Although the top of the bestseller lists based on Diamond Comic Distributors sales to comic stores reflect sales similar to those of a year ago (see 'ICv2 Top 300 Comics Actual -- October 2006' and 'ICv2 Top 100 Graphic Novels Actual -- October 2006', the bottom half of those lists shows surprising strength against year ago numbers.  This is true in both comic and graphic novel numbers for October 2007 vs. October 2006. 

For example, Kong, King of Skull Island #0, the #300 title in October 2007, sold more than twice as many copies as the second month sales of Civil War: X-Men #3, the #300 title in October, 2006.  In fact, you had to go up 64 ranks, to the #236 title in 2006, to match the sales of the 2007 title.

The growth rate halfway up the list, at #150, was not as rapid, but was still a whopping 63%.  The effect did not disappear until around the 25th title, where the 2006 title was above the 2007 title.

At the top of the list, Marvel had seven of the top ten titles, and 13 of the top 25.  DC had most of the rest, with Dark Horse's Buffy the Vampire Slayer #7 in the #7 slot the sole exception.  

Buffy was on top of the graphic novel list, with Buffy the Vampire Slayer Long Way Home the #1 title at just under 9,000 copies. 

Here are ICv2's estimates of the sales by Diamond Comic Distributors to comic stores on the top 25 comic titles in October:

111,481     New Avengers #35
110,405     Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man #24
101,763     Justice League of America #14
  99,544     Mighty Avengers #5 CWI
  99,424     Justice Society of America #10*
  98,958     X-Men Messiah Complex One Shot MC
  94,144     Buffy The Vampire Slayer #7
  92,587     Marvel Zombies 2 #1 (Of 5)
  85,638     Uncanny X-Men #491
  83,810     Wolverine #58*
  83,456     X-Men #204
  78,650     Green Lantern #24
  78,222     Countdown 30
  77,755     Countdown 29
  77,131     Captain America #31 CWI
  77,003     Countdown 28
  76,890     Batman #670*
  76,401     Countdown 27
  75,514     Countdown To Final Crisis 26
  74,310     Ultimate Spiser-Man #115*
  66,548     Punisher War Journal #12 WWH*
  63,028     Ultimate X-Men #87*
  60,862     Green Lantern Corps #16
  60,253     Tales of Sinestro Corps Cyborg Superman #1
  60,050     Wolverine Origins #18

We are estimating actual sales by Diamond U.S. (primarily to North American comic stores), using Diamond's published sales indexes and publisher sales data to estimate a sales number for Batman (the anchor title Diamond uses in its calculations), and using that number and the indexes to estimate Diamond's sales on the remaining titles.  We can check the accuracy of our numbers by comparing the Batman number that we calculate using multiple data points; our numbers for Batman are within 1/10 of 1% of each other, ensuring a high degree of accuracy.

For an analysis of the dollar trends in October, see 'Comics Up 20%.'

For our estimates of actual orders to Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books scheduled to ship during October, see 'Top 300 Comics Actual--October 2007.'

For our estimates of actual orders to Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels scheduled to ship during October, see 'Top 100 Graphic Novels Actual--October 2007.'

For our estimates of actual orders to Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books scheduled to ship during September, see 'Top 300 Comics Actual--September 2007.'

For our estimates of actual orders to Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels scheduled to ship during September, see 'Top 100 Graphic Novels Actual--September 2007.'

For our index to our reports on the top comic and graphic novel preorders for January 2000 through October 2007, see 'ICv2's Top 300 Comics and Top 100 GNs Index.'