By RM Rhodes
The finish of Heavy Metal journal has been a really unusual factor – anticipated, ongoing, however nonetheless not formally confirmed. In truth, the standing might by no means be confirmed. The newest, most definitive inference of the journal’s demise got here from an article on the information web site Bleeding Cool in late July 2023, however there was no official remark or announcement from Heavy Metal itself. The data got here completely from its enterprise companions.
To perceive the July announcement, it’s a must to return to the 2022 New York Comic Con (NYCC). At that conference, Heavy Metal introduced that they had been ceasing publication of what they described as the primary quantity of the journal, which had been revealed repeatedly since 1977. The final problem of the primary quantity, quantity 320, was scheduled for publication in late October of 2022 and the successor, Volume 2, can be revealed by WhatNot Publishing beginning with problem 1 in February of 2023.
Ultimately, nothing went in line with the plans introduced at NYCC. Issue 320 was pushed to the top of December 2022 and finally revealed in April 2023. The scheduled publication date for the primary problem of Volume 2 was pushed again a number of occasions. On July seventeenth, simply earlier than the 2023 version of San Diego Comic Con, the CEOs of Massive Publishing (publishing associate of WhatNot) introduced by way of Bleeding Cool that they might not be accountable for publishing Volume 2 of Heavy Metal.
At the time, most observers understood this information to imply that Heavy Metal journal would not be revealed in any respect anymore, which might be not inaccurate. Just a few weeks later, this information was augmented by the announcement that Kris Longo, the writer of the journal, was leaving the corporate. It’s price noting that Longo is the CEO of Modern Fanatic, a model administration firm that previously talked about Heavy Metal as one of their shoppers.
The unique announcement got here on Longo’s Facebook web page in a friends-only put up. His Twitter account additionally went personal on the similar time. The most fascinating half of Longo’s announcement was his assertion that “I won’t be commenting any further on any HM-related matters, and questions and gossip will be ignored and deleted.” In this, he joins an extended record of former Heavy Metal staffers who’ve declined to supply precise particulars about what really occurred on the finish. Plausible deniability appears to be the identify of the sport.
The weirdest factor about this gradual trickle of unhealthy information is that no person from Heavy Metal itself has mentioned something in any respect, a technique or one other. For an organization that has a well-earned status for self-aggrandizement and writing its personal narrative to easily disappear and not using a hint is downright weird and is the saddest factor about the entire affair. To be truthful, Heavy Metal stopped responding to emails and posting to social media in February 2023, so it has not been completely surprising for them to proceed their radio silence, however you’d assume they’d have an opinion.
As somebody who has learn the complete run of Heavy Metal and written extensively concerning the historical past of the journal, I completely have an opinion about the best way the entire thing appears to be ending: I’m dissatisfied, however in no way shocked. More than that, I’ve been ready patiently for this information to return out for many of the previous 12 months – properly earlier than the WhatNot announcement at New York Comic Con, in reality.
When most individuals speak about Heavy Metal, they discuss concerning the content material. This is sensible – Heavy Metal was generally known as the platform that launched Moebius, Enki Bilal, Phillippe Druillet, Richard Corben and a really lengthy record of different creators to English-speaking audiences. In the earliest days, the content material drove gross sales of the journal. Its earliest incarnations have had an unlimited cultural affect.
I’ve written a number of thousand phrases about the place and when the primary main peak of Heavy Metal ended (October 1984) and the truth that lots of the credibility that the model has been coasting on was generated throughout the years instantly previous to that problem. But let’s be sincere: Heavy Metal hasn’t been a significant half of the cultural dialog for many years. Despite this, they cultivated an viewers of hardcore followers who would purchase something that had the model on it, which saved them solvent.
Unfortunately, most of the information about Heavy Metal for the previous few years has been centered on the behind-the-scenes features of the enterprise. There’s an excellent motive for this. In 2012, points with the enterprise (and rumors of monetary malfeasance) led Heavy Metal to shut its East-coast warehouse and cease publishing for a couple of months. When it returned from its unscheduled hiatus, it had modified from the month/12 months format that it had been utilizing to differentiate its points since 1977 to plain previous problem numbers, beginning with problem 259. Part of the rationale for this was to disguise the truth that Heavy Metal was not publishing on a daily schedule.
Heavy Metal by no means actually recovered from this destabilizing occasion. Kevin Eastman, one of the creators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, purchased the journal in 1992. In 2014, he bought the journal (and model) as a result of unprofitability. Two years after that sale, the brand new co-owner (together with David Boxembaum) Jeff Krelitz, appointed Grant Morrison because the Editor-in-Chief. The twelve points that Grant Morrison produced between 2016 and 2018 had been some of the most effective in the complete run. It was a return to nice content material, however apparently there was no monetary return on this high quality funding.
From circumstantial proof in problem 292, it could seem that Morrison left the journal extra abruptly than was initially deliberate. In 2019, Krelitz bought the journal and the brand new homeowners arrived simply in time to have a good time problem 300. The CEO of this new crew was Matthew Medney, son of famend model supervisor Clifford Medney. With a level in restaurant administration and a previous as a tour supervisor for DJ Tommie Sunshine, Medney the youthful appeared like an uncommon option to run {a magazine}. True, he was (and nonetheless is) the proprietor of Hero Projects, a writer and marketer of bespoke comedian guide properties, however not a single one of these properties was an ongoing periodical.
Two points into the Medney regime, Kevin Eastman was changed as Publisher on the masthead by David Erwin. Eastman reportedly discovered concerning the change when he learn it within the journal – no person had bothered to inform him. This staggering lack of fundamental communication set the tone for the way enterprise can be performed. From that time till Medney’s abrupt departure in early 2023, the journal went by the strangest interval of its existence.
Medney, the brand new CEO, labored laborious to make himself the face of the journal. At the identical time, he began writing for the journal. Inevitably, this invited comparisons to Grant Morrison, which didn’t mirror properly on Medney. At least one of my associates from the Heavy Metal Discord server has described this era as Medney turning Heavy Metal into an arrogance challenge. The conclusion is debatable, however it’s a undeniable fact that Medney printed a ten web page extract of his novel Beyond Kuiper in problem 307, which resulted within the ten most visually boring pages in the complete 43.5K pages of the journal.
Medney is legendary for opening his editorial for problem 310 with the next sentence: “Mad & Epic Magazine, DC and Marvel’s attempts to dethrone Heavy Metal.” There had been 9 editors on the masthead for this problem and none of them corrected him on the truth that Mad Magazine began publication 25 years earlier than Heavy Metal existed.
Medney additionally interviewed Richard Corben for problem 301. Corben was clearly having enjoyable poking the brand new particular person from Heavy Metal. He panned the Heavy Metal film from 1981, made enjoyable of Heavy Metal’s irregular publishing schedule and, when Medney provided to supply a movie for him, Corben responded “I didn’t know that Heavy Metal was producing movies.”
It wasn’t, however on the similar time Medney was attempting very laborious to get one thing produced in movie and/or tv. His model imaginative and prescient appeared locked on replicating the success of the 1981 film and constructing an Intellectual Property empire. Unfortunately, Heavy Metal barely owned any IP past Taarna, the unique character that was created for the 1981 film. Accordingly, it began to construct itself a portfolio. From the early 300s onward, Heavy Metal very clearly reworked into one thing whose audience was Hollywood producers, not readers.
The solely finish consequence of this effort was a sizzle reel created in partnership with Range Media that premiered at San Diego in 2022. This sizzle reel contained lots of current footage that had been minimally doctored to make it seem like somebody had really invested of their total slate of tasks. As far as I’m conscious, placing collectively a multimedia deal is the one energetic effort that the present homeowners of Heavy Metal Entertainment (who personal the rights to Heavy Metal journal) have on their plate.
There was an try to normalize the publishing schedule, a commendable effort. However, their self-promotion for altering their schedule rested virtually completely on nostalgia, mentioning that they had been going month-to-month for the primary time because the 80s. (It is completely potential that they didn’t know Eastman tried and failed to do that in 2003, although the company workplace saved an entire run of the journal readily available.) Mirroring this publishing schedule didn’t appear to have any considerable affect on their backside line.
During this era, Heavy Metal additionally did lots of issues that weren’t really publishing {a magazine}: launched two comics strains – Virus and Magma Comix – with little or no precise promotion, arrange a podcast community with the assistance of DIGA, revealed unique graphic novels, created branded pinball machines, created branded espresso, launched a big quantity of NFTs, tried to rebrand itself as HM+ (however was vetoed by the workers), created (and deserted) a Discord server, and stopped fulfilling subscription and merchandise orders.
Perhaps not surprisingly, it was this final enterprise choice that did probably the most to alienate the very long time followers. If you go to the social media pages for Heavy Metal, you’ll find giant remark sections full of annoyed readers who need what they’ve paid for. Heavy Metal will not be accredited by their native Better Business Bureau. If nothing else, Heavy Metal ought to function an object lesson in ensuring that you just take merchandise success very, very severely.
There had been a number of heroic makes an attempt to deal with the success points, however there are nonetheless readers who’re on the lookout for solutions. When the Discord server was created, one of the channels was referred to as Do Better Heavy Metal and rapidly stuffed with disgruntled prospects questioning the way to get ahold of customer support. The largest level of rivalry stays a reprinting of Libertore’s Ranxerox comics, merely referred to as Ranx. The presale occurred in 2019 and the guide nonetheless doesn’t exist. And, so far as I’m conscious, not a single subscriber acquired a replica of problem 320.
Right earlier than Eastman bought the journal, the duvet value of problem 295 jumped from $8.95 to $9.99. Issue 301 had a canopy value of $13.99, the most important soar within the historical past of the journal’s cowl costs. The cowl value went up once more as of problem 317, to $14.99. During this era, the web page counts fluctuated significantly from problem to problem. The largest problem was 200 pages and the smallest problem was 128 pages. All the identical value as a difficulty with 152 pages.
By the time New York Comic Con rolled round in 2022, the writing was on the wall. The model had been exploited managed to inside an inch of its life. Almost all credibility that it held amongst long-time readers who needed their merchandise had been destroyed and the flip to NFTs alienated a whole different section of readers. Choices had been made, is what I’m saying.
The concept of canceling a long-running title and beginning once more with problem number one has been a long-discredited manner for the large two comics publishers to goose their gross sales numbers by ostensibly providing a brand new manner into the property. Given that Heavy Metal is an anthology journal the place each problem is theoretically leaping on level, this at all times appeared like a foolish proposition.
As it seems, the rationale for altering publishers might have had extra to do with detrimental money stream than the rest. Heavy Metal turned infamous for each not paying creators and a cavalier angle in direction of reprint rights. At the identical time, the one commercials within the journal had been for Heavy Metal-related properties. It is rarely signal when no person desires to pay to promote in your journal.
News got here in direction of the top of 2022 out that Heavy Metal was having issue paying creators, which coincided with a solicitation for brand new buyers for the corporate. The total workers of Heavy Metal was furloughed in November 2022. In January 2023, Heavy Metal introduced a brand new slate of officers, together with Jamie Durko because the Chief Restructuring Officer and Chief Financial Officer, and Marshall Lees as CEO. Massive Publishing claims that they sponsored the printing of problem 320 in April of 2023. Which brings us to the ignominious finish of the journal’s publication historical past.
Like I mentioned, the strangest factor by far concerning the ending of Heavy Metal is the entire lack of an official announcement. All of the data we have now concerning the finish is the dearth of a publishing deal, which comes from the facet that determined to name it quits. There has been full radio silence from Heavy Metal since mid-February, barely a month after Medney was changed by incoming CEO Marshall Lees – no response to inquiry emails, no posts on social media, no advertising emails. It’s a hell of a approach to run a railroad.
As a consequence, the demise of Heavy Metal journal is information by manner of implication, not proclamation. The motive lots of observers discover this conclusion credible is the unhappy state of affairs that the journal had been diminished to by the top of 2022. This interpretation might be flawed, however there was a six month hole between points 319 and 320 and there was a definite lack of advertising about something new for months.
My full ideas on Heavy Metal journal run to 75,000 phrases, however the extraordinarily abridged model is that I feel the journal was very important at a time and place when comics readers wanted to be reminded that comics had been extra than simply four-color company American superhero comics revealed on a month-to-month foundation. Ultimately, the revolution in French comics that led to Metal Hurlant had an even bigger cultural affect than anybody would have thought potential.
Heavy Metal taught the (presumably incorrect) lesson that ongoing anthologies might be viable. It additionally confirmed that there have been different methods to make comics and totally different voices with extra grownup factors of view. The content material was everywhere in the map and lots of the visuals had been completely stunning. On the flip facet, lots of the writing was simply not superb in any respect. The nicest approach to put it’s that Heavy Metal contained a mess of contradictions.
It is completely potential that Heavy Metal may shock observers by releasing one other problem, however they don’t have any workers, no writer, no companions, no credibility, no cash and an alienated viewers. It definitely looks like the top. It can be very straightforward for Heavy Metal to show me flawed, however I’m inclined to agree with the bulk view on this one. I really feel assured in stating that the journal has ceased publication. I simply want that the corporate would trouble to say one thing to that impact.
Personally, the journal has occupied a big portion of my consideration for a really very long time. I’m unhappy to see it go and particularly unhappy to see it go in such a desultory method with such a tattered status. The once-mighty model has pale away after 45 years of publication, leaving a confused legacy and an unimaginable again catalog. That type of status needs to be celebrated. There needs to be bonfires surrounded by folks in trenchcoats in honor of Heavy Metal. Not a bunch of confused former prospects wandering round a liminal state predicated on a terminal model saved on life assist.
But that’s precisely the place we’re. And truthfully? It’s a really deeply unsatisfying ending.
RM Rhodes is the curator of the Heavy Metal Magazine tumblr. He lives and works in Washington, D.C.
[This story has been updated to clarify the relationship between WhatNot and Massive Publishing.]
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