NEW UNIVERSE AT DC COMICS

At DC, a universe-altering re-organization that has been in the works for some time was announced, pushed forward, no doubt, by the Disney’s acquiring Marvel last fall. At Publishers Weekly, Heidi MacDonald reported that “the home of Superman and Batman will become part of a larger division called DC Entertainment, to be run by WB branding veteran Diane Nelson. The new arm is charged with expanding opportunities for DC's huge library of characters into other media, including feature films, television, interactive entertainment, direct-to-consumer platforms and consumer products. Nelson, who has been successfully handling the Harry Potter franchise at WB for the last 10 years, is looking to hire a new publisher who will take Paul Levitz’ place to oversee DC's comics business.” Paul Levitz, who will be stepping down as DC’s president and publisher to make room for Nelson, will continue his relationship with DC as a consultant, and he will also pursue writing projects for the company.

The new configuration is expected to position DC better to compete with long-time rival Marvel now that the latter has acquired Disney clout. “While Marvel and DC have been four-color comics publishing rivals since the early 1960s, the stakes have intensified in recent years as superhero-based movies have flexed their superpowers at the box office. Warner/DC's ‘The Dark Knight’ is the all-time #2 money winner, but the recent Superman reboot stumbled, and a Wonder Woman movie has been in the concept stages for years. Meanwhile, Marvel successfully launched the little-known Iron Man into a top franchise, and Spider-Man has three blockbusters in his web. Now it's Warners' turn to start mining the DC library of properties and characters, with Nelson in a position to help the entire studio develop DC's properties across various platforms.”

And DC’s roster is more varied than Marvel’s, including non-superhero creations like Jonah Hex and the Losers. Comics scripting veteran Marv Wolfman, who is currently collaborating with Warner Studios on as yet unnamed projects, elaborated for MacDonald: "The bulk of DC's characters aren't superheroes; over the last 70 years they've developed mystery and horror materials and children's comics." This could be even more important down the road, if superhero movies prove to be as cyclical as other once-popular movie genres. "You could take a lot of the other DC characters and succeed with them," says Wolfman, pointing to the huge library of concepts and characters at DC's Vertigo imprint as one example. According to Wolfman, print publishing as the engine for character creation is still key, even for giant movie corporations like Disney and Warner Brothers. "Profits may come from other mediums, but it's the comics that generate the characters. I think you're going to see continued emphasis on the comics because, frankly, it's a very easy way of discovering what characters you have and telling really fascinating stories."