DC Comics

Origin

It all started with National Allied Productions (Before DC comics) ^[7] , founded by Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson in 1935, debuting with the big ( tabloid-sized ) release of New Fun: The Big Comic Magazine ^[8] . The company's second name, New Comics # 1 , first appeared in December 1935, appeared on the covers of comic books during the Golden Age of Comics ^[9] . This name was eventually replaced by Adventure Comics , and as such, the series lasted until No. 503 in 1938, becoming the longest comic book series in history ^[10] .

The third and final series of Wheeler-Nicholson, Detective Comics , which appeared as an advertisement in December 1936, started three months later in March 1937. This thematic series became a sensation with the appearance of Batman in No. 27 (May 1939). By then, however, Wheeler-Nicholson had already left the company. In 1937, owing to Harry Donenfeld, owner of the printing factory and magazine distributor - also publishing cheap magazines ( pulp magazines ) and working as director of the Independent News - Wheeler-Nicholson was forced to take him as a partner to release Detective Comics # 1. Detective Comics, Inc. was formed, owned by Wheeler-Nicholson and Jack Leibowitz, an accountant at Donenfeld. Wheeler-Nicholson stayed with the company for a year, but his problems with money continued, and he was simply crowded out. Shortly afterwards, Detective Comics Inc. acquired the remains of National Allied, also known as Nicolson Publishing, at an auction for bankruptcy of the latter ^[11] .

Detective comics Inc. soon launched another series, Action Comics , the first issue of which was introduced to Superman readers (a character who had nothing to do with Wheeler-Nicholson; editor Vin Sullivan decided to launch the character after Sheldon Meyer got him out of the mailbox). Action Comics # 1 was released in June 1938 and became a bestseller, creating a new character archetype - now known as a " superhero ". The company soon introduced readers to other popular characters such as Batman and Sandman .

On February 22, 2010, a copy of the Action Comics comic (June 1938) was sold at an online auction for $ 1 million, breaking the previous similar record of $ 317,000 for another copy of the worst quality sold the previous year. Both the buyer and seller remained unknown ^[12] .

Golden Age

Soon, National Allied Publications and Detective Comics Inc. teamed up to form National Comics , which in 1944 acquired Max Gaines and Jack Leibovitz, All-American Publication . In the same year, Gaines allowed Leibovitz to buy back his stake, leaving only Picture Stories from the Bible to establish his own company, EC Comics . At this stage, Leibovitz led the merger of All-American Comics and Detective Comics into National Comics. Following this, he began to organize the merger of National Comics, Independed News (own distribution network), as well as their enterprises into a single corporation, National Periodical Publications ^[13] . Shares of this company appeared on sale in the stock markets in 1961 ^[14] .

Despite the official names of the companies, National Comics and National Periodical Publications, the Superman-DC logo was printed on comics (the DC logo began to appear on comics since 1940) and the company became known as DC Comics long before the official registration of this name in 1977 ^[15] .

The company launched an aggressive campaign against copyright infringement - explicitly copying characters such as Wonder Man - the Fox Comics character that Fox almost completely copied from Superman . An important milestone was the DC lawsuit against Fawcett Comics about the character Captain Marvel , who at that time was one of the best-selling series. Despite the fact that the relationship between Captain Marvel and Superman was quite controversial (Captain Marvel’s forces were magical in nature, unlike Superman’s forces), the court recognized the intentional and intentional copying of the recorded material. Faced with canceled sales and subsequent bankruptcy, Fawcett surrendered in 1955 and stopped publishing the comic. Years later, Fawcett ironically sold the rights to Captain Marvel DC Comics - which revived Captain in 1973 in the new Shazam! Series featuring drawings by Charles Beck. Before the character returned to popularity and renewal, Captain Marvel appeared only in the morning TV show, later taking his rightful place in the DC universe. In 1967, a new company appeared - Marvel Comics , now the main DC competitor in the market.

When the popularity of superheroes began to fade in the late 1940s, the company focused on genres such as science fiction , western , humor, and romance. DC also published detective and scary stories, but very short ones, and therefore avoided moving against comics in the mid-1950s. Several popular series featuring superheroes (most of all Action Comics and Detective Comics ) were not closed and successfully continued publication.

Silver Age

In the mid-1950s, editor-in-chief Irwin Donenfeld and publisher Leibowitz instructed editor Julius Schwartz to create a new Flash comic for a sample in the Showcase series. Instead of resurrecting the old character, Schwartz, taking the help of writers Robert Kaniger and John Brum, artists Carmino Infantino and Joe Coubert , created a completely new character , improving and modernizing Flash's civic position, his costume and origin. The reinterpretation of Flash in Showcase # 4 (October 1956) proved its popularity and soon led to a similar rethinking of the Green Lantern series. The subsequent performance of the Justice League of America , as well as many other superheroes, was later called by historians and fans of the Silver Age of Comics .

The publisher did not rethink the main characters, such as Superman , Batman and Wonder Woman , but they were significantly updated. Led by the new editor, Mort Weissinger, the Superman comic book series has been replenished with new characters that have become very successful, such as Supergirl, Bizarro and Brainiac . In the Batman series, led by Jack Schiff, the highly successful Batwomen, Batgirl , Ace Bat Hound and Bat Might were added to improve the non-scientific part of the comic book. Schwart, along with the artist Infantino, performed a Batman update advertised by the company as “New Look,” highlighting detective moments. Meanwhile, Editor Kaniger has successfully updated the adventures of the characters in Wonder Woman series, making them fantastic, but with a mythological bias.

The introduction of updated DC superheroes did not go unnoticed by other comic book companies. In 1961, when DC launched America's Justice League comic book series, Marvel Comics editor-in-chief Stan Lee and legendary creator Jack Curby , commemorating the entry into the Marvel Century comics, began the Fantastic Four series ^[16] .

Since the 1940s, Superman, Batman and other company heroes began appearing in comics together, starting to share a common universe, which was later called the DC Universe. Together with the story “ Flash of Two Worlds ”, in the comic book Flash # 123 (September 1961), the editor Schwartz (along with writer Gardner Fox and artists Infantino and Joe Giella) presented a concept that allowed the Golden Age heroes to be introduced into the story, explaining that they live in a parallel universe, on Earth-2, and new ones live on Earth-1. This concept will later be called DC Multiverse .

The 1966 television series Batman , featured on ABC , provoked a temporary surge in the popularity of comics. There were manifestations in other media. DC has greatly lightened the tone of many of its comics - in particular, Batman and Detective Comics - to more closely match the tone of the television series ^[17] .

In 1967, the main artist of the Batman comic strip Infantino (who designed the popular characters Batgirl and the Ghost Wanderer) grew up from an art director to one of the editorial directors. With the growing popularity of the rival Marvel Comics who suddenly threatened to overthrow DC from the first position among comic publishers, Infantino tried to spur the company by creating new series and characters, as well as taking on new important workers, for example, former Marvel artist and one of the creators of Spider-Man , Steve Ditko , as well as the young but promising newcomer Neil Adams .

New, creative employees suggested expanding the audience to include older people - teenagers and even students. The new talents really served the good of the company, for example, Dennis O'Neill, who had previously worked for Marvel and Charlton Comics , received critical acclaim from the public for updating the Batman and Green Lantern series. Nevertheless, during this period a lot of episodes appeared, which started very successfully, but quickly lost popularity and closed.

In 1969, the National Periodical Publications was bought by the Kinney National Company, which in turn was purchased by Warner Bros.-Seven Arts, which later became Warner Communications ^[18] .

Fourth World

In 1970, Jack Kirby moved from Marvel Comics to DC, at the end of the Silver Age , during which Kirby played a very large role. Having received carte blanche to write and illustrate his own comics, he created a series of thematically related series, which he called the Fourth World . In the already existing series , Superman's Buddy Jimmy Olsen and in his own, the newly launched series of New Gods , Mister Miracle and The Forever People, Kirby introduced such long-playing characters and concepts as supervillain Darkside and other Apocalypse reality. Despite the fact that the sales were quite decent, the comics did not meet much support from DC management managers, and also suffered from a lack of understanding and internal support for Infantino. In 1973, all of the series of the Fourth World were canceled, although the concepts and ideas introduced by Kirby would soon become an integral part of the expanded DC universe. Kirby also created several other daring DC series, including Kamandi , which talks about a teenage boy in a post-apocalyptic world filled with anthropomorphic talking animals, receiving an order from the publisher for something resembling a Planet of the Apes .

Bronze Age

Following the trends of the Silver Age , in the 1970s and 1980s in the comic book industry, later called the Bronze Age, fantasy motifs in the comics became more naturalistic and gloomy. The use of drugs in literature banned by the Comics Code Authority first appeared in the Marvel The Amazing Spider-Man comic in early 1971, and after updating the DC code, it suggested writing a drug story to writer Dennis O'Neill and artist Neil Adams as part of a series about the Green Lantern called Snowbirds Don’t Fly in Green Lantern / Green Arrow # 85 (September 1971), in which Speedy, Green Arrow’s assistant, becomes heroin addicted.

Janet Kahn, the former publisher of the children's magazine, replaced Infantino as editorial director in January 1976. DC tried to compete with the released Marvel, dramatically increasing the number of comics to win a spot on the market by simply overfilling it. In the course of this, a series of new characters were launched, such as Firestorm ( Eng. Firestorm ) and Shade, Changing Man ( Eng. Shade, the Changing Man ) . Many episodes without superheroes were launched, in the hope of returning the days of post-war comics to Wertam. In June 1978, five months after the first Superman movie was released, Kahn expanded the line even further by increasing the number of episodes and the number of pages, increasing the price of comics from 35 to 50 cents. Most episodes received 8 additional pages, while others had a full 25 pages of history. This move is called “DC Explosion” ^[19] . The move was not successful and the company’s partner, Warner, closed most of the unsuccessful series, while dismissing many employees, which was called “DC Implosion” in the press ^[20] . In September 1978, the company returned to 17 pages of history, although it left a price of 40 cents ^[21] . However, by the year 1980, the publisher again raised the price to 50 cents and increased comics to 25 pages, but the additional pages were mainly occupied with announcements and advertising.

Looking for new ways to increase their market share, new members of the Kahn team, vice president Paul Levits and managing editor Giordano decided to consider the problem of instability of talents in the company. To this end, as well as following the example of companies such as Atlas / Seaboard Comics and Eclipse Comics , DC began offering royalties instead of the standard agreement, in which the creators worked for a one-time fee and waived all rights to the work. Thus, the company gave talents a financial incentive to strive for success. In addition to this, imitating the new television format, and in response to the closure of many episodes after just a few episodes, DC created the concept of limited episodes . The new format made it possible to create individual end stories in a more flexible format, allowing you to demonstrate creativity without involving talent in an unstable “open-closed” position.

Эти изменения в политике сформировали будущее компании, и в краткий срок позволило DC переманить создателей у Marvel, и пошатнуть стабильность независимых серий. В ноябре 1980 DC запустила постоянную серию The New Teen Titans , созданную писателем Марвом Вольфманом и художником Джорджем Перисом, двумя популярными талантами с историей успеха. Этот комикс, повествующий о команде супергероев, был весьма схож с серией комиксов Marvel Люди Икс , однако был основан на оригинальной истории вселенной DC. Комикс заслужил славу и значительные продажи ^[22] за счет стабильности команды создателей, работавшей над серией в течение шести лет. Вдобавок к этому Вольфмен и Перис воспользовались возможностью создавать ограниченные серии, чтобы создать спин-офф Tales of the New Teen Titans , представив в нём истории происхождения персонажей без прерывания истории основной серии и без удвоения их работы выпуском другой постоянной серии.

Конец 1980-х

Успешное оживление команды Юные Титаны Серебряного века, переименованной в Новых Юных Титанов, привело к тому, что редакторы DC начали искать похожие варианты для всей вселенной DC. В результате 12-серийный комикс Crisis on Infinite Earths дал компании возможность перестроить вселенную, «выбросив некоторый багаж» истории, вроде ошибок в историях персонажей и — в частности — пересмотреть, обновить и модернизировать основных персонажей, вроде Супермена и Чудо-женщины. Вдобавок к кроссоверу были выпущены две публикации престиж-формата, озаглавленные The History of the DC Universe , в которых была рассказана пересмотренная история основных персонажей DC, и расчищена сцена для эффективного перезапуска всех серий комиксов, тем не менее, основанных на традициях и истории вселенной DC. Эффектно сместившись от реализма Бронзового века к эре, иногда называемой порой «Тёмный век», Кризис описал многие ключевые и резонансные смерти, которые сформируют вселенную DC на последующие десятилетия и разделил времена публикаций DC Comics на до- и после-Кризисное время.

В то же время схожая революция происходила в комиксах жанра ужасов и негероического. С начала 1984 года британский писатель Алан Мур придал новый импульс серии ужасов The Saga of the Swamp Thing , его работа для комиксов стала началом события, названного по аналогии с музыкальным событием Британским Вторжением. Основываясь на тёмном натурализме Бронзового века, многие британские писатели, включая Нила Геймана и Гранта Моррисона начали работать на компанию. Результирующий наплыв утончённого хоррор/фэнтези материала привёл не только к тому, что DC оставила Comics Code из-за некоторых работ этих талантов, но и запустила в 1993 году импринт Vertigo , рассчитанный на взрослую аудиторию.

Ключевыми комиксами, охарактеризовавшими тонкий переход к Современному веку, стали The Dark Knight Returns Фрэнка Миллера и Хранители Алана Мура и художника Дэйва Гиббонса . Эти комиксы привлекли внимание к переменам в DC Comics благодаря психологической сложности и поощрению антигероев . Новая свобода для креативности и сопутствующая реклама позволила Миллеру создать тёмного Бэтмена будущего, а Муру — схожую по мрачности альтернативную историю, что привело к тому, что позволило DC оспорить лидирующую позицию Marvel Comics в индустрии. Также благодаря этим комиксам литературные критики смягчили своё мнение о комиксах, начав считать их подходящими для взрослой аудитории и позволили периодически делать набеги на книжную индустрию, благодаря книжным переизданиям этих ключевых комиксов, продающихся так же хорошо, как и обычным.

Напротив, пока Вселенная DC стала темнее, в середине 1980-х увидели свет многие долгие серии военных комиксов DC, включающие почётные серии, начавшиеся в 1960-х годах. Эти серии, каждая более чем на 100 выпусков, включали Sgt. Rock , GI Combat , The Unknown Soldier и Weird War Tales .

В марте 1989 году Warner Communications объединились с Time Inc. , что сделало DC Comics дочерней компанией Time Warner . В июне увидело свет первое кино о Бэтмене , не сделанным чисто DC. DC также начала публиковать DC Archive Editions, сборники ключевых ранних серий комиксов, издаваемых в твёрдой обложке, которые могли быть не увидены более молодыми читателями. Восстановлением многих из них для Archive Editions занимался Рик Кин, а восстановлением цветов занимался давний работник DC Боб ЛеРос. Эти коллекционные издания попытались ретроактивно воздать почести сценаристам и художникам, работавшим над комиксами DC в раннее время, когда известность некоторых из них была крайне невелика.

1990s

Индустрия комиксов переживала короткий бум в начале 1990-х годов благодаря комбинации спекулятивной скупки (массовых закупок книг в качестве коллекционных объектов с целью потом перепродать их за большую цену, а возросшая цена на старые выпуски была принята за грядущий подъём цен на все комиксы) и нескольких сюжетных линий, получивших очень много внимания не только в индустрии комиксов, но и за её пределами. DC расширила сюжетные линии, в которых Супермен был убит , Бэтмен был покалечен , а супергерой Зелёный Фонарь стал злодеем Параллаксом , в результате чего продажи резко увеличились, но это увеличение было лишь временным так же, как и замена героев. Продажи упали и индустрия комиксов впала в большую депрессию, а производство «коллекционо» увеличившееся до миллионов, что привело к увеличению количества и уменьшению качества, привело к тому, что фанаты и спекулянты оставили попытки приобретать их.

Piranha Press и другие импринты DC (включая взрослые импринты Vertigo и Helix , недолго живший научно-фантастический импринт) были представлены, чтобы разнообразить продукцию и позволить специализировать продвижение каждой линии отдельно. Они увеличили использование нетрадиционных контрактов, увеличив количество авторских проектов, что привело к росту количества работ с хорошими отзывами (особенно за работы в Vertigo ). DC также увеличила публикацию книжных и коллеционных форматов серий комиксов, а также графических романов .

DC заключило издательское соглашение с Milestone Media , давшее DC линию комиксов, описывающих культурно- и расово-разнообразных персонажей. Хотя линия Milestone исчезла несколько лет спустя, она запустила популярный мультсериал Static Shock . DC основала Paradox Press , чтобы публиковать материалы, вроде серии книг Big Book of… разных художников, интерпретирующих индивидуальные темы, а также криминальную фантастику, вроде графического романа Road to Perdition . В 1998 году DC приобрела Wildstorm Comics Джима Ли , импринт Image Comics , продолжая его в течение многих лет, как совершенно отдельный импринт (и отдельную вымышленную вселенную) с собственным стилем и аудиторией. Частью этой сделки стал факт того, что DC начала новый суб-импринт Wildstorm, America's Best Comics , серию комиксов, созданную Аланом Муром , включающую Лигу выдающихся джентльменов , Тома Стронга и Прометею. Мур очень протестовал против этой ситуации, и DC, в конце концов, остановила публикацию ABC.

2000s

In March 2003, DC acquired the rights to publish and distribute the long fantasy series ElfQuest , previously published by Wendy and Richard Piney in their own publisher WaRP Graphics . This line was continued by another series not originally owned by DC, but Tower Comics - the THUNDER Agents series and was published as part of the DC Archive Edition . In 2004, DC temporarily acquired the rights to publish graphic novels by publishers - 2000 AD and Humanoids . DC also rebranded the Johnny DC series and established the CMX imprint for publishing the translated manga . In 2006, CMX took over Megatokyo's webcomic for printing from Dark Horse Comics . DC also took advantage of the collapse of Kitchen Sink Press and acquired the rights to most of Will Eisner's works , such as The Spirit , and his graphic novels.

In 2004, DC began work on a new crossover that would use the entire DC universe and become a sequel to the Crisis on Infinite Lands , and also step back from the events of the 1994 crossover Zero Hour , who tried to remake the history of the DC universe. In 2005, the Batman movie was released : The Beginning , received by critics very well; The company also released several limited series that heated conflicts between DC characters, which culminated in the Endless Crisis . Shortly after these events, DC's constant series jumped forward one year , after which DC launched the weekly 52 series to fill the gap in time. At the same time, DC lost its rights to Superboy when Jerry Siegel's descendants used the 1976 copyright law revision clause to regain these rights.

In 2005, DC launched the new All-Star series (revitalizing the 1940s publication series), designed to describe some very famous characters in stories that did not affect the complex events of the DC universe and that were provided by the all-star creative team . The All-Star Batman & Robin the Boy Wonder was launched in July 2005, and the All-Star Superman in early November 2005. All-Star Wonder Woman and All-Star Batgirl were announced in 2006 on the release date for Superman Returns , but neither were released or planned for late 2009. Adam Hughes, originally announced screenwriter / artist for the All-Star Wonder Woman in 2006 ^{[23] [24]} , explained at Comic-Con in San Diego in 2010 that the project was frozen for a while due to difficulties in at the same time writing the plot and illustrating the comic strip that he experiences ^[25] .

2010s

September 2009 Warner Bros. announced that DC Comics will become a subsidiary of DC Entertainment, Inc. Diane Nelson, president of Warner Premiere , became president of the new company, and Paul Levitz, president and publisher of DC Comics, has been reassigned as executive editor and consultant. ^[26]

On February 18, 2010, DC Entertainment named Jim Lee and Dan DiDio co-publishers of DC Comics, Jeff Jones as Creative Director, John Rood Executive Vice President of Sales, Marketing, and Business Development and Patrick Caldon Executive Vice President of Finance and Management ^{[27 ] [28]} .

In May 2011, DC announced that it would be the first comic book publisher to launch digital versions of its comic books on the same day as paper ones ^[29] .

Restart

On June 1, 2011, DC announced that it would cancel all ongoing episodes of the DC universe’s characters in August and resume 52 episodes starting with No. 1. The first re-released comic was the Justice League, which was released on August 31, 2011, and the rest of the episodes began to appear in September ^{[30 ] [31] [32]} .

On May 25, 2016, DC launched a new line of comics called “Rebirth,” which is the logical continuation of New 52.

Active

• DC Universe (1934-present)
• DC Archive Editions (1989-present)
• Johnny DC (2004-present)
• Mad Books (1992-present)
• Vertigo (1993-present)
• Will Eisner Library (2000-present)

Ceased to exist

• All Star (2005-2008)
• Amalgam Comics (1996-1997; with Marvel Comics )
• DC Focus (2004-2005; combined with the main focus of DC)
• Elseworlds (1989-2004)
• First Wave (2010-2011; from Condé Nast Publications and Will Eisner Library)
• Helix (1996-1998; merged with Vertigo)
• Impact Comics (1991-1993; made thanks to Archie Comics)
• MilstoneMedia (1993-1997)
• Minx (2007-2008)
• Paradox Press (1998-2003)
• Piranha Press (1989-1993; renamed Paradox Press )
• Tangent Comics (1997-1998)
• WildStorm Productions (1999—2010)
  • America's Best Comics (1999-2005)
  • Cliffhanger (1999-2004; combined to form the WildStorm Signature)
  • CMX Manga (2004-2010) is basically an anime genre
  • Homage Comics (1999-2004; combined to form the WildStorm Signature)
  • WildStorm (1999—2010)
  • WildStorm Signature (2004-2006; combined with the main WildStorm series)
• Zuda Comics (2007—2010)

License Partnerships Acquired by Companies and Studios

• 2000 AD
• All-american publications
• Archie Comics (superhero rights were acquired from 1991 to 1993 to become part of Impact Comics , others were acquired from 2008 to 2011) ^{[33] [34]}
• Bad Robot Productions
• Charlton comics
• Columbia pictures
• Condé nast publications
• Edgar rice burroughs
• Epic games
• Fawcett Comics (partially acquired in 1972, fully in 1991) ^[35]
• Filmation
• Flex comix
• Hanna-barbera
• Harmony Gold USA
• Kenner
• Humanoids publishing
• King features syndicate
• Larry Harmon Pictures
• Lego
• Leisure concepts
• Mad Magazine (copyright is EC Publications , but transferred control of DC Comics in 1994. Both companies are part of Warner Bros. Entertainment) ^[36]
• Martin Manulis Productions
• Mattel (some parts were licensed from 1982 to 1983 and from 2012 to the present) ^[37]
• May company
• Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
• Milestone media
• Nbc
• Paramount pictures
• Quality comics
• Revell
• Ruby-spears
• Tatsunoko production
• Tower comics
• TSR, Inc.
• Warner bros
• Warp graphics
• WildStorm Productions
• Will eisner library