First off, happy Hanukkah!
The Top 300 Comics for December 2002 is out, and Aquaman #1 is gratifyingly high on the list. My favorite swimmer debuts at #34, which is considerably higher than I've seen him since I started paying attention to such lists. For those of you who don't know what this means... you already know that comics are ordered by comic shops two months in advance, right? This list is just the top 300 comics by those pre-orders. It doesn't include any re-ordering activity. For a first issue, it basically is just an indication of how confident stores are that it will sell.
The real interesting numbers will be on Aquaman #3 and #4, after retailers have seen how well Aquaman actually does sell. At that point, we'll have a general idea of how many readers this series will have. Also in about two months, we should get a list of "actual" sales from Diamond. Those numbers for Aquaman #1 will include re-orders.
Early guessimates of where this rank puts Aquaman in actual sales (ie, number of copies sold through Diamond Distributors) are around 40,000-45,000. At the height of the Peter David run, he was barely topping 30,000 (and in the Silver Age, he was cancelled when his sales dropped under 150,000). I suppose these numbers are actually quite meaningless, but it's interesting to look at, nonetheless.
If you want a nice, inexpensive way to keep me happy, go out and buy a copy of Aquaman #1 (when it comes out December 11th) and either read it, or give it to someone who will. I'd like the sell-through to be high on this book, so DC will keep publishing it. I'd like this series to get over issue 100. It's only $2.50, and Rick Veitch is reportedly a very good writer. Give it a shot.
Moving on...
There is an interesting article about Jay Hosler on Dirk Deppey's Journalista, with a link to a New York Times article about Hosler's works. Good stuff, as I've said before.
There's also a Pulse article on Girl Genius. It had some spoilers, so I didn't read the entire thing, preferring to be surprised as the issues come out.
Thanks to my little sister, I saw a movie last night. It had some witches and wizards and giant spiders... here's a rapid review:
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets: I like the book better. That's almost a given, all things considered. Taken on its own, as a sequel to the first movie, it's pretty darn good. Great characters, plenty of action... you almost forget how long the movie is! I'm still going to wait a couple of decades for the definitive mini-series adaptation of the books, but until then, this will certainly do. 4 starfish.
And lastly, the shop got in some 12-sided dice that are numbered 0-10, with a crown on one side. The vendor says that they are "Portuguese Joker Dice" but I can't find a game to go with them, even on-line. Anyone know what these dice are used for? I'd like to be able to tell people who are curious. They are neat, and I plan to add them to my collection some time, but what are they?
Tonight: Why I like Aquaman, the essay.
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