Commentary by Walt

Honestly, this is probably one of the most ordinary months we’ve had in quite a while. Not that it's a bad thing, on the contrary, it's probably very representative of what is going on at the moment in the overall market.

The #1 spot, as always, clearly goes to Absolute Batman. Issue #23 is still supported by our Jorge Corona exclusive cover. And then we already have the Fraction/Jiménez Batman #12, which keeps adding readers from month to month. Both Batmen will be featured in the upcoming Batman Day (Sep 19, folks!) launch "Batman of Two Worlds" with exclusive stories, not hard to predict it will be one of the most in-demand comics of the month!

The good news in August is that Marvel’s comeback is already in full swing, even before the Marvel Midnight titles arrive in the first week of October. Both the Avengers #1 pre-orders and the Miles Morales relaunch are a full success.

But the two new DC books also managed to impress. First, Batman & Robin: Year One – Dynamic Duos by Mark Waid and Chris Samnee. And don’t be fooled by Kyle Higgins' relaunch of Teen Titans ranking at #21. It only had one week to accumulate sales, and the fan reviews have been very positive.

Image also had a very strong debut with Sean Gordon Murphy’s Last Driver #1 at #16, and overall they account for around 10% of our total single-issue revenue.

Speaking of which, this is where the new Marvel vibe has already made itself felt. DC drops from around 50% to 43%, while Marvel climbs from 24% to over 30% in overall singles sales at Walt's. And the smaller publishers, meaning the indies outside of Image, continue to hold their historic high from last month at more than 15% of the total market share.

We’re now racing into the fall season at full speed and we at Walt's are particularly excited about Marvel Midnight and the next wave of DC Next Level releases (The Demon! Jonah Hex!).