IDW Publishing: История и развитие издательства комиксов

American comic book publishing company

Penguin Random House Publisher Services
Diamond Comic Distributors The company is known for its licensed comic book adaptations of films, television shows, video games, and cartoons.

Idea and Design Works (IDW) was formed in 1999 by a group of comic book managers and artists (Ted Adams, Robbie Robbins, Alex Garner, and Kris Oprisko) that first met while working at Wildstorm Productions. Each of the four was equal partners, owning 25%. When Jim Lee sold Wildstorm to DC Comics in 1999, Lee turned that company's creative service department, previously run by Adams, over to IDW, allowing IDW to be profitable in its first year. With these profits, the firm decided to fund a new venture every year.

In 2000, IDW developed a TV show concept, getting as far as a pilot episode. For the 2001's project, Adams's Ashley Wood talked to them about publishing an art book, thus starting up IDW Publishing. Una Fanta was published in March 2002. Woods had Steve Niles send Adams some of his rejected screenplays. Adams selected one, 30 Days of Night, and paired him with artist Ben Templesmith for a comic adaptation as a three issue series, beginning in August 2002. With low pre orders, Adams personally pushed the comic with the distributor and major comic book stores. Soon the title's back issues were hot and were followed up with Wood's Popbot. In 2007, IDT Corporation purchased a 53% majority interest in IDW from the company's founders, removing Garner & Oprisko, while reducing Adams & Robbins to minority owners collectively at 47%. Then, in 2009, IDT proceeded to increase its interest to the current 76%, reducing Adams & Robbins's interest once again to the current 24%. Then, shortly afterwards, IDT created CTM Media Holdings via a tax free spin off. This new company consisted of the majority interest in IDW and CTM Media Group. Eight years later, on April 3, 2015, CTM Media Holdings announced it would continue operations under a new name, becoming IDW Media Holdings, which would continue to consist of the majority interest in IDW and CTM Media Group. The company's first traditional comic series, 30 Days of Night, created by Steve Niles and Ben Templesmith started a seven figure bidding war between DreamWorks, MGM, and Senator International, with Senator winning and Sam Raimi attached to produce. IDW Publishing's second title, Popbot, won two Gold Spectrum Awards. IDW Publishing also publishes comics based on the TV franchises Star Trek and CSI. The company's other licensed comics include Topps' Mars Attacks, Sony's Underworld, FX's The Shield, Fox's 24 and Angel; Universal’s Land of the Dead and Shaun of the Dead; and Konami’s Silent Hill, Castlevania, Metal Gear Solid, and Speed Racer. The company has also had success with comic license from toy company Hasbro brands: The Transformers (with Takara), G. I. Joe, My Little Pony, and Jem. Transformers has had as many as five different titles running concurrently. Beginning in 2008, the company licensed the Doctor Who series from the BBC, launching two concurrent titles: Doctor Who Classics, which reprints colorized comic strips featuring the past Doctors such as the Fourth Doctor and Fifth Doctor originally published in the late 1970s early 1980s by Doctor Who Magazine, and Doctor Who: Agent Provocateur, an original six part limited series featuring the Tenth Doctor and overseen and written by TV series script editor Gary Russell. An additional six part limited series titled Doctor Who: The Forgotten started in mid 2008 by Tony Lee and Pia Guerra, as well as a series of monthly one shot, self contained stories. July 2009 saw the beginning of Doctor Who, an ongoing series featuring the Tenth Doctor, written by Tony Lee and illustrated by a rotating art team. IDW Publishing acquired the G. I. Joe comics license in May 2008 (previously held by Devil's Due Publishing) and released three new series under editor Andy Schmidt, from writers such as Chuck Dixon, Larry Hama, and Christos Gage. Other comics were released in time to tie in with the summer 2009 G. I. Joe film. In March 2009, IDW Publishing forged an agreement with Mike Gold's Comicmix. com to publish print versions of Comicmix's online comic books. The agreement stipulates Comicmix must provide two comic books a month to IDW Publishing to publish, as well as graphic novels and trade paperbacks as demanded by the market. The books are published with both the IDW Publishing and Comicmix. com logos on the covers. As of the end of 2009, the agreement has produced print versions of the Grimjack series The Manx Cat; the Jon Sable series Ashes of Eden; Mark Wheatley and Robert Tinnell's pulp hero series Lone Justice; the graphic novel Demons of Sherwood by Tinnell and Bo Hampton; and a graphic novel collecting Trevor Von Eeden's The Original Johnson. A collection of Munden's Bar stories original to Comicmix's website is also forthcoming. In 2004, 2005, and 2006 IDW Publishing was named Publisher of the Year by Diamond Comic Distributors.

Between April and May 2020, during the COVID 19 pandemic, IDW was forced to furlough and then lay off several employees, including Managing Editor Denton Tipton, Associate Publisher David Hedgecock, Senior Graphic Artist Gilberto Lazcano, Senior Graphic Designer Christa Miesner, and Brand & Marketing Manager Spencer Reeve. In July 2020, Chris Ryall announced that he would step down from his position of President, Publisher, and Chief Creative Officer to launch a new imprint named Syzygy Publishing, but he is still editor of future Locke & Key projects. Jerry Bennington was promoted to President, Nachie Marsham was promoted to Publisher, and Rebekah Cahalin was promoted to General Manager and Executive Vice President of Operations covering IDW Publishing, and Veronica Brooks was promoted to Vice President of Creative Affairs. Around 2021, IDW announced that the comic book license for Disney properties would pass to Marvel Comics, while the license for Lucasfilm's Star Wars passed back to Dark Horse Comics. In September 2021, IDW announced that its partnership with Diamond Comic Distributors would switch to Penguin Random House. In December 2021, The Library of American Comics announced that they would be moving to Clover Press. That same month, John Barber announced that he would step away from the role of Editor in Chief. In January 2022, IDW announced that they would lose the comic book licenses for Hasbro's Transformers and G. I. Joe by the end of the year, but would continue publishing other Hasbro licenses, including My Little Pony and Wizards of the Coast's Dungeons & Dragons. On April 27, 2023, IDW cut 39% of their staff and delisted from the New York Stock Exchange; the company also restructured its C suite and experienced an almost 50% drop in its share price.