quote:
Sales went up with Byrne and Jurgens, and they've been going down since their work's been invalidated and ignored.
Two words for you: Speculator market.

Everything was selling like hot cakes in the late '80s to mid-'90s because specualtors were expecting to make a big killing on the secondary market. Why do you think so many "event" stories were done during that period? Because the industry was catering to the speculator market. Once the speculators left, the market went bust, and all but one comic book franchise got in step with the times and evolved beyond that period.

The sole franchise that chose to stay mired in the speculator age was Superman. And It's not even trying to grow out of it.

As for Byrne/Jurgens being "ignored" and "invalidated," not even close. "R2K" was nothing but a chicken-shit gimmick that teased people with the promise of a Krypton that was actually worth a damn and ultimately proved to be a bait-and-switch because they didn't have the guts to undo Byrne's work. The timing of the Byrne reissues at the same time Birthright is running invalidates Waid's book completely, something that NEVER would have been done to Byrne back in '86. And the books are still entrenched in the Jurgens-era "dish up a pointless, empty 'event' gimmick and drag it out as long as possible to make it look like an epic" approach to the stories. And the dopey Super-Wimp, Lois-as-bitch, ultra-undefeatable Lex, and over-rigid status quo have all been held over from the Jurgens years to the present day, at the expense of any kind of fresh perspective. Byrne and Jurgens' work is by and large intact, protected from any kind of change.

quote:
How do you explain the books selling so badly today, when they don't have numbered triangles and Superman's origin changes as often as you sneeze, while when they had triangles and the origin was stable sales went up?
(a) See the speculator market.

(b) The linked-triangle format drove readers away as time went on (and it was only retired as of this year). Further, once the books went unlinked, people could see that the emperor wasn't wearing any clothes. Linkage was a gimmick used to disguise the fact that DC had some horrible creators on the books. It's the very reason why Simonson and Bogdanove, perhaps the least-liked creative team in Superman's entire history, were able to stay on the books for 8 years. The format ensured that bad creators would stay on the books and that "event" stories with no substance or meaning would be the order of the day. Once the linkage went, people finally saw just how little DC cares for the Superman line, and since they were no longer FORCED to buy all of the books to follow ONE story (which in itself turned a lot of people away), they now had the option of walking away from crap instead of being forced to accept it just to follow one story.

And as Kilgore said, the very status quo you so violently assert is sacred perfection is the very thing that's turning people away from Superman. But since it's ensuring the downfall of Birthright, that's OK by you, isn't it? Byrne's Superman remains unchallenged, innovation, freshness, and respect for the character's entire history gets stamped out, and you get the exact same gruel recycled over and over again just as you wanted. You get to keep Superman perpetually stale and stagnant, and the rest of us end up losing. So enjoy yourself. DC's catering to you and your fellow Byrne/Jurgens zealots and screwing everyone else over. The way things are going, they might as well cancel Birthright now and be done with it. It's not going to be allowed a fair shake, it won't be allowed to revitalize the monthly books, and DC certainly doesn't have the brains to at least make it an "Ultimate Superman" book. Waid and Yu should just cut their losses and walk away. They're just killing themselves on this project for no reason.