by 
Last updated on December 10th, 2021
October’s comic shop sales figures are in, and thanks to the current Marvel soft reboot (with a pile of new #1 issues), Marvel completely dominated the top 10 this month, as well as the direct market as a whole. The top-selling comic this month was “Invicible Iron Man” #1. Others that did well: “Spider-Gwen,” “Guardians of the Galaxy,” and the usual “Star Wars” books, including one for Chewbacca.
The top 10 sales figures are below; sales information from Comichron.
| Rank | Title | Issue | Price | Publisher | Estimated sales |
| 1 | Invincible Iron Man | 1 | $3.99 | Marvel | 279,514 |
| 2 | Amazing Spider-Man | 1 | $5.99 | Marvel | 245,873 |
| 3 | Spider-Gwen | 1 | $3.99 | Marvel | 197,103 |
| 4 | Secret Wars | 6 | $3.99 | Marvel | 192,244 |
| 5 | Doctor Strange | 1 | $4.99 | Marvel | 145,456 |
| 6 | Star Wars | 10 | $3.99 | Marvel | 134,613 |
| 7 | Chewbacca | 1 | $3.99 | Marvel | 122,952 |
| 8 | Star Wars: Shattered Empire | 2 | $3.99 | Marvel | 119,508 |
| 9 | Guardians of Galaxy | 1 | $3.99 | Marvel | 118,342 |
| 10 | Amazing Spider-Man | 2 | $3.99 | Marvel | 111,322 |
DC’s highest selling comic came in at #11, “Batman” #45. “Jughead” #1 also did fairly well,, with the relaunch of that long-running Archie title coming in at #71.
The top selling trade paperbacks are listed below; information also from Comichron.
| Rank | Title | Price | Publisher | Estimated sales |
| 1 | Star Wars Vol. 1 Skywalker Strikes | $19.99 | Marvel | 21,826 |
| 2 | Star Wars Darth Vader Vol. 1 Vader | $19.99 | Marvel | 10,143 |
| 3 | Bitch Planet Vol. 1 Extraordinary Machine | $9.99 | Image | 9,979 |
| 4 | Deathstroke Book and Mask Set | $29.99 | DC | 7,556 |
| 5 | Marvel Super Hero Contest of Champions Vol. 1 | $7.99 | Marvel | 7,514 |
| 6 | Walking Dead Compendium Vol. 3 | $59.99 | Image | 6,666 |
| 7 | Saga Vol. 5 | $14.99 | Image | 6,557 |
| 8 | Outcast By Kirkman & Azaceta Vol. 2 | $14.99 | Image | 6,332 |
| 9 | Lumberjanes Vol. 2 | $14.99 | Boom | 5,882 |
| 10 | Injection Vol. 1 | $9.99 | Image | 5,160 |
While Marvel took the top two trade paperback slots, non-Big Two companies also did well, including popular titles such as “Lumberjanes” and “The Walking Dead.”
The top five comics publishers (by unit share and dollar share respectively):
- Marvel (48.26%/43.65%)
- DC Comics (22.92%/21.85%)
- Image (9.27%/9.17%)
- IDW (4.96%/6.16%)
- Dark Horse (3.10%/4.04%)
Comic sales are up (by unit/dollar share) 16.59%/11.91% over September. Compared to October 2014, they’re down 12.47%/9.55%. However, October 2014 had an extra week’s worth of books.
This is the first time Marvel’s taken all top 10 selling slots since January 2005, and their highest for the top 300 selling books ever. It’s also a low point for DC’s sales, in turn. DC’s already had a rough time this year, and I doubt they’re pleased with Marvel’s sort-of-a-reboot doing this well. Of course, I assume in the short term, DC will rely even more on Batman and/or the attention for the upcoming “Batman V Superman” movie in March. Expect Marvel’s numbers to sink back to normalcy for November’s sales.
