[32] Another important Batman debut was the introduction of the fictional mansion known as Wayne Manor first seen in Detective Comics No. [52] Reportedly, DC ignored the initial success of Marvel with this editorial change until its consistently strengthening sales, albeit also benefiting Independent News' business as their distributor as well, made that impossible. [31] Batman's origin would first be shown in Detective Comics No. [44] This was then followed by a First Wave six-issue limited series with art by Rags Morales[43][44] with the first issue released on March 3, 2010. Rock and the Men of War, Deathstroke, Blackhawks, OMAC, Blue Beetle and Suicide Squad titles. For instance, there was the Doom Patrol series by Arnold Drake, a writer who previously warned the management of the new rival's strength;[55] a superhero team of outsiders who resented their freakish powers,[56] which Drake later speculated was plagiarized by Stan Lee to create The X-Men. While sales were respectable, they did not meet DC management's initially high expectations, and also suffered from a lack of comprehension and internal support from Infantino. [11], First Wave is the name of a separate DC Comics line of comic book featuring a fictional universe and a comic book limited series of the same name. All-Star Superman was considered a landmark series for the Superman character and the creators. [dct 2] The miniseries Crucible began in February 1993 by writers Mark Waid and Brian Augustyn and artist Joe Quesada and was an attempt to relaunch the line, but with sales still lagging, the imprint was instead cancelled. The event introduced the Dark Multiverse concept and the Dark Knights, a villainous team that mixed Batman with other Justice League members. The universe also features an assortment of well-known supervillains such as Lex Luthor, the Joker, the Cheetah, the Reverse-Flash, Black Manta, Sinestro, and Darkseid. In June 2020, Warner Bros. announced a separate DC-themed online-only convention. [dct 3] Additional titles printed were Tom Strong, Promethea and Top 10. Earth One (EO) is a DC Comics graphic novel imprint that features a separate continuity from their main imprint. [citation needed], Edge is a line of DC Comics books that includes the Wildstorm characters. Discovery unit (2018present), In a 19471948 lawsuit field by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster against National, the presiding judge noted in a "Findings of Facts": "DETECTIVE COMICS, INC. was a corporation duly organized and existing under the laws of the State of New York, and was one of the constituent corporations consolidated on September 30, 1946 into defendant NATIONAL COMICS PUBLICATIONS, INC.", Apocryphal legend has it that in 1961, either. basically, like we know, DC buys a lot of comic companies and incorporates their characters into their universe (last example, Wildstorm. The line began with All-Star Batman & Robin the Boy Wonder and All-Star Superman, with All-Star Wonder Woman and All-Star Batgirl announced in 2006 but neither being released nor scheduled as of the end of 2009. [dct 3] In November 1999, the Star Trek comic book began publishing under Wildstorm with a series of one-shots and miniseries. [78][79] The stories in the line were part of its own shared universe.[80]. The world's #2 superhero comics publisher is undergoing a stress test. With the sales of all books included, DC is the second biggest publisher, after Viz Media, and Marvel is third. Fables first spin-off, Jack of Fables, was launched in July 2006 and lasted over 38 issues. . Charlton Comics was an American comic book publisher, noted for its Action Heroes line: Captain Atom, Blue Beetle, the Question, Nightshade, Peacemaker and others. The only DC superhero comics to continue publishing through the 1950s were Action Comics, Adventure Comics, Detective Comics, Batman, Superboy, Superman, Wonder Woman, and World's Finest Comics . While Captain Marvel did not recapture his old popularity, he later appeared in a Saturday morning live action TV adaptation and gained a prominent place in the mainstream continuity DC calls the DC Universe. [dct 2], Helix was a science fiction imprint of DC Comics. The title of the book usually appeared inside the circle, either above or below the letters. New titles were released in March 2017. Furthermore, AT&T spun off WarnerMedia to Discovery, forming Warner Bros. This logo was the first to occupy the top-left corner of the cover, where the logo has usually resided since. We used to have fun ones. DC Ink was a graphic novel imprint for younger readers. DC Comics is one of the largest and oldest American comic book companies, with their first comic under the DC banner being published in 1937. Also, in October, the imprint had its first crossover storyline "The Childrens Crusade", running through the Vertigo annuals with The Children's Crusade "book-end" series. [17], In November 2006, All-Star DC was launched with All-Star Superman and ran 12 issues. [41], The Killing Zone is an upcoming pop-up imprint from DC Comics curated by Geoff Johns, formally announced at San Diego Comic-Con 2018. The universe was a melding of licensed pulp fiction characters with versions of established non-superpowered DC heroes. This was a move the company called the "DC Explosion". The company began to move aggressively against what it saw as copyright-violating imitations from other companies, such as Fox Comics' Wonder Man, which (according to court testimony) Fox started as a copy of Superman. It was founded in 1992 by several high-profile illustrators as a venue for creator-owned properties, in which comics creators could publish material of their own creation without giving up the copyrights to those properties. The letters "DC" were rendered in a block-like typeface that remained through later logo revisions until 2005. The first four titles in the line were Future Quest, Scooby Apocalypse, The Flintstones and Wacky Raceland. DC Comics, American media and entertainment company whose iconic comic -based properties represented some of the most enduring and recognizable characters in 20th- and 21st-century popular culture. DC planned to merge the characters into the DC Universe and tapped writer J. Michael Straczynski to write their introductory stories in the series The Brave and the Bold in 2009. [dct 10], In 2018, Neil Gaiman and Mark Doyle began to oversee a Sandman Universe imprint under the Vertigo banner.[34]. [dci 4], In 2001, DC shut down Paradox Press. The November 1941 DC titles introduced an updated logo. The line was led by Doom Patrol in September, written by Way with art by Nick Derington. For much of its history, the company was colloquially known as DC Comics, but it did not officially adopt that name until 1977. ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS, DRAGONLANCE, FORGOTTEN REALMS . [35] The first issue, introduced in June 1939, helped directly introduce Superman's adoptive parents, Jonathan and Martha Kent, by Siegel and Shuster. This section is about the 2006 DC Comics imprint. Concurrently, DC lost the copyright to "Superboy" (while retaining the trademark) when the heirs of Jerry Siegel used a provision of the 1976 revision to the copyright law to regain ownership. [citation needed], In July 1998, the Cliffhanger comic Danger Girl was licensed out to New Line Cinema for a film adaptation. [63] Obligated by his contract, Kirby created other unrelated series for DC, including Kamandi, The Demon, and OMAC, before ultimately returning to Marvel Comics in 1976. In 2004, DC began laying the groundwork for a full continuity-reshuffling sequel to Crisis on Infinite Earths, promising substantial changes to the DC Universe (and side-stepping the 1994 Zero Hour event which similarly tried to ret-con the history of the DCU). [44], National Allied Publications soon merged with Detective Comics, Inc., forming National Comics Publications on September 30, 1946. The company now referred to itself in its advertising as "Superman-DC". Goodman, a publishing trend-follower aware of the JLA's strong sales, confirmably directed his comics editor, Stan Lee, to create a comic-book series about a team of superheroes. [dct 4], With DC's New 52 reboot in September 2011, the Wildstorm characters were integrated into the DC Universe with the Edge line of titles with a Stormwatch and Grifter title. Image Comics is an American comic book publisher and is the third largest comic book and graphic novel publisher in the industry in both unit and market share. Comics, was a superhero imprint for DC Comics using the Red Circle characters licensed from Archie Comics. DC had its headquarters at 1700 Broadway, Midtown Manhattan, New York City, but DC Entertainment relocated its headquarters to Burbank, California in April 2015. [43] Fawcett Comics was formed around 1939 and would become DC's original competitor company in the next decade. [39][40] Detective Comics No. Furthermore, Kirby intended their stories to be reprinted in collected editions, in a publishing format that was later called the trade paperback, which became a standard industry practice decades later. That commercial situation especially applied with Marvel's superior sell-through percentage numbers which were typically 70% to DC's roughly 50%, which meant DC's publications were barely making a profit in comparison after returns from the distributors were calculated while Marvel was making an excellent profit by comparison. TSR was a DC comic book line based on games licensed from TSR, Inc. Dragonlance was first to be licensed and published with its first issue hitting the stands in August 1988. The first revealed city was Superman's home city, Metropolis, that was originally named in Action Comics No. These changes in policy shaped the future of the medium as a whole, and in the short term allowed DC to entice creators away from rival Marvel, and encourage stability on individual titles. MyComicShop. Issue#1, cover dated June 1938, first featured characters such as Superman by Siegel and Shuster, Zatara by Fred Guardineer and Tex Thompson by Ken Finch and Bernard Baily. Today, CCG serves. Kingdom Come is one of the most well-built alternate worlds in the DC multiverse, a setting that gets its blend of superhero cynicism and faith in humanity just right. DC Black Label is DC Comics' out of continuity all-star creator imprint. Executive Editor Bobbie Chase was given custom comics, DC Kids, Digital First titles, Hanna-Barbera comics, Milestone and the relaunched Wildstorm Universe. [50] featuring artwork by his creator, C. C. Beck. The mid-1980s also saw the end of many long-running DC war comics, including series that had been in print since the 1960s. DC Comics Leaves Its Legacy Behind. Rock, G.I. [dct 2] In September 2004, DC upgraded this line to a full imprint as Johnny DC for the November cover date. [15][18] While superhero comics are what DC Comics is known for throughout modern times, the genres in the first anthology titles consisted of funnies, Western comics and adventure-related stories. [57] There was also the young Jim Shooter who purposely emulated Marvel's writing when he wrote for DC after much study of both companies' styles, such as for the Legion of Super-Heroes feature. In June 1978, five months before the release of the first Superman movie, Kahn expanded the line further, increasing the number of titles and story pages, and raising the price from 35 cents to 50 cents. 1. Way also co-wrote two other books, Mother Panic with Jody Houser, and Cave Carson Has A Cybernetic Eye, with Jon Rivera. Copyright Dark Horse Comics A 12-issue maxiseries titled Tangent: Superman's Reign, written and drawn by Jurgens, ran from March 2008 to March 2009 and revisited the Tangent Universe 10 years later, both in reality and fiction.[6]. Pat McCallum took the DC superhero titles and Mark Doyle the two mature imprints, Vertigo and Young Animal. [dci 2][6] The Comet, by creators Mark Waid and Tom Lyle, was the imprint's longest running title. DC Universe characters returned to the DC imprint in July 2010, thus cancelling a title and effecting a proposed new Swamp Thing series. National did not reimagine its continuing characters (primarily Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman), but radically overhauled them. DC's extended storylines in which Superman was killed, Batman was crippled and superhero Green Lantern turned into the supervillain Parallax resulted in dramatically increased sales, but the increases were as temporary as the hero's replacements. In 1967, Batman artist Infantino (who had designed popular Silver Age characters Batgirl and the Phantom Stranger) rose from art director to become DC's editorial director. [1][16][17] The first publishing of the company debuted with the tabloid-sized New Fun: The Big Comic Magazine #1 (the first of a comic series later called More Fun Comics) with a cover date of February 1935. In addition to moving over his Jinxworld personal imprint to DC from Marvel, Bendis took over writing Superman and Action Comics and later became curator and contributor to a new in DC Universe continuity imprint. DC almost got bought out by Marvel Marvel, WB Back in 1984, DC Comics wasn't doing so hot. The World's Largest Selection of Comic Books, from Batman and Superman comic books to Spiderman and X-Men comics, new and back issues. The final series in the initial line-up was Shade the Changing Girl by Cecil Castellucci and Marley Zarcone, with covers by Becky Cloonan. At that point, "Liebowitz promptly orchestrated the merger of All-American and Detective Comics into National Comics Next he took charge of organizing National Comics, [the self-distributorship] Independent News, and their affiliated firms into a single corporate entity, National Periodical Publications". [dct 4]. Batman was depicted as a masked vigilante wearing a caped suit known as the Batsuit, along with riding a car that would later be referred to as the Batmobile. DC Comics. 16 in September 1939. With the story "Flash of Two Worlds", in Flash No. [dct 4], As part of the DC Entertainment reorganization, DC ended the Zuda imprint in September 2010. Supergirl: Cosmic Adventures in the Eighth Grade began in December 2008. . The comics industry experienced a brief boom in the early 1990s, thanks to a combination of speculative purchasing (mass purchase of the books as collectible items, with intent to resell at a higher value as the rising value of older issues, was thought to imply that all comics would rise dramatically in price) and several storylines which gained attention from the mainstream media. In July 1989, Forgotten Realms began publication. [106], In March 2021, DC relaunched their entire line once again under the banner of Infinite Frontier. [28][29], Starting in 1939, Siegel and Shuster's Superman would be the first comic-derived character to appear outside of comic magazines and later appear in newspaper strips starring himself, which first introduced Superman's biological parents, Jor-El and Lara. As it happened, her first task even before being formally hired, was to convince Bill Sarnoff, the head of Warner Publishing, to keep DC as a publishing concern, as opposed to simply managing their licensing of their properties. DC's first logo appeared on the April 1940 issues of its titles. The site was a competitive-based submission site where users could try to have their feature run the longest to qualify for a print collection. A notable debut in the first issue was Slam Bradley, created in a collaboration between Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster. [8] The majority of its publications takes place within the fictional DC Universe and features numerous culturally iconic heroic characters, such as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Aquaman, Green Lantern, and Cyborg; as well as famous fictional teams including the Justice League, the Justice Society of America, the Justice League Dark, the Doom Patrol, and the Teen Titans. [dci 8] The original purposes of the line was to have stories featuring the characters in their "most identifiable versions as seen by the world outside of comics", but based on the creators recruited, the purpose shifted to the creators' vision. 03 of 06 Dark Horse Comics Star Wars. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. [99][100] However, Bleeding Cool reported that he was fired.[101]. The convention also returned for the virtual premiere of Wonder Woman 1984[104] and once again on October 16, 2021.