Looking for Dan Dare

The new Dan Dare from Virgin Comics had a mixed reception from comics fans although it has to be said that most reviews were fairly positive. John Freeman did a roundup of reviews recently which gives a fairly accurate snapshot of reaction. A more negative view of the new title was aired by a number of fans of the original Frank Hampson strip, although many were willing to give it an open verdict and wait until the story had played out before condemning it.

Because of the way comics are distributed in the USA (and Virgin Comics is based in New York), copies are pre-ordered by shops some months ahead of publication. Retailers base their orders on what they expect to sell, usually basing their figures on what similar things have sold in the past. The recent WildStorm Albion Universe titles were probably used for guidance and as these generally sold below 10,000 copies, the initial orders for Dan Dare #1 (released in November) were low. The Top 300 listing at ICv2, based on comparative numbers sold by Diamond, the biggest comics distributor in the US, placed the first issue at 187 with sales of around 9,434. The Comics Buyer's Guide estimate was almost identical at 9,431.

Given the comparative size of the US and UK markets and the number of comics shops, the chances are that less that 1,000 copies of Dan Dare #1 were ordered in the UK.

What copies were available were snapped up quickly and the Virgin Comics blog posted a list of comics retailers in the UK where copies could be bought... except you couldn't, of course, because most of them had sold out. Planet Ace in Colchester summed up the problem: they had ordered what they thought were reasonable levels based on pre-orders. But, as interest in the title spread around the internet, more customers asked for the title to be put aside for them, meaning that less than half a dozen copies were left to go onto the shelves.

Virgin have reacted sensibly and you can read the comic on their website. Comics shops are trying to reorder copies but

The interest generated by the new release can be seen using Google Trends which measures the volume of searches internet users do for various phrases and words. Searches for 'Dan Dare' increased dramatically in 2007:

Google Trends also gives a few details for where searches are being made from and interest was (as you would expect) high in the UK, Australia and Canada (where the original Eagle was distributed) but far lower in the United States; Italy, Spain and Germany also registered some interest. Farnborough seems to contain the most avid searchers for Dan Dare via Google, followed by Manchester, London, Thames Ditton, Birmingham, Brentford and Sydney, Australia. Unfortunately, the graphs generated by Google Trends don't give numbers, only a comparison.

The chart for 2007 only gives a clearer picture of the volume of searches over the year. The early peaks are from announcements made about the comic and the final, highest peak is when the publicity for the comic really kicked in shortly before its release at the end of November.

Unfortunately, given some context, the interest in Dan Dare is still pretty meagre compared to, say, Spider-Man, who starred in a major film in 2007. The Google Trends chart comparing the two barely registers Dan.

That's Dan Dare in the red. The labels refer to news items featuring Spidey, the peak (B) being the release of the movie.