DC has really put the fear of god (or God, whichever you prefer) into both its retailers and its fans with this double news. Same-day-digital release is risky. But restarting a series' numbering from 1 of a new volume always peeves some. Retooling ongoing stories with little warning downright angers people. Starting in August every single damn DC Comics character, property, and title will be available same-day-digital and gets a story re-boot with their new volumes. Or so it seems. The statements that have people concerned are those from DC The Source:
"the first issue of JUSTICE LEAGUE by Johns and Lee... will offer a contemporary take on the origin of the comic book industry’s premier superhero team."
and this one from DC co-publisher Dan DiDio in the big USA Today article:
"We really want to inject new life in our characters and line ... This was a chance to start, not at the beginning, but at a point where our characters are younger and the stories are being told for today's audience."
However, no other statements I've seen clearly make claim to a resetting of any narratives. Not even, as far as I can tell, this list of a few of the new titles with creator line-ups and quick 'new directions' descriptions from The Source. I'm an optimist: intentional misdirection to get fans angry and talking? Probably not. That's what I thought about Marvel's "Spider-Man: One More Day" (another attempt to 'refresh through reboot' the Spider-Man story) and I was dead wrong. The idea is to make the characters feel new again by disregarding the complicated stuff that's come before. Sounds great but smells very, very fishy to those of us who follow the industry's shake-ups of the past two decades. We've heard these things before, you see. It rarely goes well. I could show you proof:
Google "joe quesada spider-man one more day" or "crisis on infinite earths zero hour" or "grant morrison batman rip final crisis return" or "rob liefeld heroes reborn" or "john byrne spider-man chapter one". Some people liked these stories (and they have elements to recommend them), but they all have in common a deus ex machina, nonorganic, magic approach to storytelling. An approach that was inevitably again and again rolled-back.
That said? Totally HAS worked out on occasion. "Crisis on Infinite Earths" was more successful then not for a long time. Green Arrow being brought back from the dead. "Spider-Man: Revelations" narrowly solved more problems than it created. Regardless. As I wrote a few weeks ago, the stunt writing needs to stop. Just because you've done something shocking doesn't mean you've done something good.
Some of the smartest commentary I've seen on his issue has come from comics-artist and Hypothetical Island studio (@HypotheticIsle) member Reilly Brown. His Twitter stream (@Reilly_Brown) in real-time after the announcement read:
...
Wouldn't it be wild if PROGRESSING the story made sales go up and they didn't even have to reboot it in the end?
...Let's give Superman a kid! Let's kill Batman and leave him dead! Let's have Nightwing and Starfire get hitched!"
... let's make some bold moves and take the characters to new places with their lives, do some things we wouldn't be able to take back...
Next time, before they reboot a whole comics universe, they should say, "hang on a sec, since we know we're going to start over anyway...
One statement that should have people excited is this one, also from DiDio in this ancillary USA Today interview:
"It's not just about straight superhero characters and stories. We're going to use war comics, we have stories set in mystery and horror, we've got Westerns."
Variety is a good thing.
The image below is being asociated with the news. It has been confirmed by The Source in a note from DC's Co-Publishers to be the cover of the new "Justice League" #1 (and to have been penciled by Jim Lee (@jimlee) and inked by his oft-art-partner Scott Williams, with colors by long-time DC colorist Alex Sinclair). As of Thursday June 2 at about 5 PM a Google Image search for: " "DC comics" reboot " brings it up first. And fourth and fifth and eighth and tenth and fifteenth and seventeenth and eighteenth...
And the sources for this image and other related ones? Most are comics-centric but mixed in are various sites that cover a variety of news, some with a dedicated section for comics, some without, including: MTV.com's Splash Page, GottaBeMobile.com, HomeIsPhones.com (whatever the hell those are), Movies.com (whose article is really about the implications for future film adaptation but gives a rounded overview of the issues), UGO.com, InsidePulse.com, KaboomMagazine.com, EscapistMagazine.com, and The Onion's famous AVClub.com. USA Today and The Associated Press are also covering this as it unfolds. This is indicative of the changed attitudes toward comics in the wider world, but much more-so the changed attitudes toward the superhero genre.
And that's a very good thing to this pundit's mind.
~@JonGorga
P.S. ~ I really try to resist this kind of commentary but... in the real world not EVERYONE wears a high collar. Or any single unifying element of clothing. These characters were always presented as different people from different places coming together to form a loose union. Looks silly to me for now. Just sayin'.
Two observations on the cover art for the new Justice League #1.
ReplyDeleteWonder Young Woman's costume seems modeled on the costume from the scuttled TV show: silver replaces gold, and the cuirass is curiously reminiscent of Spider-Man tights, but otherwise ... Is this a good thing? Did I mention "scuttled"?
Metaphorically Green Lantern seems to have placed his Gatling gun to, um, indicate the huge size of his, er, imagination.
So.