I rather wish this was the case, must admit, but since sales are holding up, have to suppose that the majority of readers are happy with what they're getting.
From what I've seen online, my guess is the vast majority are happy. It's not a big group. Comics don't tend to appeal to a broad audience to begin with - about 65% of the Buffy fandom, I'm guessing, probably either hasn't ever bought them or did briefly out of curiousity, got bored and went elsewhere.
Saleswise - they are doing quite well in comparison to other Dark Horse titles - but you have to keep in mind, Dark Horse isn't normally a big seller, and comics are a nitch market, with a very narrow sales margin. From their perspective - they are kicking ass. From our perspective - they aren't, but then we are using different yardsticks of measurment.
Same deal with IDW - from their perspective Spike and Angel are selling rather well, but from ours they aren't.
I have no idea what numbers comics have to bring in to stay viable or to make up for production costs and provide a profit. My guess is at least a million. But it may be alot less than that. Depends on the production cost - but based on sale price alone? I'm guessing they are pretty cheap to put together, nothing like a novel or gasp, a tv show (which can cost over 4 million an episode).
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From what I've seen online, my guess is the vast majority are happy. It's not a big group. Comics don't tend to appeal to a broad audience to begin with - about 65% of the Buffy fandom, I'm guessing, probably either hasn't ever bought them or did briefly out of curiousity, got bored and went elsewhere.
Saleswise - they are doing quite well in comparison to other Dark Horse titles - but you have to keep in mind, Dark Horse isn't normally a big seller, and comics are a nitch market, with a very narrow sales margin. From their perspective - they are kicking ass.
From our perspective - they aren't, but then we are using different yardsticks of measurment.
Same deal with IDW - from their perspective Spike and Angel are selling rather well, but from ours they aren't.
I have no idea what numbers comics have to bring in to stay viable or to make up for production costs and provide a profit. My guess is at least a million. But it may be alot less than that. Depends on the production cost - but based on sale price alone? I'm
guessing they are pretty cheap to put together, nothing like a novel or gasp, a tv show (which can cost over 4 million an episode).