The first issue of the new Justice League, the flagship title of the DC ‘New 52’, received its third printing last week, and so quickly has that been snatched up by retailers, and already there’s a fourth edition with an all new cover ready to go.
Check out the art to your left.
The problem is that comic retailing isn’t sale or return like magazines or newspapers, and ‘selling out’ just means that stores have rinsed the distributor, and they have to place orders over a month in advance. Does Justice League‘s rapid cycling through the print run mean that comic fans are snapping it up, or that the hype and marketing push behind the relaunch has resulted in comic stores overbuying comics they may not be selling? Is the fourth print run of Justice League to cope with the demand from Johnny Q Geek or are they still filling orders from comic stores that were placed in August and adding to the rows and rows of dead stock?
Only time will tell.
