An issue every month? That’s madness!

Tomorrow marks the release of Exiles #75, an important issue for Marvel Comics. No it’s not because it’s an anniversary issue, and it’s not because it sees the return of the 2099 universe. It’s because Marvel’s only been publishing Exiles for 4 1/2 years.

Yes, in a short 54 months, Exiles has managed to crank out 75 issues. That’s about 17 issues a year. And you know what? They’ve been a damn good 75 issues. Not Ultimates good, not Astonishing X-Men good, but better than most of the other stuff on the racks each week. And when you get it twice or even three times as often as one of those blockbuster series, it makes it that much better.

Between December 2004 and November 2005, Marvel released 19 issues of Exiles. Each issue sold an average of 33-34K copies, a pretty respectable number in it’s own right, which routinely landed the series in the top 50. Over the course of those twelve months, the series sold 683,468 issues, and average of 56,956 issues a month. That’s a number nearly high enough to land a title in the top 25 in November. It’s also more copies than Marvel heavyweights like the Fantastic Four, Incredible Hulk, Punisher and Daredevil sell, when those books struggle to keep a monthly schedule. And it does all this without a high profile creative team and with a higher cover price than titles like Uncanny X-Men and the Ultimate Spider-Man.

I’d just like to give the creative teams of Exiles past and present the credit they deserve. They’re a shining example from whom most of today’s creative teams could learn a thing or two. Write a great story, give it great art, and make it come out on time. Is that really so hard?

Did you think I made those statistics up? Nope, I got them right here: http://www.comicon.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=36;t=004600