On the occasion of the 60th anniversary of Spider-Man, the publisher Panini is launching a collection of 10 complete stories at €6.99 each. How to make the right choice ? What were the decisive elements? Answers with Aurélien Vives, from Panini Comics.
Peter Parker, the spider-man, celebrates his sixtieth birthday this year. Almost a temporal aberration for a character who remained stuck in adolescence for the majority of his career… On the occasion of this anniversary, Panini editions published a series of complete stories in the form of 10 albums: “La Spider-Man Anniversary Collection”. All sold at the ridiculous price of €6.99 per volume. Aurélien Vives, publisher and community manager France at Panini Comics, returns for L’Internaute to the genesis of this project.
Linternaute.com: How did the idea for this project come about?
The idea germinated with the success of the “spring of comics” collection in 2021, which was on the same format, same number of volumes, with a frieze on the back, and the same type of price. The collection has established itself with the weaver’s 60th anniversary in 2022. The universe’s most iconic hero Marvel !
In the publishing of comics, there is a recurring idea: that of creating gateways, of offering things that are as readable as possible and of making selections for readers, as it is true that the universe is abundant . These editorial selections allow you to set foot in the stirrup, to get started without feeling dizzy. With the “spring of comics”, we wanted to create a collection intended for the greatest number, but which was rather sexy in terms of the container. We therefore chose a cardboard format, with fairly graphic covers. The most seasoned readers had to want to buy the volumes they didn’t have, and new readers had to be enthusiastic about having this collection in their library.
Do you understand that the mass of comics can frighten or discourage a neophyte readership?
Absolutely! That’s why we do this kind of collection, and why we try to offer clearly visible number 1s. In the world of manga, it’s very different. One Piece counts 102 volumes, but there is only one number 1. Simple and direct. Comics are scriptwriters who change, crossovers, special numbers… Enough to make you dizzy! It’s part of the richness (and it’s extremely satisfying) to have for the same hero three or four different interpretations, with aspects that we will like and others less.
But I understand that it can have this effect of rabbit in the headlights of a car: “There are too many I’m lost!”. Hence the interest of a collection like “The Spider-Man Anniversary Collection”.
Spidey, it’s more than 1500 different comics, 4500 appearances in periodicals… How do we choose what we keep?
It is not obvious at all! It is a collegial work with the editorial teams. We want full stories, not something that ends on a cliffhanger and may frustrate new readers. A second filter is related to the choice not to have volumes of 400 pages. There’s a great story arc called The inner child, by John Marc DeMatteis and Sal Buscema. We all wanted to put this story in the collection, but its size prevented us from doing so…
Then an iterative process begins: we think about our favourites, the stories we want to put, whether they are cult or not. It’s important to take advantage of this collection to highlight stories that we like and which have not necessarily had the echo they deserve. the bow The nightmare by Paul Jenkins and Humberto Ramos is typically a bow that you don’t immediately think of but which is nevertheless of high quality. And it hadn’t been featured in a long time…
Do you have complete freedom from Marvel?
Yes. If we did something totally crazy, I think they’d slap us on the wrist, but that’s not our goal! We have real freedom in what we can offer, but obviously we go through validation with the rights holders. That said, we are used to it and we know how to do it…
Death is very important in the construction of Spider-Man. Deaths where the weight of responsibility is increasingly strong: he is a baby when his parents disappear, he does not intervene for Ben, he fights against Dr Octopus when the latter causes the collapse of a building and kills Captain Stacy. Finally, he is directly responsible for the death of Gwen, thrown from the top of a bridge by the Green Goblin. How to capture the construction of Spidey without the chronology of these deaths?
Indeed, the evolution of the weight of mourning on the shoulders of Peter Parker is not only a factor in the evolution of the character but also one of the keys to the empathy that the reader develops towards the latter. Grieving is something that everyone has experienced or will experience. Ditto for the evolution of his feeling of guilt. But we have to put ourselves in an editorial context! At the time of writing Spiderman, the papers come out and disappear. They are not reissued and therefore they are not read again. Thus, the deaths that follow one another are intended for different readers.
Uncle Ben’s death is replayed in flashback form at regular intervals. When we are at episode 75 or 100 and it has been eight years since this character died in the comics, new young readers have never read this episode. This guilt seems remote.
So when the writers, the editor, kill off a new character in Spider-Man’s entourage, the event resets the guilt in new readers.
This is also why this phenomenon occurs much less afterwards: there are reissues, reprints. The reader has access to these episodes and there is no longer this need to constantly recreate this feeling. In the collection itself, we chose not to offer the very beginning of Spiderman, because it’s something that has been seen in many editions and that everyone knows inside out. We thought that the death of Gwen Stacy was a little less reissued, and that it was an opportunity to put it forward again via this selection. Construction-wise, I think everyone knows about Uncle Ben’s death. Gwen Stacy’s is the second most iconic. It therefore seemed appropriate to offer it to readers.
Speaking of movies, did you see a surge in sales on the Spider-verse arcs after the animated masterpiece?
Spider-verse is a bit of a special case, because as soon as it came out, it was a hit. Written by Dan Slott, one of the screenwriters who immediately became one of the most emblematic of Spiderman, accompanied by two exceptional designers: Giuseppe Camuncoli and Olivier Coipel, who is perhaps the biggest current star in the industry. There was everything to make it work. The Spider-Men who come from all dimensions, interact together. There is an almost primitive side to this concept. The twists and turns are legion and surprise readers. There is also an epic aspect and a very great adventure. As soon as it was released, the title became a top seller. Of course the movies Into the Spider-verse and the No Way Home further reinforce this “indispensable” position of the story. It’s very recent, and it’s already one of the most reissued in different formats.
What is the circulation of this collection?
We printed each volume in several tens of thousands of copies.
What are your expectations ?
We’ve based our expectations on our experience with the previous Spring Comics Edition. We know that some volumes, the most iconic, will be sold in full, and that others, older, will sell a little less. But the goal beyond sales is to federate new readers.
Has this collection brought back regular readers?
We are indeed observing increases in sales linked in particular to the reading recommendations that accompany each volume and which invite readers to share other adventures with the Weaver.
How many Spidey titles do you have in the Panini France catalog?
In the current catalogue, if we refer to the integrals alone, around fifty. These are all the titles that appeared until the 80s. If we add the other collections, I would say around 200. And I’m talking about series, not volumes, of course.
What three Spider-Man titles do you personally recommend?
Superior Spider-Man: it is Dr. Octopus who replaces Peter Parker by stealing his body, but Peter Parker’s last gesture is to imprint his mantra “with great powers come great responsibilities”. So Dr. Octopus is going to try to be an even better Spider-Man than Peter Parker. This is probably one of my most frequent tips.
Spider Island, where the entire island of Manhattan recovers powers from Spiderman. The question is, “If everyone has Spider-Man powers, what makes Peter Parker special?” The whole thing is for the reader to realize that it’s not just having Spider-Man’s powers that makes Peter Parker special.
Ultimate Spider-Man, which has this soap side so well written, an adolescent atmosphere, high school… We have the impression of knowing where it will go – and it takes another path! It bounces all the time…
What is your definition of a “run”?
A saga is a more or less long story, while a run is the uninterrupted production of a screenwriter on a series. One can imagine that a scriptwriter has several runs if he writes for example from 1992 to 1994 and he comes back five or ten years later. For me, the run is above all the scriptwriter because he is the one who sets the tone for the stories that will unfold. We can have a run that sees several designers.
Give us two reading tips, one in the Spider-Man universe and one elsewhere, for the following three reader profiles:
- I’m leaving the movies, I liked the last Spider-Man movie but I haven’t read anything.
Without a second’s hesitation I recommend spider verse, because that’s where we get the idea of multiple Spider-Men working together to fight a multi-dimensional threat.
Apart from the weaver, I advise Dr Strange and the Sorcerer Supremes, where Dr. Strange works with several supreme wizards in the history of the world. It’s a complete story in two volumes, which has a great plot.
- I like comics from the 80s, I haven’t read anything since.
I would suggest the mini-series Spider-Man Symbiote by Peter David and Greg Land. Peter David writes stories that are part of the continuity of the character and in the past. It’s a modernized revisit but not too much, with a lot of guests and independent mini-series. And also The Marvels by Kurt Busiek and Yildiray Cinar, which is a saga where elements of the past and present are used. Ideal for getting back into the swing of things without feeling lost.
- I don’t like comics at all.
For such a comic-averse person, I recommend the second installment of the Spider-Man Anniversary Collection: The Death of Gwen Stacy. It’s a story about how Peter experiences grief. A story full of emotions. Far from the clichés of the superhero genre.
And on the rest of the catalog, die by Kieron Gillen and Stephanie Hans which is kind of Jumanji intense and moving Gothic. This series is about the dreams that we had as children and which are destroyed or abandoned when we become adults…