DC COMICS OFFERS FREE SPECIAL EDITION OF EISNER-NOMINATED EX MACHINA #1!

[MattBrady]

Press Release

Readers can sample one of WildStorm ' s most exciting new titles for FREE with the EX MACHINA SPECIAL EDITION #1 (PROM60067), scheduled to arrive in stores on May 4!

This special edition reprints the Eisner Award-nominated debut issue of EX MACHINA, written by Brian K. Vaughan and illustrated by Tony Harris & Tom Feister. It features a sensational brand-new sketch cover by Harris.

"Tony, Tom, JD and I spent almost a year developing every aspect of this first issue, and we're still tremendously proud of it," says Vaughan. "I'm very grateful to all the readers and retailers who' ve been so supportive of our series, and to everyone at DC and WildStorm for going to such amazing lengths to get the book into even more new hands. "

Check out what the critics are saying about EX MACHINA:

"Brian K. Vaughan ' s masterful mix of super-heroics with politics blends seamlessly into an engrossing tale of power versus super-powers, with a city of 10 million caught in the middle." - Wizard

"Terrifically intriguing." - Entertainment Weekly

"Intertwines super-powers with nasty backroom dealings and quirky N.Y. political history" - Washington Post

"Set somewhere between The West Wing and an alternative future, this tale asks the question: What if the mayor of New York was a super-hero? Vaughan (Y: THE LAST MAN) and Harris (STARMAN) answer with intelligence and dash ... This vastly entertaining first collection should have readers eager to read future volumes." - Publishers Weekly

"[EX MACHINA] has become a surprise hit." - New York Daily News

" Engaging ... a fun ride. " - New York Resident

"The book is sprinkled with fascinating tidbits about the history of New York amidst a sea of everyday issues that Hundred and his staff have to deal with, from trash-transfer stations to a difficult governor ... one of the best comics to come out in a good while ... " - Nashville City Paper

"Inventive." - The Newark Star Ledger

EX MACHINA SPECIAL EDITION #1 (PROM60067) is scheduled to arrive in stores on May 4. Retailers will receive it in quantities equal to 30% of their initials orders on Y: THE LAST MAN #32 (FEB050363).

Other EX MACHINA issues are available as follows:

* EX MACHINA #10 (FEB050336) is available for advance reorder and is scheduled to arrive in stores on April 20.

* EX MACHINA #11 (MAR050462) is available for advance reorder and is scheduled to arrive in stores on May 18.

* EX MACHINA #12 (APR050393) is solicited in the April Previews (Volume XV #4) and is scheduled to arrive in stores on June 15.

* EX MACHINA #13 (MAY050275) is solicited in the May Previews (Volume XV #5) and is scheduled to arrive in stores on July 20.

Also, the EX MACHINA: THE FIRST HUNDRED DAYS TP (NOV040321), collecting the first five issues of the series, is available for reorder.

[Winteriscoming]

Well, I've never read Ex Machina...so I guess this means I wont have an excuse now.

[von Doom, M.D.]

Same here

[Jed Saxon]

Why isn't Marvel doing something similar - and if they do, why only on a craptacular title such as Arana?

[CParadise]

I am torn on this one. On one hand I think it's a great "IDEA" to help the book sell more. At my store it's already a HUGE seller, outselling most Marvel and DC books, and actually outselling Y the last Man, which is another HUGe seller.

But for an average store, how much help is it really to give them 1/3 of sales of another book that they probably dont sell really well, if they dont sell this one. Why not offer it at nominal charge so that retailers could buy more. I would order a couple of hundred copies at 50c each, and would give it to EVERY PERSON who comes in the store that buys any "mature" comics or GNs. Now, THAT would work.

But for example. I sell 55 copies of Y per month. So they will give me 17 (or so) copies of this to give away? That is the first hour on Wednesday. How does that help them if I let's say a third of the people who try it buy a TP, or an issue, that is only 4 copies from me extra. But if they let me order 200-300 copies, I could probably generate some REALLY GOOD sales out of it.

They did the same thing with Fallen Angel, and I got my FIVE copies, and 10 minutes later I gave them away, and yes, I got 2 TPB sales and a run of 10 copies sales out of it, but that is miniscule. If they had let retailers order that one, FA would still be a published book.

Brilliant idea executed TERRIBLY!!!!!

PS: Also, now I have to worry about speculators trying to grab them, because it has a Black and White Sketch cover, that must be hot, just look at Wizard magazine Top Ten That means they will be beggin to "TRY" the great book, and will not even read it.

[blankpoint]

Everything Cparadise said applies in my store as well. Ex Machina sells slightly better than Y in the store, but both better than most "mainstream" superhero titles, except for the huge ones. I will be out of these free copies within an hour or two on Wednesday.

What I do to promote Y has worked well though. I sell people the collected edition of #1 & 2 at my cost. If they like it, they can bring it back and get full credit for it when purchasing the trade paperback. Vertigo First Taste has also performed very well, despite it having a poorly-designed cover. It didn't sell too much the first week because of that. After putting up a little sign next to it telling customers what it was, it started flying off the shelf.

[Citizenvain]

If ever there was a book that charged a premium above the cover price it should be EX Machina. To give a away a copy for free is blasphemy. Each month this book delivers more than my money's worth. That said, I hope this initiative brings more readers to the book.

[Jason Galvin]

Originally posted by CParadise
I am torn on this one.

But for an average store, how much help is it really to give them 1/3 of sales of another book that they probably dont sell really well, if they dont sell this one.

Brilliant idea executed TERRIBLY!!!!!

PS: Also, now I have to worry about speculators trying to grab them, because it has a Black and White Sketch cover, that must be hot, just look at Wizard magazine Top Ten That means they will be beggin to "TRY" the great book, and will not even read it.

As a retailer I COMPLETELY agree, I've done all I can to push this book, but I think this is a terrible idea. I'm no Midtown Comics. I run a small store in NJ. For one, why on earth should Y The Last Man have ANYTHING to do, let alone determine the amount of free Ex Machina's a store gets. Yeah, it is a Vaughan book, but it has nothing to do with Ex Machina.

But my MAIN complaint is, that while we have a lot of customers that read Y in trade, we only have 8 subscribers for the monthly, so I only order 11 copies total, b/c it doesn't sell well to walk-ins (the trade does) so that means we get just about nothing when it comes to the free book, so this sure doesn't help anyone in my store when it comes to getting them into one of the best comics being published. I would much prefer this being a quater comic, this way I can order a bunch at about 11 cents a pop, & hand them out to all of my regular subscribers.

And you are right about the speculators & just plain collectors that will want this book just b/c it is a variant cover.

[Kevin T. Brown]

Originally posted by Winteriscoming
Well, I've never read Ex Machina...so I guess this means I wont have an excuse now.

No you won't.

Originally posted by von Doom, M.D.
Same here

And no you won't.








This is probably one of the best non-DCU titles that DC is putting out right now. Intelligent story-telling, fantastic art, and an overall well put together package.

[BriGuy]

Not to mention that if you increase your orders on the Y: The Last Man issue in order to get more free Ex Machina #1s you have to then sell the additional copies of Y, which if you thought you could do, you would have ordered that many in the first place.

I'm sure DC has its reasons for doing it this way, I'm just not sure how effective or retailer friendly this execution is. I do commend them in trying to think of new ways of garnering new readers.

I think the speculator aspect of it is a very real concern as well. Feels counter-productive.

[adamcasey]

Originally posted by BriGuy
I'm sure DC has its reasons for doing it this way, I'm just not sure how effective or retailer friendly this execution is. I do commend them in trying to think of new ways of garnering new readers.

I caught onto the line of thinking of low-cost/no-frills marketing several years ago when I was working at a music store.

The Dixie Chicks album 'Fly' was re-released with multiple colored covers (blue, green, yellow, instead of the initial black.) I pondered for the longest time why they would do that, there was no increased demand for album to warrant something special.

I was stumped. Then a co-worker said "Well, we're talking about it, aren't we?"

For the cost of changing the design slightly, buzz is built. While many retailers may only end up with a few, we're talking about Ex Machina, retailers and their customers will be talking about it, and hopefully sales will occur because of it.

[Jason Galvin]

Originally posted by adamcasey
For the cost of changing the design slightly, buzz is built. While many retailers may only end up with a few, we're talking about Ex Machina, retailers and their customers will be talking about it, and hopefully sales will occur because of it.

I totally disagree & think this is dead wrong. The only people talking about this are the uber-fans that post on message boards. I know from running a store that this is not the average comic book fan, maybe 5-10% of comic book fans post on message boards & would even know that this incentive is happening. And most of the people that post on boards are fanatical comic book fans that are probaly already reading Ex Machina. The average comic book fan is not going to be talking about Ex machina b/c of this incentive, nor is the average retailer b/c the average comic book store is barely going to get any copies of this & b/c they are a smaller store, are probably going to mark up what few copies they get. Hell, the average comic book fan probably will never even notice this incentive exists.

The X-men, Superman etc etc crowd is the average comic book buyer. For example like I said we only have 8 subscribers for Y the last man, but we have around 65 for Uncanny X-men. And those are the people that much more represent the average comic book buyer, & have no clue that there is "buzz about this incentive". This buzz will never reach them & they are the type of people I should be able to give a free copy of Ex Machina to, b/c that is, unfotunately the only way they would read a book like this.

[MicroZone]

if they're still reading Uncanny X-Men, odds are they wouldn't want a series like this anyway.

[CousinWalter]

This is one of the first things I read every Wednesday it comes out. It is one of my favorite titles and it should be yours too. Vaughn is on a roll, imo, with Y and Machina...just two of the best things I'm reading right now.

*Glee*

[MatthewSmith]

Ex Machina is amazing. And if you don't at least give it a try now, for free even, it must be because you suck.

[adamcasey]

Originally posted by Jason Galvin
I totally disagree & think this is dead wrong...

This buzz will never reach them & they are the type of people I should be able to give a free copy of Ex Machina to, b/c that is, unfotunately the only way they would read a book like this.

Any buzz is good buzz. The above posters who said "I've got no reason not to try it now" are what this promotion is about. If Y: The Last Man's average print run is about 27,000 (for ease of math), then that's 9,000 Ex Machina #1's out there. If about a tenth of those people who get it buy the monthly, that's approximately a bump of a 1,000 issues, and with the news of Fallen Angel, Gambit, Bloodhound, Monolith etc. getting the ax, every issue counts (not that Ex Machina is in any trouble it would seem.)

As for the average comic fan, yes, they skew towards X-Men, Batman, etc. I'd wager that Ex Machina isn't a book that most of those people would be necessarily interested in (similarly, Runaways was in a bind, though Ultimate X-Men sold well.) If a book doesn't fit into a lot of people's comfort zone (not just in terms of superheroes, but there's a lot of politically and socially challenging material in Ex Machina) then they won't bother with it.

[BriGuy]

And just to be fair, DC (along with Peter David, I believe) did consider the Fallen Angel promotion to be a success. It garnered enough interest to help gain the book a two issue extension. That may not seem like much, but considering what the sales were of FA when the promotion happened, it's significant that DC felt there was enough of a reaction to it to give the title some added time. At least DC has learned something and they are trying this promotion on a title before it is in immediate danger of cancellation.

I will add that anyone that learns of this promotion and wants to take advantage of it because they are genuinely interested in trying out the book that they call their retailer in advance and ask them to pull it for you, since most retailers will probably get less than five copies.

[Jason Galvin]

Originally posted by adamcasey
Any buzz is good buzz. The above posters who said "I've got no reason not to try it now" are what this promotion is about.

Yeah, good point. I'm sure there will be a few people who this free issue works on, but I still think it could be handled a lot better & is not very retailer friendly.

[adamcasey]

Originally posted by BriGuy
At least DC has learned something and they are trying this promotion on a title before it is in immediate danger of cancellation.

It just occured to me that I don't think this is a ploy to save an endangered title, but since it's Eisner nominated (not just the issue, but Vaughan and the series), it's akin to an Oscar Best Picture screener.

[Alfonso]

I thought issue #1 was really interesting and clever, but issue #2 really failed to engage me at all, and I didn't buy issue #3. I think it's smart that they're releasing issue #1 for free, but I personally wish they could've chosen a more current issue from part of the "latest arc", whatever it is, because I'd like to sample the book again and see what the hype is about.

[Stalzer2002]

Originally posted by adamcasey
Any buzz is good buzz. The above posters who said "I've got no reason not to try it now" are what this promotion is about. If Y: The Last Man's average print run is about 27,000 (for ease of math), then that's 9,000 Ex Machina #1's out there. If about a tenth of those people who get it buy the monthly, that's approximately a bump of a 1,000 issues, and with the news of Fallen Angel, Gambit, Bloodhound, Monolith etc. getting the ax, every issue counts (not that Ex Machina is in any trouble it would seem.)

As for the average comic fan, yes, they skew towards X-Men, Batman, etc. I'd wager that Ex Machina isn't a book that most of those people would be necessarily interested in (similarly, Runaways was in a bind, though Ultimate X-Men sold well.) If a book doesn't fit into a lot of people's comfort zone (not just in terms of superheroes, but there's a lot of politically and socially challenging material in Ex Machina) then they won't bother with it.

I think you hit the nail on the head. Even if each retailer only adds one new subcriber as the result of this, that's a good thing because it'll really add up. Although I don't like Ex Machina, I think it's a great promotion and I hope they do more of it (coughcoughGothamCentralcoughcough). There's only one thing I don't like about it...the new sketch cover. I can see some fans trying to snatch it up in order to be completist. I can also see some retailers taking advantage of a small print run and NOT giving it away for free. But still, GREAT promotion. I hope it works out.

[BriGuy]

Originally posted by adamcasey
It just occured to me that I don't think this is a ploy to save an endangered title, but since it's Eisner nominated (not just the issue, but Vaughan and the series), it's akin to an Oscar Best Picture screener.

I think you very well may be right. My point still stands though. At least DC is doing this for a book that will be around long enough to fully benefit from it. And I think the promotion works better as a celebration of a title's critical success, than as one to save a dying title. Either way, DC is working with this unique promotion in order to apply it where it can do the most good and that's a good thing.

Wishful thinking: DC should consider doing this for Manhunter in September in time to coincide with the release of the first trade.

[COREMARK]

Just wanted to jump in and say that Ex Machina is a great read month in, month out. Every issue so far has been fantastic, it's nice to see it getting recognized by the Eisners.

[daryldens]

Glad to see DC behind a title, but again the promotion comes with strings attached. Why base it on orders of Y The Last Man? I guess the publishers just can not bite the bullet and release a specific amount to the retailers based on their overall orders or something. That would be too easy and make sense. Instead they have to dilute the promotion by basing it on sales for Y The Last Man. A half-arsed promotion should expect half-arsed results. I do hope it works though as its a great title.

Obviously its easy for me to sit here and take pot-shots at DC as its not my money, but it just seems like they undercut their own promotions. They come up with these great ideas then fall down on getting the promotions into the hands of the people they need to target.

I also have to question how effective this will be when someone says hey its a great issue, now I want the ones to help me catch up with the story to date. I doubt these issues are sitting on the shelves at the retailers. There should be some system developed to have the stores receive a couple of copies of the 1st 100 Days trade for people who are intrigued to purchase immediately, with the retailers only paying for them after they've been sold.

Oh well, good to see DC plugging away at promotions and not just letting another great title die an early death.

[Jason Galvin]

Originally posted by daryldens
I also have to question how effective this will be when someone says hey its a great issue, now I want the ones to help me catch up with the story to date. I doubt these issues are sitting on the shelves at the retailers.

Stuff like this is only the customer's fault & nobody elses. Again, most stores are not like a Midtown comics where they are roling in money. As brilliant as Ex Machina is, it is not the type of book that will sell off the shelves at most stores so they may not have all the issues in stock. However EVERY issue except #1 is still available for a retailer to reorder. So it is up to the customer to pick up the rest of the issues. They can buy the trade if they like & then the preceeding issues, or they can just ask there retailer to reorder issues #2-10 which are all in stock.