According to Comicsgate leader/spokesperson Ethan Van Sciver, Dynamite Entertainment CEO Nick Barruci has been secretly working alongside the group, criticized by many as an online harassment campaign, since 2018 – a decision that has apparently urged Van Sciver to break his silence as to the extent of Barucci’s support up to this point. The news comes a day after multiple artists and writers denounced Dynamite for working alongside Comicsgate.
Comicsgate is a campaign organized to combat what supporters view as “forced diversity” in the comic book industry. The campaign has preached that their mindset is about giving fans what they want in comics by making better books. However, the group has come under fire for multiple harassment campaigns against marginalized creators, associating with the alt-right, exorbitant prices for their individual books, and failure to deliver crowdfunded projects on time. On Sunday, top Dynamite talent including Mark Russell announced they were ending their relationship with the company following public support of Comicsgate properties on variant covers for Dynamite comics. Dynamite has ended such projects, but Van Sciver revealed the two have been allegedly working together for years; a relationship intentionally kept quiet to protect the publisher, and Barruci directly.
Van Sciver revealed on his live stream that Barrucci initially reached out to him “as a friend” following Van Sciver’s dismissal from DC Comics. “Nick reached out to me and said, ‘wanna do some business? You wanna make some money? We’ll help you out where you need. I can advise you, I can tell you where to go. I can help you learn to make your own comics,'” while also offering him work on Dynamite variant covers to put “a little more money in your pockets.” Van Sciver says he cautioned Barucci about ‘social justice warriors’ finding out about the pair’s business arrangement. Van Sciver said Barucci was consistently involved in his work from creator to self-publisher, saying “Nick taught me everything I know so far about publishing,” and credited Dynamite with helped him create his Comicsgate project’s playing cards.
Van Sciver said Barucci became friends with Comicsgate personalities (including donating on live streams) and shared his impression that the Dynamite CEO “agreed with a lot of what we have to say.” Van Sciver admits Barucci made a “really big mistake” by sending him a donation during a Comicsgate auction, further revealing the pair’s relationship. The pair were also together as recently as Friday, when the backlash against Dynamite began. In the same live stream, Van Sciver accused Barucci of not having “the fortitude to be Comicsgate,” and stated his working relationship with Dynamite was over as a result of the publisher’s response to criticism. It’s unclear whether Dynamite is still involved in printing any of Van Sciver’s projects. One of Van Sciver’s former Comicsgate allies confirmed Dynamite and Van Sciver’s working relationship in a live stream, saying Dynamite actually fulfilled one of his Comicsgate projects. An arrangement that, if true, represents the largest comic publisher to implicitly endorse the Comicsgate movement.
With more and more creators ending their working relationship with Dynamite for the time being, and Van Sciver’s allegations against Barrucci demanding a response, it’s clear more shoes are going to drop in this case. The fact that Dynamite’s CEO was allegedly personally supporting Comicsgate projects (and even leveraging company resources to do it) while the campaign was harassing some of the company’s top creators is shocking, to say the least. We’ll update this post accordingly should more news be revealed.
