>After a profitable Q1 (see "Games Push IDWP to Profitability"), IDW Publishing swung to a loss in its fiscal Q2 ended April 30, albeit a smaller one than in the same quarter a year ago, the company said in its quarterly earnings release. IDW Publishing revenues grew incrementally, to $6.1 million from $6.0 million in the year ago quarter. The division lost $300,000, a better result than the $500,000 loss in the previous year. The division is now solely focused on comics; it is exiting the game business after the recent release of Batman: The Animated Series Adventures.
>The publishing division’s sales were the revenues for the entire company, IDW Media Holdings, as no entertainment revenue was booked in the quarter.
>The holding company lost $2.3 million in the quarter, vs. a $2.5 million profit in the previous year. IDW Entertainment expects revenue and profits from Locke and Key S3 and Surfside Girls S1 in the back half of the year.
https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/51411/idw-publishing-swings-loss-quarter
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why can't IDW sell comics? is it because bong?
Western comics are dying. Manga is in. Industry needs to change, move beyond just capeshit and action. Etc etc.
Except IDW's floundering is entirely on them
Every other publisher is doing better
Licenseshitters don't buy comics
Image is doing so good with Marvel and DC away.
>Licenseshitters don't buy comics
Oh man, are you that guy from /toy/ who loves to say "gamers don't buy toys?"
It's not wrong
If even half of the people who read IDW Sonic actually bought it, it'd be topping sales charts easily
I'm not disagreeing, it's just interesting to recognize people across boards by posting patterns.
Surprisingly not
>sold to shops
>move beyond just capeshit and action
Bruh, horror's been at an upswing for a while now
That's just retreating pre-Hays Code genres.
So? There's an audience for it. I'd be happy to see stuff like horror, true crime, and romance flourish in american comics again.
Bruh, horror and crime have been common in modern comics for over a decade
Horror has gotten a lot better in terms of availability in comics, that's true, but what about true crime? That used to be a huge seller for adult women in america before the CCA did it in. And there's still barely any romance.
>Western comics are dying.
good
Literally the post below it shows everyone but IDW is doing better
"Comics are dying" people can't read because they rely on Youtube videos too much.
I think the problem isn't so much the genre but the constant relating to present day issues.
Comics have related to the issues of the day for years. The problem is that they are trying to balance the social commentary with moronic world building that can't keep up with almost 100 years of continuity. Moore might be a creepy schizo but he was absolutely correct in creating an entirely different world for his children's story about social unrest and nuclear tensions
This and comics being relegated to tiny niche subcommunities. A company needs to just start selling comics fricking everywhere. I only ever got comics as a kid because they were at gas stations and shit.
Most people buy comics at their local comic shop. That's also where the comics are on full display.
If children (a common receiver of comics) can no longer go outside to the comic shop, then they won't know new issues are out.
Also, most comics these days aren't worth buying because the mediocre plot is stretched out over 4 issues instead of 1 or 2.
but ....what this anon said
IDW seem to be doing something horribly wrong.
you can't even blame licensing fees because that would only affect profit not sales
Yeah, it's weird to see a quarter of profit supposedly bolstered by a game division being followed by a quarter where the game division is killed.
Maybe that's misreporting, but if not that's some wild swinging over a small period of time.
A quarter loss during a weird time in the market is hard to contextualize until more time has passed. Their bad 2021 sales is more useful probably. They've had a rough few years though.
Why would anyone read IDW when there are autists just straight uploading entire issues to youtube for free? Reading is for gays real chads get youtubers to spoonfeed them comics with background music and sound effects and yelling.
>watching youtubers so they can read a bedtime comic for you
zoomies are truly a lost cause
This guy is a reviewer, he doesn't actually upload them. The people who do upload them though have been around since Archie, surprised they've lasted this long honestly.
>reviewer
>uploading and storytime the whole comic is fine so long as you add some commentary an say you like it at the end.
"reviewers' are a meme to get around copyright strikes.
Thats honestly my plan for my "comic" frick publishers. Im gonna hire VAs off fiver and post motion panels on youtube, then sell plushies, pins and highly marked up shitty tshirts when i get a following
>Make comics targeted at children
>Do not do anything to actually get comics in the hands of children (Scholastic, advertising and collaboration, etc)
>Nobody buys the comics
HOW COULD THIS BEEEEE
IDW is just bad publisher that can't get its shit together. They have a big tradition of cancelling comics after a single issue (Marylin Manor) or needing a whole year to publish a four issue mini (Magic the Gathering: Chandra after which IDW lost MtG license.) I can only hope they'll fold.
It just kind of astounds me that both Sonic and Transformers ended up doing so poorly writing-wise, and only one of them has the excuse of having to write with one hand tied behind their back, Hasbro wasn't even mandating anything be forced into the story like what happened with the Prime Wars.
These fricking homosexuals man. I bought some comic from their website and they moved the shipping back twice and still won't give me an ETA on when the frick it's going to ship out its almost been a full month now. I about have to do a charge back.
Meanwhile you can buy the TMNT Forever War, shipped from RUSSIA, and get your order in less than 2 weeks. Wtf.
Everyone I know who's into IDW Sonic pirates it.
I just started actually collecting the comics right before issue 50 dropped. Sucks cause almost all of them are sold out online now.
Tsk tsk. This is starting to get embarrassing.
https://www.animenewsnetwork.com/interest/2021-05-26/fact-check-did-demon-slayer-really-outsell-all-of-american-comics/.173234
counting moronic shit like dog is not helping your fricking case. the super hero and various independent comics were outsold by one manga. that is fricking fact.
The article didn't even mention Dogman
What are you doing anon?
>15 million in sales for american comic industry
>10.8 million in sales from just one manga series
even if one manga series didn't outsell all of american comics (which it probably did anyway), two manga series combined outselling all of american comics is still embarrassing.
Wasn't Demon Slayer a massive seller even for manga standards?
There's also the key differences between manga and comic distribution especially given print is nowhere near as dead in Japan as it is in Burgerland
demon slayer is and will always be trash. Even more of an embarrassment that IT outsold comics lol
Read the thread
Image, Boom, Dynamite, etc are doing better than ever
Direct market publishers are doing better period
IDW is the one that stands out like a sore thumb
And average Japan hate it
Anon, Demon Slayer's manga has sold 150 million units in 5-6 years, making it the 9th best-selling manga of all time in Japan.
The movie is the highest-grossing film of all time in Japan.
The show had some of the highest viewership of any animated property ever, being watched in ~19% of homes at its peak.
Random buddhist monks have written books about the religious aspects of Demon Slayer's manga.
Even the fricking LN adaptation is still a top-seller.
Saying the average Japanese person hates it just makes you look like a moron.
and a shitty manga
im sure extremely talented wymen like heather antos had nothing to do with this.
IDW was already declining before she showed up
Their problems are far beyond the scope of a single person
So what exactly is their problem?
Over reliance on licenseshit
Fact, a comic Cinemaphile never talks about has sold multiple times more than IDW Sonic
Licenseshitters exist beyond the scope of people who actually buy comics and are thus more prone to piracy since they have no real incentive to even go to an LCS
It's something they're waking up to now and it's why they're focusing on creator owned works more and more
I mean, at a certain point luck legitimately is a factor. IDW has gone on fishing trips trying to find indie stuff to publish that'll be hot.
It's just that they've been striking out since Locke and Key. Bad luck, not for lack of trying.
They killed TMNT which was one of their best sellers.
TMNT is still their best seller
The Last Ronin was a massive hit for them
Last Ronin was great. troony webcomic not so much. Have you seen recent TMNT? Nobody wants to pay for this.
In one frame he looks like a jacked neanderthal and the other like a lanky manlet
Damn, IDW Casey was great in the early story, Now he just become Mirage Casey.
It's still their best seller because everything else has also declined in sales, and they have lost many licenses and comics in the meantime.
It's not just Antos but a company that would agree with and put up with Antos' philosophy. They say they wasted a lot trying to get series sold to streaming services, to follow up like with Locke and key and it never worked out.
The pony comic used to sell over 40,000 copies per issue, but then IDW hired cheap artists, allowed writers to write shitty stories, enabled an editor to just approve whatever it was shown to him and finally IDW decided to use pony to write woke stories.
The comic ended up selling roughly 3,000 copies per issue before being cancelled. For the record, IDW's own staffers claimed that the bare minimum a comic issue needs to sell just to break even is 5,000 copies.
The pony comic declined in sales because more people were leaving the fandom period
The pony comic used to be legit good and easy to read for people who even hadn't watched the series.
"Used to be" being the operative word.
That's true, but Loyal customers will abandon you if the art and plot decline in quality (For example, A mom decides not to buy the next issue of her Kid's favorite comic because the Kid doesn't like it anymore, and the Kid doesn't like it because the art doesn't look good anymore).
The tv show's ending cursed the IP which also affected the comics. They had epic finale planned for the show, but then decided to take inspirations from GoT's ending and the new Disney Star Wars, where averting the audiences expectations and delivering identity politics on top of a soapbox to own toxic nerds was more important that decent writing. The comics had a good idea to now write continuity to the show they're based on, but since the ending was so shit, there is no value tying the comics to it.
>They had epic finale planned for the show,
spoonfeed me
Last season starts by introducing classic villain who rivals the main character, who locates and brings together the remaining villains to work under him against their will. By forcing the villains work together, we learn why the remaining villains refused to make peace with the heroes, since they've all lost their family to the heroes. The villains form a plan against the main villain and the heroes, so the finale is going to be a 3 way battle between the classic villain, returning villains and the heroes.
With whole season of build up and only 3 episodes left, turns out the classic villain was fake, just one of the heroes pretending to frick with the villains. The villains launch an attack against the heroes, fail, and then heroes come into conclusion that the villains have not learned anything so they're put to execution on the spot. Then almost everyone comes out of the closet, except one fan favorite character gets impregnated by Weird Al Yankovic. Despite that, they decide that the world is too over populated, so most of them die alone without children, and they open the borders for all the neighboring monsters to take over their land.
The comic series tries to write continuity to this ending, but struggles to explain why everyone did what they did, why is everyone gay, how they all end up dying alone (especially the ones who were all about family and finding their prince charming) and they can't really use one of the characters anymore because everyone remembers she canonically had babies with Weird Al.
Not one single thing in this post makes any sense to me whatsoever.
The horse cartoon ended with the heroes executing the villains and then all coming out as gay? And a don't breed because of overpopulation message, and open borders/orcs welcome propaganda? What the hell?
As weird as it sounds
Boom Adventure Time and IDW MLP used to be some of the most influential comics in the 2010's
Seven Seas published 3 american-made manga volumes based on the pony show, ignoring what IDW had done to the franchise and instead focusing on the 2 first seasons of the cartoon, which are the most popular ones among fans and casual watchers.
The manga sold like crazy and was praised even for the most embittered ex pony fan. Makes you think why, right?
Yeah I remember hearing about them early on and they seemed like cool sidestories. But then they had weird off-model crosseyed art right on the cover the contents read like an unfiltered fan magazine.
Also from what I heard continuity isn't a thing in the comics?
I'm more curious about what's going to happen to their back catalog, like the pre-code horror comics or their newspaper strip collections, would they let the licenses run out or will another company buy out their back catalog on the cheap?
They better not die
If they die, we'll never get Surge again
Sega can just sell the rights to yet another publisher.
That depends if another publisher actually WANTS to make Sonic comics or not
Sonic is a crazy popular character and can print money IF he's is handled with the minimum care and talent needed to craft readable stories.
Bruh, Sonic comics are more popular than ever before
They still sell below 15k because the majority of readers don't buy the fricking comic
Archie literally got better money wise after jettisoning Sonic and calling it quits on licenses period
What other licenses did they even have besides Sonic? Don't they own the Archie characters and Sabrina?
They had Mega Man and were attempting to expand their range of Cinemaphile licenses like Mario, Kirby, Metroid, and Fossil Fighters until Nintendo said no
This has nothing to do with politics
IDW's the one publisher struggling while everyone else is flourishing
Oh right, Mega Man, I made such an effort to forget that crap adaptation existed that it actually worked.
>This has nothing to do with politics
IDW's the one publisher struggling while everyone else is flourishing
IDW was breaking pre-sale record before they started pulling stunts like hiring a literal communist to reboot GI Joe.
>IDW's the one publisher struggling while everyone else is flourishing
Prove it.
see
>Any braindead executive that doesn't see dollar signs at the idea of being able to sell a long-running video game franchise under their banner doesn't deserve to stay in business.
Well these days, any executive these days doesn't really want to share profits with licensors, as well as be beholden to their various rules (and vice versa - licensors are starting to get cheaper about making comics, so most of them go digital).
Companies want that big franchise they can own 100% and then coast on the fumes forever like Image or Dynamite does
Any braindead executive that doesn't see dollar signs at the idea of being able to sell a long-running video game franchise under their banner doesn't deserve to stay in business.
And yes I am saying Archie as a company was moronic, still is.
But will they? It didn't happen to the other comics. You certainly don't see Sally Acorn around anymore.
>You certainly don't see Sally Acorn around anymore.
Thank frick.
Sally as well as any other 90's spin off media are off the table besides vague hints. We're never gonna see Sara again but we still have Knuckle's hat.
Were not they just getting their stock price back up?
The only IDW comics I read are Transformers and Sonic. Their Transformers reboot was pretty bad compared to their earlier Transformers work, and Sonic's just plan bad, not Archie levels of bad but just not very good.
I constantly read their TMNT comic isn't very good either, and I don't know what other licenses they currently have.
Sonic's scripting is abhorrent. The ideas for the stories are good, the art is fantastic, but the dialogue and pacing and composition are ass.
I have no idea how the frick this stuff gets a pass when it's apparently their big thing at the moment.
I wouldn't say the ideas are good.
>Metal Sonic showdown
>A lonely sniper dealing with a master of disguise
>Metal Goo Zombies
>Chao Racing criminal underworld
>VR Hell
>Camping trip
>Android Saga but Sonic
These are solid ideas for stories, and most of the plot points are fine. It's all in the execution being lousy.
>Android Saga but Sonic
It didn't even end up becoming that, it was all setup with no payoff.
Like I said, bad execution.
You sound like a pseud. All of these are fun little weird stories that have plenty of potential. How high concept do you want these stories to be? Is metal goo zombie instrumentality seriously not "creative enough" for any given story?
I will concede on Metal Virus.
Camping trip is cliche.
Chao Races barely explores its own concept before abandoning it.
test run doesn't even really explore it's concept before abandoning it.
Neo-Metal is just Heroes and Forces mixed.
But yeah I would like this comic to be more high concept.
>Chao Races barely explores its own concept before abandoning it.
That's execution, not the idea.
>test run doesn't even really explore it's concept before abandoning it.
That's execution, not the idea.
A bad idea for a story is "Knuckles has to navigate politics to stop election fraud."
That sounds great if we get to learn more of how the government works and there is a lot of silliness to it.
I mean there was already an Eggman brainwashing the world to become president plot in X that was fun.
>A bad idea for a story is "Knuckles has to navigate politics to stop election fraud."
Worked for Sonic Boom.
>"Knuckles! You have to destroy 2000 ballet stuffing robots!"
>"Welp, time to get Kracking!"
>"Please leave the mottos to the staff, sir."
>Sonic copies Dragon Ball
>Again
Sega specifically asked for them to be MORE like the Androids. The people in charge of the brand know what they like.
Sonic is at it's best when its ripping off BDZ. Tell me I'm wrong.
You are really making these stories sound more interesting than they actually are and even then this is not creative. Try to be more creative please.
Except for Impostor Syndrome which you actually make sound worse.
>Metal Sonic showdown
Would've been better if it didn't play out like a Sonic Heroes tribute album
>A lonely sniper dealing with a master of disguise
Sounds like a nice Forces side-story but not something for a whole issue (unless it was about Fang)
>Metal Goo Zombies
A story for a Halloween issue not the yr long clusterfrick it became
>Chao Racing criminal underwold
>VR Hell
I'm so mad they never actually tried with those stories
>Camping Trip
Cliche, depressive and barely spent time reflecting with all the characters save one
>Android Saga but Sonic
a) it wasn't even that. It was a dumb meta-commentary on Sonic's non-existent morality
b) Android Saga barely even lasted long before it was replaced with Chad Cell
c)
>Sega specifically asked for them to be MORE like the Androids. The people in charge of the brand know what they like.
Exactly. And this is why the brand is weak.
Can they stop wanking off to moronic space monkeys & start cribbing from things that are more relevant?
Introducing two original characters (Whisper and Starline) who's main goal is to do something unobtainable both in-universe and in a meta sense (besting Eggman) was very stupid. These characters are essentially designed around character arcs that cannot proceed.
Ian Flynn and Evan Stanley aren't good writers, but they're so ingrained to the fandom now that they're really viewed as the only tennable options.
>I have no idea how the frick this stuff gets a pass when it's apparently their big thing at the moment.
Because it's not offensively bad like it was under Archie, it's just poor quality, like most of the stuff Sega itself inexpicably puts out. Think of it as stockholm syndrome.
They are fine but Sonic fans will take anyone who handles the characters well and there are lots of people who could probably write Sonic well if they tried.
I'd say Evan is fine but has no real ambitions for the comic/is trying to play nice with Ian, so her stories end up middling.
Ian keeps ping ponging between pretty good and outright terrible. The man has a crippling lack of self-awareness when it comes to his writing. 50 was pretty good, but it's what every issue should be, not a high point.
I would not be singing praises for 50 when it pissed off the fanbase for trying to explore an idea that does not make much sense and is not actually allowed to be explored all that deeply.
>They are fine but Sonic fans will take anyone who handles the characters well
You forgot one key factor anon:
They have to love Sonic.
That narrows a field a bit of you're looking in the industry for talent
>there are lots of people who could probably write Sonic well if they tried.
Name Them.
HARD MODE: Must not have written for Archie prior
>if you're looking in the industry
Absolutely nobody currently working on IDW came from within the industry.
>Absolutely nobody currently working on IDW came from within the industry.
And this is how we get a bunch of YouTubers got to write for IDW Sonic despite the lack of experience.
If you can't get actual pro writers to contribute to your comic, you'll be stuck with the Archiegays forever. You're only chance is that if you manage to snag an indie webcomic star that happens to be a Sonicgay.
It's the Larry Hama problem - you have to keep hiring him to make good G.I.Joe comics because few writers want to write about "A REAL AMERICAN HERO", but then you're just stuck with the same type of stories every year.
>not someone that just comes in and does whatever.
But This is what I want from a Sonic monthly - make it an anthology where a bunch of writers and artist can just make random stories about or inspired by Sonic.
Brand consistency be damned, Just make a mandate that the writers can't touch anything SEGA doesn't legally have access to (sry ArchieBros) & let these frickers go nuts.
I rather read good entertaining short stories in the vein of the annuals then have to deal with 50 issues of decompressed arcs complaining about the Sonic cycle
>But This is what I want from a Sonic monthly
You think you'll be getting new refreshing takes on Sonic but what you'll get are a lot of people with very basic at best understanding of the franchise. You need someone that can put "played all the games and/or read a lot of the comics" on their resume. You're not going to get a lot of good writers that can say that. If you want a bunch of people writing Sonic then you're going to get a lot of basic stories as well. Very little to build off of and repetition. Anthologies work better when the cast and subject is always different. And it will sell like crap because people will be less invested in one offs.
>Just make a mandate that the writers can't touch anything SEGA doesn't legally have access to
You're getting a thousand mandates. Even more restrictive if Sega hires a bunch of literal who's with no influence to get what they want.
>You think you'll be getting new refreshing takes on Sonic but what you'll get are a lot of people with very basic at best understanding of the franchise.
I don't see what's wrong with that.
Some of the best Sonic stories in recent memory came from folks with a basic understanding of the franchise.
>You need someone that can put "played all the games and/or read a lot of the comics" on their resume.
NO.
This is how we got the bland and predictable mess that is IDW to begin with. I don't care for that anymore.
Yes, the nature of randomness means that there is an equal chance a Sonicgay will land a chance to tell a story that appeals to Sonic autists. But If I'm looking for something different, there is no better place to look than outside the fandom
>You're not going to get a lot of good writers that can say that.
Which is why I'm looking for good writers first and Sonic fans second. Hell even bad writers are welcome, as long as they have something to say about Sonic.
I would rather take Brian Micheal Bendis hilariously trying and failing to make a story about racial issues among Sonic folk or Chi Zdarsky making graphic prose about how he once his fingers stuck in his Sega Genesis than read another decompressed epic from Flynn complaining/embracing the Sonic Cycle or Evan making uguu junk food stories about Sonic OCs with anxiety & depression. No More!
>I would rather take Brian Micheal Bendis hilariously trying and failing to make a story about racial issues among Sonic folk or Chi Zdarsky making graphic prose about how he once his fingers stuck in his Sega Genesis
Let me look at our mandates and they say... no.
> If you want a bunch of people writing Sonic then you're going to get a lot of basic stories as well.
>Very little to build off of and repetition
That's capeshit in general. You know that right?
For every big run celebrated, there are just a bunch of basic stories where good guy fights bad guy and those are fine.
I'm not looking for a hundred writers gunning to write the next Sonic epic for the next decade or so. I'm looking for a hundred writers who want to
write a hundred stories about Sonic.
At most, you'll get maybe 3 issue stories for short arcs but nothing bigger.
>Anthologies work better when the cast and subject is always different.
Explain Shadow of the Bat.
Explain Tales of TMNT.
Hell, explain all those Sonic annuals.
Explain Sonic Shorts!!!
That also doesn't discount AUs or parodies being used in the book as well. You can use the same franchise in an anthology; just keep continuity out and use the setting in a bunch of different ways.
>And it will sell like crap because people will be less invested in one offs.
Well Sonic fans always does have bad taste, so I'm not surprised.
>You're getting a thousand mandates. Even more restrictive if Sega hires a bunch of literal who's with no influence to get what they want.
Frick what SEGA wants. SEGA wants all the money but none of the work. SEGA just wants cheap garbage they can peddle to make a quick buck.
It says a lot when the best Sonic media are the ones that SEGA has the LESS say about the output. They can go frick off back to Japan & make another gay Sakura Wars mobile.
>That's capeshit in general. You know that right?
No it's not. Even DC's "everything is canon" takes everything that came before and uses it as much as possible. Comics live by continuity. They don't survive by being self contained stories, unless you want to only sell trades. New ongoings are hard to maintain and new runs only happen after a few years with one writer working on one continuous series of events. What you want is the exact opposite of cape comics.
>Frick what SEGA wants
Sorry kid, that's not how Sega operates. Otherwise IDW Sonic would be completely different.
>Comics live by continuity. They don't survive by being self contained stories, unless you want to only sell trades.
That's perfectly fine by me.
I've been advocating for Sonic to switch from monthly ongoing to annual GNs ala Dark Horse Avatar or YA novels for years.
If I'm gonna get these safe, predictable bland little stories that only appeal to children, I might as well get them in a format that appeals to that demographic.It would be basically the Classic Sonic annuals, only on a reccuring basis.
kids don;t read floppies. They read tankobons and books. It'll be fine.
Sonic trade sales suck. It was beaten by political comics and horses. Sega wouldn't want annual comics. Annual comics would kill any momentum a monthly comic would have. It's completely incompatible with the franchise. IDW and Sega have vetoed your suggestion.
Annual comics and one-offs literally do not sell. The comic would tankmuch harder than it already is, it would be cancelled, and youd never see Sega push for another Sonic comic series until several decades down the line due to the well being poisoned in their eyes. That's all that would ever happrn if your ideas got instated and both Sega and IDW know it. It is never happening.
You don't need traditional one-offs. Build stories around trades or volumes and have trades and volumes be their own stories.
If each storyline was its own thing that would be great and solve a lot of problems brought by the limitations of working with SEGA.
>Build stories around trades or volumes and have trades and volumes be their own stories.
You mean like Fleetway did, which LITERALLY resulted in the comic becoming 99% reprints and dying a horrid undignified death because nobody was buying it anymore?
Shut the frick up, mandates autist.
>I realized that not every story needs to be short, but the overreliance on continuity between stories is the problem..
CONTINUITY IS LITERALLY HOW COMICS SURVIVE YOU FRICKING SHITSTARTER
IDW does not have the freedom Fleetway had, Fleetway actually had meaningful lasting changes on the status quo. There was plot progression and actual consequences.
Everything you just described pretty much sums up early archie and issues before Ian came up.
Hell they had Slott at one point.
You remain as uselessly cancerous as ever, mandatesgay.
>Name Them.
>HARD MODE: Must not have written for Archie prior
Finding a good writer for Sonic is such a difficult thing. You want someone that someone that knows Sonic and cares about the franchise, not someone that just comes in and does whatever. And even if you do find that right person, there's a chance that a lot of their ideas would get shot down by Sega or restricted by mandates.
>Because it's not offensively bad like it was under Archie
Archie had far higher highs, IDW’s peak is still mediocre pap.
>sonic
if you take a risk and it ends up being bad, at least penders took the risk
not taking any risks and looking bad is more inexcusable
You got mixed up somewhere in that sentence.
And nah, Ken was just as safe, it just comes off as weird because it doesn't fit Sonic.
buddy he was writing about terrorists. probably horribly, but i figure i can cut penders some slack because he's probably politically illiterate. no other comic company is going allow stories about terrorists and freedom fighters. Image comics seems to be totally against it as part of their liberal image. Saga has a kidnapping of that tv prince's kid and make the person who does it stupid, not sympathetic. Low has some revolutionaries just kill randomly. Invincible's main character is neutral evil and the story as a whole is monarchist propaganda
you mean like how sega stole ideas for a half baked video game that had a fricking shitty soundtrack?
you mean like how the freedom fighters in the archie comic and the SatAM tv show appeared in the sonic spinball sega game a year later?
*has revolutionaries killed*
>you mean like how sega stole ideas for a half baked video game that had a fricking shitty soundtrack?
That was Bioware.
Also the music isn't bad in terms of composition. It was just rushed out the door in terms of production.
People always cite https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6o47N-aYd08
but that was originally a track from Sonic 3D blast, which is supposed to sound like
or, more recently https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uUqn0TZBL8
okay my bad whatever. the point is that shit was stolen and plagiarized by companies
>the point is that shit was stolen and plagiarized by companies
Not really, no. Even Dark Brotherhood's ideas about echidna's being an advanced race have more basis in japanese game lores than they do from Ken's work, which just un-apologetically turned them into the Borg from Star Trek
that's bullshit. dark brotherhood or whatever the video game in the 2000s was doing came straight from julie-soo's origin story.
You can't even spell the character's name right and you expect me to believe you know what you're talking about?
you expect me to take you seriously when you refuse to look up basic info and only care about spelling?
Bioware openly admitted to copying Archie and even referenced Archie art of Robotnik for Eggman's render https://youtu.be/JCiC21fw79s
apparently the story for that is that for some reason a bunch of the midi instruments are missing from the game's code, so when the songs play they're calling for instruments that don't exist.
>you mean like how the freedom fighters in the archie comic and the SatAM tv show appeared in the sonic spinball sega game a year later?
It was all the same year, 1993. And actually the game would've been in development earlier. That's why Sally's sprite uses the pink fur/black hair beta design. It was working off of older concept art that predates the show and comic.
No, I mean like how Ken literally traced existing art, copied layouts, stole dialogue, and repackaged old stories in general. Super Sonic is a dumb DBZ reference. Stealing a Captain Marvel issue's plot beat for beat and even tracing some panels is not.
Who created Mammoth Mogul? That always stuck out in my mind as being the most blatant offender.
Mogul is a blatant Vandal Savage ripoff, but at least it was only conceptually similar.
Exact same origin story though.
Yeah, again, that's at least not literally stealing someone's work. It's a blatant pastiche, a lazy one, but still an interpretation rather than stolen work.
I get the feeling that you're going to redefine theft in whatever way you need to in order to win an argument.
I dunno, I think literal tracing, composition swiping and word for word lines being lifted is pretty clearly theft while things akin to "it's Batman but he's a dog" aren't.
Ah, so Penders would still be a thief because of "first they came for the hedgehogs"?
Just saw this post that's not me.
Is me.
I realized that not every story needs to be short, but the overreliance on continuity between stories is the problem..
Among many other things, yes, although I can at least give him credit for actually changing the quote.
Lazy references can be pretty lame, but Ken fillched a ton of stuff very directly. Some of it doesn't come through when he did layouts, but when he does pencils you can see a lot of traced panels/characters. It's why his shit looks so fricking weird.
Is it really stealing if Vandal has a dozen different beginnings?
>Stealing a Captain Marvel issue's plot beat for beat and even tracing some panels is not.
What did he do?
>no other comic company is going allow stories about terrorists and freedom fighters.
Except every single comic that Ken shamelessly copied.
>Image comics seems to be totally against it as part of their liberal image.
Oh Christ, this isn't even about Penders, you just want to talk politics. Frick off.
>you just want to talk politics.
>IDW thread
>politics
You can't have one without the other.
People like you need to die
No one has said Sonic was original. No one also wants terrorism in Sonic and DBZ in Sonic is just Japs being nepotistic to each other, that's literally how their culture works. The west hates when others copy from each other out of superior complex, while the japs live by their kind.
I have zero idea what you're even talking about for spinball since that has nothing to do with SoJ, that was a STi made game.
Penders is good at worldbuilding and lore. Everything else is bad. The only other good thing about him is if you like the characters he pushes, like Knuckles and Geoffrey.
>Penders is good at worldbuilding and lore.
Lol what? That's what fricked up Sonic's comic in the first place.
The comic only became readable again after Pender's "lore" got literally killed off, destroyed and finally retconned out.
And Ian used it for most of his run. Killing or changing stuff, he had a lot of characters and stories to play with. Practically all his preboot arcs were built off of what Penders laid out. Only in the reboot did he work without it and did a good job adapting Sonic Unleashed.
>Practically all his preboot arcs were built off of getting rid of what Penders laid out.
Fixed that for you.
No he isn't.
Half his stories were straight plagiarized.
You can choose to pick apart what Ian can and cannot do due to Sega mandates. But it is pretty fricking clear that Sega has a strangle hold on the product that has only gotten tighter since pre-reboot archie.
Meanwhile golden age Ken and the others could get away with anything except killing Sally. Like could you picture trying to get mecha madness done today in IDW?
>But it is pretty fricking clear that Sega has a strangle hold on the product that has only gotten tighter since pre-reboot archie.
I have yet to see a single fricking thing mentioned by any writer that extends beyond surface level brand image shit. Please stop buying into lousy excuses. Ken said the same shit about editorial holding him back when he write these comics.
>could you picture trying to get mecha madness done today in IDW?
They already did that, but goo instead of hard metal and the entire cast instead of just Sonic & Knuckles.
And it's all agreed it sucked. Case made.
So you think the writer and artist are just making shit up and wasting time by writing surface level dialogue and trashing their more emotive concepts? Or are you expecting a detailed list and memo on when their boss is saying no?
I can't believe you're discussing the nuance of writing for a company when your reading comprehension is this bad.
Nobody said they make things up. The point is that nothing ever cited as a request from Sega has ever actually been meaningful. It's always stupid, vapid stuff like "don't show XYZ directly" or "make this a monologue instead since he's talking to the audience." Ian said he didn't receive a single revision note on #50, was given several flexibility estimates on certain things, and was even given a suggestion that he could have turned down to add a little spice to Eggman vs Starline.
Nobody has ever provided a "mandate" of substance. It's always minor shit. Stop using a regular part of the licensing process to absolve writers of blame for mediocre output.
How long can Cinemaphile deny American comic being political is the cancer killing the industry?
People loved stuff like Squid Game which openly addressed the idea of massive income inequality
>People loved stuff like Squid Game which openly addressed the idea of massive income inequality
1. It’s telling you can’t defend American comics being political propaganda with bringing up something not related to the industry.
2. Creator confirm squid games it’s about North Korea with South Korean pop culture. Stop projecting western politics into Asian media.
They are bad not becase they are propoganda, but because they are bad. You can make good propoganda.
How is sonic political?
for those of you that are too slow to keep up, sonic is a leftist character who resists the tyranny of a totalitarian polluter that violently captures the creatures of the forest and turns them in to his robot slaves. sonic resists him with the entropic power of chaos emeralds and perfectly circular rings and moving in arcs at high speeds (math)
the freedom fighters are terrorists. this is no more or less political than star wars or star trek
this is also similar to the warnings about an unregulated capitalist industrial revolution in princess mononoke, or the collapse of advanced civilizations and chances to move up the kardashev scale as presented in Nausicaa, Valley of the Wind. (nausicaa begins with a mural, the first time sonic and knuckles confront each other is in the hidden palace with a prophetic mural)
Get woke, go broke
Kys
Why has IDW stopped having convention panels?
I would say it was because of the covid.
But there are no plans for SDCC.
Because the covid is still out there.
They don't really have much to show
Covid
I miss them, bros. Even the reboot ones.
The only reasonable thing to do is move on, or teach yourself how to draw and make your own sustenance.
Soul.
Soulless.
Classic Sonic with the FF would be the best.
Then it literally wouldn't be Classic Sonic anymore, because he'd have to carry around all that dead weight.
That's modern Sonic.
Not so much, because the characters can actually pull their own weight.
Don't be disingenuous, homosexual. Everybody knows the Sonic cast has been rarely ever utilized fully.
Oh anon, it's too early to make jokes.
>Then it literally wouldn't be Classic Sonic anymore, because he'd have to carry around all that dead weight.
You mean Fang, Bean, Bark, Honey, Vector, Espio, Charmy...
>Fang, Bean, Bark, Honey,
I'd think it more revealing about your own feelings on the FFs that you'd compare them to these D listers
>Vector, Espio, Charmy...
They literally solo their stories and adventures.
>NO U
And no, the Chaotix don't. You don't need them to beat Knuckles' Chaotix. Mighty and Ray are literally more relevant than them.
>I miss them, bros. Even the reboot ones.
I miss them everyday. I hate that anything pre-Sonic Adventure is just tossed to the wayside without any hope of being re-interprited or collected.
>No FF in anything
>No Scratch & Grounder in Classic Sonic games
>No Fleetway or Underground ever
>OVA's lasting legacy is just a fricking hat
it hurts bro
>The only reasonable thing to do is move on
No.
>or teach yourself how to draw and make your own sustenance.
Yes.
Also, frick SEGA. Make a bootleg SatAm and ,make that into an indie game.
You know IDW is bad when even /mlp/ hates them
Has IDW ever made a profit? I'm convinced they're a money laundering scam at this point.
There's only one way to solve this
Nice OCs.
I was shocked at how small of players these characters are considering the hype they got.
At least Surge and Starline have roles at the front of their stories. These two feel like they were just designed to fill in crowd shots.
Tangle had potential because she's female Sonic but she's nothing more than that. A good backstory, interesting archenemy or rival, or a compelling goal. She needs at least one of those. Whisper has a greater problem. She needs her group back but they're dead. And even then it'd be a less interesting Team Dark.
they literally only put out one decent comic and its just ended
Honestly kinda hope Dark Horse buys them with their Embracer bucks and keep this new series going.
I think IDW have a couple of cool things to offer, aside from the Sonic license. The Artist's Editions, the TMNT license, Usagi Yojimbo, Top Shelf's Alan Moore books, etc.
Plus, i'd be down to see DH do proper art books for specific Sonic games, specially for the Classic games & maybe SA1. Or also give it the Top Cow's Tomb Raider run treatment and reprint both Fleetway & Archie's runs in volumed omnibuses.
Hell, they could even localize the 1992 manga, that'd be dope.
They are losing TF and Joe right?
And Turtles seems to be deliberately pandering to a very niche demographic right now. So that leaves them with Sonic.
I only jumped on IDW Sonic because I heard it was going to actually be rooted in game continuity this time. And that seemed to be true for a bit. It very clearly takes place right after Forces.
But then it really started focusing on OC content that really didn't tie back into the games. And now they are apparently barred from including Frontier synergy. Which is very weird.
It also feels like this comic is really disinterested in using a lot of popular characters. They seem to be going out of their way to not do anything with Knuckles and Amy despite them being very popular. Shadow is a Joke character in this continuity. And C listers like Blaze, Silver and the Choatix only get to do things in small bursts.
It's mostly just Sonic, Tails and Eggman hanging out with OCs. I don't want this shit.
>The company that has been bleeding money thinks this is a bad idea fiscally, therefore it should not be attempted. Please ignore that the only difference between the current state of affairs and the proposition is that the comics will no longer be as compatible with the graphic novel format, which I previously said was a failure and a bad thing to focus on.
Lmao at this guy.
There is no difference between a narrative driven serial and an episodic anthology so long as the last page of each issue points at next month's story.
>idw is bleeding money
>sonic is one of its best selling monthly comics
>trade sales are horrible
>I GOT A GREAT IDEA
>LET'S CANCEL THE MONTHLY COMICS AND FOCUS ON TRADES
Not him, but I mean trying anything is probably a wiser decision than current trajectory.
As someone that isn't happy with how IDW Sonic is, it's not the big problem with the company. This is about the state of IDW as a whole. So if one of your best monthlies is Sonic then a possibility is to put out another Sonic monthly. So what would you choose? There's two obvious choices. Sonic is the most popular character and Shadow is the second most popular character. So a Shadow comic of some kind would be the best bet but the problem is Sega's mandates on him. Negotiations would have to happen to lessen them and potentially make it a Team Dark comic, even if Iizuka seems to be against it. The other is a classic era Sonic comic. There have already been issues by both Archie and IDW that done that so there's past work to look at. It also depends on how well that anniversary IDW issue did. Thinking like a fan and an editor making these decisions are key to figuring out what to do. You can't just will what you want into happening when history will tell you that it's a bad idea. And even then, my suggestions would probably hit some issues because of Sega.
TMNT is IDW's best seller and that couldn't support more than one ongoing
Sonic isn't getting a second ongoing especially with the publisher's extended focus on original titles
How many Transformers comics does IDW put out a month? Of course that number will be zero next year but I'm wondering how many during the more recent years. Not sure if GI Joe had as many but I think remember them running at least a couple ongoings at the same time.
two ongoings (both over) and a mini
Beast Wars replaced Galaxies
>Schizo creates random babble that has nothing to do with the conversation.
Sad.
The first eight issues are mostly one shots with a teaser at the end. 5 and 6 are the only ones actually connected to each other meaningfully. They were the best selling issues of the entire run. The main complaint was they weren't different ENOUGH from each other.
One of the writers even said the plan Goin forward is to shorten stories a bit because the prior method was hurting sales and reception.
As long as you don't stop the monthly comic series. You could do whatever you want in addition to the main Sonic series but that's just the minis that IDW already puts out but more frequently. As for Ian wanting to do shorter stories, that's because Metal Virus was too long and the covid delays made things worse. And he did that by doing Imposter Syndrome.
>You could do whatever you want in addition to the main Sonic series
No, I'm not talking "in addition." I'm saying the structure of this comic has been slowly draining its sales. There's been a push since the start for each IDW story to be able to fill at least one full GN, but the first two volumes (where the crew had to scramble) shows that readers are perfectly content with episodic content so long as you dedicate a moment to saying "Come back next month for THIS!" The mentality that modern superhero publishing conventions must be followed just leads to readers bailing if the first or second issue of a story sucks. Each story should be allowed to be as short or long as it needs to be in order to maintain a good pace. Putting out issues that are their own satisfying short stories will not harm the book.
>As for Ian
I'm talking about Evan, who said this last year during the camping arc to explain why it was 3 issues instead of 4 and how she intends to handle future arcs.
>The covid delays made things worse. Most of the issues people complain about from Metal Virus came out in 2019, don't give me that bullshit.
>And he did that by doing Imposter Syndrome.
It's the same as every other mini, what are you even on about? It follows the same format as every GN-First story he's written for the comic, which is most of them.
Nice quints but nobody would agree to any of your ideas. You're speaking purely as someone that wants what you want. If we both went into the IDW offices, I would have trends and past sales to back up my claims. You would have nothing but speculation and opinions for what you want to do. I would get my heavily mandated Shadow ongoing and you would get security called on you after a couple outbursts.
>I would have trends and past sales to back up my claims.
You mean like issues 1 - 8 vastly outselling any subsequent issues until 50, which is a two issue size self contained story. The comic has demonstrably slumped in sales when it rigidly adheres to a story needing to conform to a multiple-of-four issue count.
Frick off, you're not actually going to acknowledge facts or figures.
Security, please escort this anon out of the building.
>"I have past sales figures!"
>"These figures say you're wrong."
>"S-SECURITY! SECURITYYYY!!!"
I'm still waiting for that evidence.
There's a website called Comichron that lists all sales and since IDW still goes through Diamond, the sales for all issues still come out. The exception being during the pandemic when almost everything was shut down. Now, averaging 10k may seem pitiful compared to Marvel and DC but it's towards the top of comics sold. This is January and February 2022 and not even the full list of comics that IDW puts out. You'll see a couple extremely small graphs below. The left has all the Sonic comics and the blue line to the left shows the Archie sales which appear to almost always be much lower than IDW even at its worse. The right graph only focuses on IDW. I'm going to assume that for the most part, sales have been good for Sonic, much better under IDW than Archie which had the license for a long, long time. No surprise it doesn't come close to the main TMNT and Star Wars comics but that is to be expected. But Sonic is still near the top and with Transformers and GI Joe leaving, it'd make sense to fill their spaces with more Sonic comics, ongoing or minis or one shots. Even if they do just as well or slightly worse than the main comic, they can still take over the vacant spots under it. While the anon to the side of me is telling you to cancel one of your better selling ongoings in favor of something yearly, I would instead suggest maintaining the monthly comic and put out more minis to test the waters. If sales are good then we can expand on them, maybe even find out what characters sell. Less risk and a greater chance for expanding and capitalizing on the Sonic IP.
Yeah I would never cancel the monthly, I'm saying IDW's standards and format for the monthly are harmful to the product long term and they need to be more flexible.
Also Archie Sonic was sold mostly outside of the direct market. Back in 2012 they reported via legalese in an issue that ~35k copies per issue sold at news stands/Barnes & Noble/Publix/etc. Comparing direct market for Archie vs IDW is misleading at best. They were sold in very different ways.
They've been mostly consistent. The drop at the start happens to virtually every comic series and the dips usually return to normal. The only problem are the delays. Anything else is just up to them putting out more Sonic comics every month. And you can ignore the Archie sales.
>Putting out issues that are their own satisfying short stories will not harm the book.
They would literally kill the book. You have no idea how comics or businesses work, mandatesgay.
Create long form self contained stories for Sonic
The volumes can actually be complete stories and there is actually more room for creativity.
IDW Sonic sucks so fricking hard.
>already a huge cast (Sonic, Knuckles, Tails, Team Dark, the Chaotix, Amy, Cream, Vanilla, Emerl, Eggman, Orbot, Cubot, Metal Sonic)
>introduce 10 new OCs
>spend half the comic on all your fricking OCs and never focus on the main cast
>spend FIFTEEN ISSUES on a melodramatic grimdark Zombie apocalypse arc
>hurt/comfort miniseries about two OCs fighting an evil octopus with the power of owning a knife
>worst Shadow
>arguably the worst Sonic, since he keeps letting Eggman get away and pretends his laziness and idiocy is moral superiority
I'd rather read Fleetway, Archie, or anything other than this tripe. Hell, Sonic the Continuation, a fricking fanfic, is better than IDW Sonic.
Based and rockpilled. Fancomics do what IDWon't.
>IDW Sonic sucks so fricking hard.
based , I too just read fancomics now
>characters are stagnant and sterilized
>no stakes
>focus on OCs because of the first one
its honestly funny how Fleetway and Archie absolutely mog IDW
>hurt/comfort miniseries about two OCs fighting an evil octopus with the power of owning a knife
You say this like it's a negative.
If you enjoy reading about angsty Sonic OCs hugging each other and crying, more power to you. I prefer things like adventures revolving around characters people other than the author care about.
It kills me because for all Cinemaphile's vitriol, I've genuinely loved most of their licensed stuff. Their Ghostbusters, TMNT, and Transformers isn't uniformly flawless by any means, but those books all have a welcome place on my shelves. Meanwhile companies making FAR worse stuff are Doing Great Thanks.
I can't imagine anyone having strong feelings about these comics without deeply rooted nostalgia for these properties.
I mean I'm not saying "This Ghostbusters comic is as good as Bone! Put it on your shelf next to Windsor-Smith's Monsters and Eisner's A Contract With God!" but I picked them up without strong nostalgia and found myself going "hey, they did a legitimately good job! This is a very enjoyable book that I'll look forward to reading more of!"
Ghostbusters IDW was genuinely amazing, but they lost the license at some point between the lead up to Afterlife. Didn't help that sales fell like a rock because they were forced to push the Fembusters.
Now Dark Horse has the license
I'm cautiously optimistic.
So besides Transformers, GI Joe, Ghostbusters and Sonic, what licenses has IDW had in the past, and which ones do they still have?
They still have Godzilla, Star Trek, and MLP
They used to have/haven't used recently
>Back to the Future
>X Files
>KISS
>Angry Birds
>Powerpuff Girls
>Samurai Jack
>Ben 10
>Dexter's Lab
>Gears of War
>Duke Nukem
>Silent Hill
>Castlevania
>Speed Racer
>Popeye
>M.A.S.K.
>ROM the Spaceknight
>Napoleon Dynamite
>Metal Gear Solid
>Littlest Pet Shop
>Jurassic Park
>Ghost Whisperer
>Doctor Who
>Mars Attacks
>Jem
>that whole list and they aren't using it
holy shit they're dumb. are they planning to fail on purpose so disney can buy them out? i thought they were doing ducktales shit too
i don't know what that is and i'm not going there
>>that whole list and they aren't using it
They lost the licenses you fricking troglodyte
Licenses expire and they chose not to renew or the IP holders pulled out
moron
so what is IDW then, but an prostitute outlet for franchises? have they attempted to create original material like "Boom!" did?
JFC you're such a casual it hurts
Some of those were lost. for some reason BBC pulled the rights of DW from IDW and gave it to Titan.
It's a poll you pussyhomosexual
>pussyhomosexual
did you just call me trans? literally yesterday you said ywnbaw. make up your mind, silly goose
How do writers respond when you message them on twitter thanking them for helping manga sales in the US?
http://poal.me/pyq0ml
>Rip out the projects that generate revenue and solely produce woke comics that are well known to operate as a loss.
What.