Our final 2002 Top Ten Cool survey of the sell-through of pop culture products in December serves as a fitting capstone, since the major trends that we have been noticing are evident in abundance.

The list of films below represents our best judgment as to which of the many films slated for 2003 actually have merchandising potential.

The Diamond Select/Art Asylum Marvel Minimates will include the characters from this year's bumper crop of Marvel movies, Daredevil, Hulk , and the X-Men .

Daniel McAbee of The Tangled Web in Spartanburg, South Carolina saw our article on the Barnes & Noble exclusive on trade paperback editions of Marvel Masterworks and the Marvel response, and went about dealing with it.

Marvel has announced that its next quickie reprint, Marvel Must-Have: Ultimate Venom , will reprint four consecutive issues of Ultimate Spider-Man , #33-#36.

Sara Gray of Comic Gallery in San Diego, California saw our article on the Barnes & Noble exclusive on the trade paperback editions of Marvel Masterworks and didn't like what she heard.

Amazon.com has begun taking preorders for three Marvel RPG products due for release beginning in June.

The following is Marvel's official statement in response to the questions concerning the Barnes & Noble Marvel Masterworks editions.

Viz Communications is providing Borders, the nation's second largest retail book chain, with a six month exclusive on four volumes of the trade paperback Di Gi Charat manga.

Barnes & Noble Books, the publishing arm of the largest book retail chain in the U.S., is publishing paperback editions of five volumes of the Marvel Masterworks series in April.