Grant Morrison is back on Batman. Post Malone is heading to comics with Big Rig for Vault. Marvel is up in market share, but at the expense of smaller publishers.
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Episode Transcript:
Grant Morrison back on Batman.
Post Malone heads to comics.
Marvel ups market share.
This is Comic Book Club News for April 22, 2025.
Grant Morrison Is Back On Batman:
Grant Morrison is returning to write Batman! Or at least, a “Batman thing.”
The news comes via the Comic Book Couples Counseling Podcast, which talked to Morrison for last week’s Superman Day. When asked whether they would ever return to write Superman, Morrison said, “I never say never. I have no ideas right now, but I just actually took on a job that I wasn’t expecting, you know, because I don’t need to do these things anymore. I only do it if it’s something interesting. It’s not Superman, but it’s a Batman thing. And I didn’t ever think I’d go back. But if someone comes to me with something good and it just strikes a spark and it starts a fire, then of course I’ll do it, you know, so I’m not writing it off.”
This lines up with news from Morrison’s Substack, where they announced they were coming back for a Big Two book, that they called a “unlikely comic book team-up project… with an artist I love dearly.”
So now we know that one half of that team-up is Batman, and the other half almost definitely isn’t Superman. Who will it be? And will the artist be Frank Quitely, as the duo have been working on something together for a good long time? More on this as it develops.
Post Malone Heads To Comics With Big Rig For Vault:
Post Malone, best known for his delicious new OREO flavor, is moving from the world of cookies to comics with Big Rig, a new limited series launching later this year from Vault Comics.
Per Major Spoilers, the new book is written by Malone and Adrian Wassel, with art by Nathan Gooden, and is pitched as “Evil Dead meets Mad Max: Fury Road in this story set in medieval Europe, where the only thing standing in the way of the horde of demons infesting the continent is a mysterious armored 18-wheeler seemingly sent from the heavens.”
Sweetening the pot, each issue will have “randomly distributed variant covers,” including ones by Daniel Warren Johnson, Peach Momoko, Tula Lotay, and more. And you may not be surprised to learn that as the limited series is released, Post Malone, Vault, and Platinum Dunes will also be developing it as a movie.
Big Rig #1 will hit stores on July 9, 2025, though you can get a preview on Free Comic Book Day. Post Malone’s OREOs are available in stores now. Grocery stores, though, not comic book stores.
Marvel Ups Market Share At Beginning Of 2025, Smaller Pubs Dip:
In direct defiance of the maxim that a rising tide lifts all boats, Marvel grew its market share in the first quarter of 2025, at the expense of multiple smaller publishers.
The news comes via ICv2, who notes that whereas DC gained ground on rival Marvel at the end of 2024, Marvel clapped back, growing to 37.9% of the comic book market, up 4.6 points. However, DC only dropped 1.4% to 25.5% of the market, meaning Marvel didn’t impact DC so much as, well, nearly everyone else.
While Image Comics stayed steady at 12% of the market, IDW fell to 3.9%, Dark Horse to 3.6%, BOOM! Studios dropped to 2.5%, and even the market share for everyone who didn’t make the Top 10 dropped from 9.7% to 8.6%. All of that points to a big win for Marvel, and a net loss for everyone else. Which, not to editorialize too much, is a net loss not just for those companies, but the comic book industry, and comic book stores as well.
Does this mean Marvel should try to be a less successful business? Of course not. But customers and store owners need to make choices about what they purchase, and Marvel flooding the zone with product makes those choices much harder. Perhaps for the good of the comic book industry, some of those choices could involve balancing out which publishers get your hard-earned dollars.
For Comic Book Club News, I’m Alex Zalben. And next time, think about whether you really need that fifth Deadpool title being released this week? Just an idea.
Got tips or stories you’d like us to cover? Email us at comicbookclublive@gmail.com.
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