"A Little Background"

(or, "Where the Hell Did THAT Come From?")




I'm still trying to wrap my head around the creation of Wizard Magazine. Here's what I know.

Wizard Magazine hit the scenes in September of 1991, and its timing was a significant part of its success. It arrived right on the heels of the release of X-Force #1 and just ahead of the launch of the new X-Men #1. Comic speculation was about to hit its all-time high, and an eye catching magazine attempting to be Previews, Overstreet, a fanboy cheerleader, and the 1960s Marvel Bullpen all at the same time, had tremendous opportunity to thrive in such an environment.

Working backward, Gareb Shamus explains in the first issue that it had been a project initiated 8 months earlier, placing the genesis of Wizard roughly four months after the launch of the McFarlane Spider-Man #1, the first clear indication that a new speculator age of comic books was on the way. That, plus the success of the 1989 Batman film, plans for various Marvel and DC movies to hit the screens (all of which were aborted), and the Batman and X-Men animated series being planned, were all further signs that this was the time to get into the comic industry. A year earlier, or a year later, Wizard might have crashed and burned before it even got started. By arriving in late 1991, Wizard was ahead of most of the major events that would define the 1990s comic book bubble and could be the credible voice that told us about those events first.

That's the part that makes sense.

The part that doesn't is the team behind it all.

Gareb Shamus was a recent college graduate with nothing in his resume to suggest he knew anything about comic books, magazine publishing, nor journalism.

His team, as of the first issue, also included:

Gregg McElhatton. a guy whose bio outright stated he was "Introduced to comics three years ago" and a freshman at James Madison University in Virginia.

Linda Perillo, a woman whose bio indicates no further experience in the industry beyond the fact that "She has some great ideas and can't wait to get started."

Michael Berry, a freelance writer who had previously reviewed "comic-related material for the San Francisco Chronicle."

Jane Scarano, publisher of a newsletter for desktop publishers.

Lawrence Watt-Evans, the one person on staff with an actual reputation, was a Hugo Award-winning writer of science fiction, fantasy, and horror (but not comics).


What in the world made anyone think these folks had the ability to be a credible authority on the comic book industry?

And yet, Shamus' thank yous in his Letter from the Publisher in that inaugural issue indicate he somehow acquired the support of Hank Rose (of Comic Images), Walter Wang (of Comics Unlimited), Steve Saffel (someone from Marvel I've never heard of before), and someone named Martin Schranz, in creating Wizard. I assume Saffel got him access to McFarlane, who did the cover and the featured interview, and the others helped to bankroll the whole thing.

How a college graduate pulled this off...well I'd love to hear that story, but with a McFarlane Spidey cover and the finances to print a significant enough number of glossy-covered issues to actually get Diamond and Capital City to not only take notice, but even contribute their insights about the direction of the industry in the first issue, Wizard was on its way to thriving in this unique age of comics.

I was a big fan of Wizard back in the day, I didn't pay attention to the speculation bits they did I just liked the interviews with writers and artists. More than that I loved the different commemorative issues they did, my favorite being the Spider-Man issue that had every costume he ever wore and a detailed history of what the costume was for and a short review of the comic it first appeared in.

And man, yeah, looking at that group of people I'm also left scratching my head over how the heck this got off the ground and why these people in particular were brought together.

Just as a first point...Lawrence Watt-Evans was far from an unknown writer in 1991. He was a pretty darn popular fantasy writer at the time and had been publishing novels and short fiction regularly for a decade. I was pretty plugged in to the SF and fantasy scene throughout the 80s and while he wasn't A-list he was quite well known and seen as an up-and-comer.

And since I'm writing away, I can say I have zero feelings one way or another about Wizard. I bought comics weekly from roughly 1979-1999 and never once looked inside an issue of Wizard.

I like that on that cover you can see Jeff Smith's name in the corner. At least Wizard was advertising SOME good comics in the 90's.

Wizard #1 (September 1991)




This first issue, seemingly created in reaction to the sales of McFarlane's Spider-Man #1 and the imminent speculation boom it suggested (Wizard was conceived 8 months earlier; Spidey #1 hit stands 4 months before that), is most certainly not subtle. A McFarlane drawing of Spider-man is on the cover, and the featured interview for the issue is with McFarlane. The only other content advertised on the cover is "Previews" and "Price Guide".

Worth noting: This first issue was printed with rough, Baxter(?) pages, almost entirely in black and white. However, the cover was the standard high quality, glossy material. This issue was also significantly shorter than those that would follow, two staples holding together the spine instead of glued binding. It's clear that keeping costs down was a high priority for this first issue.


Hindsight glimpses into the comic industry:

- A Diamond survey showed that the largest group of comic book readers were 19-25 years old (33% of sales), 13-18 year olds made up 25%, 26-35 year olds were 22%, and preteens and 35+ were grouped together as 11%.

- The CEO of Diamond observed that more companies were beginning to "produce material for what you might call 'mass-market consumption'," and there was speculation that the industry might return to Golden Age level sales figures, with top comics selling millions of copies.

- Top comics were already selling "a few hundred thousand" copies per issue.

- NOW comics was fighting for its last gasps, claiming to be reorganized and "better than ever" in its inside cover ad and in trade talk by the CEO of Capital City Distributors.

- Comico had also reorganized after going bankrupt, but no ads are to be found within, and enthusiasm from the CEO of Capital City Distributors was far more muted.

- Dark Horse was on a "phenomenal" rise

- Malibu had "improved its product line"


Industry news:

- X-Force #1 had just become the best selling comic of all time, and Wizard was already anticipating that X-Men #1 would trump it.

- Todd McFarlane is already speculating about walking away from full time comic work and ultimately self-publishing

- Digital coloring was already being adopted by DC and TSR

- The Rocketeer was about to hit theaters, and there were early murmurings about a ton of Marvel and DC movies and animated cartoons in the works.


Wizard shaping the comic book market?

- On page 20, an article on "Collecting Comics in the 90s" describes the various ways people collect, including "Character Collecting," "Artist Collecting," "Writer Collecting," and also spends nearly half the article on "Creative Marketing collecting," discussing the appeal of special covers and variants, though it's quick to warn that "Just putting a special cover on a piece of junk will not work."

- "Wizard's Top 10" places emphasis on the importance of Rob Liefield, Jim Lee, and Wilce Portacio over content of any kind, though there is attention given to the first appearances of Cable, and X-Force, two key Infinity Gauntlet tie-ins (SS #34 and 50), and the new Ghost Rider battling Johnny Blaze in Ghost Rider #15.

- The Price Guide. Absolutely no indication is given on how Wizard got their information for their Price Guide. Updating industry prices once a month SHOULD have been an impossible task in the days before the internet, so I assume a lot of this was based on very little information in order to have a quick turn-around. What's even more interesting is what Wizard does and does not include in their 18 page guide. Nothing from the Golden Age appears to be included (Batman, for example, begins at #110). While this might have been done with the assumption that the average teenage reader could never hope to afford those issues, it also indirectly suggests that Golden Age books are not desirable. Indeed, growing up on Wizard, I dreamed of one day owning Showcase #22 and Fantastic Four #1, but never really gave much thought to Batman #1 and Detective #27.

- The Price Guide begins with pictures of Whilce Portacio, Jim Lee, Rob Liefield, and Art Adams. Because, apparently, those are the most important faces in comicdom.

- Did the fact that Shamus had connections with a Marvel insider bias the magazine? Nearly all of their content discusses what's happening at Marvel, with Lobo being the only non-Marvel character discussed at any length (though there is an article late in the issue discussing the mature DC properties that would ultimately fall under the Vertigo imprint). It's true that Marvel was launching a lot more exciting "events" than DC at the time, but really? NO mention of Batman ANYWHERE in this book? In 1991???

- To further this point about bias, the price guide includes 21 small images of Marvel covers to only 12 small images of DC covers, and 14 large images of Marvel covers to 5 large images of DC covers. TMNT is the only non-Marvel, non-DC comic to get a cover displayed in the guide.

- If you include a price guide for comic book trading cards and action figures (neither of which, to the best of my knowledge, had ever been done before), that's going to inspire people to start collecting them.


Wizard's Comic Watch:

Omega Men #3: 1st Lobo

X-Factor #24: 1st Archangel


Wizard's Top 10:



1. X-Force #1
2. X-Men #248
3. Silver Surfer #50
4. X-Factor #63
5. Spider-Man #1 Platinum
6. New Mutants #87
7. Silver Surfer #34
8. Ghost Rider #15
9. New Teen Titans #2
10. New Mutants #100


Contents:

McFarlane Spider-Man cover and centerfold

Letter from the Publisher: Gareb Shamus thanks a bunch of people and toots the magazine's horn a bit

"Just Asking": Pat O'Neil, someone not credited as being on staff, states the concern that editors have no power in reigning in creators in the '90s. Too bad no one listened.

Questions and Answers: Largely made-up people send in perfectly reasonable questions about DC/Marvel crossovers, Cletus Kasady, Ghost Rider, and what "DC" stands for.

"Writing and Drawing the Web Head": Todd McFarlane brazenly admits he has little interest in comics or in Spider-Man and views all of this as a job, as well as explains that he usually completely circumvents his editor, never plans his stories in advance and makes them up on the fly, panel by panel, based on what he thinks will look visually interesting, and even concedes that he doesn't put any real thought into backgrounds at all.

"A Short History of:" provides a basic overview of the key aspects of Spider-Man's history, including villains, romantic interests, and visual evolution, but it's hardly thorough.

"Wizard's comic Watch"": Focus on the first appearances of Lobo and Archangel

"Digital Color": discusses how DC and TSR now use computerized coloring

"Collecting Comics in the '90s:" tells the helpless reader how he should collect, with an emphasis on incentive covers.

"Wizard's Top 10": All Marvel (except New Teen Titans #2), with special emphasis on the work of Rob Liefield, Jim Lee, and Whilce Portacio.

"Grading your Comics:" A basic guide to conditions (not the 10 point system, mind you).

Price Guide: 18 pages, largely emphasizing Marvel, from the Silver Age up.

Marvel Trading Cards price guide

Boris Vallejo Trading Cards price guide (what the heck?)

"The Wiz Quiz" Which of the two new X-Men teams do you like better? Fill out the survey and send it back.

Toy Figures Price Guide: Secret Wars, Super Powers, and Toy Biz only

"Number 1 Releases for the month"

"Comic Book Shipping Dates"

"Horror Comics Then...and Now!" discusses the similarities and differences between EC and Vertigo. Pretty pointless in stating the obvious, with no clear focus on trying to make EC fans read Vertigo or Vertigo fans read EC. This feature feels utterly out of place in a magazine otherwise targeted to young readers of the most common denominator superhero fare. NOTE: this was the sole contribution of Lawrence Watt-Evans to Wizard, yet he got staff credits at the beginning of the issue.

"Picks from the Wizard's Hat": Almost all Marvel

"Rocketeering On Screen": Behind the scenes of The Rocketeer

"Remembering the Middle Man": Michael Berry speaks with the CEOs of Diamond and Capital City. Definitely the most informative article of the issue, and it's pushed to the very back.

Show and Convention Calendar



Final thoughts:

I wonder if Marvel wasn't a major silent partner in the creation of Wizard, or at least a significant bank-roller. Think about it: until McFarlane's exodus, Wizard was probably the most successful Marvel advertising campaign of all time, emphasizing all of its hot artists (ignoring DC's comparably hot artists: how else does Liefield get love when Brefogle doesn't?) and upcoming books while almost entirely ignoring DC and the wealth of quality upcoming independents at the same time.

It seems like much of Wizard's content in this first issue was designed to appease/serve the interests of others in the industry. Beyond all the promotion for Marvel, there are pages and pages in the back simply indexing all the comics on sale next month that readers should order through their LCS; a nice gesture if you want Diamond and Capital City to play nice with you, and maybe even invest some cash in our venture.

Which, in the end, is more believable? That a nobody college graduate somehow gained unlimited access to the hottest artist in comics and managed to pull together enough investors to launch a major monthly publication out of nowhere, or that Marvel (and possibly some other entities in the comic book industry) bankrolled the goofy kid next door who looked and thought just like the target demographic to advertise their products for them while maintaining the guise of being an objective journalist?

Yep. It sucked.





And nothing he's done since suggests it either.






I'm pretty sure they just asked their business partners which back issues they had extra stock of, then jacked the price of those up real high so they could get a good kickback.

What was the alternative at the time? Overstreet came out annually and Wizard provided a monthly fix. It claimed to do a weighted average of retail sales at the time from various sources. Hot books were in green and decreases were highlighted in pink IIRC. At the same time, I didn't swear by it religiously...it would value blocks of books at $3 to $5 each and I thought that was just lazy, catch-all valuations.

I remember guide values still being way less than Mile High's pricing at the time. In 2001, Chuck had Ultimate X-Men #1 priced at a hundred dollars.