Brace yourself, Fury of Firestorm outsold the vast majority of other DC titles, including: Batman, Detective Comics, Justice League, Green Lantern, and Flash!!!
Astonishing, right?!?! … Alright, I know you are waiting for the catch. Here it is, the statement above is completely factual … for November 1985. A while back over on Jim Shooter’s blog, he posted some DC Comics sales data from November 1985. Below are the relevant documents.
It’s rewarding to see that Fury of Firestorm was such a top seller!
Here is a little information on the numbers themselves. The “draw” represents the composite of orders from various distributors (and thus the print run), while “sale” represents the supposed number of copies sold. There is a lot of debate as to what the true sales numbers were, plus what was the impact of newsstand versus direct market. For full details, be sure to check out Jim Shooter’s post on this.
Regardless of the exact sales figures, this data allows us to compare the individual comics to each other. Just take a moment and bask in the glory that Firestorm outsold so many other DC Comics. Could you imagine nowadays Fury of Firestorm outselling Batman, Justice League, or Green Lantern?!?! I know I can’t. Kind of hard to wrap my brain around the fact that Firestorm was so popular.
As a frame of reference, here are a few of the November 1985 covers: Fury of Firestorm #41 (by Gerry Conway & Rafael Kayanan), Batman #389, Justice League of America #244, and Green Lantern #194!
Great historical information! Anytime you see fanboys bashing on classic Firestorm, be sure to share this link with them. 
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Shooter’s blog was such a fun read (while it lasted)….I hope he gets back to it!
Analysis based ONLY on covers and what might make someone pick up a book on impulse.
Firestorm, obviously given a boost by Crisis crossover.
Batman, sorry Bats, no Crisis crossover banner
Justice League of America, DETROIT YOU MEAN, the Crisis banner can only help so much
Green Lantern, not Hal Jordan, same deal
My Master’s thesis would only be a paragraph long.
And of course, what outsells Firestorm?
That’s right. Hawkman. AWW YEAH WINGED WONDER.
If only we could get these sales numbers for Firestorm today…
News like this – even though it is old – just makes me more confident that Firestorm will rise again.
I don’t recall Crisis or Who’s Who ever making it to the 7-11 I bought most of my comics from at this time, but they definitely had a presence on the bookstore spinner racks (Waldenbooks/B.Dalton Booksellers.) Marvel Super Heroes Secret Wars and Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe did hit the quickie mart on a regular basis, and OHATMU was the better package overall, which was why I followed them instead. Other convenience store staples were Tales of the Teen Titans, DC Comics Presents, Super Powers and believe it or not, Son of Ambush Bug, all of which I at least sample and the bookends I bought with a degree of regularity. I think I recall Firestorm and The Flash making sporadic appearances, but I didn’t support them. All-Star Squadron could only ever be found at Gemco.
aaaaaaah, got me! 😛 ~ anyway THIS is the design I got to, um, well “see” as little kid (parents got me comic books even before I learned to read, bless them for it).
The pencils in that cover bring a wave of memories, nice!
Comics need to be sold everywhere again!
Look at the Comic Reader fanzines of the day. They had sales lists based on a sample of comic shops and the hotter, newer books were much more popular than the oldies. That’s why they need to revamp Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman in ’86.
BTW, Hawkman would be The Shadow War of Hawkman mini-series when mini-series were much more of an event.