It’s time for our weekly look at digital comics best-sellers on four different platforms. This is a look at what the top ten were on Sunday evening, so by the time you read this, it may have changed.
Usually the four top ten lists are really different, and this week is no exception, but they all have one thing in common: The Sandman!
1. Saga #15
2. X-Men: Battle of the Atom #2
3. Infinity #5
4. The Sandman: Overture #1
5. Avengers, vol. 5 #22
6. Guardians of the Galaxy, vol. 3 #8
7. Damian: Son of Batman #1
8. Superior Spider-Man #20
9. Green Lantern Annual #2
10. X-Factor, vol. 1 #92
There’s a new issue of Saga out this week, and that takes the top slot, as it usually does. I’m sure that bodice-ripper cover didn’t hurt. The first issue of Neil Gaiman’s much-anticipated new Sandman story, The Sandman: Overture, takes the fourth slot. ComiXology had a sale on the original run over the weekend, and while none of those 99-cent issues cracked the top ten, five of them made the top 20. All the top ten comics are fresh this week except for X-Factor, which is positively ancient by internet standards, having come out in 1993 in print and last March in digital. Marvel wins the week handily, with six of the top ten; DC has three (Sandman is part of their Vertigo imprint), and Image takes the top slot with Saga.
1. The Sandman, vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes
2. Batman, vol. 1: The Court of Owls
3. Justice League, vol. 1: Origin
4. Batman & Robin, vol. 1: Born to Kill
5. Batman: The Dark Knight, vol. 1
6. Batgirl, vol. 1: The Darkest Reflection
7. Nightwing, vol. 1: Traps and Trapezes
8. Batman: Detective Comics, vol. 1: Faces of Death
9. Catwoman, vol. 1: The Game
10. Red Hood and the Outlaws, vol. 1: REDemption
Over at the Kindle Store, on the other hand, it’s a clean sweep for DC, with the first volume of the original Sandman and nine collected editions of New 52 series. This list is completely different from last week’s list, and all the previous lists, for that matter. However, if you dip down to the second ten books, most of the usual titles show up—The Walking Dead, The Hedge Knight, Stephen King’s N. Those New 52 books are all discounted from the “digital list price,” but they aren’t listed on the deals page, so it’s not clear what pushed them all into the top ten this week.
1. Death: The High Cost of Living
2. Sandman #1
3. The Sandman: The Dream Hunters #1
4. The Sandman: Overture #1
5. It’s a Dog’s Life, Snoopy!
6. The World According to Lucy
7. Snoopy at the Bat
8. The Walking Dead, vol. 1
9. Injustice: Gods Among Us #1
10. Big Nate: Game On!
Nook users are generally a tight-fisted bunch, but Neil Gaiman is the man with the power, and four Sandman titles top the list, including The Sandman: Overture, which may be the greatest comic ever but is still five bucks for 33 pages. It looks like the 99-cent Sandman sale made an impact here. The other comics on the list are still in the same order they were in last week, which makes me suspect that there aren’t a lot of new sales.
iBooks
1. My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic #12
2. Blue Is the Warmest Color
3. My Little Pony Annual
4. The Walking Dead, vol. 1
5. Sandman #1
6. The Sandman: Overture #1
7. My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic #11
8. Ender’s Game: Speaker for the Dead
9. The Walking Dead #116
10. The Walking Dead #1
But even Neil Gaiman can’t knock My Little Pony off the top spot on iBooks! Besides Sandman and the usual suspects, an Ender’s Game graphic novel makes the list, no doubt because the movie premiered this weekend. This is actually a really interesting lineup, with a couple of old titles, a couple of new ones, and a mix of single-issue comics and graphic novels.
A former book editor and newspaper reporter, Brigid Alverson started MangaBlog to keep track of her daughters¹ reading habits and now covers comics and graphic novels for Comic Book Resources , School Library Journal, Publishers Weekly Comics World, Robot 6, and MTV Geek. She also edits the Good Comics for Kids blog at School Library Journal. Brigid was a judge for the 2012 Eisner Awards. Send her an email to wordballoons@gmail.com