Yes, Dark Knight III: The Master Race had the top unit sales in comic stores in February (see "February Comics and Graphic Novel Sales Decline").  And yes, it’s got the lineage of one of the most important graphic novels of the last 30 years and the biggest support DC can give it.  But Deadpool is hot, hot, hot, with over $300 million in box office in the U.S. alone (see "'Deadpool' Tops $300 Million Domestic"), so perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise that the #1 dollar book in comic stores in February was Deadpool #7, the "25th anniversary" issue.

With variant cover support and a hefty $9.99 cover price, the retail value of the 88,000+ copies sold of Deadpool #7 was over $881,000, topping the dollars generated by Dark Knight III: The Master Race #3 (nearly $875,000) by a whisker.

Dark Knight III: The Master Race is holding up well, though, with sales down less than 10% between #2 and #3.

As is typical for February, there weren’t a lot of launches among the top comics.  The new Spider-Man #1, starring Miles Morales, was the top launch, barely missing 100,000 copies.  The first issue of the new Deadpool miniseries, Deadpool Mercs for Money #1, sold over 90,000 copies as well, but the rest of the February launches were below 80,000.  Powerman and Iron Fist #1, with sales stimulated by variant and exclusive coves was just over 79,000 copies.  The only other first issue in the top 25 comics in February was a one-shot, Avengers Standoff Welcome Pleasant Hill #1, which sold 57,559 copies.

For an analysis of the dollar trends in February, see "February Comics and Graphic Novel Sales Decline."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during February, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--February 2016."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during February, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--February 2016."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on comic books shipped during January, see "Top 300 Comics Actual--January 2016."

For our estimates of actual sales by Diamond U.S. from comic specialty stores on graphic novels shipped during January, see "Top 300 Graphic Novels Actual--January 2016."

​For our index to our reports on the top comic and graphic novel preorders for January 2000 through February 2016, see "ICv2's Top 300 Comics and Top 300 GNs Index."