, an upcoming six-issue miniseries from DC Comics, and a load of first-look art.

“You know the story: an infant escapes the destruction of its home planet and is deposited on Earth to be raised by human parents,” reads DC’s official plot synopsis. “A goddess from a lost city defends truth. A Theropod dons the visage of a bat to strike fear into evildoers’ hearts. This heroic trinity, alongside a league of other super-powered dinosaurs, join forces to save a prehistoric Earth from the sinister machinations of Darkseid. Wait ... what? Okay, maybe you don’t know the story. So join us and bear witness to a brand-new — yet older than time — adventure and experience the Justice League as you have never seen them before!”

In speaking with Gedeon and Johnson via email, the two cited numerous points of inspiration for the series, from Street Sharks, The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Primal Rage to Genndy Tartakovsky’s Primal, Ricardo Delgado’s dinosaur story comic Age of Reptiles, and the horror-inspired sculptures of James Groman.

“I dig the Justice League,” Johnson wrote, “but I dig them MORE as dinosaurs.” And so did DC editor Katie Kubert, who according to Gedeon, came up with a few of the exceptional names for the characters, like Wonderdon and Flashraptor.

“I wanted each Dino to be recognized immediately as the hero they represent,” Gedeon told Polygon. “If anyone saw them and thought ‘which character is this supposed to be?’ it would mean the design was not successful. So I tried to pick a dino that captured the essence of their human counterpart to use as base.

“At first I thought of doing Wonder Woman as Pterodactyl or something more athletic looking so that’s how I landed on the triceratops. They’re herbivores but they could defeat a T-Rex, so that seems fitting for WW. WW is more fierce than Superman so I thought of a rose or a cactus: beautiful from a distance but they can hurt if handled incorrectly. I think this is another layer I tried to incorporate to her design.”

“Superman is the pinnacle of goodness and strength, and he only fights if there’s no other option, so I wanted a herbivore dino that looks harmless, but is solid and strong. Brachiosaurus was a perfect fit. He’d never be a t-rex because he’d never hurt a fly, it’s not his nature.

“Batman has no superpowers, but puts fear in the hearts of criminals, so a carnivore dino seemed right (although Batsaur doesn’t eat meat, we might explore that in the book). But since he’s got no super-abilities, using a t-rex or another big carnivore would’ve made him too powerful. That’s how I came up with the Allosaurus (plus they have those pointy horns on the head, kinda like Batman’s ears).”

“Joker had to be crazy, sneaky, colorful, unpredictable and dangerous. And cool but kinda disgusting to some degree, so I thought of Vertigo from Primal Rage. But since she’s a made up dino her “real” equivalent to me would be a dilophosaurus or an oviraptor. I added the green hair and some sort of “wings” inspired by Heath Ledger’s Joker.”

Jurassic League #1 hits shelves on May 10, with a variant cover by Gedeon, which you can see below:




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Ha, that's pure comic book awesomeness.

 

The choices of dinosaurs look great, I'd probably only disagree that Diana couldn't be a pterodactyl or pteranodon.