DC has announced its plans for Green Lantern lines, as well as the digital pricing model.
A couple days ago we learned that DC will be relaunching their universe with 52 lines all jumping back to issue #1. Not a reboot, but a relaunch. The official line is that it’s “the launch of the new DCU.”
DC today released two important notes about the upcoming renumeration.
First, they’ve let us know about the digital pricing. In a letter to retailers, Bob Wayne, SVP of Sales for DC Comics, wanted to assure retailers that their sales of the new lines would not suffer because the online issues, while they will be made available simultaneously with the print releases, will cost the same on release day. Four weeks after that, however, all digital issues will drop to $1 below cover price.
This means that readers who want to save money by reading the digital comics will always be one issue behind the current releases, and the only readers who get the digital version near release day will be the readers who actually prefer the digital copies over the physical once, since the price will be the same.
Sounds pretty smart, but it seems like they’re asking their retailers to rely on the impatience of comics fans to make their business continue to work.
This might fly for the first month or three, but after a while, I think most readers who are okay with digital copies will also be okay with waiting a month to get their fix.
DC has also promised that every title will now be getting the digital treatment, rather than the picking and choosing they have been doing.
Second, DC has announced the plans for the Green Lantern lines.
The relaunch will include 4 Green Lantern lines:
Green Lantern, the core line of the franchise will continue to follow Hal Jordan’s adventures and dramas on Earth, as he continues to try to fit in as Earth’s green defender. Expect more emo, guilt-trip story-lines.
Green Lantern Corps will follow Guy Gardner and John Stewart, as they lead a sort of Green Lantern SWAT team. When troubles pop up around the universe which the local green lanterns aren’t equipped to handle, the Green Lantern Corps will step in to keep the peace.
Green Lantern: The New Guardians follows Kyle Rayner as he leads up a 7-part rainbow team of ring bearers, representing “The power of Rage, Avarice, Fear, Will, Hope, Compassion and Love.” The description isn’t clear on what exactly this team will be doing, other than in-fighting, of course.
Finally, Red Lanterns will follow Atrocitus and the bloody Red Lantern Corps, a group of vigilante style combatants, roaming the universe looking for bad guys to kill.
As a Green Lantern Fan, I’ll have to get all of these, of course, but I’ll be willing to wait the four weeks for each issue.
As a reminder, all these changes are coming in September.
