Unless you only read core DCU books, there is chances DC comics canceled a series you were following.  From Great Ten only lasting 9 issues to Vertigo's cleaning out house, as well as Wildstorm and Vuda dying, DC is streamlining their product it seems.  Caring more about the "Sales" and less about the "Story".  Many fans who love Geoff Johns, Jim Lee and Dan Didio(t) [That will be the last time I don't bracket his name by the way.] are supporting the actions of this new regime.  Sure all three have proven they can make money in their own ways: Geoff John is the storyteller, Jim Lee is the living art God and Didiot gave the world the show Reboot, so he knows how to sell crack to kids.  That is a formula that works, but are formulas good?  
 
By having a formula for business you are only caring about the money. Here is a simple example of what I mean: 
Batman + Superman + Wonder Woman = 3X the fan base. Lets call it "The Trinity".
Wildstorm's sales are low and that is a fact.
"The Trinity" + Wildstorm = Even more mixed fanbase.... right?
On paper that makes sense, but in reality it never works.  Characters not born in the DCU always struggle to fit in the DCU and that is a fact the business men are missing.  Shazam and ( Ted Kord) Blue Beetle are great examples, because sure they have their fans, but Superman will always be DC's baby and Shazam is the bastard child, same with Ted Kord. He was (RIP) a rich man superhero, he can't be more popular then Batman, DCU will never allow it.  Characters who are just tossed into the mix, owned by DC or its other imprints, will not mix properly.  
 
Vertigo, which maybe the longest lasting imprint, it stated off without even knowing its own name, within the pages of Alan Moore's Swamp Thing and then Grant Morrison with his Animal Man and Doom Patrol.  With the movement and change of mentality Karen Berger was allowed to create Vertigo. Vertigo was an imprinted I fell in love with because it cared about the "Story". The stories were allowed Finite ends. The characters were allowed to grow without worries of "reboots" (pardon the Didiot pun) and re-continuity.  Vertigo was allowed to do that as long as the "Sales" were good.  Vertigo's problem was that it did not grow with the time fast enough.  Its fan base was always older readers.  Older readers stopped buying monthlies and moved to trade buying.  It took a while for Vertigo to catch on to that and to this date its longest running series Hellblazer is not properly collected. But back to the topic of sales, the monthlies decreased and the products suffered for it.  Swamp Thing Vol. 4 cut short, Swamp Thing Vol. 5 robbed after inception and then aborted.  Award winning and acclaimed Unknown Soldier was not even safe because it didn't sell more then something like Booster Gold.  I am not picking on Booster this time, I like the dude a lot.  I picked it because he is a great example of the greed DC has right now.  Before Blackest Night Booster's sales were not great and once Blackest Night did its cross-over the sales picked out drastically.  Guys like Geoff Johns and Didiot have now seen the power of the cross-over at its "best" or "worst" I'll let you word it accordingly. Because the Cross-over potential is there, DC is moving away from why I pick them over Marvel.  Marvel is all about the Cross-overs, any Marvel fan please tell he this is not true, because I will respond to "remove your rose colored glasses for that company".  Was their not a quest on comicvine about X-Overs?
 
DC has now moved into caring about the sales over the story.  So things that are not making money are getting cut and products that management thinks can make more money else were are being taken back and absorbed.  "Who cares is Swamp Thing has changed in Vertigo", right? New fans didn't read his Mark Millar run, so who cares if they reboot his history so he can "date" Poison Ivy and become the plant power house.  Okay that last line was meant as sarcastic, and if you were a Swamp Thing fan you would feel my pain about Alec, Abby and Tefe taken away so they can randomly appear in the DCU as younger versions of themselves.  Who cares about guys like me who wasted their money on great stories that are now not their history.  A character like Swamp Thing doesn't benefit the DCU, he has grown and changed and given something most North American comic characters are never allow to have and that is a real life.  He was allowed to age, marry, divorce, have a kid.  But for some unknown reason to me, most people in North American don't want their characters to have a life.  They want to complain about things like Brand New Day and OMIT yet they keep supporting the books. I guess what I am saying is, that some characters should be allowed just to take our money like Spider-man is for and some characters should be allowed to be used for a grander story, such as The Wildstorm, Vertigo, Minx and Vuda imprints all were suppose to be for. 
 
Another character I forgot to mention was Madame Xanadu, a character taken back because of the Didiot Mandate. There was no need to cancel here series because it was doing fine Vertigo-wise at least.  Its sales were in the middle of the back monthly and the trades I heard were doing fine.  Madame Xanadu was a causality of greed. DC wanted her back under the DC banner, even if she was still interacting with DC characters she was not making money directly for the parent. Madame Xandau was out selling Brian Woods books monthly, so it for sure was about having her under the DC banner.  Why is it so important for Didiot to have everyone back under the same banner? It is him being territorial.  He is a kid in daycare and he wants all the toys to play with.  A lot of his direction for DC is not helping the overall product, just himself. The Endless in the DCU is another topic, because sure they don't have much going on Vertigo-wise right now, but they are characters that just shouldn't show up in the DCU, just because.  Destiny and Death did come from the DCU, and Daniel has his connection to the DCU as well, but the Endless has to be written well to not ruin their characters.
 
Here is a quote to show DC is about the money, so you guys who think I am just a Vertigo Nut will hopefully see what I am saying. [Link it : HERE]

....Time passed, DC reshuffled the top of their management, we changed editors and I sort of watched everything nervously, but kept writing according to what I'd sent Scott. Finally, after sending in the script to WildCATS 28, I couldn't hold off any longer, and sent a note to Editor Jim Chadwick, asking if Wildstorm intended to keep the creative team in place past issue 30, as I hadn't heard anything one way or the other. I hoped my "long term plan," plus what I hoped was my obvious enthusiasm for the book, and the largely positive response we (and the Authority and Gen13 and DV8) had received here on the boards and elsewhere might play some factor in keeping the ball rolling. But there were bigger forces at work. Jim wrote me back, explaining that CATS was gone, as was Authority, and so on, and the decision had actually been made some amount of time before. Nothing to do with our work, he assured me, but sales had been declining for some time, the new top brass at DC wanted to reconsider the line, etc., etc. Business decision, not creative (and I believe that). And #30 would be our last issue...   

-  Adam Beechen  

I still think DC is treating its fans better than Marvel. The multi-colored Hulks, X-Nazis, "Avengers" and their recent events have all been slaps to the face.
 
Though I definitely see where you're coming from. However, regarding the WS thing, it might turn out to be not that big of a deal. It could just result in the binding of books being changed to say "DC Universe" instead of "Wildstorm". It could all turn out like the Marvel/Disney situation. 
 
Keep the faith a little longer, mate :)

 @Silkcuts said:

"Is DC's greed turning away fans?"  

" I still think DC is treating its fans better than Marvel. The multi-colored Hulks, X-Nazis, "Avengers" and their recent events have all been slaps to the face.  Though I definitely see where you're coming from. However, regarding the WS thing, it might turn out to be not that big of a deal. It could just result in the binding of books being changed to say "DC Universe" instead of "Wildstorm". It could all turn out like the Marvel/Disney situation.   Keep the faith a little longer, mate :) "

"  @Silkcuts said:

"Is DC's greed turning away fans?"  

Not me. "

as upset as I am over Wildstorm ending I also understand why it's happening.....Wildstorm hasn't been selling well in a long time and no matter what at the end of the day DC is a company that wants to make money and you can't make money with books that aren't selling...it doesn't matter how good a story is if the books not selling then they have to get rid of it...now this might upset the books fans but obviously there aren't a lot of them since the book isn't selling well so they can either piss off a few fans and save money or loose money and keep the book around....what would you do

Here's the thing DC comics is a business in any sales based business the amount of consumer interest is determined by the sales numbers  

It's always sad when a good series is dropped, regardless as to wether or not money (greed) is the reason.  
 
I think the big two (Marvel&DC) are just hellbent on making comics a giant trend while they can so that they can keep milking merch and movies. That's not a bad thing, but it feels like they are always trying to outdo one another with some big event or ridiculous story arc. Of course these involve the characters that cross generations (Spider-Man, Batman, Superman, Hulk) instead of actually interesting characters that are hardly ever mentioned.  
 
And I'm glad you mentioned Booster Gold and Blue Beetle. I'm a huge Booster Gold fangirl and am super happy with where the series has been heading. But when I started really getting into BG a few years back I also wanted to start reading Blue Beetle (Jaime Reyes, not Ted) and was pretty disappointed  when the Blue Beetle series ended as mini story at the back of the BG books (can't remember the issues). It was a fun series and could've had a longer run, but the Beetle was never really that big anyways so he went kaput once again. 
 
I went to DC from Marvel for two reasons: Way ruined Deadpool and DC had more compelling characters. But now I find I'm a little torn because I have one series I really enjoy (Booster Gold) and one that I'm reading just to try and keep up with what the hell's going on (Brightest Day). I adore Geoff Johns's writing, but surely DC can find more talent to write for smaller titles. And when all the hoopla surrounding the events is done and they've squeezed everything they can from the cash cow that is the Trinity etc, they are going to have nothing to fall back on except for maybe some straight to DVD animated movies because everyone is sick of Superman and Batman sequels and would like to read a genuinely good story.

If you're talking greed, talk Marvel before DC. They put out ANYTHING to make a buck.
On a side note, it's a money making business, and there's a lot of people that work hard at both companies that need to be paid. If they were truly a greedy company, they'd raise the price of their books another $1 without offering anything else within the issue.

@Joey Ravn said:

"  @Silkcuts said:

"Is DC's greed turning away fans?"  

Not me. "

That is deep.  Glad your still on board. 

I always respect these well written blogs and threads more then just angry non nonsensical ramblings you see someone post. You are right that there is more to the industry that can be about anything that don't have to be Marvel or DC or superheroes but this was a decision made by a comic book company driven by superheroes other companies have the advantage of being able to take a risk but if people are not interested like the Wildstorm line or buying it then it should be no surprise it was ended.

I think it was Moore, Vaughn, Casey, Brubaker, Millar, Quitley and Ellis that made Wildstorm interesting and important not Jim Lee and with none of the big creators interested in the universe there was no reason for the imprint to have importance it could be blamed on mismanagement  or lack of interest I don't even see many care about the line. 
 
As for the books getting cancelled it is a sad trend of the industry but hardly new it is something going on for a long time. 

" @Joey Ravn:   How about what you like and why the post in your opinon is wrong."

" @Joey Ravn: sorry dude, I didn't mean for you to see it as rude, I was just joking.   It was short, so I was just playing.  I understand, you are not effected. "

" @Silkcuts:@FadeToBlackBolt:@danhimself:@joshmightbe:   Sadly Josh is correct if not short sighted.  Josh is not short sided but the fact is short sighted.  This is not new.  I am an old time comic fan and have been buying them for a long time.  What the comic companies are doing is going after the highly sought after, younger, thirteen year old, demographic.  This means lots of violence and sex replaces clever writing and better stories.   This works only in the short term.  Younger readers eventually get fed up and stop buying when they realize they are being duped.  Some hang on for better stories but the fewer that are available the fewer they buy. My favorite five characters are Guy Gardner, Booster Gold, Ted Kord, Fire, Ice, four of the five of these have been killed.  Not to mention charcters like Maxima, Question, Captain Atom, Crimson Fox, Crimson Fox again, Gypsy, Superboy, Kilowog, and on and on.  All these characters are in my top twenty.  That is twelve dead out of twenty and with every death I bought less comics.  From about 1998-2008 I barely bought a current book.  I would buy back issues of when time was good if I bought anything at all.  acationally there would be a current book I would buy but my store requires five issues minimum for a pull list and I couldn't find five issues I wanted.    DC kills and brings back characters so often that death doesn't mean anything.  Was anyone concerned Bruce Wayne wouldn't come back when he was killed?  A smart fan just looks at it and says "well I keep buying the title waiting to bring them back" or "I'll stop until they bring my charcter back."    My point is dead characters don't sell comics.  Sure when Batman and Superman died there was a spike in sales but that soon subsided.   Superman came out with a book every week up until his death.  It was not long after that those titles started to fall by the wayside.    Now we have characters who come back that really didn't need to be back.  Hal Jordan and Barry Allen didn't need to be brought back.  They destroyed characters like Wally West and Kyle Rayner.  As long as the companies are more concerned with quarterly sales than long term sales they will ultimately fail.  That is the same thing that the automobile companies and banks were doing and look how they ended up.  Do you think the government is going to give DC a bail out.  The fact is there are less and less people buying comics now then there was decade after decade.  "

" @Liberty: i wasn't saying it was right or a good thing Im just pointing out the nature of the business "

" @Liberty said:

" @Joey Ravn:   How about what you like and why the post in your opinon is wrong."

I never said it was wrong. I said, literally, that it was not turning me away. How can an opinion be wrong? Maybe a disinformed, but never wrong. "

" @Silkcuts said:

" @Joey Ravn: sorry dude, I didn't mean for you to see it as rude, I was just joking.   It was short, so I was just playing.  I understand, you are not effected. "

No harm done. "

" @Silkcuts: I cannot get enough of his Catwoman covers. Sooooo pretty :) "

" @Silkcuts: I cannot get enough of his Catwoman covers. Sooooo pretty :) "

" If you're talking greed, talk Marvel before DC. They put out ANYTHING to make a buck. On a side note, it's a money making business, and there's a lot of people that work hard at both companies that need to be paid. If they were truly a greedy company, they'd raise the price of their books another $1 without offering anything else within the issue. "

" @Silkcuts:   I too wish it was more about the art of making a comic rather than the money factor.  I believe that the system gets bogged down in money issues when the truth is if you make something well it we be bought.  You do not have to use gimmicks and in the long run they hurt sales.  They only work in the short term. "

"Is my opinion is disinformed?  "

I am upset with the current handling of Vertigo but do not really care for Wildstorm closing. Seems even quality wise most of their titles were quite stagnant which cannot be said for V and nothing is being buried, just the label is done.
 
Also, DC is not nearly as bad as Marvel. At least, not yet. The eight crossovers for The Road Home... now that has me deeply concerned.

Shouldn't let what a company does or how they go about putting they're kids through school
effect what comics you choose to read and enjoy, by whatever choice company, ever. 
For the life of me when i was a wee-bean I can not remember ever giving a single care 
about what some product maker was doing. It didn't effect the enjoyment I would take from comics,
cartoons, action figures and video games, nor should it now. Acknowledgment of someones deviance
is always fine, but giving into it is self-defeat.

  The way DC has been handling things has been turning me away for awhile now.  As a big Captain Marvel fan, I can't help but get turned away by what is occuring at DC.  Not only that, but the characterization of Green Arrow earlier this year made me shake my head, at the very least.  It does seem like stories take the cut at DC, and if the character isn't named Batman, Superman, or Wonder Woman, then don't keep your hopes up on your other favorite characters getting a story, let alone a series. 
 
  Greed takes place for creativity, after all, what good is a great story if you can't sell it to every single person?

" I wasn't reading Authority (because Batman and Superman who kill doesn't appeal to me) or Wildcats anyway.  Vertigo, I'm not buying anything from right now.  I do want the imprint to stick around though because its produced a bunch of great things like 100 Bullets, Y, Doom Patrol, Swamp Thing, etc. "

" I am upset with the current handling of Vertigo but do not really care for Wildstorm closing. Seems even quality wise most of their titles were quite stagnant which cannot be said for V and nothing is being buried, just the label is done.  Also, DC is not nearly as bad as Marvel. At least, not yet. The eight crossovers for The Road Home... now that has me deeply concerned. "

" Shouldn't let what a company does or how they go about putting they're kids through school effect what comics you choose to read and enjoy, by whatever choice company, ever.  For the life of me when i was a wee-bean I can not remember ever giving a single care  about what some product maker was doing. It didn't effect the enjoyment I would take from comics, cartoons, action figures and video games, nor should it now. Acknowledgment of someones deviance is always fine, but giving into it is self-defeat. "

"

  The way DC has been handling things has been turning me away for awhile now.  As a big Captain Marvel fan, I can't help but get turned away by what is occuring at DC.  Not only that, but the characterization of Green Arrow earlier this year made me shake my head, at the very least.  It does seem like stories take the cut at DC, and if the character isn't named Batman, Superman, or Wonder Woman, then don't keep your hopes up on your other favorite characters getting a story, let alone a series. 
 
  Greed takes place for creativity, after all, what good is a great story if you can't sell it to every single person?

"

" @Silkcuts said: 

"Is my opinion is disinformed?  "

No, never said it was. I was just saying that opinions can't be wrong in themselves. They can be based on wrong data, but that doesn't make them wrong. I see where you're coming from, but I don't see it as a problem personally. I can't speak for everyone, but right now, I'm loving DC Comics. "

I disagree. If anything I'd say Marvel is the greedier of the two big publishers in the industry. 
 
And honestly companies need to make money, if a book just isn't selling and bringing in the profits then what's the point of continuing it?

" There is new fables readers everyday without DC doing a single ad.  

 @LightBright:  

I was so sad when Question died. And then Renee Montoya (who is a great character, don't get me wrong) becoming the new Question just felt really weird. I saw no real reason for Vic to pick her as his sucessor. It was just too weird.  
 
And when Big Barda found Scott dead I almost cried. I'm not an overly emotional person either, but I get attached to very few characters in comics so much that their deaths affect me. DC is always killing off people I like! >_< 
 
And when Batman died all I thought was "oh" because there was no way DC would let him stay dead. They (publishers in general) try to shock readers by killing off big characters but it's so overdone these days the affect is gone. It's the minor characters who don't deserve to die that tug at the heartstrings. 

 Shouldn't let what a company does or how they go about putting they're kids through school
effect what comics you choose to read and enjoy, by whatever choice company, ever. 
For the life of me when i was a wee-bean I can not remember ever giving a single care 
about what some product maker was doing. It didn't effect the enjoyment I would take from comics,
cartoons, action figures and video games, nor should it now. Acknowledgment of someones deviance
is always fine, but giving into it is self-defeat. 

" I disagree. If anything I'd say Marvel is the greedier of the two big publishers in the industry.  And honestly companies need to make money, if a book just isn't selling and bringing in the profits then what's the point of continuing it? "

@Silkcuts: Great Blog By The Way!  "

You're being silly by framing it as "greed" (the immoral wanting of more than one deserves)... if you can see the point about it being business then how about seeing it as a job for the individuals? 
 
You realize they get up every morning to provide for themselves, their families, their future, and just happen to do it in a manner that involves your consumption, but they don't live for your consumption.  If anything, condemning a person's personal and free will choices to provide for themselves as they see fit for the sake of your personal enjoyment... well, THAT is greed (hubris, and a number of other choice words in terms of mischaracterizing interests).  Comics, on the publishing side, are not that big a business.  The fact is that the vast majority of those working in it could find more lucrative work elsewhere- particularly in terms of those playing with the corporately owned toys of others- and it takes a special sort of insanity to decide to work in comics rather than reap the rewards of their talents doing something else.  What makes you qualified to call an individual immoral and undeserving of their paycheck?  What do you think DC hired those people to do? 
 
Who are you, a mere consumer, to judge people who are often in the business at a loss (to themselves in terms of opportunity cost), beholden to corporate owners and shareholders, and simultaneously slagged off by ungrateful fans who complain about business decisions rather than voting with their dollars?  Seriously, that's a much worse character flaw than anything mischaracterized as "greed", which is at least in the service of supply and demand... whereas bandying about terms like "greed" and airing irrational complaints ("Oh yes, they're economically motivated, therefore they don't care about their product!  That makes perfect sense!") are nothing but meaningless rants.  If you actually believe they're greedy monsters then you'd know slagging off does NOTHING and that only your dollars matter... otherwise, what's the point?  You're trying to insult the nonexistent conscience of your imagined greedy beast?  How does that make ANY sense?  Are you encouraging more people to abandon the books to force cuts?  I mean, THINK!
 
If you love something, then campaign FOR it.  Slagging off the one thing that has any chance of keeping it alive is WORTHLESS.  It's not intellectually deep, it's not effective, it's not analytical, it's not constructive, and all it does is promote uninformed hate which is equally pointless and stupid. 
 
What has bitterness ever solved?

Because some of the response are making me feel like I put it a lot of work and not even 50% effort back. - Silkcuts "  

• S: "DC brought back Bart... I liked that, it kept me as a reader." 
• M: "But I thought DC was greedy?  Didn't they do that out of greed?" 
• S: "Nah, bringing back Bart was entirely altruistic and filled with creative integrity right down to the de-aging!" 
• M: "Soooo... basically, DC is only greedy when they do something you don't like." 
• S: "Uh, yes... I mean, no... I mean... well, there are consequences when their greed does something I don't like." 
• M: "Wouldn't there be consequences if they did something you didn't like whether or not it was based on greed?" 
• S: "Uh... yeah... but then I couldn't call them out as being greedy to seem right and take the moral high ground!"

@Silkcuts: Great Blog By The Way!  "

Thanks. Need to find more people who are like us though.  I think some people are just reading the title and not the whole blog.  Because some of the response are making me feel like I put it a lot of work and not even 50% effort back.  Glad you enjoyed the read.  

I think that Marvel is a much more greedier company than DC =/

• S: "DC brought back Bart... I liked that, it kept me as a reader." 
• M: "But I thought DC was greedy?  Didn't they do that out of greed?" 
• S: "Nah, bringing back Bart was entirely altruistic and filled with creative integrity right down to the de-aging!" 
• M: "Soooo... basically, DC is only greedy when they do something you don't like." 
• S: "Uh, yes... I mean, no... I mean... well, there are consequences when their greed does something I don't like." 
• M: "Wouldn't there be consequences if they did something you didn't like whether or not it was based on greed?" 
• S: "Uh... yeah... but then I couldn't call them out as being greedy to seem right and take the moral high ground!"

"

I have to say i agree whole heartedly with this blog, as i can start painting the colour orange on both companies, there are very few books out there to date that i still follow, im pretty much on a head hunting trip for Joe Q, and im pissed at DC for droping some good titles, but i see what DC is trying to do, they are trying to keep their comics to the core heroes and villains so going back to just Titans, Flash, Superman, Batman Etc. they would be making more money per capita than spending money on issues where sales maybe dropping fast soon. 
 
   Marvel says lets do the shotgun approach and get as many people as they can. The idea of the heroic age to me was a great way to bring things back to the way they were. OMIT, and OMD worst stories ever and this i can blame on Civil war. Marvel Comics and Puns, are like cows, they will always be milked. Deadpool being the main series, and shadowland being another, where they have great possibilities for Daredevil epic that they decide to be cheap and steal a story idea from DC. they are always so focused on throwing us a twist just so that way people will be like what? and sell a few issues in the process.
 
  But i digress, good blog silkcuts.

"Deadpool being the main series, and shadowland being another, where they have great possibilities for Daredevil epic that they decide to be cheap and steal a story idea from DC."

" @Trodorne said:

"Deadpool being the main series, and shadowland being another, where they have great possibilities for Daredevil epic that they decide to be cheap and steal a story idea from DC."

  Simple question, what story was shadowland stolen from?  O.o, I've been wondering that for awhile. "