When DC and Marvel’s respective editors-in-chief in Marie Javins and C.B. Cebulski stepped to the stage at the recent annual meeting for ComicsPRO, 10 it’s almost certain that the audience’s imaginations immediately ran wild. “Are they going to announce a new crossover?!” retailers with dollar signs in their eyes likely wondered.

Now, the folks who run comic shops don’t always get what they want. It’s the nature of the business. Much of the success that is found in the direct market 11 comes from publishers doing things that readers and retailers would never expect. But in this case, their dreams were realized. Javins and Cebulski revealed that in 2025, the Big Two will be publishing a pair of one-shots where these universes will cross over. DC will honcho one while Marvel handles the other. Nothing else is known. Despite that, the audience was pumped by all accounts, to say nothing of the response that followed from ecstatic fans.

If there ever was going to be a time to do something like this again, it’s now. While the vibes are surprisingly good in the direct market these days, that energy comes at a time when the bankruptcy of Diamond Comic Distributors and the impact of tariffs on varying U.S. trade partners 12 hang like a guillotine over the figurative throat of everyone in this space. In a year where anxieties are high, easy wins are welcome. And you couldn’t ask for a much easier win than a crossover between DC and Marvel, a concept that’s such a lock that I could be its writer/artist and it’d still be a top seller.

It also happens at an interesting time for the publishers themselves, as they seem to be headed in opposite directions. DC has been on a heater for a while now, steadily rising over the past couple years before lifting off like a rocket in the final quarter of 2024 thanks to the twin launches of its Absolute line and its overarching All In initiative. Meanwhile, Marvel’s in a prolonged malaise, with enthusiasm in its line waning and its hold on the top of the direct market feeling as tenuous as ever.

It isn’t just me saying this, either. Conversations with retailers and creators alike have oriented on the troubles at Marvel and the appeal of DC of late — to the point that Steve Anderson from Third Eye Comics picked the former’s struggles as the defining theme at comic shops in 2024 — while the tenor of the fan and critical discussion surrounding the pair echoes and even builds on those sentiments.

Perhaps underlining it best was a recent chat I had with The AV Club’s resident comics critic Oliver Sava. He’s one of the sharpest voices in the comics space, and someone that joins me each year for the Superhero State of the Union on my podcast Off Panel. We’ve been doing that for seven years now, and much of the conversation naturally surrounds DC, Marvel, and where they find themselves in that moment. The truth is, Marvel has been on balance ahead of DC over that span, even if most years tend to be close overall.

But as we discussed recent announcements from the two houses, Sava suggested that the qualitative gap between the two is the widest it’s been since Marvel was in its Marvel Now era and DC was in the midst of its New 52 initiative. He’s not wrong. In that moment, the former was miles ahead of the latter creatively, even if DC’s sales were through the roof. These days? The opposite is true. If anything, the current gap feels like it’s as big as any other point in my time as a comic fan.

That means the first DC vs. Marvel showdown in more than two decades will be happening at an unusual time, one where the matchup is no contest in favor of the Distinguished Competition. Even if Marvel has maintained its position at the top of the market through any means necessary, there’s a chasm between the Big Two in terms of perceived quality and consumer enthusiasm. That’s a big deal. And that’s why it felt like the right time to take a tale of the tape on this pair, and to figure out what’s working and what isn’t for each house as they prepare to meet for the first time since 2004.