Hi everyone,
After 15 years, this will be the final month that Multiversity Comics will be in active operations. This decision was not made lightly, and has been a result of months of conversations with our editorial team.
I [Brian] feel you’re owed context and reasoning behind this move. The first reason is that, over the past four years, we’ve seen a precipitous decline in our staff, and a less robust field of new writers to step forward. No doubt the pandemic had a role to play in this, but also the changes in the general blogging and specifically comics journalism spaces online had a hand in it.
The second reason is that the cost of running the site has approximately doubled in the last two years. While our meager advertising used to cover 80-90% of site costs, in 2023 and 2024, it covered less than half most months. This is unsustainable. We did not add new services or features that we had to pay for, the cost of Google Business Suite and other subscriptions simply rose.
The third reason is exhaustion. Speaking personally, I’ve been writing for MC since 2011, editing since 2012, and running the site since 2015. But it’s not just my exhaustion; last year was the first time in a long time we didn’t have enough participants for a summer binge series. We had no quorum for Year in Review stuff; our staff is tired, too. Instead of everyone keeping up a good face, it seemed like the right time to pull the plug before we were even more depleted.
The site will remain up in its current form until September. After September, we are going to (hopefully) find a more cost effective way to keep the archives up in some capacity. This will likely necessitate a site without many images and a simpler interface, but we will do our best to make that happen.
Throughout May, we will keep things running as usual, but we want to make the last week a special one. We have some fun ideas we’ll be updating people about as the time gets closer, concluding with a live watch along of X-Men Origins: Wolverine, the reason the site started, to close out our regular coverage.
I want to thank each and every one of the folks who have contributed to Multiversity over the years. I want to especially thank all the folks who acted as editors/managers, even if many have since left our site: Matthew Meylikhov (the reason there is a Multiversity at all; the man who founded the site and empowered me to keep it running when he stepped away), Walter Richardson, David Harper, Mike Romeo, August Dawn, Matt Garcia, Matt Lune, Jaina Hill, Rowan Grover, and our current, exceptional managers Christopher Chiu-Tabet, Kate Kosturski, and Elias Rosner. The three of them deserve 100% of the credit for keeping the site alive over the past few years as my life has continued to get busier and weirder with juggling multiple jobs, kids, and family obligations.
There are over 190 people with Multiversity bylines, and I’d love to thank them all, but there simply isn’t time. Know that your work is appreciated and part of the foundation of our site. But here is a very partial list – coupled with the list of editors/managers – of some of the people without whom Multiversity simply wouldn’t have been what it was:
Brandon Burpee, Gilbert Short, Joshua Mocle, Patrick Tobin, Greg Matiasevich, Vince Ostrowski, Zachary Wilkerson, Mark Tweedale, James Johnston, Michelle White, Kevin Gregory, Paul Lai, Robbie Pleasant, Chad Bowers, Nick Palmieri, Christopher Egan, Luke Cornelius, Matthew Garza, Christopher Cole, Drew Bradley, Jessica Camacho, Ken Godberson III, Gregory Ellner, Alexander Jones, Matthew Blair, Gregory Lincoln, Michael Mazzacane, John Schaidler, Ramon Piña, Liz Farrell, Matt Liguori, Frida Kiernan, Alexander Manzo, Christa Harader, Brandon Arnold, Benjamin Birdie, Matthew Ledger, Christopher Thompson, Daniel Balyeat, Gustavo Lodi, Justin Beeson, James Dowling, Kerry Erlanger, Mel Lake, Corrina Lawson, Kobi Bordoley, Quinn Tassin, Kyle Welch, Leo Johnson, Matthew Vincenty, Matt Dodge, Nathaniel Perkins, Reid Carter, Reed Hinckley-Barnes, Samantha LeBas, Tom Shapira, Ryan Perry, Laura Merrill, Michael Govin, Joe Skonce, Kent Falkenberg, Johnny Hall, Jessica Graham, Jonathan O’Neil, Carl Waldron, Erik Hyska, Emily Myers, and Ryan Fitzmartin.
Thanks for reading for the past 15 years. We’ll be here all month, and then we’ll see you around the interwebs.
Brian Salvatore, Kate Kosturski, Christopher Chiu-Tabet, and Elias Rosner
