DC's turn toward the dark

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Can you support this? Or are you merely wishing?

I don't need to support it. I'm on the DC forum every day, constanly reading things that Dan has said at various Cons that contradict themselves.

 

Dan Didio is the Vice President - Executive Editor of DC comics, hired in 2002 with a specific mandate to shake up the entire works from top to bottom. He is the chief operations guy of DC comics. IIRC, his job is what Marvel would call 'Editor-In-Chief'.

Yeah, and if he sucks at his job there will be someone else in that position. He's not a supreme court judge. He can get fired. He was hired because things were going downhill. He's going to try and stem the flow but if the fans don't like what's going on changes will be made.

 

You're talking this all too personally. You have the same options with DC that you do with Hero Games: If you don't like what they are selling you don't need to buy it. I think you are looking at a specific one-year arch designed to shake things up. It's doing its job; it has you shook up.

 

Given that the outlines for 'Countdown' and 'Infinite Crisis' were blocked out before 'Identity Crisis' even hit the shelves, you are wrong. This entire ongoing metaplot was planned in advance.

That's not the info I read from the Chicago Con.

[assault]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

JLA #122

...

"World Without a Justice League" Part 3 of 6!

...

Just the title alone...

 

While I agree with the others, this title reminds me of (original series) Justice League of America #37, August 1965.

 

It's title was "Earth Without a Justice League!".

 

It was one of the wonderful old JLA/JSA crossovers written by Gardner Fox.

 

Briefly: the evil Earth-1 counterpart of Johnny Thunder gets control of his Thunderbolt and prevents the JLA from ever having existed. The JSA have to defeat him.

 

Much coolness, although of a profoundly daft Silver Age flavour.

 

But this is a digression. My general thought on DC's current heading is:

[Mutant for Hire]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

The problem is that for years now they've been darkening Batman, to use a simple example. When are they finally going to lighten up his title? Probably never.

[Chuckg]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

> You're talking this all too personally.

 

Let's not start with that **** again.

 

> You have the same options with DC that you do with Hero Games: If

> you don't like what they are selling you don't need to buy it. I think

> you are looking at a specific one-year arch designed to shake things

> up. It's doing its job; it has you shook up.

 

*sigh*

 

This arc is /already going into its second year/. When was Identity Crisis again? Last summer, that's when.

 

Dude, you simply cannot be accurate in your surmises.

 

> That's not the info I read from the Chicago Con.

 

In that case, somebody better tell Geoff Johns and all the other planning staff on 'Countdown' that they only hallucinated that "Infinite Crisis" outline/strategy session back in 2003 that *they* all participated in.

 

But whatever, believe what you want to believe.

[Agent X]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Attempting to sentence Dr. Light to 'Death of Personality' and then mindwipe your own teammate to cover up your crime is no more a "reasonable extrapolation" of blipping people with the MiB neuralyzer to make them forget your name than strapping an arrested purse-snatcher to the wall and beating him with cattle prods is a "reasonable extrapolation" of wrestling him down and putting him in handcuffs.

Well put.

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

But whatever' date=' believe what you want to believe.[/quote']

You too.

[csyphrett]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

When the editor in chief picks a third string hero/support character as a villain as an afterthought, when a heroine blinds herself to kill a monster that a normal man beat, when heroes go after their own becauise they don't know right from wrong, when they can't even realize that Green Arrow isn't old enough to have grown kids, what makes you think the stories will get better Mitch?

 

Yes DC is having a limited success with the tie ins, but their sales are still down across the board.

 

They are like marvel. The only thing saving them from going out of business is the liscensing.

CES

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

when they can't even realize that Green Arrow isn't old enough to have grown kids

My brother is 43 and has a 24 year old daughter. It's not impossible.

 

what makes you think the stories will get better Mitch?

We are at the beginning of a year-long transition period. We've got 2 limited series to go and then a bunch of stuff after that. We can't really judge what we're just seeing the beginning of. No one hates the iron age more than I do. I hated Identity Crisis. To me a hero is a hero and he lives by higher standards. I do understand that I need to see where they are really going before I can decide whether I'm going to like it or not though.

 

Over the last 35 years of comic reading I've seen plenty of characters die. I've seen plenty of characters get weakened. I've seen plenty of characters turn dark. But I've also seen it all reversed and pushed sideways and ignored whenever there was a need to do so.

 

This is all just a "Crisis-like" house cleaning. We need to wait and see what comes out the other end. There's too much money involved for them to run in an unpopular direction for too long. Money talks and bull....

[Chuckg]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

There's too much money involved for them to run in an unpopular direction for too long. Money talks and bull....

 

DC is no longer dependent on comics sales to make a profit. So long as they sell just enough comics to keep the licenses from expiring, Warner makes its bank.

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

DC is no longer dependent on comics sales to make a profit. So long as they sell just enough comics to keep the licenses from expiring' date=' Warner makes its bank.[/quote']

Everyone wants to make more. It's the standard corporate creed. If they didn't want to make more money they never would have hired Danny.

[csyphrett]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Unless they have changed GA's age, he's in his early mid 30's. His kids are 20 +.

 

He must have started young.

 

And then he didn't have one kid until after he started his carreer. And he's only been GA the same amount of time as Superman has been active at most. So that one kid should only be ten.

 

That's the kind of editorial oversight we need, baby.

 

I can see doing that to one of my players.

 

Right before I got lynched.

CES

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Unless they have changed GA's age, he's in his early mid 30's. His kids are 20 +.

 

He must have started young.

 

And then he didn't have one kid until after he started his carreer. And he's only been GA the same amount of time as Superman has been active at most. So that one kid should only be ten.

 

That's the kind of editorial oversight we need, baby.

 

I can see doing that to one of my players.

 

Right before I got lynched.

CES

Green Arrow has always been portrayed in his 40's. He's the old man of the team. That's part of the reason why he gets away with so much crap.

[csyphrett]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

He might have been portrayed that way by Mike Grell and whomever, but its not objectively true.

 

He didn't start his career until after college, after being shipwrecked for a year, after Superman started.

 

If Superman is on the scale at 10 to 15 years, GA couldn't have started before that. And his origin has stated that he did start after being shipwrecked.

 

One kid was born in the middle of his career at a monastery he was staying at. So the most that kid could be is ten, not 20 +.

 

The other is supposed to happen before or during college. That could be anytime so one kid could be 20 + but since he is still in the same range as Superman, it's doubtful.

 

CES

[Enforcer84]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Green Arrow has always been portrayed in his 40's. He's the old man of the team. That's part of the reason why he gets away with so much crap.

Course he was inspired by Batman....

 

what's Bruce now, 76?

 

 

One thing I'll say Chuckg, I don't thinks I'd believe what a guy is saying will be the tone for 20 years, because odds are he won't have his jobe in 2 years. The winds of fad will change and the entire DC Universe will lurch blindly in a new direction...

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

He might have been portrayed that way by Mike Grell and whomever, but its not objectively true.

 

He didn't start his career until after college, after being shipwrecked for a year, after Superman started.

 

If Superman is on the scale at 10 to 15 years, GA couldn't have started before that. And his origin has stated that he did start after being shipwrecked.

 

One kid was born in the middle of his career at a monastery he was staying at. So the most that kid could be is ten, not 20 +.

 

The other is supposed to happen before or during college. That could be anytime so one kid could be 20 + but since he is still in the same range as Superman, it's doubtful.

 

CES

I have never seen any reference that has said he's not in his 40s. His entire career he has always been older than everyone else. Anything is possible but I do not remember seeing it.

[Greywind]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

During The Longbow Hunters Oliver gave his age as 43. He died after that. Parallax regrew his body. No telling if he was de-aged any.

[psm]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Honestly, I feel bad for DC. Since, the seventies the comic audience has continually gotten older looking for more mature themes. Unfortunately, very few popular DC properties are able to handle the more morally ambivalent storylines . DC's icons have always been more 'pure'. Probably due to the fact that they were originally marketed to kids. Although, certian DC characters can thrive in that particular environment (ie Green Arrow, Batman and Nightwing).

 

It seems unnatural when you read Infinity Crisis. Although, well done it just doesn't ring true. Of course, in another decade a new audience will have emerged and view the same characters in the new light and it will be just as valid.

[hooligan x]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

He might have been portrayed that way by Mike Grell and whomever' date=' but its not objectively true.[/quote']

 

It's the Grell version that I care about. Obsessing about age continuity while accepting flying men from Krypton seems silly. Character and story is more important to me than continuity.

[assault]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Honestly' date=' I feel bad for DC. Since, the seventies the comic audience has continually gotten older looking for more mature themes. Unfortunately, very few popular DC properties are able to handle the more morally ambivalent storylines .[/quote']

 

The key word being 'popular', of course.

 

About 15 or so years ago DC was doing quite an excellent job of producing titles at varying levels of "maturity" and moral ambivalence. You had a choice of grim and gritty, light and easy, or anything in between, including both humour and horror.

 

Unfortunately they seem to be eliminating most of the lighter choices.

[Enforcer84]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

I feel sorry for Batman, I do. He is mr. Everything to Everyone. This is our grim stalker in the night vigilante who works with police, doesn't kill, adopts and trains teen sidekicks, and while his fans envision him skipping from rooftop to rooftop fighting homocidal maniacs with neato gimics, he spends half his time flying about the universe trying to be relevant to the most powerful heroes DC's universe has to offer. This is where we get the Bat-God complex. DC should simply choose an approach and go with it. There are other human fighters who could fill his shoes in the Justice League...

[csyphrett]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

It's the Grell version that I care about. Obsessing about age continuity while accepting flying men from Krypton seems silly. Character and story is more important to me than continuity.

 

I am not talking about age. I'm talking about get it right. It takes me 3 hours to hand claculate a hero page. What I did above only took ten seconds.

 

If you are going to insist that no hero went into operation before Superman, and the hero in question had a kid in the middle of his career, which couldn't be more than 8 years one way or the other, why is the kid almost as old or older than Speedy.

 

I am willing to give up Grell totally screwed up GA's age because no one since the Crisis (except for Roy Thomas who quit) has ever done their homework.

 

I am willing to give that because Grell has been a F-up, and his GA run was F-uped, but when you look at a character that you know is the same age as Superman being 15-18 years older and knowing that's wrong, that's because editorial oversight was abandoned for "Oh wouldn't it be cool to have a kid in the picture? Don't worry if the ages don't match up. The readers are too stupid to figure that out."

 

CES

[MitchellS]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

You're talking waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much for granted. GA has always been older than all the other superheroes he associated with [not including the golden agers]. That wasn't something Grell invented. That's why he could have children that old. Do you know how old GA was when he started college; are you just assuming he was 18? Do you know if he was a good student and graduated in 4 years, or was he a screw up and didn't care and was in college 6? Do you know if he was lost for exactly 1 year, or was it 15 months? After getting back to civilization do you know if he purchased a GA costume the first day, or did he take a couple of years to get his life back in order and take care of buying those boxing glove arrows?

 

Also keep in mind that Superman was not the first superhero of this current age [whatever they're calling this age]. There were gold and silver age heroes existing in the years prior to Superman starting sometime in the early 90s. There's too much prehistory now to say that Superman was the first. And in the silver age it was actually the Flash who was first [1959] and who led to the reassurgance of superhero comics.

 

It wouldn't surprise me to see GA as being a superhero before Superman started his career. All comic book companies need to constantly keep adjusting their eras due to the passage of time. While Supes and Batman and everyone else were our silver age heroes to be time consistant DC really needs to incorporate a whole new bunch of unknown heroes to fill the years between the end of the JSA in the 1950s and the current era with Superman starting in the 90s. Maybe that's a good place to stick all those Charlston heroes.

[assault]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

I am willing to give that because Grell has been a F-up' date=' and his GA run was F-uped, [/quote']

 

I am a very polite and very nice human being. I just want you to know that.

[Hugh Neilson]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

One thing I'll say Chuckg' date=' I don't thinks I'd believe what a guy is saying will be the tone for 20 years, because odds are he won't have his jobe in 2 years. The winds of fad will change and the entire DC Universe will lurch blindly in a new direction...[/quote']

 

Agreed.

 

How many times has a blurb said "This issue changes everything forever"?

 

How many times has everything changed for any length of time, much less forever?

 

Rememnber Secret Wars - everything will change? By the time they get around to introducing his new costume in Secret Wars, the old one is back in Spider-Man.

[psm]

Re: DC's turn toward the dark

 

Agreed.

 

How many times has a blurb said "This issue changes everything forever"?

 

How many times has everything changed for any length of time, much less forever?

 

Rememnber Secret Wars - everything will change? By the time they get around to introducing his new costume in Secret Wars, the old one is back in Spider-Man.

 

Yeah, but thats not exactly the same thing. Cosmetic changes to a character isn't the same as thing as a continuing trend. One, is a deliberate decision usually by one person or a very limited group (Spiderman's costume change). The other is a natural progression seen throughout the industry (moral ambivalent decisions brought about by complex issues).

 

Now, don't get me wrong, I didn't say there wouldn't be a trend to return to lighter stories I'm just saying that I'm not quite sure that your example is valid.

 

Although, I really don't know if it will. They had a revitialization after the 90's grim and gritty period and that didn't last long.

 

Additionally, (and this is way off topic) I wonder how much the comic code authority did to keep our icons so pure. They were published with that damn code for close to forty years. I wonder how much that has done to color our views or these characters. I mean no one thinks of Batman as a gun toting vigilante anymore. Maybe these characters aren't really darkening as much as going back to their roots.