Editor: Apparently I missed our original piece about the offer, in which Albert pointed out last July’s offer of Marvel for Marvel:
“Marvel offered retailers a very similar deal in January 2010, with a Siege #3 variant offered for Blackest Night tie-in books. Last July, they offered their own unsold comics as part of the program.”
So there you go. Still weird, though!
I admit, the whole “Tear off your Flashpoint tie-in covers to get a Fear Itself variant” thing has kind of left me cold; the “How could Marvel do that?” aspect is gone, because they did it before with Blackest Night and it’s the kind of cheap stunt that only really works in terms of PR shock once, and at least the McGuinness cover is better than the terrible Deadpool variant they offered for Siege way back when. But I was interested to see Tom Brevoort say this over on Twitter, in response to a fan complaining that Marvel should’ve offered the variant for returned Fear Itself tie-ins:
We’ve done this with Marvel books in the past too, but nobod[y] covers that because it’s not provocative.
Two things:
1. Isn’t the provocative nature the entire point of this offer? Complaining that people are covering it because it’s provocative feels as false as claiming that this is only being done to help retailers (which it can do, sure, but it’s really a PR exercise, let’s face it).
2. Has Marvel really done this in the past with Marvel books? I don’t remember any such offer offhand, but I’m sure someone out there will remember if it’s happened. To be clear: I’m asking whether Marvel has previously publicly announced a variant edition of one of their books in exchange for stripped covers of their own books as specified by title and issue, not just whether Marvel has offered variants in exchange for hitting specific order levels or whatever. Any retailers out there who can help me out here?
July 28th, 2011 at 12:56 pm
I’m a retailer and I can’t remember Marvel ever doing this. For the record I think this industry could use a shit ton less mediocre variant covers and more attention to quality and the future health of the comics industry over all.
Offering variants for stripped covers of a competitor is silly.
Tell you what Marvel, why not really help me out by not trying to get me to crowd my shelves with poop and instead stream line your line so your true talent can shine. You ‘Architects” are doing stellar work but you keep producing “hosing projects” around their stellar downtown condos.
FIX THAT before taking cheap shots at the other guy across town.
July 28th, 2011 at 1:47 pm
It’s very weird to me that the company that has the largest market share in comics does nothing but take potshots at DC over things that Marvel has done in the past. It’s really shameful to see Marvel writers and artists dumping on DC’s move when in a few months they’ll do the same thing.
Breevort’s exhortation that “Marvel doesn’t need to renumber books” in response to DC’s news, and then a MONTH LATER, renumbers Uncanny X-Men.
I’m tired of it. Quite frankly, the three or so stores I try and visit each month there are barely any Flashpoint tie-ins sitting on shelves, but a ton of Fear Itself books.
July 28th, 2011 at 2:49 pm
Don’t forget the re-numbering starting with the new Hulk title and a possible new Avengers #1 next year. Marvel’s shots at DC over the new 52 are very hypocritical. I don’t honestly blame Tom B for these promotions though, I believe that David Gabriel has more to do with it. And variant covers….and $3.99 prices. Tom B just has to spin it to make DC look bad.
July 30th, 2011 at 3:28 pm
I’ve sold out of almost every Flashpoint comic I’ve ordered (10-40 each, depending on the series). Compared to Fear Itself, where I ordered each spin-off to meet my pull lists. Many I didn’t need to order at all, as there was no interest in the spin-offs, just the core series itself.
Marvel likes to flood the market with utter crap to take up shelf space of retailers dumb enough to assume that anything with the Marvel logo means sales. I order extras of their core 20 or so comics for my shelf and the rest are for my pull list customers. This kind of stunt makes it easy to push DC and the others.