Frank Miller’s Dark Knight returned again in November, giving DC the top slot on a new comic book chart otherwise dominated by Marvel, according to a report released today by Diamond Comic Distributors, Comichron projects the month’s orders of new comics, graphic novels, and
magazines amounted to $52 million, up nearly 6% over last November, which also had four shipping weeks.
In past
years where sales have been up year-over-year, we’ve spoken of a “gravy
day” — the date when the previous year’s dollar sales are surpassed,
making everything afterward gravy, so to speak. In one recent strong
year, that date had gone back into November; this year, the day is right
around today. Only $14 million in orders are needed in December for
2015 to top 2014. Comichron projects that 2015’s Direct Market sales will finish at around $570 million, up by about 6%, or $30 million.
The aggregate change statistics:
| Dollars | Units | |
| November 2015 vs. October 2015 |
||
| Comics | 8.62% | 4.93% |
| Graphic novels |
-11.93% | -10.96% |
| Total Comics/Graphic novels |
2.70% | 3.80% |
| November 2015 vs. November 2014 |
||
| Comics | 30.05% | 18.19% |
| Graphic novels |
-17.50% | -21.76% |
| Total Comics/Graphic novels |
13.84% | 14.63% |
| Year-to-date 2015 vs. Year-to-date 2014 |
||
| Comics | 7.54% | 5.45% |
| Graphic novels |
2.24% | 3.06% |
| Total Comics/Graphic novels |
5.89% | 5.26% |
While periodical comics units were up more than 18%, dollars were up more than 30%
over the same month a year ago. The fact that market-topper Dark Knight III: The Master Race #1 was priced at nearly $6 had a lot to do with that. With eight issues scheduled, the title is expected to be a presence in the charts well into 2016. The top comic books:
| Comic Book |
Price | Publisher | |
| 1 | Dark Knight III: The Master Race #1 |
$5.99 | DC |
| 2 | Star Wars: Vader Down #1 |
$4.99 | Marvel |
| 3 | Deadpool #1 | $4.99 | Marvel |
| 4 | Secret Wars #7 | $3.99 | Marvel |
| 5 | Extraordinary X-Men #1 |
$4.99 | Marvel |
| 6 | All-New All-Different Avengers #1 |
$4.99 | Marvel |
| 7 | Star Wars #11 | $3.99 | Marvel |
| 8 | Uncanny X-Men #600 | $5.99 | Marvel |
| 9 | Star Wars #12 | $3.99 | Marvel |
| 10 | All New Wolverine #1 | $4.99 | Marvel |
The first issue of Miller’s previous entrant in the series, Dark Knight Strikes Again, had placed #1 in December 2001.
Dollar sales of graphic novels were down by 17.5%, but that translates to a smaller
dollar amount than the increase comic books saw, and there were 20 fewer graphic novels released in November
2015 versus November 2014. Sandman Overture led the chart:
| Graphic Novel |
Price | Publisher | |
| 1 | Sandman Overture Deluxe Edition HC |
$24.99 | DC |
| 2 | Star Wars: Journey to the Force Awakens: Shattered Empire |
$16.99 | Marvel |
| 3 | Star Wars: Princess Leia |
$16.99 | Marvel |
| 4 | Ms. Marvel Volume 4: Last Days |
$17.99 | Marvel |
| 5 | Spider-Gwen Vol. 0: Most Wanted |
$16.99 | Marvel |
| 6 | Deadpool Vs. Thanos | $16.99 | Marvel |
| 7 | Low Volume 2: Before The Dawn Burns Us |
$14.99 | Image |
| 8 | Vampirella #1969 | $7.99 | Dynamite |
| 9 | Star Wars: Kanan Volume 1: The Last Padawan |
$19.99 | Marvel |
| 10 | Saga Volume 5 | $14.99 | Image |
Having the top performers in both categories helped DC close the gap with Marvel somewhat. The market shares:
| Dollar Share |
Unit Share | |
| Marvel | 43.20% | 47.65% |
| DC | 26.35% | 26.09% |
| Image | 8.67% | 10.02% |
| IDW | 4.42% | 3.50% |
| Dark Horse | 3.17% | 2.69% |
| Boom | 1.96% | 1.67% |
| Dynamite | 1.90% | 1.60% |
| Oni | 1.06% | 0.61% |
| Titan | 0.73% | 0.64% |
| Valiant | 0.73% | 0.87% |
| Other | 7.82% | 4.66% |
New title volume was relatively light, with 42 fewer items released. The number of new releases by type and publisher:
| Comics shipped | Graphic novels shipped |
Magazines shipped | Total shipped |
|
| Marvel | 72 | 39 | 0 | 111 |
| DC | 77 | 27 | 0 | 104 |
| Image | 61 | 14 | 0 | 75 |
| IDW | 42 | 22 | 0 | 64 |
| Dark Horse |
36 | 15 | 0 | 51 |
| Boom | 27 | 11 | 0 | 38 |
| Dynamite | 19 | 5 | 0 | 24 |
| Titan | 11 | 6 | 5 | 22 |
| Valiant | 9 | 5 | 0 | 14 |
| Oni | 6 | 6 | 0 | 12 |
| Other | 110 | 131 | 34 | 275 |
| Total | 470 | 281 | 39 | 790 |
Comichron founder John Jackson Miller has tracked the comics industry for more than 25 years, including a decade editing the industry’s retail trade magazine; he is the author of several guides to comics, as well as more than a hundred comic books for various franchises.
He is the author of novels including Star Wars: Kenobi, Star Wars: A New Dawn, Star Trek: Discovery – The Enterprise War, and his upcoming release, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds – The High Country. Read more about them at his fiction site.
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