Comic orders from specialty stores were generally down for August, with an 8% dollar drop from July.

Estimated quantities for the top 300 comics ordered by pop culture stores for shipping in August, 2001.

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

Marvel Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada announced that Spider-Man creator Stan Lee will write the comic book adaptation of the Spider-Man movie, which is currently in production and scheduled to be released on May 2, 2002.

There is no doubt that manga's influence on American comics appears to be growing. Witness two stories that appeared on Newsarama this week. Michael Doran broke the story of Marvel's plan for an eight-title Marvel ' Mangaverse ' event planned for January, 2002, while Matt Brady detailed plans at DC Comics to use manga artist Kia Asamiya (Silent Moebius, Dark Angel) for a series of Titans covers.

The CMAA contacted Marvel and the publisher admitted that putting the Code Seal of Approval on Wolverine #165 was 'a mistake' on the company's part. ICv2 has learned that Marvel has not been submitting books to the CMAA recently and other current issues that carry the code (e.g., Tangled Web #3) are also 'mistakes.'

The Fox TV network has ordered a two-hour pilot based on the classic television series Battlestar Galactica, which was originally broadcast by ABC from 1978 through 1980.

The British website Empire On Line is reporting that Oscar-winning actor Nicholas Cage will star as Johnny Blaze in a movie version of the Ghost Rider comic. The film will be directed by Steven Norrington, who brought Marvel's Blade to the big screen.

North American comic shop orders increased in the aggregate again for July, with the total dollars up around 10% from June.

Orders by comic shops (Diamond U.S. customers) for the Top 300 Comics shipping in July.