Marvel Comics Says No Big Events For 18 months

I’ll believe this when I see it, because you can guarantee if sales continue to slump Marvel Comics will be going with another “big” event.

But Marvel’s VP of sales and marketing, David Gabriel, who recently blamed fans for Marvel Comics’ sales being so poor, is now saying Marvel Comics is not going to do a big event for the next 18 months following Secret Empire, which is already said to be suffering from low sales.

Newsarama noticed David Gabriel said the following at the recent retailer summit:

“Hopefully, you guys will be happy to know that at the end of Secret Empire, we do not have any big crossover event scheduled. We haven’t even talked about one for 18 months, at the very least. Those will be away for quite a while.”

It’s noted that Marvel will still be having (what I call) mini-events, such as the upcoming Clone Conspiracy and the Hulk/Wolverine Weapon X Weapons of Mutant Destruction storylines. What they’ll be skipping out on is the big events such as something like Civil War, Secret Invasion, Fear Itself, etc.

I’ll add my two cents, but I’ve never had a problem with Marvel Comics doing a big line-wide event. I loved Civil War, World War Hulk and something like Infinity Gauntlet back in the day. IMO, when it comes down to it, it’s all about story. The previous mentioned stories I loved; however the last few years, Marvel’s events have been downight awful (like many of their books, which is the real reason titles aren’t selling). If it’s a good story and done right, it’s going to sell; there is going to be buzz, and fans are going to talk about it–especially this day and age when we have the internet, news and opinions spread like wild fire. If something is really bad, a lot of people are going to find out rather quickly, and the same holds true for something really good.

Again, IMO, and I’ve literally been saying this for years, but Marvel Comics needs to ditch their force-fed attitude where they feel like the fans should accept anything they publish (just read Gabriel’s comments in the link above), and instead just focus on giving the fans what the fans actually want to read.

Marvel Comics needs to take a fan-friendly approach. Some of the writers and editors are hostile to fans on social networks and message boards. Before CBR closed down and relaunched their forums, then-Marvel Comics editor Stephen Wacker would regularly be hostile to readers; ditto on the Bleeding Cool boards. IMO, this is akin to the CEO of McDonalds being rude to customers and still expecting them to order their burgers (or the CEO of Ford, Coke, Subway, etc). It’s just a juvenile approach and extremely unprofessional.

Regarding giving fans what they want: Case in point is Nova.

Marvel Comics editor Bill Rosemann recently said in an interview with Marvel.com that his Richard Rider Nova series sold a solid 35K copies, as did DnA’s Guardians of the Galaxy series and any of their other Marvel COSMIC titles and events: 

I’m grateful for all the awesome work from the creators. They are the ones that, day-in and day-out started from blank pages, lists and ideas and had to make it all work. I’m also grateful for all the readers. We never had a huge following, but it was loyal. Every issue there were about 35,000 fans who read every issue of NOVA and GUARDIANS and every issue of every [limited series] that was a part of all of our events. They helped spread the word and they were there along for the ride and never went away, and without them the books would’ve never even existed; there would be no film without those loyal readers.

The most recent issue of the “Nova” reboot sold 19K copies and looks to be getting cancelled soon. Again.

It can’t get any clearer than that.