Bob Loblaw Law Blog

wakabamm asked: I am so confused by your guys method of numbering stuff these days. Do comics with higher numbers actually turn readers away? It never bothered me when I started reading Uncanny X-Men around issue 300. Of course, I mentioning this because the new Wolverine #1 with the same writer and continued story from the previous volume.

brevoortformspring:

The way comics are read and produced is changing, and so too is the way that they are numbered. And at the end of the day, like it or not, it’s the audience that really determines things like this. A new #1 inevitably, invariably increases the sales on a book, whereas a #whatever doesn’t. And the same story with the same art but a #1 will inevitably, invariably sell better than it will with a #30 or a #570 or what-have-you. You’ve shown us this time and again—and so we’re changing the way we think about issue numbering. And really, most magazines and publications don’t carry serial numbering at all, so it’s a stylistic convention of comics going back to the earliest days. I understand the comfort and familiarity of it, but at the end of the day, comfort and familiarity won’t keep the lights on at Marvel HQ.