Robserecaps Nineteen – episode 51 the DC Dilemma

Posted by Joe on Nov 18, 2020 in Robserecaps | 0 comments

by Joe

I’m delaying this one a day so the site isn’t all the Robbed up. The Rob is joined by friend Jimmy Jay, a west coast retailer to talk all things DC. Go listen to the episode as always!

• the Rob laments Wonder Woman 1984 won’t make it to theaters, but hopes it will show up on HBO Max first
• Even if there wasn’t a pandemic, this has been a tumultuous year for DC
• Jimmy talks about the DC line is hurting, but Tynion’s Batman is ‘Mama’s favorite’ meaning everyone can pick it up and read it
• DC’s more away from Diamond has added more hurdles to getting DC books to brick and mortar stores
• the Rob states DC’s problems go back many years with Paul Levitz (who was EIC at that time) saying DC was the best number 2 company around, no pressure, etc.
• The Rob makes an analogy about the Clippers playing in the same building as the Lakers, they will never been seen as the number one basketball team in LA and how that relates to DC and Marvel
• Jimmy Jay floats a theory that there are too many Marvel fanboys in the direct market that won’t allow DC to overtake Marvel
• in 2010, when Dan Didio came in as publisher, this was the first time DC made a real push to be number one, which is where everything went wrong for DC
• The Rob mentions when Dan took The Rob out to lunch, they went to Morton’s Steakhouse, when Geoff Johns ate with the Rob, they went to El Torrito’s
• The Rob credits Johns with making Green Lantern an A-Lister and with the Brightest Day pitch, Johns came to the Rob to re-launch Hawk & Dove, then Johns kept putting it off to make it part of the New 52
• In front of the New 52, DC did the whole road show for retailers, trying to sell them on this concept with the dog & pony show and according to Jimmy Jay, it worked
• The Rob did not realize how cut throat things between the New 52 books would be, but realizes he was lucky to have Hawk & Dove be in the first week
• The buzz around DC in September/October 2011 was the hottest DC had been since 1986, but by November, it was over
• With Hawk & Dove on the chopping block on the first wave of cancellation, the Rob was offered to turn the sales around on Hawkman, Grifter and Deathstroke
• the next wave of new New 52 books were to be Batman interconnected, at it’s peak, 20 of the 52 monthly books had a tether to Batman
• DC tried to replicate this success of making a family of book with Green Lantern and Superman which nowhere near the success of Batman
• Up until 1986, DC was a Superman company, with upwards to eight books a month tethered to Superman, including Legion, this allowed DC to publish risky and diverse stuff like Camelot 3000 and Swamp Thing, but never would take them to number one
• Marvel, on the other hand, since the 60’s has been building all these different but equal families, like Spider-Man, Avengers, X-Men, Fantastic Four, which now spin out there own families, like Venom
• The Rob states when the Iron Man movie was announced, the Wall Street Journal said to sell the Marvel stock since all they had left was C & D list characters
• The original takes Hollywood has on DC properties, which typically do not line up with current DC Comics is part of the problem
• Like Christian Bale was and Robert Pattinson will be iconic Batmen to a generation, Ben Affleck was on track to be that icon until politics prevented it
• As good as Joker War or Three Jokers are, we are minimally 10 years from seeing anything close to these in a movie
• In 2006, after seeing dailies for the Thor movie, the Rob called Geoff Johns and told them they needed to get started on a New Gods movie ASAP
• The Rob gives credit where credit is due, the DC TV shows on the CW are great, but have little to know licensing, where the big wigs actually care
• DC has a roster of ‘Rocket and Groots’ they are afraid to use
• Looks like there is gonna be a part two on this subject as the Rob closes out the show plugging a Burrito Brothers that just opened up down the road

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