Jim Lee Confirms DC Comics Will Remain In The Business Of Publishing Comic Books Moving Forward

Jim Lee Confirms DC Comics Will Remain In The Business Of Publishing Comic Books Moving Forward

There's been speculation that AT&T is looking to get out of the comic business, but publisher Jim Lee has now debunked those claims, while also sharing a big announcement about the Caped Crusader's future.

By JoshWilding - Aug 17, 2020 12:08 PM EST
Filed Under: DC Comics
Source: The Hollywood Reporter

When AT&T bought WarnerMedia, there was a lot of speculation that DC Comics could be sold off. Rumour had it they were looking to get out of the comic book business, a move that's not overly surprising considering the fact it's not an overly profitable business compared to merchandising and movies/TV shows adapting those stories. 

Joker proved that Warner Bros. doesn't need the source material to tell an effective story with characters from that world, so could we be nearing the end of DC Comics? No, according to Jim Lee.

"I don’t think they want to stop us from publishing comics," he tells The Hollywood Reporter. "Comics serve a lot of different purposes and one of them is it’s a great way to incubate ideas and creating the next great franchises. We want to continue that. Why would you want to stop that? Why would you want to stop creating great content that could be used across the greater enterprise?"

The trade later put one particularly silly question to the publisher when they asked about the rumour DC Comics will start only selling trades and original graphic novels, making a deal with Marvel Comics to take charge of characters like Batman and Superman. "There is nothing further from the truth in that," Lee laughed. "I don’t know where you would even connect those dots. Why would we ever do that?"

Lee would later prove that work will continue as normal at DC Comics, but pointed out that those titles which haven't been selling well or have made a loss are going to be scrapped. However, there's lots to still look forward too, including a Batman miniseries from Oscar-winning writer John Ridley (12 Years a Slave). He says that, "It will have a huge impact on the rest of the line."

So, big changes are taking place at DC Comics, but they're perhaps not as big as some believe...

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THEDARKKNIGHT1939
THEDARKKNIGHT1939 - 8/17/2020, 12:04 PM
Couldn't have said it better myself. What a ridiculous thought. These are hugely popular characters. It's in no one's best interest for them to just stop producing comics.
dracula
dracula - 8/17/2020, 12:05 PM
DC will be fine, remember that Marvel actually went bankrupt in the 90's and did bounce back
marvel72
marvel72 - 8/17/2020, 1:35 PM
@dracula - I don't think they went bankrupt. They would have if they didn't sell their movie rights and I believe I heard somewhere that Joe Quesada put in $20 million.

I maybe wrong but I think it played out like that.
lawndart
lawndart - 8/17/2020, 1:58 PM
@marvel72 -
On December 27, 1996 Marvel filed for bankruptcy in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. The company was losing money hand-over-fist. Worse, it owed money (coincidentally, its highest debt, $1.7 million, was owed to Disney). Over one-third of Marvel employees were laid off.
GeneralZod
GeneralZod - 8/17/2020, 2:10 PM
@marvel72 - They definitely filed for BKY and they were very close to having their core IP sold to multiple buyers -- the loss of Spidey film rights to Sony (and FF and X-Men to Fox) was just scratching the surface of what really could have been. There is a fantastic book on the Marvel debacle of the mid-90s that is worth reading:

https://www.amazon.com/Comic-Wars-Tycoons-Battled-Empire/dp/0767908309

@dracula
@lawndart
lawndart
lawndart - 8/17/2020, 2:54 PM
@GeneralZod - Marvel also over expanded in the early 90s before the market tanked. The financial woes As well as selling off the film rights Is why we still have issues with getting some characters in the MCU to this day.
bcom
bcom - 8/17/2020, 3:51 PM
@dracula - I remember watching an interview with one of the producers of the first Iron Man movie. Apparently at the time things were so tight that the MCU was a make or break plan for Marvel. If Iron Man was a failure then Marvel would've likely been dead and buried.
Himura
Himura - 8/17/2020, 5:12 PM
@dracula - So you're saying DC should sell the movie rights to some of their most popular characters and then buy them back in 15 years?
dracula
dracula - 8/17/2020, 5:18 PM
@Himura - no, AT&T might be screwing with DC, but at least they arent going bankrupt. If Marvel can come back from bankruptcy then DC can come back from this misstep easily
Himura
Himura - 8/17/2020, 5:47 PM
@dracula - my sarcasm doesnt come off well through text lol
MarvelDCAllDay
MarvelDCAllDay - 8/17/2020, 12:10 PM
Heard they’re bringing Milestone back into the fold too. My boy Static needs some love.
dracula
dracula - 8/17/2020, 12:16 PM
@MarvelDCAllDay - Assuming Tony Isabella calms down, how about a Static/Black Lightning crossover
Superspecialawesomeguy
Superspecialawesomeguy - 8/17/2020, 12:21 PM
@MarvelDCAllDay - Wasn't there supposed to be some form of relauch to happen I think a year or two ago? I haven't heard anything about it since.

MarvelDCAllDay
MarvelDCAllDay - 8/17/2020, 12:27 PM
@dracula - In the television universe?
dracula
dracula - 8/17/2020, 12:30 PM
@MarvelDCAllDay - Both, people would love to see them team up in live action and the comics. Almost happened in the Static animated series, but legal issues stopped it from happening. Black Lightning was replaced with Soul Power.

NicolausCopernicus
NicolausCopernicus - 8/17/2020, 12:13 PM
The comic book industry, specially the big two, its paying the price of not keeping up with the times for years now. COVID only made things change faster
comic book shops will endure the same fate as video stores.
comic MAGAZINES probably will die as well, by that meaning the current obsolete production model
($5 for a 30 page magazine with ads that comes out once a month and it takes you like 20 minutes to read its archaic at this point, considering that you can purchase a monthly subscription to a streaming service with hundreds of hours of content for the same amount of money)
I guess that the future of the industry most likely will shift to a model similar to streaming services, a flat monthly rate (instrad of purchasing each comic individually like comixology) that grants you access to a library of digital comics, including new releases that will be published directly on digital. And then only the best of the new stuff would be printed to a trade paper back directly
I´m confident on that Comic Books as narrative medium will survive.
TheUnworthyThor
TheUnworthyThor - 8/17/2020, 12:32 PM
@NicolausCopernicus - If that’s what people want why isn’t Marvel Unlimited bigger and why is DC Universe on it’s last legs?
Nightwing1015
Nightwing1015 - 8/17/2020, 1:08 PM
@TheUnworthyThor - tbf, it's possible that, financially, DC Universe may be perfectly profitable. It's probably just that they want to get all their content under one banner (HBO Max).
TheUnworthyThor
TheUnworthyThor - 8/17/2020, 1:30 PM
@Nightwing1015 - I don’t know about profitability but all the estimates have the number of subscribers as being quite low, and that’s with them having exclusive live action and animated DC content, take that away and it doesn’t sound like something comic book readers were flocking to as the new way to read comics.
GeneralZod
GeneralZod - 8/17/2020, 2:04 PM
@NicolausCopernicus - $5 for a 30-page magazine that, in 2020, takes about 5 minutes to read. The value proposition is terrible, which is another problem with the medium.
Ha1frican
Ha1frican - 8/17/2020, 12:13 PM
I mean what else would they do... they make comic books lol
dracula
dracula - 8/17/2020, 12:20 PM

best heroes there are
TheUnworthyThor
TheUnworthyThor - 8/17/2020, 12:29 PM
Sure they’ll continue to make comic books. But far less of them. You can’t fire so much staff and continue to put the same about of content. They’ve already cancelled too many good titles. They’ll just continue the trend of turning DC into the Batman Comics Universe. :(
Superspecialawesomeguy
Superspecialawesomeguy - 8/17/2020, 1:46 PM
@TheUnworthyThor - Bruh they really cancelled Hawkman, Hellblazer & Suicide Squad.


TheUnworthyThor
TheUnworthyThor - 8/17/2020, 2:00 PM
@Superspecialawesomeguy -
n1ghtw1ng2832
n1ghtw1ng2832 - 8/17/2020, 12:30 PM
Either way these characters will live on forever in one form or another. DC FOREVER
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