Malibu Comics TV spot , 1993 - An interesting look at a turning point in Comics history

Malibu was a small publisher and distributor who basically ate up most of the small comic publishers in the black and white boom and then made bank being the distributor for early Image. Malibu was also known for its very advanced computer coloring department which was the best in the industry at the time. Soon after this they would leverage the massive capitol influx into making their own superhero universe, the Ultraverse. This Tv spot is right before the launch of the Ultraverse. Some interesting things to note here are mention of a Dinosaurs for Hire Saturday morning cartoon which never actually aired. We get mention of the superior sales of the manga market from editor in chief Chris Ulm "they print more comics then potty paper in japan" and he also says "Comics in general are being looked at more and more as ways to prototype ideas visually, and then translate that to electronic media [video games] cinema or TV or animation". Within in a year of launching the ultraverse Marvel would wholesale buy Malibu to gain access to their advanced coloring and keep DC from gaining more market cap. Within a year of buying Malibu Marvel would reboot the ultraverse and move the most popular characters to their main universe. Within a year of doing that Malibu would be shuddered and all properties of their properties owned by Marvel would remain untouched to this day. No reprints, no new books, or even cameos in other Marvel Comics. To this day upper level execs are tight lipped about the death of Malibu and why the ultraverse wasn't revived.

From this we can see what happened to the comic industry before it died and that even at its height in the 90s comics were being increasingly looked at as little more then IP banks for more successful adaptations.