Ranking American Disney Comics Publishers

[drleevezan]

How do you rank the American Disney comics publishers? My personal ranking:
1. Gladstones I and II
2. Gemstone
3. IDW
4. Dell
5. Gold Key
6. Disney Comics
7. Boom
8. Whitman
9. Fresh-and-Modern IDW

[RobbK1]

I rank them as follows:

1) Western publishing 1939-1962 (under name of K.K. Publications for Walt Disney's Comics and Stories, and Dell Comics for all other Disney Comics,
until 1949, when WDC&S also became distributed under the Dell imprint.

2) Gladstone I & II

3) Gemstone

4) Disney Comics 

5) First IDW Production Unit

6) Whitman/K.K. Publications (Mickey Mouse Magazine)

7) Gold Key

8) Boom!

9) Whitman Comics

10) 2nd IDW Production Unit

[fredj]

1. Dell
2. Gladstone
3. Gemstone
4. IDW (then)
5. Gold Key
6. Disney Comics
7. Boom
8. Whitman
9. IDW (now)

[Baar Baar Jinx]

It's hard for me to evaluate Dell, since they were before my time and since they were the publishers who actually brought Barks, Murry, Moores, Strobl, etc. to the world, putting them in a category all their own. Gold Key/Whitman appears to have been mostly reprints with some low-quality original material, but I'll lump them all under "Western Publishing" and leave them out of my rankings due to lack of first-hand exposure. Gladstone-I is still king of the hill; they revitalized the moribund American Disney comics market, reintroduced Barks and Gottfredson to a new generation (including me), and elevated Disney comics fandom to a niche, scholarly pursuit. Number two (which may surprise many) would be Disney Comics, Inc., both in its pre- and post-implosion incarnations; they had a lot of great ideas and introduced many interesting concepts and characters (Mickey Mouse Adventures, Roger Rabbit and many of the Disney Afternoon titles being cases in point) and their production value was quite high. I'd rank Gemstone and the short-lived Boom! 2.0 (KaBoom!) as joint number threes. Gladstone-II comes next; somehow I never got the impression that they really wanted to resume the line again, and it felt like their heart just wasn't in it the second time around. Still, they did bring us a lot of new Rosa stories (including the first American exposure to Life of Scrooge). Next up is IDW-1; there was a very dedicated and passionate editorial/writing team behind them, but the over-reliance on Italian material did not appeal to me, nor did Duck Avenger or Donald Quest.  "Fresh and Modern" IDW comes next; the translation is atrocious and story selection leaves much to be desired, but at least for the most part they still feature classic characters in classic roles. Bringing up the rear is the Boom! 1.0, which mainly published Ultraheroes, Double Duck and Wizards of Mickey, in which I had zero interest. I actually stopped buying their books, something I never thought I'd do with "Core Four" titles (although I'd argue this particular line was only nominally that). 

[Matilda]

My ranking would be very close to fredj's:

1. Dell

2. Gladstone

3. Gemstone

4. IDW (then)

5. Gold Key

6. Disney Interregnum (which I call that because it came between Gladstone I and Gladstone II, and because it's less confusing than "Disney Comics")

7. BOOM

8. Whitman

....IDW (now), defining the bottom of the scale. I grew up enjoying Dell and Gold Key Duck comics, bought mostly by older siblings. I bought all the USA Duck comics from Gladstone I on. I am not buying the current IDW comics.

Dell I value mostly for Barks, and Gladstone mostly for Rosa. Since I have Barks in the Gladstone comic album sets and Rosa in the Fantagraphics volumes, Dell and Gladstone (regular comics, as opposed to albums) do not figure much in my current comics collection. I'm not sure, but I think that if I were to rank by "how many issues from this publisher are in my collection," it would be: Gemstone, IDW (then), possibly a tie between Gladstone and the Disney Interregnum, followed by a smattering of Gold Key, Dell, and BOOM (it got good at the end of its run!).

[hex]

I tried to make a list, but was unable to do one... maybe because I couldn't decide what criteria and rules to use when making the list. But the only publisher where I can't think of a single publication I didn't like is Fantagraphics. So I guess they are on top of my list.

But from the lists above here, I wonder how you define what is GoldKey and what comics are from Whitman. They are both imprints of Western Publishing with different distribution. To use the Uncle Scrooge title as an example; According to my own list we have 66 GoldKey only issues, 36 Whitman only, but 68 that exist with both a GoldKey and Whitman logo. I'm one of the crazy people that collects variants but other than that, I think of GoldKey and Whitman as the same publisher.

Feb 10, 2020 5:01:43 GMT Matilda said:

6. Disney Interregnum (which I call that because it came between Gladstone I and Gladstone II, and because it's less confusing than "Disney Comics")

On my own lists and sorting boxes etc. I use "W.D.Publications" (Walt Disney Publication), as that's how the publisher is written inside the comics. I also find "Disney Comics" confusing.

[RobbK1]

Feb 10, 2020 8:23:35 GMT hex said:

I tried to make a list, but was unable to do one... maybe because I couldn't decide what criteria and rules to use when making the list. But the only publisher where I can't think of a single publication I didn't like is Fantagraphics. So I guess they are on top of my list.

But from the lists above here, I wonder how you define what is GoldKey and what comics are from Whitman. They are both imprints of Western Publishing with different distribution. To use the Uncle Scrooge title as an example; According to my own list we have 66 GoldKey only issues, 36 Whitman only, but 68 that exist with both a GoldKey and Whitman logo. I'm one of the crazy people that collects variants but other than that, I think of GoldKey and Whitman as the same publisher.

Feb 10, 2020 5:01:43 GMT Matilda said:

6. Disney Interregnum (which I call that because it came between Gladstone I and Gladstone II, and because it's less confusing than "Disney Comics")

On my own lists and sorting boxes etc. I use "W.D.Publications" (Walt Disney Publication), as that's how the publisher is written inside the comics. I also find "Disney Comics" confusing.

I made my distinction between Gold key and Whitman based on the difference between when only the Gold Key imprint existed, and the time when Western  started using the Whitman imprint.  I wasn't around in USA when Whitman Comic books were sold.  But, it is my understanding that they weren't sold on newsstand and grocery store magazine stands, but, rather sold in multiple groupings, in cellophane packages, in toy stores, discount stores and "five and ten cent stores"; whereas, those same issues were sold, at the same time on newsstands and grocery store and drug store magazine racks under the Gold Key imprint.  My rating of Gold Key a few rungs higher than Whitman is because I only bought the early and some mid '60s Gold Key Comics, and didn't buy any of the Gold Keys during the 1970s and early 1980s, when Whitman Comics were sold.  The earliest Gold Key Books still had some decent storywriting and drawing, despite the books having a LOT more advertising than the Dell issues had had, less pages of comics, and terrible colouring, worse printing, and later, smaller size.  Whereas, I didn't buy the Whitman issues at all, because I never saw them, and wasn't around for the later Gold Keys, but never bought them even during my short visits to USA, other than a few with very late Barks covers.

[fredj]

I might have to switch my 8 and 9. My recollection was that Whitman just published reprints, but I have since discovered that they still did some new stuff. And while late Murry isn’t that fun to read, it’s still more engaging than yet another story about Scrooge’s millions.