Marvel and DC are pulling out all the stops for December in a contest to see which publisher will gain the most customers from an expected wave of new consumers surging into comic stores that month.

For the first time this month, we've applied our analysis methodology to calculating the initial orders to Diamond U.S. for graphic novels ordered for shipment in October 2001.

The first 80-page installment of Frank Miller's Dark Knight Strikes Again, one of the most highly anticipated comic releases in years, will be accompanied to market by a second monster product capable of generating huge sales, the Dark Knight Strikes Again Statue .

At the Diamond Retailer Summit in Fort Wayne, DC Comics announced that the first issue of Frank Miller's Dark Knight Strikes Again will go on sale on the fifth of December.

The big players seemed to dominate this month, with multiple products associated with the strongest properties taking many of the top slots.

DC Direct has a huge slate of products on tap for 2002, which will make it unlikely that any challenge to DC's dominance in this increasingly important product area will succeed.

The retailer sales numbers that ICv2 has collected for June continue to display the trends that we have seen over the past six months.

Most, but not all, of the retro art books will be deluxe 'coffee table' type books that should have a strong appeal to the visually oriented customers who shop at pop culture stores. Part II of our coverage of the category.

As more products became available in March stores reported positive sales trends to ICv2. In anime, DVDs took five of the ten spots including the first two, which were occupied by high ticket boxed and collector's set editions. Note that the videos in the top ten were all new releases from very popular series, Gundam Wing, Dragonball Z , and Martian Successor Nadesico.

Wizards of the Coast announced an ambitious slate of products for 2001 at the Gama show held in Las Vegas this week.