Wednesday, June 29, 2011

New Comics Day Times Two

Since I was on vacation last week - something I may post about in a few days - I got to pick up two weeks' worth of comics today!

  • Hack/Slash #5 - To be dropped.
  • Fables #106
  • Incorruptible #19
  • FF #5
  • Knights of the Dinner Table #175
  • Batman : Gates of Gotham #2
  • Gotham City Sirens #24
  • Detective Comics #878
  • Superman #712
  • Wonder Woman #612
  • Justice Society of America 80 Page Giant 2011 #1
  • Justice Society of America #52
  • Green Lantern : Emerald Warriors #11
  • Zatanna #14
  • Batman Incorporated #7
  • Justice League of America #58
  • Action Comics #902
  • Brightest Day Aftermath : The Search for Swamp Thing #1
  • Flashpoint : Green Arrow Industries #1
  • Flashpoint : The Canterbury Cricket #1
  • Flashpoint : Hal Jordan #1
  • Flashpoint : Lois Lane and the Resistance #1
  • Flashpoint : The Outsider #1
  • Flashpoint : Project Superman #1
  • Flashpoint : Kid Flash Lost #1
  • Flashpoint : Reverse Flash #1
  • Butcher Baker : The Righteous Maker #4

Ta-dah!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Heroes Rebored, Aftermath : A Little More

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/06/21/dc-roadshow-hits-dallas-million-dollar-ad-spend-justice-league-beyond-and-black-people/

Nothing there that really grabs me. I wonder though - a little while back, DC announced there would be a new edition of Who's Who. Is it still coming, and if so - will it cover the classic DCU, or this new lameass knock-0ff?

Monday, June 20, 2011

Heroes Rebored, Aftermath : At Last, Clarity

The news had slowed quite a bit, but today, there was this :

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/06/19/more-from-the-dc-retailer-roadshow/

"Action Comics and Justice League are set in the past, the Green Lantern, Batman and LSH books are all continuing without a reboot. DCU Presents, Green Arrow and Hawkman are picking up where Brightest Day left off. But for everything else, yes, it will be more of a reboot/restart. They are basically keeping the books going that were financially successful for them and restarting everything else."

So, the top brass at DC, when saying "It's not a reboot", were lying. I have zero trust in them at this point. So that raises the question - what will I be buying come September? I think I have four basic approaches available to me.

1.) Screw'Em. I've read DC Comics for 30 years, since age 3, and there's never been a better time to jump off than now. I'd save a crapload of money - I'm reading about 30 core DC titles right now, including the recently cancelled Doom Patrol, REBELS, and Freedom Fighters. That's going to be $90-$100 a month.

2.) The Cautious Approach. Read only those titles I think are most important or interesting. That'd be the three Justice League titles, Action, I Vampire, Resurrection Man, Stormwatch, and the two Legion titles. So, 9 titles.

3.) The Optimist. Add to the above at least short term commitments on books that I otherwise consider marginal. Blue Beetle, Suicide Squad, Voodoo, Demon Knights, the four GL titles, Batwoman and three Batman titles, Superman, Hawkman, Flash, and Wonder Woman would probably make the cut. That'd bring us to 25 - potentially a handful more like Aquaman or Nightwing could sneak in. Then I'd be spending roughly as much as I do now.

4.) The Sucker. Buy them all, at least for a few issues. Hahahaha, no. I have absolutely zero interest in Captain Atom, Mr. Terrific, Batwing, Batman : The Dark Knight, Birds of Prey, Grifter, Deathstroke, OMAC, Blackhawks, Men of War, Hawk and Dove, or Static Shock. Please note that two of those are current ongoings that I actually read right now - the reboot version of Birds of Prey is uninteresting, and Dark Knight basically sucks and I'm glad to have an excuse to drop it.

DC would have been a lot better off with a lower-key relaunch with no adjustment of continuity, but with some of the additional titles. Then they'd assuredly be making more money off of me. As for what I will do, I'm waffling between #2 and #3, primarily.

While I was writing this, more news emerged :

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/06/20/talking-about-the-dc-relaunch-at-calgary-and-philadelphia/


Apparently, Wally's still around. Thank heaven for small favors?

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

New Comics Day

More Heroes Rebored stuff tomorrow, I expect. For now, this week's haul.

  • Warlord of Mars : Dejah Thoris #4
  • Invincible #80
  • Gladstone's School for World Conquerors #2
  • Darkwing Duck #13
  • Cinderella : Fables are Forever #5
  • DC Universe Online Legends #10
  • Superman / Batman #85
  • Batman #711
  • Teen Titans #96
  • Supergirl #65
  • Batgirl #22
  • Power Girl #25
  • Legion of Super-Heroes #14
  • Flashpoint : Grodd of War
  • Flashpoint : Deadman and the Flying Graysons #1
  • Flashpoint : Legion of Doom #1
  • Flashpoint : Wonder Woman and the Furies #1

Big week.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Heroes Rebored, Aftermath : Day Two

And the last batch of solicits :

Justice League solicits

The mystery character on the JLI cover is gone. Weird.

My thoughts on this reboot so far is that there are two bad things for every good thing, and that's not good. If I have time today, I need to do the tally of how many books I'm currently buying from DC, then do breakdowns of what I'm likely to get come September.

Hey, Shannon of the forgotten mini-series Crimson Plague, what do you think of DC's rumored pants policy for superheroines?

Monday, June 13, 2011

Heroes Rebored, Aftermath : Day One, Part Two

JSA Confirmed gone. Additional info.

Screw you, Dan Didio.

'The Dark' solicits.
Batman solicits.
Green Lantern solicits.

Heroes Rebored, Aftermath : Day One

So some clarification has been forthcoming. Action Comics #1 and JLA #1 both take place in the "past" of this new DCU, so the solicits may be somewhat misleading. Flashback arcs to kick off your new reader-friendly universe. Oy. Also, Tim Drake's position as a former sidekick to Batman has been confirmed in the revised actual solicit for the Titans book. (What we had before was apparently teaser-text, but now the actual solicits are going up..)

Superman Solicits
'The Edge' Solicits
Young Justice Solicits

More to come, I'm sure.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Heroes Rebored : Day Seven

Took them long enough. To post these, I mean. I did not mean to imply that any of the changes herein were overdue.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/10/history-happens-now/

#49 - Action Comics, by Grant Morrison and Rags Morales - Hey, it's the Super-Hobo. I love the creative team, but I'm still dubious.

#50 - Superman, by George Perez and Jesus Merino - George Perez.. writing. Hm. And is it me, or does Superman look astonishingly like Superboy Prime?

#51 - Supergirl, by Michael Green, Mike Johnson, and Mahmud Asrar - And Supergirl gets to show some thigh. Good for her.

#52 - Superboy, by Scott Lobdell, R.B. Silva, and Rob Lean - Did.. did they make Connor a cyborg or something? Wha?

Okay, so, characters we haven't seen :
  • Any of the Wolfman or original Teen Titans except Starfire, Arsenal, Cyborg and Dick. No Raven, Wally, Beast Boy, Donna, Aqualad, et cetera.
  • Any of James Robinson's Justice League except Dick and Supergirl. Again - Donna, Jade, Jesse Quick, Starman, Congorilla.
  • Any of the JSA except Hawkman and Mr. Terrific. This disturbs me most of all, especially with the Action Comics blurb calling Superman the first superhero. I think the JSA just went poof. Or maybe they'll be on Earth 2..
  • Any of the Outsiders, save Katana - but no one really cares.
  • Plastic Man, Steel, Huntress, Stephanie Brown, Cassandra Cain, Lady Blackhawk, the Question, the Doom Patrol...
So when Bob Wayne asserted this isn't a reboot - assuming he's not a liar or an idiot, I think the only conclusion remaining is that this is a heretofore unseen DCU, and not the one we're used to. Otherwise, if ANYTHING ever was a reboot, this also qualifies. The continuity changes in this are bigger than Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Heroes Rebored : Day Seven, Prelude

Still no official announcement from DC on the final four, but three of them leaked - Superman, Superboy, and Supergirl; with the last presumably being Action. Supergirl apparently also has an exemption from DC's pants-or-shorts policy.

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/06/10/those-52-dc-comics-issue-ones-and-what-and-who-is-missing/


BleedingCool did the missing creators thing already, but at first glance, I didn't see Paul Dini, Stephane Roux, or Dustin Nguyen on their biiiiiig list of people who had been working for DC but are nowhere to be found in these announcements.

No JSA makes me an unhappy camper.

DC is apparently going to do a push of honest-to-God TV advertising to promote this relaunch, though, so.. yay?

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Heroes Rebored : Day Six, Part Two

Things are looking bleak for JSA. I will be supremely pissed if there's no JSA title. Why bleak? Because we're down to four unknowns now, and with four rumored Super-titles, I just don't see the room.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/09/suicide-squad-1/
http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/09/blue-beetle-1/

#47 - Suicide Squad, by Adam Glass and Marco Rudy - I was honestly surprised not to see this one before now, I thought it would be a natural for DC's feeble attempts at 'edginess'.

#48 - Blue Beetle, by Tony Bedard, Ig Guara, and Ruy Jose - and given the diversity push, Jaime was conspicuously absent thus far.

Tomorrow I think we'll see the last reveals, and then I can do a breakdown of missing creators (Paul Dini, where are you?), missing characters, and an estimate of how much I am spending with DC now, and how much I'll be spending after the reboot.

Heroes Rebored : Extra Two

Over at Newsarama, incoming Batman writer Scott Snyder indicates that Bat-continuity is unchanged. I'm finding that pretty difficult to reconcile with the solicits we've seen, but..

Heroes Rebored : Extra

The image on DC's blog for Teen Titans is not the cover, apparently. This article has the final image - be warned, it's loading slowly and occasionally failing to load, possibly due to high server activity.

The costumes are still awful, and Kid Flash's is even worse than I thought, and that looks like it's going to be Wally, dammit. On the upside, we can now see all seven of the team's supposed roster. No Jaime, though.

Heroes Rebored : Day Six

Mostly Non-Superheroic reveals today, with one exception.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/09/welcome-to-the-edge/

#40 - Stormwatch, by Paul Cornell and Miguel Sepulveda - Oh, THERE'S J'onn. And you know what? His costume's not bad. My only quibble with this series is that we already have three Justice Leagues, a Titans team, two Legions, the Outlaws, the Birds of Prey, the Green Lantern Corps, the New Guardians, and a Partridge in a Pear Tree. What's their niche?

#41 - Blackhawks, by Mike Costa and Ken Lashley - And here I thought Dynamite or IDW had the GI Joe license. It's nice that DC is doing something in this genre, I suppose.

#42 - Sgt. Rock and the Men of War, by Ivan Brandon and Tom Derenick - Two somethings in this genre, then.

#43 - All-Star Western, by Justin Gray, Jimmy Palmiotti, and Moritat - A Western anthology title, headlined by Jonah Hex? Yeah, this one's probably overdue.

#44 - Deathstroke, by Kyle Higgins, Joe Bennett, and Art Thibert - Oh, look, Slade picked up a few things at Jean-Paul Valley's estate sale. DC : Deathstroke is not interesting. Please stop pretending he is.

#45 - Grifter, by Nathan Edmondson with art by CAFU and BIT - You know, with a reboot, they could've changed his name to something other than 'Cole Cash'. I'm just sayin'.

#46 - OMAC, by Dan Didio and Keith Giffen - Despite Giffen's impressive ability to channel Kirby - No.

Six announcements left. We have already been told about Superman and JSA; Presumably there will be Action as well, and I'd hope there's a Supergirl. So two real question-marks. Probably all revealed tomorrow.

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

New Comics Day

The list.

  • Knights of the Dinner Table #174
  • Warlord of Mars #7
  • Mega Man #2
  • Annihilators #4
  • Batman and Robin #24
  • Red Robin #24
  • Birds of Prey #13
  • Booster Gold #45
  • Flashpoint : Citizen Cold #1
  • Flashpoint : Deathstroke and the Curse of the Ravager #1
  • Flashpoint : Emperor Aquaman #1
  • Flashpoint : Frankenstein and the Creatures of the Unknown #1
  • Empowered Special

That's it.

Heroes Rebored : Day Five

Subtitle : "What the Hell, DC?"

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/08/the-next-generation-of-justice/

I guess this is nominally their 'Teen' block of releases, but some of them are questionable inclusions in that category, and some of them are just questionable, period.

#35 - Legion Lost, by Fabian Nicieza and Pete Woods - I like the writer. My only issue with this is that this exact premise has been done. A lot. Including once very recently.

#36 - Legion of Superheroes, by Paul Levitz and Francis Portela - The Legion is still getting two books, so that's a good thing.

#37 - Teen Titans, by Scott Lobdell, Brett Booth, and Norm Rapmund - Sweet zombie Jesus, my eyes. That is, collectively, the worst set of costumes ever. Compared to the new Titans, the WildCATs looked fashionable. This looks like a total reboot - they have the right four central characters, but the shared past that makes them work (namely, Young Justice) is gone. And it doesn't even look like Tim's got a connection to Batman.

#38 - Static Shock, by John Rozum, Scott McDaniel, and Jonathan Glapion - Okay.

#39 - Hawk and Dove, by Sterling Gates and.. God help me.. Rob Liefeld - What. The. Hell.

After a mostly positive set of announcements yesterday, things were looking up, but they've just destroyed the Titans. That and Liefeld make today's batch the most concentrated batch of suck that we've seen yet.

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Heroes Rebored : Day Four

A new day, a new set of reveals.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/07/dc-embraces-its-dark-side/

#27 - Swamp Thing, by Scott Snyder and Yannick Paquette - To be expected, after the Brightest Day push.

#28 - Justice League Dark, by Peter Milligan and Mikel Janin - That is the worst title for a comic, ever. The premise and cast look interesting, though. And is that a redesigned Zatanna I see? And it's nice to see that DC's newfound puritanism about the female leg doesn't extend to boob windows. Thanks, Madame Xanadu.

#29 - Animal Man, by Jeff Lemire, Travel Foreman, and Dan Green - I hate that cover, but I like the idea of Buddy Baker having his own book again.

#30 - Demon Knights, by Paul Cornell, Diogenes Neves, and Oclair Albert - I love Paul Cornell's work. The Demon has a horrible track record as far as series go, but I'm cautiously optimistic.

#31 - Frankenstein, Agent of SHADE, by Jeff Lemire and Alberto Ponticelli - Eh. Could be good.

#32 - Resurrection Man, by Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, and Fernando Dagnino - Holy f%#ing crap. This is the first bit of unequivocally great news to come out of this reboot.

#33 - I, Vampire, by Josh Fialkov and Andrea Sorrentino - And this is the other. I have a bizarre fascination with some of DC's obscure characters, and Andrew Bennett, the titular self-identifying vampire, is one of them. But hey, that vampire lady has no pants! What gives?

#34 - Voodoo, by Ron Marz and Sami Basri - The Wildstorm Voodoo, I guess? Sounds sorta like her. After Resurrection Man and I, Vampire, anything else would seem like a letdown.

So based on today's news, my reaction is edging up from 'Bah', towards 'Eh', and possibly even nearing 'Huh'.

Monday, June 6, 2011

Heroes Rebored : Day Three, Part Three

Confirmation on the Red Hood. (#25) And notice that Batman Inc returns in 2012 with a new number 1, so Grant gets to finish the storyline there, but it's not part of their September launch.

This, on the other hand, is :

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/06/batwing-1-the-batman-of-africa-deals-justice-in-his-own-series/


Batwing, by Judd Winick and Ben Oliver - Now we have official covers, titles, and creative teams, along with initial solicitations, for half of DC's relaunch. (#26)

Heroes Rebored : Day Three, Part Two

One of these is official, the other isn't yet, but this brings us up to 24 official reveals (plus several rumors). Almost half.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/06/nightwing-1-dick-grayson-is-back-as-nightwing/

Nightwing, by Kyle Higgins and Eddy Barrows - I like the costume. I haven't had that reaction to much of the new stuff, yet. So that's a good sign.

And though I'm trying to limit myself to the DCU Source blog to prevent misinformation, this one looks pretty official with a creative team and cover and everything :

http://uk.comics.ign.com/articles/117/1172824p1.html


Red Hood and the Outlaws, by Scott Lobdell and Kenneth Rocafort - Deeply mixed feelings here. One, I want to see what happened to Starfire's costume under DC's new Burqa policy. Two, "Red Hood and the Outlaws"? Really? Arsenal's arm looks like flesh, though.. That's hopeful.

Heroes Rebored : Day Three

Eight more reveals today.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/06/batman-1-and-detective-comics-1-history-in-the-making/

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/06/batman-and-robin-1-and-batman-the-dark-knight-1-bruce-wayne-the-one-true-batman/
http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/06/batwoman-1-batgirl-1-catwoman-1-and-birds-of-prey-1-the-women-of-gotham-city/

Batman, by Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo - Batman Inc. is no more. I am sad.

Detective Comics, by Tony Daniel - Okeydokey.

Batman and Robin, by Peter Tomasi and Pat Gleason - But we still have Damian. That's good.

Batman : The Dark Knight, by David Finch and Jay Fabok - Relaunching at #1 after two whole issues. Or is it going to be three?

Batwoman, by J.H. Williams III, Haden Blackman, and Amy Reeder - Finally.

Batgirl, by Gail Simone, Ardian Syaf, and Vicente Cifuentes - Odd that Barbara is Bat'girl' and Kate Kane gets to be Bat'woman'.

Catwoman, by Judd Winick and Guillem March - Meh.

Birds of Prey, by Duane Swierczynski and Jesus Saiz - Oh dear God, no. The writer, the costumes, the team line-up, the solicit/concept pitch, just - no. Gray Katana! Modest Canary! Inexplicable Ivy! Tattoo Gun Girl! You're showing too much arm there, T.G.G..

Wow. After the Green Lantern solicits, I was thinking I might basically keep buying what I was already getting, but this Bat line-up is pretty terribly disappointing.

Friday, June 3, 2011

Heroes Rebored

Based on the second set of reveals, I think that the folks predicting that this will be the equivalent of Zero Hour (in that most continuity stuck, some got tweaked, and very few got major revamps) are spot-on. Some heroes will be younger, hipper, edgier, collar-ier. In that light, I am calling this relaunch "Heroes Rebored", because.. yawn.

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/03/green-lantern-1s/

The Green Lantern family of titles brings us up to a total of 15 reveals out of 52. I assume we'll have a bloc of Superman and a bloc of Batman reveals soon as well. It looks like not one shred of continuity has been lost here. The GL titles are :

Green Lantern, by Geoff Johns, Doug Mahnke, and Christian Alamy - I don't like Mahnke's art.

Green Lantern Corps, by Peter Tomasi, Fernando Pasarin, and Scott Hanna - Now starring Guy and John, but don't worry, Kyle fans..

Green Lantern : The New Guardians, by Tony Bedard, Tyler Kirkham, and Batt - Featuring Jet! Extrano! Pieface! Er, wait, no.. wrong one. Tony Bedard deserves a GL book, I think.

Red Lanterns, by Peter Milligan, Ed Benes, and Rob Hunter - I just can't wait to see Ed Benes' illustrations of the Red Lantern district.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

New Comics Day

Belatedly.

  • Irredeemable #26
  • Herc #4
  • DC Universe Online Legends #9
  • Weird Worlds #6
  • Batman Beyond #6
  • Wonder Woman #611
  • Superboy #8
  • Adventure Comics #527
  • Secret Six #34
  • World of Flashpoint #1
  • Flashpoint : Batman - Knight of Vengeance #1
  • Flashpoint : Secret Seven #1
  • Flashpoint : Abin Sur, Green Lantern #1
  • Flashpoint #2

Voila.

The New DCU

I didn't put up my new comics haul yesterday because I was pressed for time; I'll get to it tonight or tomorrow, I expect.

Right now, all my geek braincells are preoccupied with DC's 'sort of reboot' bombshell they've announced for September, with 52 #1 issue, some continuity kept, and some discarded. (Rainbow Lanterns? In! Barbara Gordon as Oracle? Out!) Maybe it won't suck. Right now, I'm kind of shell-shocked by it all, honestly, so you get to watch me ramble about this post, from DC's The Source blog :

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/06/02/the-new-justice/

Justice League, by Jim Lee and Geoff Johns - I've kinda wanted to see a Geoff Johns JLA for a while now, and we've got the big guns back on the team, so that's a big jump over the current lackluster JLA series. On the other hand, Jim Lee's costume redesigns range from 'meh' to 'what the hell'. Flash and Cyborg in particular, and Wonder Woman's still got her stupid new outfit. (Along with a new editorial mandate that says female characters can't show leg, apparently.) It is nice to see Cyborg front and center on the JLA. I wonder who the replacement artist will be once Jim doesn't finish issue #3 on time.

Wonder Woman, by Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang - Well, I love Cliff Chiang's art.

Aquaman, by Geoff Johns and Ivan Reis - I was kind of interested in a new Aquaman series before I heard about this reboot. Since my enthusiasm levels have been sapped, I don't know if I give a dolphin's ass about the King of the Seas.

The Flash, by Francis Manapul and Brian Buccelatto - I always worry when they let artists write.

The Fury of Firestorm, by Gail Simone, Ethan Van Sciver, and Yildray Cinar - Our first confirmed full character reboot. A new origin for Firestorm. I love Gail Simone, but damn it, I just can't bring myself to care about this new version of Firestorm.

The Savage Hawkman, by Tony Daniel and Philip Tan - I can't tell from the solicitation text whether or not this is an 'origin story'. If it is, the implications to the Justice Society trouble me deeply. I mean, yes, Hawkman needs his continuity roto-rootered, but I like Hawkman bridging the JSA and JLA.

Green Arrow, by JT Krul and Dan Jurgens - This is another one that doesn't make it clear if it's an origin story or not. Green Arrow may not have even been rebooted, but I wouldn't mind clearing his murder of Prometheus from his backstory. Unfortunately, Green Arrow wasn't that interesting with a version of the DCU I liked to prop him up - with this new, unknown DCU, there's just no reason to buy this whatsoever.

Justice League International, by Dan Jurgens and Aaron Lopresti - This seems to follow straight from the Generation Lost series, but with the 'reboot' - does it? Or is it a coincidence the pre-Flashpoint DCU set up a new version of the JLI, and the post-Flashpoint DCU has one as well? I hate this ambiguous crap, and I say that as someone who loves Crisis on Infinite Earths. The presence of Guy Gardner confirms that Hal's not the only Earth GL, so that suggests there's some continuity.. Booster's new design looks really stupid. And none of the girls are showing legs, but none of the girls on this cover were last seen in leg-revealing costumes, anyway.

Mister Terrific, by Eric Wallace and Roger Robinson - I like that Mr. Terrific is getting a book of his own, a new costume design, and an interesting sounding premise. I hate that I've never heard of the people working on it.

Captain Atom, by JT Krul and Freddie Williams II - So they're giving him the full Dr. Manhattan treatment. Yawn. I also really don't like Williams' art style, so while some of the other titles on this list I'm still waffling on, this one is almost certainly a pass.

DC Universe Presents, by various - The return of the anthology title. I approve.

Of the eleven confirmed titles, I am somewhat interested in six of them, I think. Sorry Aquaman, Firestorm, Green Arrow, Captain Atom, and Mr. Terrific. Honestly, Flash, Hawkman, and Wonder Woman are on the bubble too.

Maybe it's not too late to start collecting pogs.