NYCC 2018: DC Comics Meet the Publishers Panel Liveblog

After showing a brief DC Universe teaser video, Lee and DiDio took the stage to applause.

"The longer you cheer, the more job security I have," DiDio joked, before Lee promised the audience swag.

"This service gives us the freedom to do the kind of stories that we can't do in other venues or other storytelling platforms," Lee said of the DCU.

"[Doom Patrol] really is something that's very faithful to the Grant Morrison run," he said, before teasing work going on for Swamp Thing and Stargirl.

Lee promised more news about Young Justice: Outsiders at the DC Universe panel later today.

Lee called the Harley Quinn series "out there" and said that it pushed the boundaries of what they think they can do.

For DiDio, he said that the movies and TV are pushing the DC publishing side to be better. He said he thinks that the DC talent linup, including Tom King on Batman and Brian Michael Bendis on Superman, is as good as it has been in a long time.

"It's great to do the spectacle, it's fun to do the big events, but when you get to something like Heroes in Crisis, you want to peel back the layers and see what it takes to be a superhero, what it takes to make the sacrifices they make," he thinks stories like Heroes in Crisis help to build out the universe.

DC Zoom is aimed at kids 6-12, and DC Ink is 12+ young adult readers. Lee said that the projects came together by finding some top talent and giving them what they need to make the books they want to make.

DiDio said that while DC loves the direct market, they see the need to expand the comics marketplace by reaching outside of traditional comic book stores and bringing those readers into the business.

With Kelly Sue DeConnick on Aquaman, G. Willow Wilson on Wonder Woman, and Grant Morrison on Green Lantern, DiDio said that DC has "one of the best talent lineups we've ever assembled."

With Black Label, DiDio says they want to create more "evergreen" titles that fans can hand to people who want to try comics for the first time.

Meanwhile, DC is creating original books for Walmart. There are almost as many Walmart locations as direct market comic book stores, and so DC sees the opporutnity to almost double their audience by putting comics into Walmart.

"If they can't find our books, then we've got to go out and find them," DiDio said.

The two discussed the Vertigo relaunch, John Ridley's Secret History of the DC Universe, and other high-profile projects aimed at non-traditional readers.

Pre-relaunch Sandman tie-in books are now "apocrypha," which might or might not have happened, but the Sandman Universe books being published now are "official" within Neil Gaiman's story. DiDio said that pop-up imprints overseen by high-profile creators lend the line a sense of authenticity and direction.

Then he brought Brian Michael Bendis onstage to talk about his upcoming pop-up imprint.

Called Wonder Comics, Bendis's imprint will relaunch Young Justice, including the return of Conner Kent and Impulse in their classic costumes, and a few new characters, including Jennie Hex (Jonah Hex's descendant), Teen Lantern (who has hacked the power batter), and a mysterious new character named Naomi.

DC is introducing Funko's Primal Age toy line to Amazon this week. If you look at the DC Wiki, there are entries for these toys, including old color guides, Marv Wolfman's old photos, and an animated intro video.

Wolfman joined the panel to applause, including a brief ovation led by Bendis.

"The idea of taking the DC characters, which I've loved since I was six years old...it was like that," Wolfman said.

The world has no technology so they have to find ways around it like a Bat-magic-crystal instead of a Bat-computer. Wolfman said "it's a great exercise, it's a great bunch of fun as a writer to do it."

He is writing a comic book based on this fake toy line, exclusive to Target in February, in a faux-'80s style.

Wolfman said that he has been enjoying sitting in Artist Alley talking to fans who were excited about the Titans premiere last night.

"I was so thrilled to see characters that George and I created back in 1980 got to be set as an adult set of characters -- but earlier this year we saw them in Teen Titans Go, which was an incredibly hysterical movie for young kids," Wolfman said.