Dark Horse counts on 300

This story originally appeared in PW Comics Week on January 10, 2006 Sign up now!

by Heidi MacDonald -- Publishers Weekly, 1/10/2006

Recently, Toronto retailer Christopher Butcher wrote on his blog that Dark Horse was not making enough copies of 300, Frank Miller and Lynn Varley’s graphic novel (published in 2000) about the ancient Greek battle of Thermopylae, particularly now that the movie version is filming in Montreal. PW Comics Week contacted Dark Horse director of publicity Lee Dawson, who explained that the book is not out of print. He acknowledges that there was a brief delay while books arrived from the printer in China, but says the book should be available in the immediate future.

Dark Horse has had some criticism in the past for not having enough books available when movies based on their titles launch, but "it’s incredibly hard to predict how any kind of media coverage will affect a book's sales," says Dawson. "Especially with a book like 300." 300 is available only in an oversized hardcover edition that retails for $30.

Although the film, directed by Zack Snyder and using the kind of CGI technology that made Sin City a hit, is still without an official release date, Dawson expects Dark Horse to ramp up for the movie in a big way. "Of course we're going to capitalize as best we can when the movie comes out," he says.

The success of the films Hellboy and Sin City sold slews of graphic novels for Dark Horse. In fact, a special edition of The Hard Goodbye graphic novel was included in the deluxe DVD edition of the Sin City, resulting in some 500,000 copies in print.