We’ve all heard about the upcoming “Batman R.I.P.” storyline, right? Well, the staid Times of London calls shenanigans on an obvious sales gimmick:

Much as failing magazines always try ‘The Sex Issue’ ploy to pump up failing circulations, so embattled comics publishers are increasingly fond of killing off a major character to grab some attention outside their core readership. Now it looks as if one of the most famous costumed crimefighters of them all is going to meet his end in issue 676 of the long-running comic.

The Times chalks up the event, which begins in April, to DC’s usurped position in the market, noting that the publisher has “opted for a series of cosmological cataclysms that have obliterated and then resurrected entire planets full of characters” in an attempt to compete with Marvel.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 25th, 2008 at 10:13 am and is filed under Comic Books, DC Comics, Industry. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.