Legendary Comic Writer Chuck Dixon Blasts Marvel Comics Rebooting Amazing Spider-Man With Another #1 Issue As "A Cynical Cash Grab"
One of the tells of a problem in sales and fan reactions for a title in the modern comic industry is a reboot with an all new #1 issue. Today, Marvel Comics announced Amazing Spdier-Man will be getting another reboot in 2025 which comics legend Chuck Dixon has called “a cynical cash grab.”
It seemed like 2024 was the year of the desperate reboot for Marvel and DC Comics. Marvel had its relaunch of the entire X-Men line after sales had stagnated from the Krakoa era, while DC did a line-wine reboot again for their DC All-In initiative. Both companies claimed success and used the artificial temporary sales boosts from books like Absolute Batman #1 and Uncanny X-Men #1 to claim that sales in the comic industry had recovered from their slump.
These numbers are not just artificial because of the collector’s nature of the #1 issue, but with such issues, the companies offer dozens of variant covers, which they only do for milestone issue numbers like this. Some of these require hundreds of orders for basic cover just to get access to these covers, creating a sales bubble of speculation with a lot of unread books.
Even for normal books, Fandom Pulse comic retailer insiders tell us that they believe only about 30% of people who buy the books actually read them, but with these issues, it’s far lesss.
Even though one might get a temporary sales boost like with Absolute Batman #1 which is reported to have moved over 400,000 copies, data has shown that every time these reboots occur, the actual readership declines by the sixth or seventh issue.
It hasn’t stopped Marvel Comics from trying it again with Amazing Spider-Man.
After Zeb Wells’ disastrous run, which turned many readers off of the character forever, they didn’t move for a reboot and #1 issue right away. They hired Justina Ireland, a race grifter who’s gotten herself embedded with Disney Marvel, to write a brief stint before choosing a long-term writer.
Marvel Comics announced that Joe Kelly would be returning to Amazing Spider-Man for a new reboot in April 2025. Oddly, they are keeping half of the current creative team of John Romita Jr. in place, making this not much of a reboot at all, lending credence to this merely being a publicity stunt to try to generate speculator sales with the numbering.
Kelly himself told Polygon it wasn’t a real new start for Spider-Man, “Even though this is a new #1, I don’t think of it as a ‘restart’ per se. I’m writing the next chapter of the story of one the world’s greatest characters, lucky enough to follow in the footsteps of the folks before me. After that sinks in, I spend a lot of time thinking about what I love about Spider-Man and his cast, what stories resonated with me at different times of my life, and how I can synthesize all of that into something that works with what came before but breaks new ground…. I feel a drive to take bold, unexpected swings in order to see how Spider-Man deals with Marvel-sized curve balls. Pressure makes diamonds.”
Fans have already started rumbling that they’re sick of the constant reboots and mistreatment of characters like Spider-Man under the current regime.
Chuck Dixon, the most prolific comic writer alive and legend who made characters like The Punisher and Moon Knight into staples for Marvel Comics also has choice words to say about this tactic.
"This is nothing more than a cynical cash grab for those few comic book speculators gullible enough to fall for it,” Dixon told Fandom Pulse in an exclusive interview.
"It's not like anyone at Marvel seriously believes that this will be the beginning of a new 60+ year run."
Dixon also said, "Number one issues are all they have left to prop up their failed line. This is how legacies dies."
While Marvel continues the same old recycling of material, creators like Dixon are blowing the current mainstream makret away with concepts like this. The project is described as, “A French Crusader of royal blood gains his powers of immortality from an ancient prophet only to prompt Death himself to come for him.”
The art on The French Baron also looks better than anything John Romita Jr. has done for years for Marvel Comics, showing that independent comics rely on good art and storytelling while the corporate only has gimmicks based on their brands.
What do you think of Chuck Dixon’s comments on Marvel Comics rebooting Amazing Spider-Man with a #1 first issue? Leave a comment and let us know.
Grab Chuck Dixon’s The French Baron graphic novel on Kickstarter.
Dixon writing le Baron Francais? Gotta get a copy, question; is there a French translation?
Dixon is right on. I recall the justification for these reboots starting in the mid-90’s as a way to “bring in new readers”. Well, clearly that didn’t work. And if Marvel and DC actually understood that their readers, especially the older ones but I suspect many feel this way, want continuity in the numbering since we follow these stories sequentially. I think the impact and frequency of these reboots (I think Captain Marvel is up to Vol. 10 LOL) drove away more old guard collectors.
The spider-man I follow and know and am interested in, kind of died in 1998 when “Volume 1” ended with issue 440 something.