God save the shade!

[MechanicalClavicles]

So, you haven't been reading James Robinson's excellent SHADE mini-series??? Not "the changing man" --- The Master of the Stygian Darkness.

Now would be a good time to start, says Robot 6.

The Beat says that the series debuted to 30,000+ sales in October, which might not be good enough to make it all the way through to issue 12, the planned final issue.

Know any lapsed Starman fans? I'd be willing to bet that there are thousands of them (former Gen X slackers, I'd wager!) who have no clue that The Shade is back (it's been nigh unto a decade since Starman ended, you know). Now might be the time to phone up those folks and let them know that it's time to boost The Shade much the same as Starman's fan base rallied to support Jack Knight during his low-selling early days in the DCU. Ah, the good old days..

Pre-orders for Shade #3 and #4 are on the horizon.

Issues 1 and 2 are out now.

[Joe Kalicki]

DC gave Robinson a special contract giving him control of Jack Knight, and chose to give his series the deluxe hardcover treatment, a rarity for non-Vertigo work. I can't imagine any scenario besides his death that would leave this series unfinished.

[MechanicalClavicles]

Trolling for press, then?

Old DC may have given Robinson contracts and hardcovers and Entertainment Weekly space, but this is New DC and these aren't the good old days, I'd wager.

*1000th post

[Joe Kalicki]

Trolling for press, then?

Old DC may have given Robinson contracts and hardcovers and Entertainment Weekly space, but this is New DC and these aren't the good old days, I'd wager.

*1000th post

Maybe being a little dramatic to boost sales. Perhaps he knows the cancellation threshold for ongoing books and worries this might have the same standards, but I would be shocked if this book ends before issue 12 regardless of sales. I suspect DC has more long-term plans for it beyond its monthly installments.

Though I do think everyone should buy it anyway.

[Grendel]

The first 2 issues are great. And I didn't even read Starman back in the day. Always meant to.

[MechanicalClavicles]

Getting the 1997 Gene Ha series reprinted might be a good move for DC? It's only been available in those $50 hardcovers, never in paperback. It's also possibly Robinson's finest comic, so why not bring it back for a new generation of readers? Hmm??

[MechanicalClavicles]

A late Sunday opinion on The Shade (and industry lunacy) from Comics Should Be Good.

"DC decided to publish a mini-series about a villain who hasn’t appeared regularly in a series in a decade. They decided to publish this by a writer whose most recent work in comics has been vilified, and a lot of people in comics who weren’t reading comics in 1990s wonder why anyone would enjoy this guy’s work.. They decided to publish this as a 12-issue mini-series, which is fairly ambitious considering the first two points. They decided to publish this very soon after a highly-publicized “soft” reboot of their entire line in which the foundations of this mini-series (the JSA, for instance) were wiped away. They decided to publish this in single issues when they have recently published the series out of which it was generated in handy, giant-sized hardcover formats (according to Brian Hibbs, the smaller, softcover Starman trades are out of print, so there is that). And now they’re surprised when sales of the single issues might not be as strong as they thought? Really, DC? How tone deaf are the people running that company?"

[Joe Kalicki]

I'm pretty sure they're publishing it for two reasons, 1)As a favor to James Robinson, who they consider an elite creator and who has presumably made them a lot of money, and 2)For the later collections that they'll be able to sell, considering its tie to the presumably well-selling Starman.

[tony ingram]

I don't care why they're publishing it, as long as they are publishing it. it's now the only non Vertigo DC title I'm buying, at least until the JSA return.

[Joe Kalicki]

I just don't like when people "DC doesn't know what they're doing," as if all these people are such marketing geniuses themselves, and they know what will sell and what they could make money off of for years, or anything really about why DC comes to the decisions they do.