The BKV issues of The Runaways are $.99 each on Comixology for about the next 12 hours.

You know, Quesada could only make empty boasts about Marvel events breaking the internet. Under Alonso’s watch, it actually happened.

For those of you looking to pick up some geek gear, We Love Fine is having a Cyber Monday sale tomorrow. Use the coupon code ALLIANCECYBER25 when you check out and you’ll get 25% off your whole order.

Right, so Roseman’s editing Academy, but he’s also the one who pushed Avengers Arena in the first place, iirc, so zero trust there. Nick Lowe’s in charge of the X-Books these days, right? Think we can write some emails asking for a real teen mutant book?

davidyardin:

seanhowe:

“I would tell any cartoonist who has an idea, think twice before you give it to a publisher.” —Stan Lee, 1971

Here’s one of the many fascinating documents I came across in the process of researching Marvel Comics: The Untold Story: Stan Lee forcefully criticizing the comic industry’s treatment of creators.

On the evening of Wednesday, January 20, 1971, Stan Lee joined a number of comic veterans—including Gil Kane, Will Eisner, and Archie Comics publisher John Goldwater—at the Lambs Club in Manhattan for a discussion about the state of the industry. Jack Kirby had quit Marvel the previous spring, and Lee himself was only a few months away from taking a sabbatical to collaborate on a film script with Alain Resnais. His disillusion with the world of comics is striking, as is the spirited nature of the debate with the other panelists, some of whom seem to feel he’s putting too much blame on publishers.

“I would say that the comic book market is the worst market that there is on the face of the earth for creative talent and the reasons are numberless and legion,’ says Lee. “I have had many talented people ask me how to get into the comic book business. If they were talented enough the first answer I would give them is, ‘Why would you want to get into the comic book business?’ Because even if you succeed, even if you reach what might be considered the pinnacle of success in comics, you will be less successful, less secure and less effective than if you are just an average practitioner of your art in television, radio, movies or what have you. It is a business in which the creator, as was mentioned before, owns nothing of his creation. The publisher owns it….”

The above documents pick up the conversation about halfway through. Near the end, you can practically Stan Lee prophesizing his escape hatch to Hollywood: “Isn’t it pathetic to be in a business where the most you can say for the creative person in the business is that he’s serving an apprenticeship to enter a better field? Why not go to the other field directly?”

Interesting read

Rule 63 Dagger by Joe Phillips

Jean-Paul and Kyle by Modraen

Damn, this one turned out nice. Love the intensity in both their expressions.

The [SDCC 2012] Northstar panel was great, though — maybe my favorite so far.  Loved the other panelists, loved the questions, the crowd, the positive energy.  I’ll tell you what I told them:  Northstar isn’t going anywhere.  He’s not leaving the team.  He and Kyle are going to be fine.  And in this upcoming arc, after Karma’s big issue in #52, we’re going to see a storyline that forces the team — quite literally — to stay together.  As in: physically, non-stop, in a small space.  What happens between them, the stresses that emerge, the tensions, will define them as a team.

BBL, have to go give the shrine another dusting of hearts and glitter…

(Though ugh…Warbird and Iceman locked in the same room. Anyone wanna guess what kind of “jokes” we’re going to get out of that?)

Jan: Astonishing X-Men #46 - 31,134
Feb: Astonishing X-Men #47 - 30,490
March: Astonishing X-Men #48 - 34,182
April: Astonishing X-Men #49 - 31,291
May: Astonishing X-Men #50 - 57,931
June: Astonishing X-Men #51 - 82,654

Thanks to Northstar and Kyle’s wedding, AXM #51 was the 12th best-selling comic for June, missing the top ten by that much, and the best-selling monthly X-Book by a comfortable margin. There’s no doubt that the wedding was a stunt, but it paid off nicely. Next month’s numbers will undoubtedly plummet, but it’ll be nice if some of the curiosity seekers that picked this up for the hype hang around for the next arc, which will focus on our other gay X-Man, Karma.

PS: Suck it, Alpha Flight v. 4. ;)

Speaking of which:

Alpha Flight Complete Series TPB - 916

Rank 125, so selling a little better than the first (and only) HC collection, which didn’t even break 700 units in the DM.