Marvel To Release Delayed Comics Digitally This Month
With COVI-19's disruption of the comic book industry stretching into its second month, Marvel announced it would switch seven current titles to digital release through May 20th according to Newsarama. The titles are Hawkeye: Freefall, Ghost-Spider, Ant-Man, Ravencroft, Star, Spider-Man: The Black Cat Strikes, and 2020: Ironheart. The issues will be collected for print editions once they are re-released as trade paperbacks.
After the recent pandemic temporarily shut down Diamond Comic Distributors, Marvel and DC were forced to delay their comic book releases. DC Comics continued to release a handful of digital-only comics, such as Batman: The Adventure Continues. The status of Marvel's new releases has been largely up in the air, with some reports indicating the publisher was pausing fifteen to twenty percent of its line-up in the coming months.
Though not entirely unexpected, the switch to digital-only comes somewhat late, especially with regular print and digital comic releases scheduled to resume May 27th. Meanwhile, DC Comics has resumed shipping by adopting a "multi-distributor" model with Diamond retailers Midtown Comics and Discount Comic Book service. With comic book stores set to re-open (albeit with limited curbside service), the move to switch several titles to digital-only seems a bit of a surprise, especially since fans were calling for a switch to digital the moment Diamond announced they were ending shipments. Still, one reason for this delay could be the sufficient push-back from retailers, who fear such a move would cut into their business if readers permanently made the jump to digital, especially during a pandemic.
It's worth noting that, of the seven titles, only Ghost-Spider is an ongoing title. The rest are mini-series of varying lengths. Thus, logistics are probably at the heart of this decision. Finishing up these mini-series - even in digital - ensures that Marvel will eventually have more space in their already-packed schedule. It also seems increasingly likely that some of these mini-series, such as the villain-heavy Ravencroft and the Reality Stone-wielding Star - will probably set the stage for major events within the Marvel Universe. If this is indeed the case, it could serve as a bad omen for the Gwen Stacy solo book Ghost-Spider, although the case for Marvel's reasoning is pure speculation at this point.
Although the comic book industry is poised to return to some degree of normalcy in the coming weeks, the chaos from the coronavirus will likely still reign supreme at Marvel and throughout the industry. The rapid switch to digital seems to indicate Marvel - like many other publishers - are slowly finding their way through the shroud of uncertainly perpetuated by the pandemic. Time will tell if this digital-only decision was the right one.