Yesterday, Paul Cornell confirmed what had been rumored for some time – Captain Britain and MI: 13 were getting the axe by Marvel.
Lastly, and this is really important, while we didn’t know this would be the last arc until comparatively recently, I had it in mind that it was possible it would be from the time I started plotting it. Indeed, the end of this arc marks the end of what I had planned for the book when I started. One of the images right at the finish is what I always felt I was heading towards, and I’m very pleased I got there. So: you will get a real, thorough, proper, ending, not just of ‘Vampire State’, but of the whole run. It hasn’t been rushed to fit the space, it hasn’t been compromised, it won’t just suddenly cut off: it’s what I intended.I think the Annual and the two remaining issues finish off one of my best stories in any media, and that story is actually the entirety of Captain Britain and MI-13.You’ll see what I mean a bit more next issue. This is a comic with a proper ending.
It’s interesting Marvel is giving the series the ol’ Heave-Ho as the last couple of months the title has finished in the top half of all comics being sold. In April, issue #12 sold an estimated 20,000 issues, while Wolverine: First Class #14 sold a mere 14,000 copies, and it doesn’t appear Wolverine is being canceled any time soon.
At least the series is getting a proper send off.
12 Comments
This is terrible, just terrible, being a brit myself I tend to wait for trades (and catch up with my Marvel DCU subscription as well which can be good for feeling stuff out for what to pick up on trade along with this marvelous website) and loved the first arc and eagerly await the next ones. I’ve yet to hear a single bad thing bar possibly stealing the concept of a dracula moon base from Dr McNinja about the comic and am bitterly disapointed at this news.
Were it not for loving the iron fist and what DnA are doing galactically I could happily ditch my marvel buying ways now, they let the ultimate universe go to pot, then make it worse in order to save it in some sort of reverse logic magic and now this. Heck I’m not renewing my DCU subscription now when it comes due in a months time.
Schaferlord, I too am British and feel horribly disappointed. I partially saw it coming – how much of an American audience is going to be hugely interested in a British book? – but at least, like Morrison’s New X-Men or Ellis’ Iron Man, the run can be read as a timeless story, with a beginning, middle and end.
Okay, to get the nationalism out of the way, I am Canadian and have _no_ particular love for Wolverine. With that said, I must ask you this: Cancel a Wolverine title? What are you smoking? (I don’t really like the hairy little cur all that much, but he apparently is a license to print money.) I can sorta feel sympathy pains for fellow spoilerites who are brits, because I’m a DC reader, and apparently in that world my country has _NO_ heroes.
This thing keeps getting cancelled every other year (there was Excalibur, New Excalbur, X-Men: Die By the Sword, Captain Britain and MI:13…), at least it’s going out in style (fighting the dragon is always epic) and Meggan may finaly come back after the events of House of M.
Curse you fans who bought Dark Avengers and all the Dark Reign BS instead of this fun series.
I’m down to one Marvel title now. And it’s on the verge of being dropped.
I wasn’t meaning to come across as awfully nationalistic, I just always liked the British Mythos in the marvel universe (much like my current love for the kung fu exploits of iron fist or the galactic stories, I like the knooks and cranies it’s where the interesting stuff lies) and it was being told well and it’s just a crying shame.
I won’t pretend to be an expert in selling comic books but I feel that this has more to do with percieved marketablity rather than any issues with sales figures in the here and now. That said the comic buying public shouldn’t be voting (to paraphrase Art Brut) and we all know that the quality of writing and craftmanship in a book is only a minor factor to the sales.
This book is good, regardless of nationality, and it sucks that a book with this much good stuff in it is going away.
I think that the fact that Wolverine is in everything, and that Captain Britain gets canceled is indicative of the general problem with comics: the companies only know how to sell what they know how to sell, and as a whole, the buying public only buys what they already know they like.
There are so many things wrong with comic now a days. The major thing I think is wrong is that there are too many editors involved in the process. Why dont they just let the writter and artists create a story and go with it. No!!! The editors want it to have a beginning, middle, and end. They want it all to be in three issues and they want the sales to be record. Well, readers of comic books, especially the older ones enjoy a good story. If the story is long so be it. These editors are putting too many restrictions on characters and comic books that it is a cancer on the industry. Kudos to Marvel for letting Brubacker do what he wants with Cap. Johns did that with JSA. Now if some of the cooks would get out of the kitchen we can go back to the story telling which is what comics should be without the huge crossovers that ensnare 24 titles. Editors I hope you are reading this.
Perhaps all people who lament losing CB&MI13 should write to Marvel and protest for it.
Anybody knows who is the editor of the series? I’ll write him myself.
Nick Lowe was the ed.
As much as I’d like to see the editors of the Big 2 hang by their ankles, the fault isn’t entirely on the editors. Writers & Artists do bear some of the blame. Some of those ‘epic’ ideas do come out of the head of popular writers.
As for fixing the problem; maybe comic book stores should start behaving like elites. Instead of selling them their copy of Wolverine & Friends; they should throw it in the trash, tell them “You don’t want this…”, give them a copy of something good and tell them “You’ll thank me later.” before you send them on their merry way. ;p
“the companies only know how to sell what they know how to sell, and as a whole, the buying public only buys what they already know they like.”
This does not only manifest itself in the periodically published pulps. See also: modern TV, movies for the past 30 years, music for large chunks of the last _60_, clothes for EVER, food, etc. We are, for better and worse, creatures of habit and creatures of comfort. Habits are comfortable, and why would we want to seek discord or anything even remotely unfamiliar? :D