Comichron released the November 2017 estimated sales in December and the main Star Wars surprisingly cracked the top 10 books for the month. I'm surprised because Marvel has been making a lot of noise about their return to legacy numbering, but apparently, that proved to be a one month blip and not an ongoing bump as I had imagined. Marvel only had two books place in the top 10, Captain America #695 in 8th place and Star Wars #38 in 10th place. The main Star Wars title is Marvel's top selling ongoing title for another month! DC's Doomsday Clock mini-series takes the top 2 places and the Batman one-shots, ongoing, and annual fill out the remaining top 10 positions. IDW's Star Wars Adventures all-age title continued it's tumble in November.
Marvel
| Title | Monthly Rank | Estimated Sales | Last Estimated Sales | Percent Change | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Star Wars | 38 | 10 | 73,885 | 65,606 | +12.62 |
| Star Wars | 39 | 24 | 56,125 | 73,885 | -24.04 |
| Darth Vader | 7 | 26 | 53,552 | 56,594 | -5.38% |
| Darth Vader | 8 | 25 | 53,696 | 53,552 | +0.27% |
| Doctor Aphra | 14 | 60 | 33,157 | 34,405 | -3.63% |
| Jedi Republic - Mace Windu | 4 | 64 | 30,630 | 33,453 | -8.44% |
| Poe Dameron | 21 | 72 | 29,451 | 31,045 | -5.13% |
The main Star Wars title double shipped in November. The good news is Kieron Gillen's first issue, Star Wars #38, saw an increase in estimated sales of over 12% or 8,000 units. The bad news is issue #39 fell over 24% or 18,000 units. If you look at the average sales of both issues, each sold approximately 65,005 units and, when compared to the previous month's estimated unit sales of 65,606, that is insignificant. But, Star Wars #38 used a variant, incentive, and exclusive cover to help boost sales. I questions whether or not that practice is good for long term sales or not. Where this can be a problem is if sales for Star Wars #40 do not rebound from the 56,125 units sold for issue #39. We will know in a few short days when the numbers for December are available.
The Darth Vader title also double shipped. Darth Vader #7 sees the start of a new arc starring Jocasta Nu, the librarian from the Jedi Temple in the prequel movies. Darth Vader #7 saw another 5% drop in estimated units sold and Darth Vader #8 sold approximately the same number of units.
The ongoing Doctor Aphra and Poe Dameron both continue to slowly bleed sales this month. Looking back 6 months, Doctor Aphra has lost about 10,000 unit sales and Poe Dameron has lost about 3,000 unit sales. Rumor is the ongoing Poe Dameron title may be ending with issue #24 to be replaced by another title. Considering Poe Dameron sells better than many Marvel superhero titles and Poe Dameron has been fairly consistent in its sales, I'm not convinced it makes sense to end the title.
Jedi Republic - Mace Windu #4 continues to bleed buyers with only one more issue left to this mini-series.
| Month/Year | Total Estimated Sales | # Issues | Average Sale per Issue |
|---|---|---|---|
| January 2015 | 985,976 | 1 | 985,976 |
| February 2015 | 526,451 | 3 | 175,484 |
| March 2015 | 596,299 | 4 | 149,075 |
| April 2015 | 537,812 | 4 | 134,453 |
| May 2015 | 324,835 | 3 | 108,278 |
| June 2015 | 396,931 | 4 | 99,232 |
| July 2015 | 597,023 | 5 | 119,404 |
| August 2015 | 430,241 | 5 | 86,048 |
| September 2015 | 551,880 | 5 | 110,376 |
| October 2015 | 953,289 | 10 | 95,329 |
| November 2015 | 1,003,954 | 8 | 125,494 |
| December 2015 | 507,545 | 6 | 84,591 |
| January 2016 | 465,698 | 5 | 93,139 |
| February 2016 | 288,355 | 4 | 72,088 |
| March 2016 | 355,554 | 5 | 71,110 |
| April 2016 | 533,976 | 5 | 106,795 |
| May 2016 | 299,189 | 4 | 74,797 |
| June 2016 | 545,833 | 6 | 90,972 |
| July 2016 | 359,166 | 5 | 71,833 |
| August 2016 | 322,499 | 5 | 64,500 |
| September 2016 | 174,420 | 3 | 58,140 |
| October 2016 | 339,778 | 5 | 67,956 |
| November 2016 | 269,975 | 5 | 53,995 |
| December 2016 | 303,886 | 4 | 75,972 |
| January 2017 | 161,014 | 3 | 53,671 |
| February 2017 | 262,889 | 4 | 65,722 |
| March 2017 | 214,603 | 4 | 53,650 |
| April 2017 | 274,262 | 5 | 54,852 |
| May 2017 | 285,363 | 6 | 47,560 |
| June 2017 | 495,588 | 9 | 55,065 |
| July 2017 | 326,062 | 7 | 46,580 |
| August 2017 | 425,473 | 9 | 47,274 |
| September 2017 | 418,023 | 9 | 46,447 |
| October 2017 | 299,174 | 7 | 42,739 |
| November 2017 | 330,496 | 7 | 47,214 |
The average sale per issue of 47,214 would rank 36th on the top 300 chart for the month of November. Marvel's Star Wars trade paperbacks, reprints, and reorders are not accounted for with these numbers. The Star Wars trade paperbacks are strong sellers.
IDW
| Title | Monthly Rank | Estimated Sales | Last Estimated Sales | Percent Change | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Star Wars Adventures | 4 | 135 | 15,917 | 23,739 | -32.95% |
Star Wars Adventures tumbled again in November, losing nearly 1/3rd of the sales from the previous month. IDW's next best selling issue is Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Ghostbuster II #1 with 12,787 estimated unit sales and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles #76 is very close behind with 12,258 unit sales. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles brand has been very important to IDW and they have published more issues of the ongoing title than any other publisher including Archie. Can Star Wars be just as important to IDW with Marvel also publishing titles at the same time?
Let's look at the last month Dark Horse published Star Wars pamphlet sized comics in August 2014:
| Title | Monthly Rank | Estimated Sales | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Star Wars | 20 | 84 | 26,645 |
| Star Wars: Darth Maul - Son of Dathomir | 4 | 142 | 15,522 |
| Star Wars: Legacy II | 18 | 163 | 12,234 |
Star Wars Adventures #4 has unit sales in line with Dark Horse's Star Wars line at the end. These numbers are pretty typical for Dark Horse going back for several years prior to their final month of publishing. I would think IDW will be happy with sales of their main Star Wars title, so long as those sales remain at or above those of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, but it isn't clear if that will be the case.
IDW is publishing several one-shots in January 2018 based on the Forces of Destiny sub-brand. I expect we will see sales in the 15,000 - 25,000 range for these one-shots. IDW might need to experiment like Dark Horse did when they first acquired the Star Wars license. An anthology title might not be the best indicator of potential sales; they should try putting out ongoing titles featuring specific characters to see if anything sticks. Since they seem willing and able to publish stories based on characters from the new movies, it might make sense for them to publish an ongoing title based on them.
| Month/Year | Total Estimated Sales | # Issues | Average Sale per Issue |
|---|---|---|---|
| September 2017 | 81,318 | 2 | 40,659 |
| October 2017 | 23,739 | 1 | 23,739 |
| November 2017 | 15,917 | 1 | 15,917 |
Take a look at the Star Wars Sales Estimates Charts and please read the blog posting November 2017 Comics Order Estimates: Doomsday Clock #1 near 239k copies.
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