It's been a rollercoaster for DC Comics of late, with massive layoff reportedly affecting one-third of DC's editorial staff including Editor-in-Chief Bob Harras, and has now ended with Marie Javins and Michele Wells named as interim Editors-in-Chief of DC Comics.
In 2018, telecommunications conglomerate AT&T acquired DC Comics parent company Time Warner in an $85.4 billion dollar deal and formed WarnerMedia. On May 1st of this year, Jason Kilar — founder of Hulu and CEO of the streaming service from 2007 to 2013 — was appointed CEO of WarnerMedia and wasted no time implementing a corporate restructure of the company in order to “streamline decision-making." These bold and urgent actions included the sweeping changes at DC Comics which have resulted in the first turnover of the Editor-in-Chief position in a decade.
Bob Harras served as Editor-in-Chief at Marvel Comics from 1995-2000 and became DC’s Editor-in-Chief in 2010 after the position stood vacant for eight years following the 2002 departure of Jeanette Kahn. Kahn -- the first female Editor-in-Chief of a major comic book publisher -- took over in 1989, overseeing one of DC’s most successful eras and bringing issues such as racism, sexual orientation and gun violence to the forefront of their titles. Replacing Harras after his ten year run as EIC, Javins and Wells are well-positioned to help guide DC through the many changes the currently company is facing. Jim Lee explained their selection to THR:
We thought it would be a great pairing to bring them together to help draft and organize the content we’re doing along these lines. Across digital, across global, we want to make sure we have diversity and inclusivity, and making it in a way that we have authenticity to the storytelling that we’re doing. It’s really about consolidating all of our efforts and having every editors involved in all these directives and also organizing, broadly speaking, in content that is for kids 6 to 11 and then 12 to 45. It’s about consolidating format and oversight to a smaller, more concentrated editorial group.
Marie Javins began her career in comics at Marvel as an editorial assistant to the late Mark Gruenwald. She eventually became an editor at Marvel on title such as Akira, Groo and Earth X, as well as the colorist of over 2,000 comic book pages. Javins most recently served as DC’s Executive Editor of Global Publishing Initiatives & Global Strategy. Michele Wells is the author of several books for children and young adults, having served as Executive Editor at Disney Publishing Worldwide before becoming the Vice President and Executive Editor, DC Books for Young Readers.
With DC's virtual, online 24-hour mega-event, DC FanDome, set to launch this coming Saturday, August 22nd, Javins and Wells certainly have their work cut out for them!
Source: THR