Constant Work in Progress...

From today's Uncanny X-Men (2024) #13

Sadurang came to talk to Gambit and happened upon shenanigans at the Haven house. He had to pause and ask

This sounds like the take of someone who doesn't understand what they're talking about. But I got time - I'll shed some knowledge.

Comic sales are based on many things, but the biggest factor is the amount of units ordered for the issue. So for example, if shops only ordered 10k of Book A and it sold out vs. 50k of Book B and it sold 50% of its stock, the second book will have better sales no matter what because it had more units available for purchase. But you can argue that the popularity of Book A is higher given it sold 100% of its units.

The other thing to factor in is what's considered when units are ordered. Comic shops look at the character, their history with selling for that character at their shop, and - very important - the reception of the previous issues. If issues 2 and 3 sold well, they'll buy a lot of issue 4... if issues 2 and 3 weren't strong sellers, then they become more conservative with how many of issue 4 they order, and so on.

In the case of Storm, who has a history of not selling well long-term, she's not going to get a high order from shops. Issue 1 was high simply because it's the first issue, but then it was a big drop in units ordered for issue 2 and then another drop for issue 3. Again, comic shops are understandably conservative with their orders given her history.

But you mentioned issue 3, so let's talk about that one specifically. If anything, the sales of issue 3 are more of an indication of issues 1 and 2, because the reception to those issues is what shop owners would rely on to know how much to order for issue 3 (they have to place the orders weeks in advance and then can order again right before the final cutoff). And given that issue 3 was selling out at shops AND sold out at the distributor level, it sounds to me like the reception was pretty damn good and that shops didn't order enough to begin with (and this all indicates that if the initial order for issue 3 had been higher, the sales would have been, too). And considering the issue was mainly a filler issue, it's actually very impressive that it even made the Top 50 for the month and was Top 10 for its highly competitive week.

An even bigger indicator that it was well-received was the spike in issue 4's sales. More units of issue 4 were ordered - why? Because shops saw how well issue 3 was selling, and they didn't want to be in a position where they didn't have enough supply to meet the demand again. And guess what, when issue 4 sold well, they ordered more of issue 5 - and that one also had high sales because again more units were available to purchase. And this isn't speculation by the way - the author of the series AND comic shops (including mine and those of my friends who are also shop owners) confirmed more of issues 4 and 5 were ordered based on the reception of the prior issue. Murewa Ayodele has even said they (Marvel) were surprised and excited by how well issue 3 did considering Storm's track record, and its reception along with the subsequent increase in orders for issues 4 and 5 is what allowed the series to be greenlit to go beyond issue 10.

Now was this all due to the Storm and Wolverine of it all? I don't think so. It certainly was a major factor considering it was all over social media and drowned out discussion of pretty much anything else happening in comics that week - people were interested in it and were curious about what would come next with two of the most popular X-Men characters ever. But I also think the tease of a pending confrontation with Sorcerer Supreme Doom also added to it, and the fact that it's actually just a very good book with solid word of mouth. But at the same time, if you're quick to lay blame on the issue's "failure" on the sex scene, you better be just as ready to give it credit for its success.

Currently, I like her being single because I'm interested in the expansion of her mythos and just her in general more than anything. That being said, I fully support her having a harem - it's what she deserves and doesn't tie her down to any one person long-term. She's young and a goddess - let her be free to live her life and sleep with whoever she wants.

But in general, I enjoy her with Logan (my blog makes that pretty clear). I also like her vibe with Kurt, Yukio, and sometimes Callisto. Forge is a hard no as their lives have gone down such different paths since they ended, and the other people she's been with aren't particularly memorable (the surfer dude from the X-treme X-Men run, that one astronaut dude on Krakoa, etc.).

Honestly, I don't really ever think about them. I don't hate them or anything, I just don't particularly care for them. I think they were at their best under McDuffie in his Fantastic 4 run (really liked them under his pen), but other than that, I wasn't particularly interested or invested in them as a couple. I love X-Men, so I'm deeply invested in Storm. I couldn't really care less about T'Challa - sorry to any BP fans, it's not anything against him per se, that's just not a franchise I'm into, and I often find his stories boring and a little repetitive. And it's a struggle when you really only care about half of the pairing.

Open-mouthed panting while straddling

Him lifting her leg and them pulling each other close

Stripping each other down naked

Weather going crazy in the background

Merry Christmas to meeeeee!