The Race to 50

THE RACE TO 50
GASI used to conduct a nationwide survey regularly then, after every three months I think, to keep track of which comics novels were most awaited weekly by followers; which writers had the most number of concurrently running novels that clicked with the readers; which artists rendered illustrations that readers loved most; which writer-illustrator them-up in novels had that magic chemistry that made diehards out of fans; and, which comics-magazines were the winners or losers based on their circulation reports. Oh, and incidentally, it wasn’t only all of GASI’s comics-mags and their contents that these surveys covered. In order to compare how their products did against their closest publication rival, they also gathered complete datum on all the comics of ATLAS as well. You see, GASI and ATLAS were sister companies: GASI was owned by Doña Elena Roces and ATLAS was owned by Doña Carmen Roces Davila, sibling daughters of the late Don Ramon Roces. But there was nothing sisterly in how they fiercely tried to outdo each other in monopolizing the local comics industry!
Based on these surveys, which GASI gave a lot of serious credence to, they came up with something they dubbed as “THE MAGIC 50”. They in turn used this Magic 50 as their basis for prolonging the life of a novel—or abruptly cutting it short. The maximum life span initially allowed to a weekly running novel was 30 issues. A new novel was of course put at the bottom of the list the first time it hit the comics stands, and it had better make a leap up into the top 50 most read titles within those 30 issues—or die a natural death. Only when the serial entered that Magic 50 circle, or if it showed signs of inevitably getting there, was a serial allowed to exceed the 30 chapter limit. CONSISTENCY was the name of the game, and for as long as your novel hugged a spot within the charmed perimeter, it remained assured of the magazine space it occupied.