Part Three (Economics)

If it is by making the value of authenticity problematic that Mosaic avoids the common pitfall of stereotypical black protagonists, it is important to address how it avoids the economics failure of low sales. Poor sales have long been a problem for titles that prominently feature African American characters. Although this is more than likely caused by the industry's unwillingness to widen its pool of readers by advertising in the African American community, the logic behind this failure has been best expressed by comics writer and editor Roy Thomas who has stated, "You could get blacks to buy comics about whites, but it was hard to get whites to buy comics in which the main character was black."

At first glance, it may seem odd to state that Mosaic was not a victim of low sales, as it ran for only eighteen issues from June 1992 to November 1993 - a time of great financial growth in the industry. Relative to other black superhero titles, the length of its run is in the mid-range, between Luke Cage's nearly fifty issue run, but better than Black Lightning's eleven issues, or Black Goliath's five issue foray into the world of super-heroics. However, what is important to note is that Mosaic was not canceled because it was unprofitable, but because of the fear that it would become so. As Gerard Jones related to the fan press, the series was not canceled because it was performing badly but because DC Comics publisher Paul Levitz and senior editor Mike Carlin "felt it would inevitably lose sales, although I don't feel the evidence was there for that." The failure then is not in the cancellation of the title; the cancellation of the title because DC feared the title would fail, reflects a much deeper failure in terms of rhetoric and by extension ethics. This type of failure illuminates the temerity of DC Comics management to speak to, as Mosaic endeavored, comics' core constituency as more than just fans or consumers and to encourage these fans to be more poetically minded.