I have been doing my monthly orders this weekend. Even cutting as close as I could, I still had an increase in Marvel orders. The editors at Marvel are geniuses at tying titles together, making me order material that is tangential to the stuff I really want. I think it's a dangerous strategy in the long term, tending to burn customers out. But then again, they've been doing it for years.

DC tries to do the same thing. I like the quality of DC comics a bit more, especially the Vertigo line, but they are really bad at tying their main titles together. It actually seems to hurt them in the short run.

I always had an incentive to order more DC than I actually needed because of their discount levels. Marvel had levels much higher, and I wouldn't even try. Then a few years ago, Marvel went to a rolling discount, taking into count the reorders over the course of a year. DC and the rest of the comic universe froze their discount levels, with the intention of doing the same thing. Years later....my discount level has risen by 4% points with Marvel, which is now higher than my DC level. I have absolutely no incentive to order extra DC comics, because my discount stays the same.

Somehow, especially in Bend, Marvel just seems to have a way with creating Events that interest more people. This spring it is SECRET INVASION; it seems that the Skrulls (shape-shifting aliens) have been infiltrating the Marvel Universe for some time now. Who will turn out to be Skrulls? What happened to the original characters?

Even I'm kind of curious, and that probably means my Marvel Maniacs are going to be all over it.