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In the following excerpt posted on Rich's CBR column: linky , a hidden sources named Felicia makes some pretty bold statements about the future of Marvel. To cut and paste a bit:
"Bill Jemas' view of comics is not that of an established, respectable means capable of attaining it's deserved public acclaim. He has attempted, through past efforts, to help 'validate comics' by approximating them as close as possible to the other magazines in newsstands. Larger in size, change of paper quality and density and even the art, in his eyes, should be produced in a photoshopesque manner in order to achieve an illusion with the ultimate means of mimicking the look and feel of 'real skin' portrayed in periodicals such as Maxim and Stuff.
""The problem with this, of course, is that comics are not these magazines. They have, in the opinion of many, been the product of the labor of long lineage of intellects who breathed the life and culture already existing in the flame that we know today. To try and change or rearrange the configuration of this flame into some kind of money-making based scheme for simple marketing appeal and perspective, a very shallow and skewed one at that, is to say or to the least hint that the geniuses that laid out the foundation of comics, men and women of legend, were simply the gears and cogs not necessarily consequential to the product which resulted in the medium and base market that supports it today.
"Marvel's total base income from their publishing division accounts for an average or nearly 5% of total current income. This means that they are currently making most of their money from things such as licensing and movies. This also means that, comics, the very lifeblood of the previous two, from a financial perspective is nearly irrelevant for the economic potency the company currently possesses. Which is the reason why Marvel's owners, Isaac Perlmutter and/or Avi Arad, are looking into either: A) Shutting the publishing branch down completely and simply license property out or B) Selling the company, all of it's intellectual property to either Universal or Sony.
""Bill Jemas has subscribed to completely unconventional ideals, a religion if you will, of how to go about cementing the future of Marvel. In order to cut down on what, in his opinion, may be unnecessary expenses of both time and money and in an effort to admonish risk venture in individual titles, Bill is planning to slowly, but surely, replace every highly paid, respected creator, every talent that may be a 'headache' or may not hand in work on a timely fashion, but is still popular, every writer, artist or employee that may perhaps be a burden more than a blessing, financially or any other way, with an individual who will not be a required element or investment in their future and will have no interest in the full market potential of intellectual property. In other words, he wants people that will sell out cheap or at least people that they can milk for ideas.... and they are finding them. "
Big old etc. The article is huge and goes into many crannies of rumor without really substantiating any facts and urging readers to look into the matter. BUT one bit resounded for me. The Epic line could be an easy out for Marvel to save money... but to replace expensive comics written by talent (subjective ofcourse) with cheap comics written by unknowns is a crazy idea... to you or me.
I know I was shocked to learn that my boss had no idea what email was how it worked, etc and even moreso when I left my job after she pitched it to me as everything I hated to do for less money... My point being that idiots drive the car a lot of the time. Maybe they ARE thinking along the lines Felicia draws here.
I dunno.
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