Ask Me Anything

[sdelmonte]

Ever feel like you have a lot to say? And don't have the focus to post about it?

That's been me lately. Not sure why.

So how about I ask you to ask me about something, anything, and I will give my thoughts?

Have at it!

Comments

[batyatoon]

Do we need to buy milk?



hi. :D

[sdelmonte]

No.

But if we did, we could buy it at Amazon.

[osewalrus.livejournal.com]

What's the most interesting new thing in the last week?

[sdelmonte]

Haven't really encountered much that's new in the past week. Captain America was a new movie, but didn't have anything I think of as "New to Me."

That said, maybe it is new that mainstream columnists like Thomas Friedman are suggesting it's time for a new political party in light of the "debt crisis." I don't really see this going anywhere, but it's nice to see that I am not the only one ready to jump ship (or rather, to find a ship now that mine seems to have be swallowed by another).

[weaverandom.livejournal.com]

Every day of my life, lately.

So tell me, how do you - as a sensible, not-over-invested-in-a-handful-of-specific-characters comics reader - feel about DC's reboot?

[ladymondegreen.livejournal.com]

We were just talking about that last night.

Reading anything good?

[sdelmonte]

Thanks for asking. This is one of the things I wanted to write about, and you got the thoughts flowing. SO much so I overshot the comment limit.

Overall, I am cautiously optimistic but concerned. And I have to divide between the new books and the end of the old books.

Taken on their own terms, lots of things sound exciting: Paul Cornell doing a book set in the Middle Ages with such faces as the Demon and a paraplegic woman who is the world’s greatest rider and archer; Sinestro – by far the most interesting character in the Green Lantern books - as Earth’s unexpected GL; Gail Simone reinventing Firestorm and holding on tight to Barbara Gordon; rising stars Scott Snyder and Jeff Lemire getting a chance to go wild; Nick Spencer getting to continue THUNDER Agents; and James Robinson’s long-awaited Shade miniseries. Never mind Morrison writing Superman and Snyder still writing Batman. I really expect that when we reach year’s end, I will be reading more DC books a month than at any time in the last five years.

But of the 52 books, for every one I want to read there is one that I think will be forgettable or even terrible. DC has failed to bring in enough writers established writers and enough rising stars. Scott Lobdell, who was pretty meh for Marvel 15 years ago, is writing three books and could ruin Superboy, the Teen Titans and Red Hood for years to come. Adam Glass, the weak link on the writing staff for Supernatural, will do the same for DC on Suicide Squad. Why does DC think Paul Levitz is the man for the Legion and Huntress when his work feels so dated? And why are so many artists being given writing assignments without any experience?

I think the reboot will be a moderate success. Online sales will jump. Readers curious about DC Comics will give at least some of these books a try, and established fans will stick with the writers and characters they like, at least for a while. The anger over the reboot is not universal, and DC seems to be looking to address the concerns of its diehard fans (even if putting up a post on their blog about the lack of women writers and artists is not the same thing as hiring women). I think that DC making these moves now, before sales drop too low and before Marvel can formulate a digital strategy, is a good decision. And there are bound to be some books that come from nowhere, like Batgirl did.

BUT…

[sdelmonte]

BUT…

In thirty days, a lot of what we loved will be gone. Abruptly. This isn’t the first reboot for me. I was there in 1986, when huge swaths of DC history were changed or lost. But the buildup to the reboots took over a year. We got endings of sorts to the Silver Age Superman (Moore’s amazing “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?”), Wonder Woman, and the Flash. Writers had time to tie things up if need be. Not this time. The present era of the DC Universe – call it the Post-Crisis Universe one last time, before we get the DCNu, or the post-Flashpoint Universe, or the Timeline Barry Allen Made – will just stop this month. The only books I know of that will be tying things up is Red Robin and Detective. Most are getting the sendoff we see for failed TV shows pulled after six weeks.

Never mind that we are losing things that have been around for a while and that we liked. Dick Grayson as Batman. The marriage of Lois and Clark. Oracle, of course, and her Birds of Prey. Years of JLA history. The JSA. (Steph Brown might end up on this list, but DC apparently told the fans at SDCC she is still around, whatever than means.) The anger the fans have is not over the reboot. It’s not over the abrupt ending. It’s not over the mediocre writers or the bad editing. It’s over losing everything we loved for the past 25 years. I don’t share that anger. But I get it. I get why readers are saying, “I don’t care if DC hires Morrison, Gaiman, Cornell, Espenson, Whedon and David Fincher. They’ve screwed with me one too many times and I am gone.” I really don’t blame anyone for feeling that way. And DC hasn’t really figured out how to address this.

I am also concerned that all the “new” ideas for what to do with the characters came not from the editors but from writers, and there was much better communication between the creators and the bosses. There is a sense today that Didio, Lee and Johns are dictating everything (except maybe the things Morrison writes), which has alienated people who belong at DC like Waid and Rucka and left us watching non-entities like Adam Glass and Eric Wallace and Tony Daniel with writing jobs they don’t deserve. But I am willing to give DC the chance to show me that my perception of how things are run is based on rumor and not fact.

So overall, I am there for the reboot. And I am sure I will like some of it. And will read a lot of it, maybe online and maybe in the library. But I cannot say that I am filled with confidence that DC will make the most of the opportunity. Or that they will not once again miss their chance to stand toe to toe with Marvel. When the post-Crisis reboot took hold, DC had their best lineup ever: The Question, Captain Atom, Flash, Sandman and Swamp Thing and Doome Patrol before becoming Vertigo, a revitalized Superman and Wonder Woman and Batman, and a runaway hit no one expected in Justice League International. They overtook Marvel for about six months. Then slowly reverted to form, even though Marvel was pretty sucky then. Today, even I have to admit Marvel is pretty strong (if not to my tastes). The window of opportunity for DC is tiny. And I fully expect Didio and Lee and Johns to get their fingers caught in the window as it closes.

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

I think you should repost these comments as a main post.

[mabfan.livejournal.com]

I love those milk reviews.

[weaverandom.livejournal.com]

I also think you should make this a main post!

I am too exhausted and sleepy to be coherent, but I wish to stamp this with my approval. I like when comicsy people are sane about comics - especially when I am too involved to be particularly sane about it myself.

THIS IS A GOOD POST *STAMP*