The impact of variant covers is very visible when looking at the December comic numbers, with storylines, the old way of influencing sales, also having an effect.

The biggest move in the comic numbers was the change from #1 to #2 of Dark Knight III:  Master Race, which dropped over 282,000 copies.  The first issue numbers were increased by many retailer variants, as is often the case these days.

In the other direction, orders for Batman were up over 20,000 copies, and Harley Quinn was up over 10,000, probably due to the polybagged Harley Quinn variants, which had a rare sketch cover as the winning ticket.

And some titles were impacted by the stories.  Star Wars was up over 16,000 copies, due to the Vader Down storyline crossing over from Darth Vader.     

DC did very well with its Batman Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles crossover, selling over 134,000 copies of the first issue into comic stores in North America. 

Marvel had a ton of All-New All-Different #1s in December, led by Guardians of Infinity #1, which topped 121,000 copies.  Daredevil was the next highest, with 84,500 sold of its first issue.

And we should mention that Secret Wars #8, which was supposed to be the final issue of the series but is now the next-to-the-last issue, sold nearly 170,000 copies in the #1 slot.

For an analysis of the dollar trends in December, see "Comics Finish the Year Strong."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during December, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--December 2015."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during December, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--December 2015."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during November, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--November 2015."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during November, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--November 2015."

For an overview and analysis of the best-selling comics and graphic novels in November, see "'Dark Knight III' #1 Orders Top 440,000."

​For our index to our reports on the top comic and graphic novel preorders for January 2000 through December 2015, see "ICv2's Top 300 Comics and Top 300 GNs Index."