Image Comics Announces Huge Sales Numbers For King Spawn #1, Dominates Marvel And DC Comics
Image Comics announced that Todd McFarlane’s upcoming King Spawn #1 book shattered comic book sales.
The publisher claims that King Spawn #1 had just under 500,000 pre-orders of the book from comic book retailers that “this marks the single largest new superhero monthly title launch in the comic book industry in the past 25 years based on the standard sales formula of the comic book industry (non-returnable, non-retailer exclusive sales.)”
They add that “No Avengers or Justice League character has debuted a monthly book with sales numbers like King Spawn #1 in the 21st century.”
Specifically, Image notes that the book’s pre-orders totaled 497,000.
Related: Spawn Creator Todd McFarlane To Develop Sam And Twitch Series For TV
When DC Comics relaunched their entire line with the New 52 back in 2011, their flagship book, Batman, only shipped 188,420 units for its first issue in September 2011. Justice League #1 topped the charts at 171,344 in August 2011.
Then in 2016 when they launched their DC Rebirth initiative, the first issue of Batman shipped 280,360 units in June. It was beaten by Marvel’s Civil War II that shipped 381,737 units.
While Image Comics claims King Spawn is the best selling superhero comic book in the 21st century, Marvel’s relaunch of Star Wars in January 2015 shipped 985,976 units.
However, the Star Wars brand would take a significant hit with the release of the sequel trilogy and the relaunched book in 2020 would only ship 97,053 units.
Related: Image Comics Touts Big Numbers For Spawn’s Universe #1
Maybe more impressive is that King Spawn #1 comes off the release of Spawn’s Universe #1 that was Image Comics top selling book since 1998. King Spawn #1 beat Spawn’s Universe #1 by over 200,000 orders.
Back in June, Image announced that Spawn’s Universe had sold “well over 200k units.”
Spawn and King Spawn creator Todd McFarlane said, “The numbers that came in were much higher than what I had projected. With sales that now have a historical impact in our industry.”
“It proves that the character Spawn and the world he lives in still resonates to fans almost thirty years after I first introduced him. But the biggest thing for me is having King Spawn becoming another example to the creative community that you can have creator-owned success outside of the two huge publishing giants, Marvel, and DC Comics,” he continued.
McFarlane added, “Every story that shows you can make a career on your own will hopefully inspire other talented people to try. As President of Image Comics, advocating for the creators has been our goal since its inception in 1992.”
Related: Image Comics Reveals New Details And Stunning Artwork For The Upcoming King Spawn Series
King Spawn #1 is the first monthly title as part of McFarlane’s Spawn Universe.
The creator previously revealed his goal for the universe saying, “I’ve waited almost 30 years to be able to get to this moment. To deliver on ideas, I hope they will grow from this initial seed called Spawn’s Universe #1 into a fully formed world populated with hundreds and hundreds of characters in the near future.”
“The stage will be set with this book, and soon I’ll be launching into new monthly titles for the first time since 1992. I can’t wait to show comic readers all the crazy ideas in my head as well as opening up the floodgate to so many talented creators that have said they’d like to join me on this journey,” he added.
King Spawn #1’s official description reads, “A historical NEW ongoing Spawn series begins! The launch of this book, nearly three decades in the making, further expands the SPAWN UNIVERSE with a growing presence of Hell, Heaven, and Heroes here on Earth.”
It continues, “A classic villain from Spawn’s past has begun asserting his powers on Earth by corrupting as many souls as possible. And only Spawn knows that he even exists. Continuing the dramatic battles from SPAWN’S UNIVERSE #1, this is where it all begins!!!!!
The description concludes, “Don’t miss out…the last time a new ongoing SPAWN series launched was in 1992.”
King Spawn #1 arrives on comic shelves on August 25, 2021. It will retail for $5.99.
Do you plan on picking up King Spawn #1?
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