Grumpy Old Fan

February finds DC's superhero books gearing up for various endgames. The month begins with the end of the World Of New Krypton miniseries and ends with the final issue of Cry For Justice. Blackest Night and Superman: Secret Origin present their penultimate issues, Titans reaches a stopping point, and the revamped Batman line closes out its third quarter. Given the publisher's track record, I suppose that means a month or two of relative calm before the next round of character-specific events starts. (The 700th issues of Superman and Batman are right around the corner, relatively speaking.)

But that's still in the future, and just like a box of chocolates or a big pile of valentines, there's a lot right here....

NACKEST BLIGHT

I've just about concluded that there will be a big letdown after Blackest Night. There has to be, if these solicits are at all credible. I mean, over the past few years we've gone from a new Multiverse to the triumph of Ultimate Evil and now to the very limits of Death itself -- and what's left after that? Reunification with Vertigo? (Wouldn't it be great to see Death of the Endless put a big hurt on Nekron?)

The solicit for BN #7 does give me a nice thrill: the thought of Hal Jordan as the ultimate pioneer -- "star voyager," even -- out on the farthest frontier imaginable, with only his indomitable will standing between the universe and utter annihilation. Again, stuff like that is a big part of the reason I read superhero comics. You're on notice, issue #7 -- my expectations have been raised!

Speaking of Vertigo, though, did we ever get closure on Daniel/Sandman's advice to Kyle that because he "knows fear," he'll "surpass" Hal? Maybe the revived Kyle is the key to the whole thing, hmm?

Of course, the thing about those Black-Lantern-fied issues of Adventure Comics and Green Arrow is that they could both refer to alternate versions of Superboy (-Prime, perhaps? I read this week's Adventure…) and Green Arrow (Everyman?). In any case, I'm surprised Geoff Johns isn't writing the Adventure issue.

WORLD'S FINEST

I'm sure I'm not the first person to think that "Bruce Wayne lost in time" practically begs for a crossover between Red Robin and Booster Gold. It's one of those things which, on the surface, looks just that simple; but as a practical matter of course it won't be.

Case in point:  looks like February's Batman And Robin issues might involve that dessicated Batman corpse we saw in Final Crisis….

There's something to be said for the relative simplicity of the secondary Bat-books' solicits. Streets Of Gotham's storyline has been building since the first issue, but it's still straightforward superhero action. Same goes for Batgirl #7, which (appropriately) uses C- and D-list villains. Meanwhile, Azrael tries to broaden its horizons, spiritually speaking, with a Ragman guest appearance.

By the way, the "Batman Reborn" books (Batman And Robin, Streets, Red Robin, and Gotham City Sirens) are all set to hit issue #12 in May, which is perfect timing to set up June's aforementioned Batman #700. The Superman books don't have similar timing. DC's on pace for Superman #700 in May, but World Of New Krypton (the final issue of which might have made a good lead-in) ends right at the beginning of February.

You know, we hear so much about stereotypically intransigent fans making up the core of the Big Two's readership, it makes me wonder about how the solicit for Superman: Secret Origin #5 -- and really? Metallo is your penultimate-issue villain? -- will be received. John Byrne's revisions to Metallo's origin are pretty well-established by now, so you'd think a vocal contingent of readers would protest Geoff Johns' changes. On the other hand, it's just Metallo, right? Who would care that much?

Along the same lines, I'm surprised, but not unpleasantly so, by Helen Slater's involvement with Supergirl #50. Considering the reputation the (now twenty-five-year-old) Supergirl movie has, Ms. Slater sure has been a good sport about it, and seems genuinely to like the character.

AROUND TOWN

I expect the Peter Johnson/Chris Sprouse backup stories in the new Human Target miniseries will follow the format of the new TV show, which eschews the character's traditional disguises. However, by the same token, I'd hope the Len Wein-written lead would be about as traditional as you can get.

Two 48-page issues to wrap up four years' worth of the Milestone Universe? Heroes Reborn got a lot longer sendoff, and it was a lot shorter (and a lot less fondly remembered). At least the original creators are back together.

While I've been critical of J. Michael Straczynski's Brave and the Bold, I liked this week's Batman/Brother Power story and am looking forward to February's Aquaman/Etrigan combo.

Yay, Crazy Jane's back in Doom Patrol #7! I'm cautiously optimistic -- which, appropriately enough, seemed to be Jane's default attitude....

If REBELS #13 means what I think it does, I'm kinda glad Despero's dead. He was okay in Trinity, but he's become a sort of all-purpose unstoppable villain, and that's gotten old.

The cover of Justice League of America #42 reminds me that the Dr. Impossible action figures aren't exactly flying off the Target shelves. More to the point, though, "evil versions of good New Gods" is the kind of thing I'd expect to see in a Justice League book; so I'm really looking forward to this one.  Here's hoping Dr. I. justifies his toyetic status.

And not to be overly pessimistic, but Titans #22 strikes me as an excellent jumping-off point for longtime readers like myself. That said, though, I'm curious to see where the book goes from here. Clearly it won't become DC's loose-knit answer to Defenders, but I don't know who's left from that particular generation to join the new team. It's hard to explain, but I'm getting kind of a "Detroit League" vibe (no pun intended) off the whole transition.

COLLECTIONS

Between reprinting Batman In Barcelona and Batman: The Scottish Connection, the Batman International paperback looks pretty good. (The Legends Of The Dark Knight reprint is "Tao," by Alan Grant and Arthur Ranson, which involves -- get this! -- a flashback to his days training in China!)

Meanwhile, that new Brave and the Bold paperback includes the Batman/Hawk & Dove issue of the original series (#181), written by Alan "I Never Wrote A Bad Batman Story" Brennert, as well as a Flash/Captain Marvel story (set during 1995's Underworld Unleashed crossover) from Flash #107 and an Impulse/Zatanna story from Impulse #17. As for B&B's more recent reprints, the Superman/Catwoman story from issue #16 is especially good.

I notice that the third JLA Deluxe Edition doesn't include the DC One Million miniseries. That's unfortunate, since it was practically an extension of Morrison's JLA, and honestly, JLA #1,000,000 might not make much sense without it.

By contrast, the worst thing about the second JLA By George Pérez hardcover is that it won't be out by Christmas. This volume contains a pretty good Red Tornado story -- and no, that's not a backhanded compliment -- but I'll be getting it pretty much for the phenomenal JLA #200. Although Pérez penciled the main story, featuring the League fighting off a very familiar alien invasion, the other chapters were handled old-school Justice Society style, by artists synonymous with the characters. Gil Kane drew Green Lantern vs. the Atom, Joe Kubert drew Hawkman vs. Superman, Carmine Infantino drew the Flash vs. the Elongated Man, Dick Giordano drew Wonder Woman vs. Zatanna, and Brian Bolland drew Batman vs. Green Arrow and Black Canary. JLA #200 isn't just a landmark for the Justice League, it's one of the most beautiful superhero comics DC has ever published.

I am happy to be wrong about the Wednesday Comics hardcover. How wrong was I? Well, back in April, I supposed -- rather testily, I must admit -- that "[a] complete Wednesday Comics collection [probably] won't retail for less than $50.00 ($75.00 if it's still 14" x 20") and probably won't be out until next summer … that is, if it's collected at all."  In fact, it'll be out around Memorial Day (which might fit your definition of "summer," but is still, strictly speaking, spring) and it'll retail for $49.99 (oh! that cruel penny). It will be smaller than the original issues (11" x 17.5", not 14" x 20"), but bigger than either an Absolute book (8.5" x 12.8") or those oversized Paul Dini/Alex Ross specials from ten years ago (9.5" x 12.8").  In other words, I think I lost a bet to my LCS' owner.  And yes, I'll want one for my coffee table.

Glad to see the first Hardware collection on the schedule -- but finally there's a Wonder Woman Chronicles series! Now I can enjoy psychosexual superheroics on a budget!

Ironically (in light of the above), maybe inflation has gone to my head, but you know, $150.00 seems pretty reasonable for two volumes of Absolute Planetary. It'll probably be closer to $100.00 at a lot of places, so about $4.00 or $5.00 an issue.

Does it seem to anyone else like the Batman And Robin hardcover was produced rather quickly, while the Mysterius and Tor paperbacks took a long time coming out? Yeah, I know, priorities….

* * *

Anyway, that's what jumped out at me this month. What looks good to you?

Grumpy Old Fan

I am always glad to talk comics with Carla Hoffman, especially when she makes me think hard -- and that's the case today.

In her capacity as a retailer, Carla has been wondering about the relative accessibility of any given DC title, preferably in single-issue form (to accommodate those who, reasonably enough, might not want to start with paperbacks).

This raised all sorts of questions. What’s the standard for “accessibility” these days? How new-reader-friendly should a single issue be? How deep is the average superhero reader’s knowledge base? During the Silver Age, DC’s books were considered less sophisticated than Marvel’s because they weren’t that dependent on continuity. These days, the roles seem reversed, such that DC’s superhero line appears too mired in labyrinthine mega-stories. Considering the publisher's string of annual Big Events, that criticism isn’t entirely unfair.

DC has also acquired a reputation for spinning its events out of (or basing them around) obscure points of trivia. Civil War was "gubmint outlaws superheroes," but Final Crisis featured the Miracle Machine and Blackest Night is extrapolated from that Alan Moore/Kevin O'Neill story. This is especially ironic considering that DC's characters are pretty simply drawn: "last son of Krypton," "dark night detective," "Amazon princess," "fastest man alive."

Timing is important too. Odds are that any given issue will take place in the middle of an extended storyline, especially this year. In addition to Blackest Night, DC’s most familiar characters are occupied with stories which reach back several months and won’t be over until at least 2010. By that reckoning, the only “accessible” DC titles may be those set apart from the regular DCU: Batman Confidential, Superman/Batman, and The Brave and the Bold. Even among those books, though, only B&B consistently tells single-issue stories.

So should readers penalize DC because it has followed the trend of extended story arcs? Again, it depends on both reader expectations and the publisher's marketing goals; each of which can be self-fulfilling and/or self-reinforcing. Readers can only buy what's published, and publishers only publish what they think will be bought. Today, that means stories "written for the trade," and therefore a new set of pressures on the individual issue.

Regardless, the single issue can still succeed, thanks to a couple of factors. We may be stuck with a fairly rigid single-issue format (22- or 8-page stories, the occasional double-sized issue notwithstanding), but comics professionals can endeavor to make those installments as standalone as possible. If that's not practical -- or perhaps regardless of its practicality -- each issue's goal should be to encourage the reader to pick up the rest. Back issues are still readily available, after all; so who knows? You may be so moved that it's worth it to spend $5.98 on a couple of single issues rather than wait for a $14.99 or $19.99 paperback.*

(Granted, determining whether it's more cost-effective to sample individual issues or go for a trade seems about as complex as deciding whether to go for two, but still.)

With all that in mind, here are my thoughts on the relative accessibility of DC's various superhero titles.

GREEN LANTERN/BLACKEST NIGHT

At this point, I think the two GL books and the various Blackest Night tie-ins are tough calls in terms of accessibility. By now there’s just so much BN material out there that anyone who hasn’t been following the books from at least BN #1 may have a hard time getting on board. On the other hand, the main BN miniseries has been moving pretty slowly, focusing on various Black Lantern attacks and only introducing the Special Surprise Villain in the latest issue (#4). Also, by itself the Black Lantern idea is fairly simple, such that regular series which feature the BLs shouldn’t require a lot of explaining.

BATMAN

Apart from the big changes behind the Batman and Robin masks, the Bat-books themselves are about as reader-friendly as they've ever been. In fact, Batman himself (ex-Robin, ex-Nightwing Dick Grayson) is more friendly, although the prickly new Robin (Damian Wayne, Bruce's illegitimate son) balances that out. Essentially, there are a handful of "fiefdoms" in the Batman line. The Grant Morrison-written Batman And Robin sets the tone for the new Dynamic Duo, especially Damian/Robin. Batman itself is currently in the hands of writer/artist Tony Daniel, with writer Judd Winick set to return next spring. Paul Dini writes two ancillary titles, Streets Of Gotham (with Marc Andreyko writing a Manhunter co-feature) and Gotham City Sirens, which stars Catwoman, Harley Quinn, and Poison Ivy.  A couple more degrees separated from the main Bat-action are Batgirl, Red Robin, and Azrael, each of which is encumbered by backstory.  For the traditionalists, classic Bruce Wayne stories appear in Batman Confidential; and under Greg Rucka, Batwoman and the Question have a new home in the original Bat-book, Detective Comics.

Indeed, if I had to give a new reader only one Bat-book, it would probably be Detective. Not only do Rucka and artist J.H. Williams III produce a stunning 22 pages every month, they are essentially building Kate "Batwoman" Kane from the ground up. There's a lot more to the character than was revealed in 52, so this is an excellent opportunity for folks to get into the series. It'll cost you about $20.00 retail (5 issues @ $3.99 each), but it's worth it.

(Actually, since the most recent issue kicked off a new arc, detailing Kate's origin, you could even go cheap for just $3.99.)

If my hypothetical new reader wanted more Batman in her Bat-book, Batman And Robin is my no-brainer recommendation. The sixth issue just came out yesterday, so for about $18.00 she'll be up to speed. She can even take her time reading those six issues, since the series will be on hiatus until January.

Otherwise, if only Bruce Wayne will do, Batman Confidential just started a new arc (involving the Blackhawks), and it's also still $2.99.

SUPERMAN

For all practical purposes, there are four monthly Superman titles, each having something to do with the overarching “New Krypton” storyline. Here's what you need to know:  thanks to an Evil Government Conspiracy, the Kryptonians (Brainiac's prisoners until recently) hate us and we're not too keen on them.  Thus, Superman's gone to live on New K. while some of his friends pick up the slack back in Metropolis.

In Superman: World Of New Krypton the man himself is part of the Kryptonian military and must deal with local and interplanetary politics, like having his aunt rule New Krypton. Meanwhile, Action Comics stars the Kryptonian soulmates Nightwing and Flamebird and co-features Captain Atom; Superman stars Mon-El and the Guardian; and Supergirl, oddly enough, still stars Supergirl. Personally, I’m enjoying the heck out of “New Krypton,” but I don’t know where to tell a new reader to begin.**

Actually, that’s not true: the 4-issue World’s Finest miniseries, which started last week  (written by Sterling Gates and drawn by various artists) may be a good way for readers to sample the new Superman and Batman players, if not the status quos themselves. The first issue featured Tim “Red Robin” Drake and Chris “Nightwing” Kent, and subsequent issues will have similar team-ups. Classic World’s Finest-style action can still be found in Superman/Batman, and Geoff Johns and Gary Frank are only two issues into Superman: Secret Origin. Finally, Johns and artist Francis Manapul are spotlighting Conner “Superboy” Kent in the fairly-new Adventure Comics – but they won’t be on the book too much longer.

If I had only one book to recommend, I suppose it’d be Secret Origin. It’s the Superman setup most familiar to the general public, and I bet it will have some effect on the regular titles.

WONDER WOMAN

I don't know whether Wonder Woman would be "starter-level," because right now there's a bit of backstory. Diana has been "voted off the island," pretty much literally, and in the latest issue so has her mom (replaced as Amazon ruler by Achilles).  Also, a bunch of Amazons are mysteriously pregnant, and Donna Troy is still mad at WW for reasons which probably boil down to mind control. Basically, there are a lot of subplots, but I don't think they're terribly hard to follow.  If collections were part of this equation, I'd recommend starting with the Rise of the Olympian collection, which came out last week.

JUSTICE LEAGUE and JUSTICE SOCIETY

All things considered, this is as good a time as any to sample Justice League of America.  New writer James Robinson and new penciller Mark Bagley have begun (in last month's issue #38) a 3-part Blackest Night crossover which is also supposed to segue into January's new lineup. While that lineup includes a few characters from the Superman books (Mon-El, Guardian, Doctor Light) and some from the Cry For Justice miniseries (Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Congorilla, the Atom), everyone still has to be introduced to each other, and thus to the readers. It might be redundant for those who are reading the other books, but that's not the hypothetical new reader, now is it?

The Justice Society books are also at a crossroads, with the team having split just in time for December's new title, JSA All-Stars. I haven't been reading regular old JSA, so I don't know how much buildup the new book has gotten. Obviously a new series has to cater to potential new readers, but a lot of the characters on the cover of issue #1 were introduced in the existing Justice Society book, and that may mean a steeper learning curve. My impression of Justice Society of America is that it trades very heavily in character interaction among an ever-expanding cast, so I'd be extremely hesitant about giving it to a new reader who didn't want to dive right into the deep end.

Two Justice Socialites have solo series, Power Girl and Magog; and of the two, I'm tempted to give the accessibility edge to Power Girl. Her origins are a continuity tangle -- she's basically a more mature Supergirl from a parallel-universe's Krypton -- but since they're pretty much off-limits, that makes her a somewhat generic superhero. Her first storyline (issues #1-3) was a straightforward "villain holds Manhattan hostage so he can hijack hero's body" tale, and in fact it devoted the bulk of an issue to the villain's origin. The second arc, which wrapped up last month, apparently involved a trio of extraterrestrial party-girls. Power Girl is taking November off and returns in December with an old Superman supporting character, the gregarious Vartox.

TEEN TITANS and TITANS

Personally, I’d hold off on both of these for a few months. Titans is about to go through a significant roster change, because half its membership will be joining the Justice League. Teen Titans’ roster is more stable, but Raven and Beast Boy are about to come over from Titans and I suspect Superboy and Kid Flash will be rejoining before too long.

SECOND-TIER TEAMS

At first glance, Doom Patrol (written by Keith Giffen, penciled by Matthew Clark) looks like a stereotypically impenetrable DC title, “revived” by way of rolling back its status quo to the Silver Age. However, the book has several things going for it. The DP is based on Oolong Island, an independent nation made up of mad scientists. The Patrollers are all longtime DC superheroes, well-known to their peers, but each with various types of neuroses. The series is still new enough that finding all the issues shouldn't be a problem, and the current issue (#4) does a good job incorporating Blackest Night into the proceedings.

I have to admit, I don't read either Outsiders or REBELS, and neither seems especially new-reader-friendly. They're both revivals from decades past, so the characters aren't particularly familiar to begin with. Outsiders was organized around (classic) Batman, and without him the title seems to have lost a lot of direction. Word about REBELS is more positive, although again, it stars Adam Strange, Captain Comet, Brainiac's son Vril Dox, and other space-oriented heroes (including the Omega Men) with whom a new reader probably isn't conversant.

Accordingly, in this category I'd recommend the anti-heroes of Secret Six. Last week's issue #15 (guest-written by John Ostrander and guest-drawn by Jim Calafiore) was a standalone spotlight on Deadshot, but it was also a good example of the dark, complex characters which populate the book. Besides, next issue begins a new arc, and the Sixers have a new leader, Batman's ostensible opposite number Bane. Regular writer Gail Simone and regular artists Nicola Scott and Doug Hazlewood consistently produce one of DC's best books month in and month out, so a new reader could do a heck of a lot worse.

THE PROFESSOR AND MARY ANN

I've drifted away from Green Arrow And Black Canary for various reasons, including budget; but it's not an overly difficult book to get into. Currently the eponymous characters must deal both with Cupid, Green Arrow's murderous stalker, and a Green Arrow impostor whose involvement recalls the book's inaugural storyline. Writer Andrew Kreisberg and penciller Mike Norton produce 30 pages of story and art every month, so you get a lot for your $3.99.

You remember The Brave and the Bold from last week, right?

DC's "Red Circle" revival started in August and continues with ongoing series The Shield and The Web. Both are $3.99 titles with 22-page leads and 8-page co-features.  These are venerable characters once published by Archie Comics, and DC is basically introducing them new, so you'd think they'd be fairly accessible.

Much the same analysis applies to The Great Ten, the new miniseries which just debuted last week, over three years after the characters debuted in 52.  Hey, it took Batwoman a while to get going....

However, my there-can-be-only-one recommendation goes to Booster Gold, written and drawn by Dan Jurgens. In this week's issue #26, Blackest Night gives Jurgens (with an art assist from Mike Norton) an opportunity to recap Booster's origin and the origins of two Blue Beetles, as well as surveying Booster's supporting cast. Probably the most obtuse scenes involve Booster's ancestor Daniel, who's also the misfit superhero Supernova; but that's a minor quibble. For a series rooted firmly in esoteric DC history (including the mysteries of Rip Hunter's blackboard), Booster Gold excels at making that history meaningful.

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As always, your results may vary. I thought Trinity was pretty accessible to casual superhero fans, but I know a lot of folks disagreed. Regardless, there's a lot out there for the superhero reader who wants to sample DC's fare. Booster Gold might make all that history less intimidating. Power Girl is full of old-fashioned action. World's Finest and Justice League are designed in part to sample other books' heroes, while Batman Confidential, Superman/Batman, and Superman: Secret Origin deal in classic interpretations. Finally, Secret Six and Detective Comics are simply excellent examples of the genre.

Of course, it's not always wise for any work to be completely upfront with its readers.  When I was getting back into comics after what seemed like a long time away, I enjoyed catching up on what I'd missed.  I still pick up back issues and collections of old books in part because I miss that thrill of discovery.  Today, the Internet makes a lot of that research more efficient, but somewhat impersonal; so I envy those folks who can come to a new superhero comic with truly fresh eyes.

+++++++++++++

* [Prices not adjusted for whatever discount(s) you may enjoy.]

** [Look at this week's Action:  a character returns from being thought dead, a couple of longtime DC characters are brought more fully into the storyline, a new/old villain is (re)introduced, and everybody's wearing "S"-shields on their costumes again.]

Grumpy Old Fan

In a fractured, niche-oriented environment, it can be hard to justify one's existence, let alone one's relevance. When the tastes of your audience have changed, you are naturally prompted to change as well. Thus, MTV cultivates youth-oriented reality shows, VH-1 spotlights fading celebrities (and their desperate hangers-on), and The Weather Channel now plays meteorologically-minded movies like The Perfect Storm and The Wizard Of Oz.

To be sure, there must be scads of people who think AMC's shift towards showing Catwoman edited-for-TV is a step up from those all-weekend marathons of uncut Hitchcock films. Why shouldn't a channel try to keep as many eyes glued to it as possible? If you don't care what kind of elements Jim Cantore is braving, you can get your local radar instantly from the Internet. (And then you can watch Cantore highlights on YouTube.) Only those who remember how these channels began now lament what they have become -- and may envy their successes.

That brings me to The Brave and the Bold, DC's venerable team-up title. Relaunched about three years ago with the combined star power of Mark Waid and George Perez, it has survived the departure of both, as well as several months' worth of rotating creative teams. Nowadays things have settled down under writer J. Michael Straczynski and artist Jesus Saiz. They've produced two issues so far, one pairing Batman and Robby "Dial 'H' For Hero" Reed, and one with a time-lost Flash meeting the World War II-era Blackhawks. Future issues will team Batman and Brother Power the Geek, Green Lantern and Doctor Fate, and the Joker and the Atom.

All of this is consistent with B&B's format of unusual team-ups. Straczynski told CBR last year that he was "intrigued" by "the oddness of the [original series'] pairings," and his choices are appropriately unconventional.

However, two issues into his tenure, Straczynski seems determined to frustrate reader expectations. For example, the premise of Dial 'H' For HERO is that Robby Reed's H-Dial transforms him into a new (and perhaps reader-designed) superhero each time he uses it. Robby might therefore go through multiple alter egos in a single story. Consequently, when Waid had Robby meet various other DC heroes (as in the Silver Age miniseries and in B&B #9), the latter were themselves transformed by the H-Dial. Specifically, it made Tin, the insecure Metal Man, into a confident (and human-looking) crusader. In Straczynski's first issue, though, after the H-Dial reveals a terrible fate for whoever uses it next, it forces Robby and the dial into the background for much of the issue. Similarly, in last month's issue #28, both the Flash and the Blackhawks are compelled by circumstances out of their comfort zones and away from their usual operating modes. Barry Allen eschews his super-speed and the Blackhawks abandon their planes, in order to help the infantry fight the Germans in Belgium.

Now, these plots are not indefensible, and each of them highlights a different aspect of heroism, which is not unreasonable for a superhero anthology. Still, Straczynski's B&B lacks the multiplicative exuberance which (by and large) his predecessors brought to the book. Put another way, he doesn't seem that interested in his characters' surface details, and thus doesn't seem that interested in the possibilities of combining them.

This is certainly a non-traditional perspective on superhero team-ups. Each of DC's characters comes with a certain set of expectations, and while it's perfectly okay to play with those expectations, in a general-interest title like The Brave and the Bold I think you at least have to acknowledge them. The Flash is synonymous with super-speed action, and the Blackhawks are all about fighter-pilot swagger. Put 'em together, and perhaps you get a story where the Flash must use his scientific know-how (and a healthy dose of speed) to, I don't know, help the grounded Blackhawks overcome the laws of physics. Maybe the situation's reversed, and the Blackhawks are the key to getting Barry back to the present. Or maybe there's nothing wrong with either of them, and they work behind the scenes to help the Greatest Generation repel the Axis and save civilization as we know it.

Any of those sound more exciting to me than the actual plot of B&B #28, which finds a time-lost Flash at the Battle of the Bulge with a broken leg, and otherwise unwilling to use his powers to kill Nazis. (He will gladly use his powers to hurt Nazis, but Blackhawk says that only makes him "a coward and an impediment to the war effort.") As a result, Barry puts on a dead G.I.'s uniform and spends the next few weeks as an anonymous American soldier, before returning to the present with a new appreciation for those who served.

Again, that's a perfectly decent (albeit familiar) plot … but I don't know why it had to feature the Flash and the Blackhawks. Like I said a couple of weeks ago, it could have been any combination of modern and wartime characters: Robin and Sgt. Rock, Blue Beetle and the Boy Commandos, Firestorm and the Haunted Tank. The appeal of The Brave and the Bold, if not its reason for existing, is the showcasing of these characters not just in combination, but individually. That thought was behind the series of Milestone-character spotlights in issues #24-26, and that was to have been the point of Straczynski using the title to reintroduce the Red Circle characters. Straczynski's two issues so far seem to be for people who are more familiar with the characters -- not just Batman and the Flash but Robby and the Blackhawks -- and while that's okay in a vacuum, it's not what The Brave and the Bold should be about.

Now, I say this having just revisited the series' first twelve issues (the "Lords of Luck" and "Book of Destiny" arcs), over the course of which Waid and Perez allowed their fannish impulses to run free. Key moments in these issues seemed to hinge upon relatively obscure DC trivia, like the source of Ultraman's powers or the appearance of familiar Rannian weapons. Although these are things the characters would know, it's also easy to see them as "Mark Waid showing off." Of course, if you like Waid (and Perez) showing off, all the better. The narration in the especially cheesetastic introduction of the Challengers of the Unknown did have a certain movie-trailer ambiance, but Waid and Perez made it work.

By contrast, Straczynski's scripts operate from the inside out, looking at character dynamics as opposed to those broad surface details. The H-Dial doesn't turn Batman into a fan-designed superhero at any point in issue #27, but it does force Robby into the decision which drives the plot; and the superhero it does create is equally important to the story's resolution. Moreover, Batman's experience with teenaged (and younger) superheroes makes his closing speech to Robby particularly poignant. Similarly, the conflict in issue #28 comes from Barry Allen's refusal to let "the Flash" kill, and Blackhawk's deadly-serious response. I can appreciate Straczynski wanting to do unconventional takes on the characters, to go along with his unconventional pairings, but at the same time it feels like he is missing the point of the series. By the end of the story, I should want to read more about the characters in their natural settings; but I'm not convinced that having Batman try to comfort emotionally-wrecked Robby is the way to get me to read more Dial 'H' For HERO.

Still, DC has already been down the general-interest-anthology road. Some ten years ago (cover dates February 1998-June 2001), it published Legends Of The DC Universe, which ran for 41 monthly issues and a handful of specials. LOTDCU wasn't strictly a team-up book, although it featured a few (including Aquaman and the Joker in a sequel to "The Laughing Fish"). It was more of a venue for short stories and small arcs starring older versions of high-profile characters (e.g., the then-dead Barry Allen and Hal Jordan). Therefore, it didn't exactly go deep into DC's bench, and with the exception of a Hal-Spectre three-parter, neither did it try to raise a character's profile. Instead, it tried to be for the rest of DC's characters what Legends Of The Dark Knight was for Batman: a venue for marquee creative teams to work on marquee properties. This belt-and-suspenders approach got LOTDCU three-and-a-half years.

By inviting readers to come for the creative team and stay for the characters, The Brave and the Bold steps out in faith a little more. DC's faith evidently is in Straczynski's ability to write good stories using a variety of matchups. Still, like the Weather Channel expanding its scope, Straczynski's style represents a significant shift away from B&B's usual practice. Presumably this is intended to attract new readers, and it may pay off for DC in the long run -- sales of September's issue #27 were up over 33% (26,904) from August's #26 (20,154). Unless the bottom drops out unexpectedly, B&B may well have a longer life than LOTDCU. DC could then reasonably claim to have met its readership's changing expectations, using stories which went deeper than fannish superficiality.

And notwithstanding my criticism, I'll still be happy if Straczynski's Brave and the Bold is successful. I'll always support the sort of anthology which highlights the little-known corners of DC's shared universe, because it encourages the imaginative possibilities which such a shared universe offers.  Besides, I can't imagine any writer using these characters being downbeat for long, especially with a character as deliberately disruptive as Brother Power.

Who knows -- maybe Straczynski is ready to loosen up after all?

Grumpy Old Fan

It shouldn't surprise you that I like Halloween.* I like it a lot. I'd like the whole month of October to be nothing but brisk, stark days and clear, blue-black nights, with gentle breezes herding dead leaves through the stillness, and the overall sense that something unseen can still see you.

(Actually, my idea of the perfect Halloween is probably best expressed -- minus the revenge-killing, of course -- in the classic "Night of the Reaper!" story from Batman #234 … but I talked about that last year.)**

Accordingly, every year I try to get as much out of the Halloween season as possible: horror-movie marathons, a jack-o'-lantern, candy, costumes, etc. However, when the time comes to tie that into a DC Comics-centered column, I tend to come up short.

Of course, DC has had a number of horror- and mystery-themed titles over its history, but for various reasons I have never really gotten into them. I mean, I've read Sandman and Swamp Thing, and I knew the Elvira's House Of Mystery makeover didn't go over well. I even bought most of the run of Wasteland, the unsettling anthology headed by writers Del Close and John Ostrander, which featured art from non-superhero folk like Don Simpson and Bill Messner-Loebs (back when he was known more for Journey than Flash). So, you know, I'm not completely ignorant of DC's efforts in this area, but I can count the number of favorite House Of Mystery stories on one hand.

Therefore, once again I must go back to the superheroes for spooky fun. Lucky for me there's a good bit of material.

MONSTERS

The traditional group of "Universal Horror" monsters -- vampire, werewolf, Frankenstein's monster, and mummy -- have been fairly well-represented over the years in DC's superhero books. Superman and Batman have fought vampires and werewolves, and not just in the Superman And Batman Versus Vampires And Werewolves miniseries. In a 1982 Batman/Detective Comics arc, Batman even became one of the bloodsuckers. Frankenstein's Monster has also shown up in the Superman books, with "Bizarro Meets Frankenstein" from Superman #143 (February 1961) being particularly memorable. Although the Monster in that story was just an actor, the real creature showed up later in Superman #344 (February 1980) as one of Dracula's henchmen.

Of course, in Jimmy Olsen #s 142-43 (October-November 1971), Jack Kirby gave us the movie-monster wannabes of planet Transilvane; and last year Trinity reminded us that DC had no shortage of were-creatures. (Anthony Lupus, the star of Batman #255's "Moon of the Wolf!", even got adapted into an episode of "Batman: The Animated Series.")

Mummies are a little more scarce, but perhaps that's because when we encounter DC's ancient Egyptians (Nabu, Teth-Adam, et al.), they're not in a position to be embalmed. Accordingly, going back to Superman, John Byrne combined a giant mummy with an ancient-astronaut theory in Superman vol. 2 #s 5-6 (May-June 1987).

There have been monster-themed protagonists too. Vampires include Andrew "I … Vampire!" Bennett and Dagon of the Team Titans. Bennett also turned Julius, former leader of the Primate Patrol, into the creature later dubbed "Primaul." The Creature Commandos included a vampire, werewolf, patchwork monster, and Medusa, and were joined later by an amphibian creature and a mummy. The short-lived Scare Tactics series was about a band made up of a vampire, a werewolf, and a couple of mutated humans. Simon Dark is a Frankenstein-esque revenant, and Frankenstein and the Bride have steady work through the S.H.A.D.E. organization.

However, for its more sympathetic characters DC has tended to look outside those familiar types. Ghostly heroes abound, from the Spectre and Deadman to Ralph and Sue Dibny. The Demon and Man-Bat aren't werewolves, but both are variations on the "creature within" approach. Being a monster (again, like in the "Universal Monsters" sense) comes with its own set of problems, and as we all know, DC has traditionally stayed away from superheroes with built-in flaws. Obviously it's not averse to them; but it does make them harder to find.  Besides, it's not like Scare Tactics or Team Titans really captured the public's imagination.

COSPLAY

Now, in this category I'm not talking about the everyday wearing of skintight spandex. That would be too easy. Instead, on a few occasions our heroes have found themselves in the costumes of their colleagues. The Silver Age Superman and Batman switched outfits frequently, mostly to let criminals expose Batman to Kryptonite while Superman kept a safe distance. Likewise, the Justice Leaguers often posed as each other to avoid their particular weaknesses; and in an extended Legion Of Super-Heroes arc, the Legionnaires adopted entirely new heroic identities. The "I take up this mantle in honor of my mentor" thing is old hat by now too.

Nevertheless, what got me thinking about these change-ups was a rather convoluted story from World's Finest Comics #s 248-249, involving Green Arrow, the villainous Hellgrammite, and John Deleon, the man who stole Oliver Queen's fortune. In a series of events a little too complicated to explain here, Deleon announced to Ollie that he'd uncovered Ollie's secret identity … and confronted him with a Batman costume.

Yeah.

Because Hellgrammite had captured Black Canary, Ollie had little choice but to don the Bat-suit and take out Hellgrammite's goons with Bat-weapons from the utility belt. I'm not clear on why that particular suit, which was supposed to have been donated to a superhero museum, would have working gadgets. Anyway, when I was eight I thought it was pretty cool that Ollie could still do well with someone else's gear, even though he was fairly awkward in the suit. However, I'm still not sure whether the sight of blond-goateed-"Batman" (drawn by Trevor Von Eeden!) is funny or horrifying.

All the original equipment was present when Wally West and Kyle Rayner switched costumes involuntarily in 1997's Flash/Green Lantern: Faster Friends miniseries, but the fellas couldn't use 'em, in part because they thought they were each other. This forced them to walk in each other's shoes … and by "walk" I mean walk, because "Flash" didn't have super-speed and "Green Lantern" couldn't use his ring. Afterwards, there was much male bonding.

Naturally, DC's superhero characters have donned other familiar costumes at Halloween parties and similar functions. As newlyweds, Clark Kent and Lois Lane dressed as Batman & Robin for a costume party; and in probably the most infamous example, Iris Allen was wearing a Batgirl outfit when Professor Zoom apparently murdered her. On the plus side, a group of Justice Society spouses had a fun adventure with Wonder Woman in a Times Past story from Starman #69 (September 2000). I would say that helped inspire Shiera Saunders to be a full-time Hawkgirl (supplementing her first Hawkgirl adventure in June-July 1941's All-Star Comics #5), but I'm not sure where it fits into her history.

Then there's the inadvertent assumption of another heroic identity, later exploited by a continuity loophole into a touching denouement. Of course I refer to the "Starman of 1951" story, which in turn took its cue from Detective Comics #247 (September 1957). In the older story, Professor Milo made Batman afraid of bats, so the Caped Crusader went adventuring as "Starman." As the '90s Starman series was winding down, this Starman's identity remained a mystery. Issue #77 (May 2001) revealed that initially Ted Knight's JSA teammate Charles "Dr. Mid-Nite" McNider took over as Starman, but that's not the touching part. Ted's time-displaced son David, murdered not long into his own Starman career, finally got a chance to be a big-time superhero. It was a nice bookend to a series about family.

We're not so much concerned with emotional resonance today, though, as much as we are the immediate effect of wearing another person's clothes. Clearly costumes, be they for Halloween or for scaring the superstitious and cowardly, are talismans which help their wearers internalize whatever they symbolize. You dress like Sarah Palin or Jaime Sommers because some little part of you identifies with, or at least wants to make a statement about, that person. Whenever modern superhero comics (and adaptations thereof) try to justify the costumes as anything more than visual shorthand, they run the risk of overthinking. Sometimes an "S" is just an "S."

In the comics themselves, these talismanic functions are even more pronounced, because often the costumes "work best" only for their owners. It's not just Wally West being unable to use Kyle's ring. Green Arrow dressing as Batman is nowhere near as effective as Batman himself, and doesn't make a good Green Arrow either. Obviously this is crucial to comics' visual shorthand, because some random guy in a Batman costume really shouldn't be mistaken for Batman. For fans, though, it reinforces the notion that such costumes are transformative. Paradoxically, I even think it helps to see them "not work" for other people in the comics. After all, in the comics, there's only one Batman (at a time, anyway); but in the real world, we can each have our chance.

THE DECOMPOSING, BLACK-RING-WEARING ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM

I'm a little surprised it took me this long to mention Blackest Night in a Halloween-themed post, especially since three installments of the frickin' thing came out this week. Honestly, though, I have a hard time thinking of BN as horror. Not that it isn't creepy, gory, or scary; but it's about as much a horror story as Aliens was.

Now, the original Alien (which I watched earlier this week, along with its sequel, as per my holiday rituals) was very much a horror movie, full of suspense and shocks. I want to say that Stephen King (in Danse Macabre) described it as a haunted-house movie with outer-space trappings. By contrast, Aliens uses the characters and situations to dress up an action-movie storyline. When the aliens pick off the Marines one by one, they do so in force, with almost none of the subtlety (for lack of a better word) that the lone alien displayed in the original. Now that our heroes know how to destroy the Black Lanterns, BN is a lot like that: find enough Lantern Corpsmen, tell them to combine their powers, and repeat as necessary. I expect there will also be some commentary, and perhaps some new "rules," about what death means to DC's super-characters, but again, I don't see that as horror.

And naturally, I don't mean to insult either Blackest Night or Aliens with the comparison … but boy-howdy, does Aliens love to see its warriors (especially those gung-ho Marines) flex their muscles. I remember when the movie first came out and all my friends were quoting Hudson, Vasquez, et al., enthusiastically. What's weird is that it's possible to appreciate Hudson whether he's the posturing egomaniac at the beginning of the mission or the "game over, man!" basket case from later on. At first you're confident that these guys have the firepower to eradicate the alien colony as completely as wiping a window clean; but you know that's foolish, because otherwise there would be no movie. Thus, the conflict in Aliens comes in making the monsters so much more than the heroes expect (how do aliens cut power or operate freight elevators, anyway?), so it's that much more cathartic when the heroes finally get the upper hand. Thankfully, although we're only halfway through Blackest Night, it looks like most of the pieces of the puzzle have been identified, and the problem has thus become one of scale.

Still, that's not horror to me, because it's a problem which can (and, inevitably, must) be solved. The malevolent parts of a good horror story are never really eradicated, just thwarted or postponed. It's not the same as a superhero comic leaving, say, a grinning Superboy-Prime in an "inescapable" prison cell. That too is something which will be addressed, and therefore resolved. Real horror -- the kind which sends a chill down your back on a moonlit October night -- will always be out there, just waiting….

* * *

Of course, Halloween's main attraction is the notion that all those shocks are, to a great extent, manageable. You know you're not Batman under all that grey and black fabric, and by extension you know there are no monsters or demons coming to get you. It's only a story, only a radio play, only a movie. If Batman and Robin really did show up at your costume party, tracking down a real murderer, well then … that line between fantasy and reality would look awfully blurry.

So as you go out this weekend to your own festivities, whether it's a big shindig or just welcoming the neighborhood trick-or-treaters, remember: no matter how eerie things look in the moonlight, no matter what you think you hear in the unnatural calm, no matter how convincing that costume is; it's nothing you can't handle. Those kinds of fantasies are confined to the comic books…

… aren't they?

+++++++++++

* [And by "Halloween" I mean the secular aspects of the holiday. I'm not here to tread on anyone's religious beliefs.]

** [By the way, a certain Bat-artist/writer is treading on very dangerous ground in referencing "NOTR." I'm not talking about potentially angering fans who might not want the story revisited, I'm talking about the wrath of Harlan Ellison, who was involved in its creation.]

Grumpy Old Fan

Time once again for the monthly ritual of parsing DC's solicitations. This batch is special, not because it's the first of a new year. (That would require the calendar to mean something to superhero comics, like it does at least superficially to TV and movies.) No, January '10 finds DC's superhero books taking a break from Blackest Night to … pretty much continue the same amount of Blackest Night coverage.

Anyway, grab your wallet and fire up your spreadsheet, because it's a decent month regardless.

BLACKEST NIGHT

While the actual BN miniseries may be taking January off, I have to say I am really looking forward to Hal vs. Black Lantern Spectre in Green Lantern #50. That sort of plot is, in a nutshell, one good example of why I read superhero comics.

As for Green Lantern Corps … well, three months into Blackest Night it doesn't seem like GLC is doing much beyond "collateral damage." Issue #44 hawking Red Lantern Guy sounds like more of the same, with soap opera substituting for larger plot moves. I am certainly not the world's biggest Geoff Johns fan, but his intricate Green Lantern plotting has made me want to revisit everything from Rebirth forward, including Hal/Spectre's last appearance in JSA. Green Lantern Corps is continuity-heavy in a way which focuses more on character dynamics and is a little more overwhelming.

Here, as always, is the tote board. Counting Secret Six #13, which concludes the story begun in Suicide Squad #67, there are fourteen BN-related titles, same as in December. For the most part, the eight "zombie" titles -- two per week -- take the place of the regular-series issues into which BN tied (and which were promoted by the variously-colored rings). The only regular-series issue which does tie into BN (however indirectly) is Secret Six, which kind-of takes the place of BN proper.

1/6: BN: Wonder Woman #2, Weird Western Tales #71, Suicide Squad #67
1/13: BN: Flash #2, Catwoman #83, Power Of Shazam! #48, Secret Six #13
1/20: GLC #44, Phantom Stranger #42, Starman #81
1/27: GL #50, BN: JSA #2, Atom & Hawkman #46, Question #37

Speaking of those long-canceled titles, I still think the idea is pretty clever, but I'm having trouble seeing what they promote in the long term. There's the Suicide Squad/Secret Six two-parter, and obviously there's an opportunity to flood sales charts with BN tie-ins. Maybe there will be some cross-promotion in the books themselves, leading readers of the Question issue into Detective Comics, etc.

Also, while I don't feel compelled to get all the zombie issues, I am looking forward to Ryan Sook on Atom & Hawkman, Don Kramer and Michael Babinski on Power Of Shazam!, Denys Cowan & Bill Sienkiewicz returning to The Question, and of course James Robinson and John Ostrander back on Starman and Suicide Squad.

ODDS AND ENDS

Batman & Robin #6 is currently on the schedule for November 4, which means it'll be a two-and-a-half month wait ('til January 27) to see the tasty goodness of Cameron Stewart's work on B & R #7. Guest-stars the Knight, the Squire, and Batwoman sweeten the deal; and Batman (the old one, looks like) apparently returns the favor in Detective #861.

I don't know if it's convinced me to buy the issue, but I like the solicitation for REBELS #12. It lays out the plot and sets an appropriate mood without spoiling anything or engaging in hyperbole.

It doesn't feel right saying this, because I am a big George Pérez fan; but I don't think he was a good choice to do covers for The Authority #18 and WildCATS #19. The characters just don't look like themselves.

That's a nice-looking head sculpt on the Robin figure in the Detective Comics Box Set, but I think the body is a repainted version of "College Robin" from the New Teen Titans series. I'm guessing the Batman is likewise a new head (and/or cape) on the existing Silver Age Batman figure's body. Might still get this set, though.

COMINGS AND GOINGS

Dan DiDio and Philip Tan -- has someone already called them the "Dan 'N' Tan Show?" -- take over Outsiders with January's #26, and Joe Casey is the new Superman/Batman writer (with Ardian Syaf drawing) as of issue #68. Now, it's obvious why DC wants to keep publishing Superman/Batman, especially in light of the changes in the regular Superman and Batman books. I have to wonder, though, why Outsiders is so important that DC's Executive Editor will be writing it himself (to say nothing of having Tan draw it). Does the world cry out that loudly for more Geo-Force?

Geoff Johns and Francis Manapul leave Adventure Comics with #6; The Mighty is cancelled with issue #12; and it looks like Lana Lang's death is Supergirl #49's big draw.

Felicia D. Henderson returns to writing Teen Titans after apparently just taking a break for the Blackest Night tie-ins. The issue finds the Titans headed for the Milestone-centric city of Dakota, so that should be fun.

Joe The Barbarian is this month's only first issue, and for $1.00, too!

COLLECTIONS

Lots of good collections coming in February, but let's start with Batman: King Tut's Tomb. It's an excellent story (written by Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir) with great art (by Jose Luís García-López and Kevin Nowlan), and rather than "reintroducing" the '60s-TV-show villain King Tut, it repurposes the name quite well. The older reprints feature García-López' art on Batman team-ups with Hawkman and Scalphunter, and a story featuring the Joker; so a good package all around, and a bargain at $14.99.

The second Hitman paperback gets a new printing, which is good for me because I missed it the first time around.

Make up your own "instant gratification" joke about the final Planetary hardcover being scheduled.

Not sure how the Origins paperback will read as a collection, considering it's a bunch of two-page origin stories meant as bite-sized backup features. Still, there's some nice work here, and I suppose it's a showcase for an unusual format.

Hardcover Jack Kirby reprints (this time with Joe Simon) continue with The Newsboy Legion Volume 1. I'm guessing there will be a Volume 2, but I'm not sure how much material there is for it. According to GCD, Don Cameron and Joe Kubert produced some Newsboy Legion stories which were signed "Simon & Kirby" -- this one, for example -- so I wonder if those will be included under some kind of loophole. (I also wonder if the Newsboys are getting more attention now that the Guardian's profile has been raised. Probably not.)

More Kirby work appears in the Kobra: Resurrection paperback, a collection of early Kobra stories, Checkmate's "Castling" arc, and the "Faces Of Evil" special which grafted an unhappy ending on the latter. To me it seems like a primer on Kobra for anyone currently reading the JSA Vs. Kobra miniseries, but I did like that Checkmate story.

And speaking of old DC characters given new life via James Robinson, Sinister House's hostess -- coming soon to Showcase Presents Secrets Of Sinister House -- went on to be Starman's Charity O'Dare, who also had a significant role in Trinity.

Kind of surprised to see the Wonder Woman Archives (Vol. 6), because I had thought the Archives program was being phased out. Not sure if I'd rather have them replaced with a Wonder Woman Chronicles series. I would wonder if the Archives' higher price is meant to discourage impressionable youngsters from stumbling onto Marston & Peter's work; but I read the Fleisher Wonder Woman Encyclopedia in third grade and as far as I can tell, it didn't warp my mind.

BACK-LOADED

After looking at January's roster of titles, I noticed that I'd be buying almost twice as many books on January 27 as I would any other week of the month. Apart from all the Blackest Night tie-ins and assorted miniseries, this is pretty much what I'd be getting regardless.

January 6 (5 issues): Blackest Night: Wonder Woman #2, Doom Patrol #6, Suicide Squad #67, Superman: World Of New Krypton #11, and Warlord #10.

January 13 (7 issues): Action Comics #885, Batman #695, Blackest Night: The Flash #2, Booster Gold #28, Power Of Shazam! #48, Secret Six #17, and The Unwritten #9.

January 20 (7 issues): Batman: Streets Of Gotham #8, The Brave And The Bold #31, Green Lantern Corps #44, Joe The Barbarian #1, Justice League Of America #41, Starman #81, and Supergirl #49.

January 27 (13 issues): Astro City: The Dark Age Book 4 #1, Atom And Hawkman #46, Batman And Robin #7, Detective Comics #861, Green Lantern #50, Justice League: Cry For Justice #6, Madame Xanadu #19, The Question #37, Superman #696, Unknown Soldier #16, Victorian Undead #3, Wonder Woman #40, and World's Finest #4.

At first I thought DC was back-loading its schedule for some reason, maybe to provide a cushion for late books. However, looking at the overall schedule, everything seems pretty balanced. January 6 and 20 see 13 DCU titles each, and January 13 and 27 have 14 each. Vertigo ships four titles each week, Johnny DC ships two on each of the first two weeks and one on each of the next two, and WildStorm ships two on the 6th, three on the 13th, and four each on the 20th and 27th:

1/6 (21 total): DCU = 13, JDC = 2, WS = 2, Vertigo = 4
1/13 (23 total): DCU = 14, JDC = 2, WS = 3, Vertigo = 4
1/20 (22 total): DCU = 13, JDC = 1, WS = 4, Vertigo = 4
1/27 (23 total): DCU = 14, JDC = 1, WS = 4, Vertigo = 4

Therefore, it may just be the way my buying habits fall (there are a lot of miniseries on the 27th), but has this happened to anyone else?

TEAM PLAYERS

Yesterday's Justice League of America #38, the first from new creative team James Robinson, Mark Bagley, and Rob Hunter, featured some spoilers for the Justice League: Cry For Justice miniseries, which is now set to wrap up in February. As if that weren't enough, January's JLA #41, the first with the new League roster, is set to come out a week before JL: CFJ #6. I know it's not like they could do fill-ins until March, but still -- logistics seems to have gotten in the way of storytelling.

Based on half the team being "promoted" to the Justice League, it may be time for me to drop Titans. Two years or so ago, when the title was first announced under writer Judd Winick, I thought it could be DC's answer to the classic Defenders setup: a non-team where members drop in and out as circumstances warrant, and which is held together pretty much on personal relationships alone. No "first line of defense," no "training the next generation," no specialized mission statement -- just old friends getting together every now and then. Of course, it didn't turn out that way, and the book went through a number of writers and artists before Dick, Donna, Vic, and Kory left for the JLA.

Ironically, under Deathstroke's leadership, the book could turn into a whoever-shows-up situation, with him, Red Arrow, and maybe Wally West being the only constants. I'm reluctant to predict who'll be in the book because I have a feeling that a number of characters will be coming back to life as a result of Blackest Night. Regardless, though, that would put the burden more on the creative team than on the characters, and I'm just not confident that anyone at DC knows what to do with Titans if that generation of Silver Age sidekicks isn't involved. Granted, a book about the Old New Teen Titans always has the potential to slide into nostalgia and self-referentiality, but it might be better simply to cancel the book until Dick, Donna, et al., can participate in it again. If it turns out they can't, well … that'd be okay too.

* * *

Anyway, that's what jumped out at me this month. What looks good to you?

Grumpy Old Fan

Over the weekend, Comics Reporter Tom Spurgeon shared his five "stickiest comics biases":

1. I don't covet the comics of my youth, I covet the comics from just before my youth.
2. Whether or not there are comics for kids, I still want comics to function as a pastime for a child.
3. I over-trust the serial.
4. I distrust a social component for comics.
5. I expect everything in comics to last forever.

It got me thinking about my own comics biases -- but because I haven't yet distilled those into postable prose, this week I'll share my reactions to his.

* * *

1. "I don't covet the comics of my youth, I covet the comics from just before my youth."

If I understand correctly, Tom compares his experience with self-referential 1970s Marvel and DC superhero comics with being unable (for various reasons not entirely within his control) to participate fully in a perpetual conversation. I've been there too, but I think because my formative years were spent largely with the less-self-referential DC, I had fewer questions. Thus, while Tom wondered about the Kree-Skrull War and Neal Adams' work on X-Men, I didn't know the story behind that critter on Hal Jordan's shoulder, who Dexter Myles was, or what happened to the Sand Superman.

Regardless, these days I also covet the comics of just before my youth, not quite for the stories they told but for the transitions they represented. When I started reading DC's superhero comics in the mid-1970s, the style changes of the late '60s and early '70s had already happened: an Adams/Giordano-esque "Darknight Detective," the redesigned Legion of Super-Heroes costumes, Curt Swan drawing the definitive Superman. So too had a certain generation of writers become firmly entrenched: Denny O'Neil, Gerry Conway, Elliott Maggin, Cary Bates, Len Wein, et al. Therefore, today I am much more interested in how DC and Marvel made those transitions from the Silver Age into the '70s -- or, put another way, how that new generation of writers and artists treated characters who had been defined largely by a single creative team.

Naturally, between the exponential growth of the reprint market, and the Internet facilitating the back-issue market, it's far easier today to catch up on the comics of one's youth (or before). Gerry Conway's Return of the New Gods follow-up has apparently been relegated to a distant corner of Hypertime, but if I ever get the itch to read it, I know where to start looking.

This is not to say that I am particularly nostalgic for the comics of the 1970s as much as I am curious about them. Certainly curiosity was the main factor in reading those Essential Spider-Woman and Essential Nova books. Indeed, with those characters I'm still a little curious; because based just on the original comics, I can't quite figure out why they got the revivals they now enjoy.

2. "Whether or not there are comics for kids, I still want comics to function as a pastime for a child."

In his own response to Tom's essay, Charles Yoakum notes that "[t]he medium should make no distinction between ages [because the] material presented in the medium is the distinction." My own reaction is probably a little different from either Tom's or Charles', because the DC superhero books of the mid-1970s didn't seem written for grade-school kids like me. For one thing, DC had moved past using pre-teen sidekicks as reader-identification characters. By the mid-'70s, the Teen Titans were either finishing, or through with, high school (as were Spider-Man and the Human Torch), and the JLA's generation did grownup things when not in costume. The adventures themselves weren't particularly kid-oriented, either. For example, I didn't know what a "nervous breakdown" was, but Jean Loring was suffering from one as she bopped uncontrollably through space in an extended Super-Team Family arc.

None of this necessarily qualifies those comics as better-suited for a particular age group, although I imagine that both Marvel and DC were even then hoping to hold onto the older kids, teenagers, and adults who had been reading O'Neil/Adams and Lee/Kirby. I will say that, by and large, I enjoyed both companies' superhero books regardless of whether they were meant for me, or featured characters with whom I could easily identify. Accordingly, while I appreciate Marvel and DC producing all-ages comics, part of me thinks that is a self-limiting strategy which allows the other titles to focus on older readers to an unhealthy extent.

Before leaving this topic, I do want to mention that superhero comics' easy availability also played a role -- although I'm not sure how big of one -- in my reading experiences. The fact that I could get them at the grocery, or the drugstore, made them part of that adult world. When I got to high school, and started buying comics at the LCS, they became something else -- part of "my" world, if you will, separate from the general public's; and therefore something which I chose to do.

3. "I over-trust the serial."

This one will be easy: I don't have any particular affection for serial storytelling. I can see why it's popular with, if not encouraged by, the Big Two and their readers; but at the same time I think it perpetuates some bad habits, also by both readers and publishers. It's fine that Tom "still see[s] the comic books as the real unit, no matter how many of [his] peers' bookshelves are filled with collected versions," but I think that glosses over the capacity for a single issue to tell one or more standalone stories. I've said before that the Big Two especially need to redefine "unit" to more closely equal "story." (In fact, that's probably one of my biases.) I don't think that will happen anytime soon, because the development of the Direct Market has centered around supporting those ubiquitous 22-page periodical episodes. Indeed, I'm sure there are ways to get the most out of those 22 pages. However, it seems to me that all parties would benefit from experiments with different formats.

4. "I distrust a social component for comics."

This one was a little harder for me to understand, but it seems like Tom distrusts socializing (on the Internet specifically) because it distracts readers from exploring outside their comfort zones. On balance I think I agree with this, but it's a very delicate balance. I tend to agree because I buy certain books so that I can talk about them in this column. However, the other side of all that socializing is that it creates a different kind of peer pressure. Certainly if I were not so involved online (and let's be clear, I'm not as involved online as a lot of people are), I wouldn't be exposed to as wide a variety of tastes and opinions, and my reading habits would probably be rather different.

Naturally, before the Internet came along, I experienced other opinions and tastes via traditional dead-tree venues: letters of comment and glossy fanzines. I went to my first comics convention in 1993 (Chicago), at the height of the cover-enhancement craze, so I never did experience fan culture in that halcyon Roy Thomas/Jerry Bails kind of way. In fact, on a whim I went to the Milestone panel at that 1993 Chicago convention, got a free copy of Static #1 (which by then was about a month old), and liked it so much I bought the series for all of its four-year run. Again, I suppose it has more to do with your comfort zone than your degree of socialization.

5. "I expect everything in comics to last forever."

For me, this luxury enjoyed by corporately-owned properties goes back to issues raised by point #1, above. I enjoy a lot of creative endeavors which were here before I was born and which will probably outlive me by a wide margin. As Tom says, though, corporately-conferred immortality shouldn't be the yardstick by which the worth of another creator, creation, work, or company is measured. When I was getting back into comics in the mid-1980s, First Comics was still going strong, publishing American Flagg!, Nexus, and Jon Sable, among other things. First is long gone now, but those series are still finding new readers today, as are other series whose original publishers have gone kaput.

And yet, everyone knows Superman. Everyone knows Peanuts -- heck, the local Kroger's big boxes-o'-pumpkins are decorated with Linus in the pumpkin patch; and "Snoopy One" flies over countless sporting events. You don't have to explain these characters to people like you would, say, the heroes of Bottomless Belly Button or the residents of Palomar. Their ubiquity is comforting. Would you want to live in a world where that was not so?

It all comes back to the ability of my generation to shape the marketplace for comic books, especially by choosing to support superhero comics in the same ways we did ten, twenty, thirty years ago. We superhero readers expect things to last forever -- or, more particularly, not to change in strange or unwelcome ways -- because we are not doing anything to force that change. Furthermore, now that DC's and Marvel's libraries are being mined for the collected-editions market, readers of all generations are able to explore decades' worth of comics, and pick and choose the versions of characters and concepts which they like best. Thus, in theory, DC and Marvel can tailor future releases to suit the reprint market's preferences, until finally the whole process becomes a closed loop of familiarity and illusory change, where no new idea lasts very long.

Actually, I don't think it will get that bad, especially considering (you'll love the irony here) the structural changes awaiting both companies. It's an odd circumstance indeed where a corporate restructuring could be seen as an opportunity for more creativity and diversity, but perhaps that's another of my own biases: the notion that wider audiences are reached through a variety of approaches to the material.

Now, that bias has probably been nurtured by DC's recent reliance on overwhelming superhero mega-stories. After several years' worth of interrelated Big Events, the company looks rather single-minded, especially when those events have distracted from more esoteric projects. It's easy as well to blame unjust failures on the perils of the Direct Market and/or the uncultured tastes of its participants. However, it's frustrating to realize that DC has such an embarrassment of riches, both in terms of intellectual property and professional resources, and can publish pretty much whatever it wants because neither it nor those characters are going anywhere -- and it has apparently chosen a narrow set of storytelling tools and subjects.

* * *

Overall, I can appreciate Tom's wrestling with the foundational elements of his comics experiences. I don't like to think of myself as especially nostalgic for the superhero comics of the '70s (or for the '70s comics marketplace), but DC's books were more self-contained, the DC line was more diverse, and the circulation figures dwarfed those of today. It was a different time, of course, and those sales figures definitely aren't coming back. Besides, today I see the '70s as the transitory period I talked about above, and not the culmination of anything started in the Silver Age. Today, with DC's superhero line in a state of perpetual transition, it's even harder to see it working towards some ultimate Platonic expression.

By and large, my own biases center around reconciling my affection for DC's superhero characters with the realities of their corporately-owned existence. It's hard for me to get into those biases without going off on rants about "this is how DC should act" (as I seem to have done in this post), but I'll try to pull something together. As for this week, you know what the music means ... our time is up.

Grumpy Old Fan

Obligatory Tardiness Joke: I was going to wait a year or so to discuss Planetary #27, but you know....

[crickets]

Ahem.  My most recent trip through the Planetary series was a couple of weeks ago, on a Sunday afternoon. I read the first two Planetary paperbacks before dinner, and finished off issues #13-26 after "Mad Men." After years of waiting interminably between issues, it became almost compulsory for me to read the next one immediately, regardless of how late it was getting. Taken as a single extended storyline, Planetary starts slowly, but before too long has gained considerable momentum.

Planetary's initial charm comes from its familiar genre pastiches, reconstructed faithfully by writer Warren Ellis and artist John Cassaday and investigated by their heroes, Elijah Snow, Jakita Wagner, and The Drummer. The notion that modern society has been shaped secretly by various groups of superhumans -- from Sherlock Holmes and Count Dracula to pulp-hero analogues to an evil version of the Fantastic Four -- is incredibly appealing. Add in Japanese monsters, Hong Kong gangsters and 1950s' B-movie paranoia and the setup becomes even sweeter.

However, the nature of that setup means that many of the fantastic sights the Planetary team investigates are appreciated too late. The series mourns its world's lost potential, stolen by the Four for their own selfish ends and likewise denied us readers. The more familiar the honorees, the harder they seem to have fallen, as with the monster-corpses in issue #2 and the brutal murders of superheroes in issue #10. Eventually this turns Planetary away from its archaeology-of-the-impossible beginnings and into something of a revenge fantasy, as Elijah Snow and company visit their own brand of retribution unto the Four. Jog described this over-arching plot as "… reductive, stuffing the complexity of one hundred years of pop culture into this damsel in distress role, and then declaring the white hats triumphant gatekeepers of a better, changed, complex, enlightened world, basically by virtue of having hit the bad people to death."

As you might expect, that is all over now, and issue #27 offers a coda to their efforts. I suppose issue #27 is therefore the series' last opportunity to emphasize the Planetary team's constructive behavior, as opposed to the aforementioned violent retribution … but I'm getting ahead of myself.

It's possible as well to see Planetary as a sort of polemic against "realism" in superhero comics, although you'd think there would be better choices for "realistic" superheroes-gone-bad than the almost-fifty-year-old FF. Besides, Ellis pretty much took apart most of the Marvel characters in The Authority's hard-to-miss blunt-force satire.* If Planetary is about returning pop-cultural diversity and "strangeness" to the world, building up DC while attacking Marvel is an odd choice, sort of like picking ABC over NBC or Warner Bros. over Paramount. Perhaps it's because DC's signature characters, like the pulp heroes which preceded them, are each products of different creators, and thus represent greater diversity; whereas most of Marvel can be traced back to Stan & Jack & Steve (themselves not quite "The Four"). Still, that's kinda thin.

Regardless, if we are to blame Marvel, the FF are probably the most appropriate villains. One could make the case for Peter Parker, Hank Pym, Tony Stark, and Bruce Banner, but the FF were there first; and the start of the "Marvel Age Of Comics" is arguably the point at which comics either stopped being so stodgy or stopped taking themselves so seriously (depending on how you look at it). If Marvel's unifying theme was that super-powers only create their own set of problems, well then brother, you ain't seen nothin' like the problems this super-powered quartet can cause. Marvel-as-mercenary, willing to stop at nothing less than total domination, becomes even more horrific once Planetary twists around its flagship team.

Again, though, that's an awfully superficial reading of the series, not least because versions of both Thor and the Hulk are killed off along the way. If Planetary had been a Marvel book, I don't think it would have suffered by having the Justice League as the villains with the Avengers (and/or the FF) dying in issue #1. For me (not particularly an Ellis scholar), Planetary is probably most like Nextwave in its love of the weird and the obscure. (Also the violence -- "healing America by beating people up," as it were -- although the two series clearly use different tones.) Where the latter played things like Fin Fang Foom and Forbush-Man for laughs, Planetary celebrates them, perhaps to the point of excess. That threatens to oversimplify the series and obscure its nuances under a fog of sentiment.

Indeed, right from the start much of Planetary is about the clash of genres -- not just the Four versus everyone else, but issue #1's pulps-vs.-JLA fight and the "real-world" concerns which end up killing characters like the Hulk-analogue (in the preview story). As such, Planetary describes a world devoid of a certain imaginative spark; and it's eminently appropriate that the only surviving good-guy superhero is an analogue of the pure-in-heart Captain Marvel.

SPOILERS FOLLOW for issue #27...

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It's also appropriate that the opening pages of Planetary #27 find the world enjoying the somewhat predictable, but still gratifying, fruits of the Four's downfall: a cancer cure; cheap water, food, and power; interplanetary travel; etc. The bulk of the issue concerns Snow's efforts at a more personal victory, namely bringing his colleague Ambrose Chase back to the land of the living. Although the science involved warns of a small-p "planetary apocalypse," it -- like "Captain Marvel's" revival -- is a rare chance (in the context of the series) for Snow to do something positive, instead of cleaning up after the Four. The Drummer is pessimistic, but Snow is determined; and this reader felt as though anything could happen. What indeed would be the consequences of dipping into the timestream, tapping the power of Planet Fiction, and attracting all manner of undue attention? Would issue #1 play out all over again, only this time with Snow, Jakita, and Drummer having to fight off an even greater interdimensional menace?

Well … as it turns out, nothing so dire. The world doesn't end, Snow gets what he wants, and the future of Planetary looks brighter than ever.

None of it would have happened without opening the Four's vaults, from whence the time-travel basics come.** Although this inverts the Four's secretive practices, the issue doesn't openly acknowledge that its new utopia depends on having terminated the Four with extreme prejudice. At one point Jakita reflects on the fight they've won, saying she's "shallow" because she doesn't "have anyone to hit." She explains further that "… it feels like all the adventure is over, you know? Like we won the war, and I've been at war so long that I don't know how to do peace." Having spent most of the series imagining creatively brutal ways to dispose of the Four, many readers likely sympathize. Because the Four were built up as the series' ultimate villains, the series couldn't exactly go back to genre-of-the-month stories once its baddest bad guys were defeated.***

The battles with the Four, and the early conspiracy involving Snow's past, made Planetary one of those series which invited readers to make something cohesive out of all the details. I'm not sure how far issue #27 goes in that regard, because it definitely leaves one hanging subplot open. Snow observes they'll "probably never" learn what happened to the one person who returned from Planet Fiction. "There's no reason to believe he'd have to stay here," Snow says. "We're all living on two-dimensional planes of information…. He could be living in other stories now. Slipping between the turns of pages. Surfing down through a rack of books." Snow looks almost wistful as he says this, presumably happy that the Four no longer control the "stories" into which this mysterious person could travel.  Later in the issue, it's suggested strongly that Snow's personal feelings can affect an uncertain outcome.  Truly, the world is as we might wish it to be.

Speaking of Snow's expression, I've been remiss in not mentioning John Cassaday more. His work here is elegant as always, as usual enhanced by Laura Martin's subtle colors. This is an extra-sized issue which involves a lot of talking, but under Cassaday's direction, the conversations have life and the action sequences are suspenseful. Cassaday does particularly well with Jakita, helping make her an important presence in the issue despite her not having much to do beyond reacting to dialogue and events. Cassaday is at least an equal partner in this venture, and Planetary would have been a lot poorer without his considerable skills and talent. When a character says tantalizingly that "the good stuff hasn't happened yet," I picture that good stuff as drawn by him.

Planetary has been easy to appreciate, both for its eclectic approach to pop-culture fantasies and its play-fair-mystery atmosphere. Now that it is complete, I expect a new round of analysis will begin, once again trying to organize all of the series' minutiae, this time in light of issue #27's events. It's a shame we won't see the Planetary team rebuilding their "strange world" (and then keeping it that way).

Nevertheless, Planetary goes out on a high note, perhaps trying to counterbalance all the grimness it had endured to get here. Debuting in an atmosphere of premillennial anxiety, when The X Files was peaking and the future was uncertain, Planetary played on those fears by showing that the old fictional icons were also gone for good. With Planetary #27, Ellis, Cassaday, and Martin reveal that the world's destiny (and that of our heroes) has been righted. The sky's the limit, as it should have been all along. Issue #27 may not tie off all the series' loose ends, but after this long, at least Planetary has its victory lap.

+++++++++++++

* [EDIT:  actually, as alert commenter James points out, The Authority #s 13-16 (May-August 2000) were written by Mark Millar.]

** [In fact, the "loop of light" at the heart of the time machine is essentially the same shape as Galactus' home planet/space station, where the Human Torch found the Ultimate Nullifier 'way back when.]

*** [I would love to see Planetary/Santa Claus, but I have a sinking feeling the Four offed him too….]

Grumpy Old Fan

Although it's been a few weeks since the new Justice League lineup was revealed, I have been slow to post about it. Sometimes even we emotionally-stunted man-children have other obligations, you know?

The new League won't come together until a six-parter starting next year (according to the preview writer James Robinson gave CBR), but this is a rare occasion for me. Normally when I get stuck for a blogging topic I fall back on either Dick Grayson (with or without his Titan peers) or the JLA, so I can't really avoid this.

Honestly, though, I'm getting tired of writing this-time-for-sure! posts about the League, because inevitably all that careful optimism is betrayed. The Meltzer Era was a bore, the McDuffie Era was snakebit, and the new Robinson/Bagley Era looks transitory. In fact, the first thing which struck me about this League lineup is its impermanence. Robinson told CBR as much, but any lineup which includes Mon-El and Batman III will last only as long as those status quos do … which might not be too long after Robinson gets done with the introductions.

Now, if I'm wrong, that's fine. Robinson certainly sounds like he's plotted a year's worth of issues, although three of those segue into that six-issue team-building arc. There's also no reason why most of the team can't stick around after any or all of the Big Three come back into the picture. Indeed, Robinson seems to have anticipated the team's continued growth, which will apparently involve bringing back Vixen and Firestorm and bringing in a speedster-to-be-named-later. Clearly he's looking at the long term.

Let's hope he gets there, because the upcoming lineup actually does have a lot of promise. (Having Mark Bagley illustrate it sure doesn't hurt either.) The problem is, as Meltzer's initial arc and Cry For Justice both demonstrate, JLA team-building can be crushingly dull. You know these characters are going to get together, because there they all are in the promotional material. Skip to the good part already.

Accordingly, I'll cut to the chase here. I've said before that "Justice League, in whatever form, has two basic components: characters who have other gigs, and situations which play off those characters appropriately." Let's look at the characters first.

The new eleven-member League (for whatever it's worth, the same number as the original Meltzer lineup) has only three women and three non-white members (four if you count Congorilla). When Firestorm and Vixen return, those numbers will increase accordingly. Two members are extraterrestrials, three were in the original League, and four were New Teen Titans.

More particularly, though, who will be their friends? (Who will be their blood enemies?) Obviously the new League will have two evenly-matched four-member cliques: the ex-Titans, and the Cry For Justice-ers ("Criers For Justice," I suppose). However, besides Starfire/Donna, Starfire/Batman, and Green Lantern/Green Arrow, other pairs suggest themselves. Not only have the Guardian and Mon-El worked together, but Guardian already has a relationship of sorts with Dr. Light, and Starfire might find some common ground with a fellow extraterrestrial. Doctor Light and Donna are mothers. The Atom, Cyborg, and Congorilla all know what it's like to be stuck with an unfamiliar body, and as we'll see below, the Guardian has a related set of existential issues.

As for the individual members…

The Atom (Ray Palmer): I've always liked the Atom as a Justice Leaguer. I like the fact that he's a super-genius able to interact firsthand with the things he studies. Of course, most of the time he's written as a fairly upbeat individual (even post-Countdown, as in Trinity), which of course is at odds with his Cry For Justice portrayal.

Batman (Dick Grayson): Despite his wealth of leadership experience -- especially with such familiar colleagues -- I don't expect Dick to be this JLA's leader. Regardless, I don't think Dick will be shy about sharing those leadership experiences with whomever is in charge. It'll be interesting to see a Batman interact with the League in a way which doesn't involve frequent assertions of authority. Dick is easy to work with, super-competent, and one of the team's most valuable players, so I see him as this team's Mr. Miracle.

Congorilla: Robinson says Congorilla is around 100 years old, with all the life lessons and street smarts that implies. I like to think of him as the team's connection with the natural world (and perhaps the magical one), which is how I'd look at Aquaman if he were still around.

Cyborg (Victor Stone): Along with the Atom and Dr. Light, Vic rounds out the team's scientific expertise nicely. He's also got a heck of a life story, having to struggle as a teenager between the conflicts of school and the street before being recruited reluctantly for the New Teen Titans. Next to him, Ollie Queen's late-in-life liberalism looks practically phony. Unfortunately, I'm not sure Vic has really been done right by anyone but Marv Wolfman and George Perez.

Doctor Light (Kimiyo Hoshi): Even before her current stint, she was actually pretty experienced as a Leaguer, having served a few years with Justice League Europe in the early '90s. Back then her costume was black-and-yellow, and she was portrayed as sort of a wallflower next to Power Girl. I liked what McDuffie, Len Wein, and (in the Superman books) Robinson have done with her recently, so I'm glad to see him continue with her.

Green Arrow (Oliver Queen): It's hard for me to imagine how Green Arrow is going to be the center of the DC Universe in 2010. Maybe he casts the critical vote which passes health-insurance reform. The way Robinson has been writing him in Cry For Justice, he sounds like a wimpier version of his old outspoken self, capitulating to Hal's clenched-teeth directions. Rationalizing that CFJ represents bad behavior in the heat of the moment is one of the ways I'm able to get through it, so I'm hoping Robinson brings Ollie back to (somewhat) normal by the time CFJ has ended.

Green Lantern (Hal Jordan): The first issue of the Giffen/DeMatteis/Maguire Justice League begins with Guy Gardner imagining himself in charge of the new team. Hal is the protagonist of Cry For Justice, he's probably the highest-profile DC character in the new lineup, and he's led Justice League Europe as well as innumerable Green Lantern missions … but I hope he's not the new League chairman. For one thing, he's not setting a very good example in CFJ. More importantly, though, the League is generally best-served when a big name isn't in charge. Batman running a Justice League tends to turn into "everyone reacts to Batman," just as Superman running JL America (briefly, in the Dan Jurgens days) turned into "everyone reacts to Superman." That can work when there's some pushback (as in the Giffen/DeMatteis League) and/or parity (as in the Morrison League), so it could work here, especially in connection with Batman and the Guardian. In any event, I can't see Hal's Cry For Justice attitude lasting long into JLA itself.

The Guardian (Jim Harper): Robinson says he's "tough" and "likes giving orders," which suggests he's going to be challenging Hal's purported authority pretty early on. Personally, though, I wouldn't mind seeing him take a more active leadership role, and not just because he reminds me of Captain America. After all, he's been leading a squad of Science Police which, until recently, included an undercover Mon-El, so you'd think he'd have some ideas about how to manage various combinations of Leaguers. Also, his worry about potentially not having a soul might be assuaged somewhat by Congorilla, who's made a career out of his own soul's portability.

Mon-El (Lar Gand): By all accounts, Robinson has done wonders with Mon-El in Superman, so I really don't have much to say about Lar as a Leaguer.

Starfire (Koriand'r/Kory Anders): Not only is she on a team with three of her closest friends and most respected teammates, she's on a team with her former lover and one-time fiancé. Kory seemed finally to have gotten closure on that relationship in Titans #16, but according to Robinson, "people will enjoy seeing the sparks between Starfire and Dick Grayson again." So, you know, there's that; and I just hope it doesn't end up defining Kory on the team. (It probably won't, but as long as it's out there, it threatens to dominate.) By the way, three years ago I predicted Starfire would be the "graduating Titan," so it's nice to see her finally in the League.

Donna Troy: As you know from last week, my feelings about Donna are complex. It might be good for her to get away from the emotional baggage accumulated during her Titans days (which, as of this week, includes being mauled by her Black Lantern-ized husband and child). Therefore, she's not helped by Robinson's lineup. Nevertheless, you'd think that being in the Justice League, apparently for reals and not as merely a Wonder-Woman-sponsored fill-in, would give her some psychological boost. Besides, she probably doesn't feel the need to "mother" these particular ex-Titans.

Clearly this lineup mixes well on paper -- perhaps better than any League has in a long time. Regardless, the Justice League isn't just a team book. It's DC's genre-busting, permanent-crossover, de facto Big Event title. At the risk of indulging my optimistic impulses, I am encouraged by Robinson's willingness to refer "constantly … to what’s going on in other books," and his statement that "[i]n a sense, the events of the Justice League of America are unfolding around the adventures of all the heroes of the DC Universe." While this has the potential to (once again) rob JLA of its own unique narrative, when kept in proper perspective I think it could work well with the League's all-star concept. In theory, people read Justice League of America as sort of one-stop shopping, so they can see various solo stars working together. There's not much more to the concept than that. (And yes, having four New Teen Titans on the same team tends to undermine that concept.) Thus, acknowledging the extracurricular activity reinforces the notion that it's a big deal for these folks to be on the same team.

The challenge, as always, is to tell stories which live up to the team's potential. Line-wide crossovers have taken the place of JLA-style epics, so JLA needs to re-establish its high-stakes bona fides. This week's JLA 80-Page Giant might look inconsequential and random, but I found its tale of time-lost Leaguers to be a fun standalone story and an excellent use of the classic JLA format. As for the regular title, send the team into space, have them explore the Multiverse, pit 'em against Cthulhu -- just make sure Justice League's scope is suitably expansive. I say this pretty much every time I mention the Justice League, but … this time for sure!, right?

Again, the new Robinson/Bagley lineup is temporary on its face, at least for Mon-El and Batman. However, in a way that's good for the book. Recognizing that this lineup is only a gateway to the next one -- which, given Dan DiDio's preferences, you'd think would be more "definitive" -- should relieve some of the pressure which comes with that "world's greatest" banner. This isn't JL Detroit or Cap's Kooky Quartet, and neither is it the Satellite Team or the Morrison Pantheon. It looks like a good group which I hope will produce fun, exciting superhero comics. I'll probably have to write another retooled-JLA post in a year or so, but maybe I can enjoy the book in the meantime.

Grumpy Old Fan

I'll be honest here, folks: I'm not terribly excited about the December solicits. This is not to say that I am "bored with comics" -- heaven forbid! -- just that there is little in these adverts which really thrills me. It's like this year's Emmys. I'm glad "Mad Men" won, but there were a lot of repeat winners.

Maybe the missing week is to blame. Would Ambush Bug Year None or All Star Batman have come out on December 30? We'll never know.

Anyway, here come the highlights.

BLACKEST NIGHT

While I don't think any ring-giveaways are involved, December sees a total of fourteen BN-related books. Eight of those are the second parts of regular-series tie-ins from November, three are the latest round of BN tie-in miniseries, and three are the core Green Lantern and BN titles. The tally works out like this:

12/2: BN: Flash #1, BN: Wonder Woman #1
12/9: Adventure Comics #5, Booster Gold #27, Doom Patrol #5, REBELS #11
12/16: GL Corps #43, Superman/Batman #67, Outsiders #25, JLA #40
12/23: BN #6, GL #49, BN: JSA #1, Teen Titans #78

This month BN's skip week (if indeed there is one), comes a week later than usual. However, the way the schedule falls, the bulk of BN proper falls on the 23rd with BN #6 and GL #49. Naturally, I am reminded that Green Lantern #50 is on deck for January, and that's probably related to BN's "skip month."  You'd think the second issues of the BN: [Title] miniseries would appear next month, but if only Blackest Night itself skips, what would be the point?

By the way, it's funny how last month's solicits were open about one of the miniseries' central mysteries, but this month it's all generic plot and "TOP SECRET." I know retailers don't like the lack of information when Marvel does it,* but you know, sometimes I like being surprised. Sometimes I also get a little tired having to separate today's plots from tomorrow's.

Speaking of spoilers, the solicit for Blackest Night: Flash #1 tends to spoil the end of Flash: Rebirth, now doesn't it?

And speaking of Green Lantern #49, I hope it's not the start of another "emo John Stewart" subplot. Yes, it's probably been twenty years or so since the last one (brought on by the one-two punches of Katma's death and Xanshi's destruction), but I liked "Square John" the outspoken architect and I don't see much of that guy anymore. Guy gets to be a Red Lantern (naturally) and Kyle was "the Torchbearer," so here's hoping John gets a little love as well.

Incidentally, the new BN tie-in miniseries should be good, judging by their creative teams. I'm especially looking forward to BN: Wonder Woman, because I liked Greg Rucka's Wonder Woman and I really like Nicola Scott.

BATMAN

Please tell me the DC Chronicles Batman statue -- where he's rising up out of the fiery explosion -- plays "The Final Countdown."

Tony Daniel didn't impress me with Battle for the Cowl, but Batman #694's phrase "Black Mask and his Ministry of Death" is pretty catchy.

I'm reserving judgment on the "Batwoman's dead sister" bit (introduced in this week's Detective and revisited in December's issue #860). It strikes me as melodramatic, but I can see where it might fit into the Church of Crime's prophecies about Batwoman.

The Under The Cowl collection features Dark Knights Damian Wayne, Terry McGinnis, Jean-Paul Valley, Tim Drake, and …?  Well, that would be telling.  I remember liking that LOTDK story quite a bit, though.

INS AND OUTS

No new Cry For Justice or Batman And Robin solicited for December. However, Widening Gyre #4 and Power Girl #7 are back on the schedule, after missing last month.

With the addition of JSA All-Stars, the Justice Society finally has a presence on each ship week (assuming the idea of "ship weeks" still means something): first All-Stars, then Magog, Power Girl, and the main book. Expect crossovers, folks.

THIS AND THAT

Doom Patrol's solicitation is probably supposed to remind longtime readers about the original Patrol's sacrifice to save tiny Codsville, Maine. Did that still happen in the DP's revised history, though? I can never remember.

Still can't believe there's a character in Warlord named "McBane." I like Warlord well enough, but really … McBane?

Adam Strange is welcome anytime in World Of New Krypton. However, I did not know he was also in REBELS. (Perhaps I should pick up the REBELS paperback, helpfully solicited this time out as well!)

Jonah Hex is one of those titles (along with Blue Beetle and Manhunter) about which I have heard good things, and which I fully intend to pick up (or otherwise catch up with) in paperback form, should the budget ever allow it. However, Darwyn Cooke's double-sized issue #50 may finally get me to pick up a single.

I'll probably sound like an even bigger goober if I try to wax effusively about Daytripper, the upcoming Vertigo miniseries from Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá, so I'll just direct you to the preview.

I liked that Secret Six #16 cover the moment I saw it, and I'm eager to see the whole issue.

FAILED TRADE PAPERBACK HUMOR

There's a joke somewhere about taking over twenty years to collect an Adam Kubert-drawn miniseries (Doc Savage: The Silver Pyramid), but I can't find it.

Likewise, there's a litigation joke somewhere around the Superboy: Greatest Team-Ups paperback, but … yeah.

And finally, the Tales of the Green Lantern Corps paperback suggests an "I dare you to get Alan Moore to sign this" bit….

COLLECTIONS

About that Superboy book, though -- Grand Comics Database was down, so I haven't been able to research the particular team-ups. Still, if memory serves, these are things like Superboy saving a plane from crashing (I think) with the help of fearless teenager Harold Jordan, or solving a crime with a time-traveling Robin. Makes me wonder if these are going to be the basis for future "untold but in-continuity" stories in Superman/Batman.

The Creeper By Steve Ditko collection reminds me that DC can't do too many of those. There have been the Kirby books, the (sadly out-of-print) Walt Simonson paperback, the Across The Universe Alan Moore collection, The Complete Frank Miller Batman, the George Perez Wonder Woman and JLA books, and the various Neal Adams hardcovers, but even those seem few (relatively speaking) and far between. I suppose the Superman books are ripe for mining, for example with the best of John Byrne or Jerry Ordway. Personally, I'd love to see a book collecting Michael Golden's Batman work.

Wasn't expecting the Hellboy crossover to be in the latest Starman Omnibus. That's a pleasant surprise.

Nice to see a Human Target paperback scheduled to coincide with the new TV show, but what about collecting the original material? There's only about 144 pages of it (18 8-page stories), so it could even be in color.  Maybe if the show's a hit?

CAN YOU TAKE ME TO…

So Courteney Cox has this new TV show, "Cougar Town," about how she might be older, but she's still gettin' it done. I used to think Ms. Cox would have made a fine Donna Troy, especially when "Friends" first started. Monica Geller had the right look and she had the same sort of stop-me-from-being-so-fussy attitude. Of course, "Friends" is so far off the radar these days that the premise of "Cougar Town" seems credible, and although DC wants us to believe Donna Troy is just "twentysomething"**, Titans #20 seems to have her acting rather cougarish.  At any rate, she might be older, but she's still gettin' it done.

Now, Titans has been a frustrating read for me -- full of potential but constantly being tweaked -- and in the context of the current run, the solicit for Titans #20 is kinda sad.

For starters, Donna is an odd character. She was created almost by accident out of a castoff concept from one of Wonder Woman's more loopy periods. It took her four years even to get a proper origin story, courtesy of Marv Wolfman and Gil Kane; and it took another ten years or so for Wolfman and George Perez to make fans care about her. I mean really care, to the extent that readers ate up Tales of the Teen Titans #50 like they could taste the wedding cake themselves. Accordingly, I tend to think fans find their own dream girl in the relatively wholesome, grounded superheroine.  (She was the Team Titans' den mother, for goodness' sake!)  Indeed, I suspect this has created a self-reinforcing protection against a possible descent into skankitude, and it's why I found Titans #17's image of Donna in a halter-top and peekaboo thong kind of jarring.

Now, I say that with the full awareness that Donna is a fictional character; and worse, she's a fictional character ripe for imprinting with any number of fannish desires. I'm pretty sure that at some point some writer (Byrne, perhaps?) has even incorporated into his story the notion that there's no real reason for Donna to exist. For one person she could personify all of superhero comics' alleged innocence and whimsy, but for another she could represent the kind of intellectual regression those comics stereotypically foster. Therefore, who cares what Donna wears; because either way it symbolizes DC's attitude towards its readers, whether condescending to their misguided nostalgia or pandering to their baser instincts.

Regardless, Donna and her fans can't win. If she remains inviolate, she runs the risk of being "boring," and therefore unmarketable. If we see more of her thong, though, that's a sad commentary on what a superheroine needs to do to sell books these days. Bare midriffs aren't exactly the best reputation-enhancers -- just ask Supergirl.

Oh well. It may be just a phase, like Donna's post-traumatic reaction after being mind-controlled into loving a Titan Of Myth during the Wolfman/Perez days. Pretty sad that it's happening to a "twentysomething," though. Good thing she's not in Cougar Town.

++++++++++++++++

* [DC hasn't done it in a while, if at all, unless you count the fake Flash solicitations from the summer of '07.]

** [Donna most likely turned 20 along with the rest of her Titans peers sometime in the mid-1980s, so DC is now telling us she's not out of "twentysomething" range yet? Sure, DC. Donna and her pals might not be 30 yet, but they can see it from here.]

Grumpy Old Fan

So this is the post where I blend a week's worth of restructured-DC coverage with my own ill-considered thoughts, and try not to sound too naïve and/or obtuse in the process. Should be fun, right?

Yeah.

While it's a little foolish to attempt any real predictions at this early stage, I'm left with a few general impressions. First, I get a good vibe from new DC Entertainment President Diane Nelson. I don't know that we'll be bonding over 'Mazing Man next summer in San Diego, but for now she's not saying anything too worrisome.

As Brian Hibbs has pointed out, though, comic books don't appear in the list of media platforms Nelson hopes to dominate with DC characters. That's my second general impression -- Ms. Nelson doesn't absolutely need the comics (nor, by extension, does she need the Direct Market) in order to succeed at her appointed tasks.

Nevertheless, the third impression I have is that in the near term nothing much will change, at least in terms of logistics, for DC's comic books or for the Direct Market. In fact, at the risk of reading my own wishes into Ms. Nelson's job description, she could very easily change DC's comics  -- and yes, even the DM -- for the better.

Clearly, where DC's superhero line has of late been focusing on story, Ms. Nelson's focus will be on characters. Through its Big Events and mega-arcs, DC has been selling significant parts of its superhero line as a unit, or in chunks -- in other words, selling Blackest Night, not Green Lantern. However, if it's going to reinforce Ms. Nelson's objectives, the superhero line must change accordingly. Individual books and concepts will have to bring readers back themselves, without counting on a crossover's rising tide.

This change in focus may, in turn, force DC to re-examine its units of storytelling. If each story is meant to highlight a particular character, then the units thereof -- be they individual issues, arcs, collections, or Big Events -- must facilitate that. In other words, a random issue of Titans can't just be an oblique Blackest Night tie-in, but a standalone story about Tempest.  Selling that standalone Tempest story won't be easy, but that's why Ms. Nelson gets the big bucks.

DC must also examine how format affects not only story, but a potential new reader's introduction to a character. Regular installments of DC's ongoing superhero serials now come in a few different flavors, including 22-page lead stories, 8-page co-features, and oversized Annuals and Secret Files which offer even more flexibility. DC must now be even more concerned with what a reader needs to know in order to enjoy a given installment appropriately.

What does this mean for the Wednesday habit? For one thing, perhaps a return to an enforced schedule. Although some books (e.g., Legion Of Three Worlds, Ambush Bug, Flash:  Rebirth) still suffer months-long delays, DC seems to have fixed a good bit of its recent logistical difficulties. Most titles come out each month, if not always the same week of every month. However, the more strictly DC follows a set schedule, the more readers will anticipate those particular weeks. If the individual titles hook readers on their own merits, the readers need to be able to rely on those titles' regularity, just like TV viewers rely on a regular program schedule.  If Ms. Nelson intends to hook customers who aren't used to going to the comics shop every week, they'll need to know when to go.

And that, in turn, gets to the mechanism of the Direct Market itself. Depending on how you look at it, the Direct Market is a supplement to, replacement for, and/or mutated version of, newsstand distribution. This is not necessarily bad. For fogeys like me, newsstand distribution meant not knowing exactly when the new comics would come in, how long they'd stay on the shelves, or how long they'd stay in good condition. A halfway-decent comics shop provides reasonable reassurance on all three counts. As such, they can be the friendliest places on earth, but over the years they have come to symbolize the exclusion of the general public.

Again, Diane Nelson does not need to use the Direct Market in order to do her job. If DC Entertainment decides to do (for example) an Amethyst, Princess Of Gemworld movie -- which, by the way, would be a heck of a shot across Disney's bow -- DC Comics would probably collect the original material and maybe commission some new stuff. Regardless of whatever corporate synergies exist, though, I bet it still wouldn't make a significant ripple in the DM.

That may well be a plus, because Direct Market success doesn't always match exposure in other media. Static and Blue Beetle have gotten much more exposure on television than in print. Jonah Hex is set for a Summer 2010 movie while the current series sells fewer than 13,000 copies per month. There'll be a new "Human Target" TV series on FOX in January, but no signs as yet of a companion comic book.

Nevertheless, in the short term I expect Direct Market sales will continue to be driven largely by the past few years' big-event mentality.  Still, as DC Entertainment starts promoting characters from further down the charts, DC Comics will necessarily follow suit. A new Amethyst miniseries won't have to sell tremendously in the DM if DC Entertainment sees it doing better in other venues. In this way the main DC Universe line could adopt Vertigo's philosophy of serializing stories for comics shops so they can be collected and sold through regular bookstores.

Furthermore, a DC which is not as concerned with Direct Market sales strikes me as a company more willing to take chances in the pursuit of new audiences. If a successful Amethyst movie translates into increased sales of Amethyst collections, fans might reasonably expect a new Amethyst series. Now, those fans could either wait several months for the first paperback collection to hit Amazon or Barnes & Noble, or they could read it as the Good Lord intended, in serialized comic books. (Consider the early success of Buffy Season 8, or imagine if J.K. Rowling had serialized all or part of the Harry Potter books.) And where will those fans find those comics but in their neighborhood comics shop?

Granted, DC could also serialize a new Amethyst series electronically (as IDW did with Star Trek Countdown), which would make some sense for readers who didn't want to have duplicate print versions. However, by and large I still see local comics shops as a new customer's point of entry. All of that might sound like every wishful-thinking theory of how comic-book adaptations help comics, but the difference this time may be that it's the goal of a coordinated plan, and not just wishful thinking. Put another way, the difference may be between hoping a concept will break out, as the Direct Market does, and guiding it to a breakout, as Ms. Nelson is charged with doing.

See, while Ms. Nelson doesn't need to rely upon the Direct Market, she might as well use it for the specific delivery vehicle it is. Furthermore, through her influence over what DC publishes, she can make DC's portion of the Direct Market more friendly to those hypothetical new customers. That way, they won't be met in the DC section only by a wall of insular superhero books. (Ideally, the superhero books they would find wouldn't be particularly insular anyway.)

Speaking of insularity, Steven Grant muses that DC Editorial's longstanding conservatism, and attendant reliance on its "hardcore superhero fans," will lead Ms. Nelson to look elsewhere if she wants to revamp venerable characters into more exploitable properties.  Again, I think DC's approach to macro-level storytelling needs more work than the characters do. Wednesday Comics seems to stand for the proposition that a 14" x 20" page provides ample room to introduce the players, advance the story, and hold the reader's attention for a week. Contrast that with the current Question, whose development starts at least with the end of Gotham Central, goes through 52 and the Crime Bible miniseries, takes a detour through the Final Crisis: Revelations miniseries, and finds itself presently in a Detective Comics co-feature. Similarly, bringing back the classic Legion of Super-Heroes involved a Justice League/Justice Society team-up, an Action Comics arc, and the Legion Of Three Worlds miniseries. The Legion may end up headlining Adventure Comics once more, but it will have taken a long and winding road to get there.

While there is something to be said for serialization, whether or not it's in 22-page chunks, the sort of shaggy-dog serials DC has been telling can't be sustained endlessly. After all, who will guide Dirk Deppey's hypothetical bookshelf browsers? More importantly, will they stick around through multiple paperbacks?

The good news is that Dan DiDio and company have, however clumsily, been cultivating a more "definitive" stable of DC's characters -- Barry Allen, Hal Jordan, etc. The bad news is that the general public may not share DiDio's definition of "definitive." Somewhere between those extremes is the public's general apathy about the details of DC's characters.  This may not be something which commands Ms. Nelson's attention -- Tom McLean summarized her mission as "help[ing] the company make more money off the DC library rather than micromanag[ing] the ins and outs of comic book continuity [or] ... meddling in the creative side of the comic books" -- but I'd imagine she doesn't want her job made harder by labyrinthine continuity.  Basically, Ms. Nelson must make the public care not so much about Hal Jordan or John Stewart, but about Green Lantern. The more Ms. Nelson can concentrate on the characters' core attributes, the easier that job will be.

Ironically, I think Diane Nelson's hiring may therefore do more in the long run to reinforce a particular status quo than all of DC's combined attempts at forced nostalgia. Where DiDio has been trying to sell the "DCU" as an exciting, anything-goes, quasi-grown-up fantasyland, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if Nelson wanted nothing more than to keep it in a perpetual state of new-reader-friendliness.  That may frustrate longtime fans who value meaningful developments, but if the rookies outnumber them, DC won't care.

For years, if not decades, DC and its customers have achieved a self-reinforcing symbiosis between the superhero line and its marketplace. The overarching message I take from DC's restructuring and Ms. Nelson's arrival is that the relationship is about to get a lot more open.  The main sign of that new openness could very well be the resurgence of characters who might not have flourished under a more conservative regime.  That alone should produce some fascinating changes at DC, and I believe such change will be for the better.

(Now, about that 'Mazing Man cartoon...)