Oh shit, DC cancelled Demon Knights and Legion of Superheroes.
…
Whelp. I guess I’d best read Demon Knights to see if I’m outraged at that. Legion…well. I kind of hate the way Paul Levitz has been writing them since, uh, pretty much ever, so c’est la vie?
You ever just suddenly get depressed that you’re saving money?
I mean, before the reboot, and right at the beginning of it, I was buying so many books from DC. I think I started off the New 52 reading 30 books. With the exception of Deathstroke, Catwoman, and Legion Lost, I bought the first three issues of all the books I was reading. 25 of those books were $2.99, the other two were $3.99. I spent close to $300 in the first three months of the reboot.
I’m currently down to these books from DC:
I also bought the Smallville issues that Bart appeared in, as well as the Smallville and All-Star Western issues that Booster has appeared in. I bought the first issue of The Movement as well, but I’m not sure if that’s going to be an ongoing thing.
Taking the 20% discount I have at my comic shop into account, I now spend about $22 a month on DC books. Soon to be even less, because Batman Inc is almost over, and Ame-Comi Girls is driving me insane with how badly it’s written, but Jesse Quick you guys.
Sigh.
-rolls around in a pile of saved money, crying-
Guess what Hot Topic will be getting weeks before other Funko vendors? A Superboy Pop Vinyl figure has been revealed via the Funko Facebook page:
There’s no release date yet, but seeing as Wave 4 of the DC Funko Vinyl figures drops in July, I’d assume sometime around then.
Okay, so DC put this giant free thing out recently:
HRMM.
So, there are several parts to this 117-page monstrosity. The first part is the 25 Essential DC Graphic Novels.
I feel like I should point out now that of these 25 graphic novels, four are by Geoff Johns, two are by Frank Miller, three are by Grant Morrison, and a whopping five are by Alan Moore. There are no female creators on any of these books. Six are alternate-universe stories that don’t connect in any way to the main DCU. Eight are Vertigo titles. Two are event books from the last six years.
Then they have a section where they list all of the first volumes of the New 52 books. Twelve pages of New 52. Not all the New 52 books are essential, DC, especially when 19 of those book have been cancelled so far.
Oh, this is fun. They’ve got a Batman section, a Superman section, a Green Lantern section, a Flash section, a Green Arrow section, a Justice League…and a Women of DC section. Wow, burn. And guess what else?! All the other sections mention the first volume of their New 52 books, too! They just had an entire section dedicated to the New 52, this is ridiculous. But the Women of DC section…five New 52 first volumes, the two Wonder Woman: Odyssey volumes, one non-canon Catwoman story, and Batwoman: Elegy. No Birds of Prey volumes, no Cassandra Cain or Stephanie Brown Batgirl, no Manhunter, no Power Girl. The Women of DC section is two pages and nine books long, the only singular characters with smaller sections are Flash and Green Arrow.
Moving on to Vertigo! Three pages of miscellaneous Vertigo books, then literally the entire Sandman series, the entire Fables series, the entire Y: The Last Man series, a whole page for Alan Moore, and a whole page for Grant Morrison. Vertigo over! Onto two pages dedicated to MAD magazine, and another two pages for DC all ages stuff. The remaining 21 pages are just a checklist/rehash of the books they’ve already shown us, and a ‘suggested reading order’.
DC, I…
Okay, look. I understand that you want people to buy your books, and that you want to give new readers some sort of starting point, but this isn’t the way to go about it. For one thing, at least 22 of your 25 essential graphic novels are either no longer canon, or never had any relation at all to the universe you’re trying to promote. Ditto for at least 9 of your 20 Batman books, 18 of your 20 Superman books, three of your five Flash books, four of your five Green Arrow books, nine of your ten Justice League books, and 3 of the 4 non-52 related Women of DC books. Congratulations on your Green Lantern section, though, as 90% of your Green Lantern continuity made it into the New 52 intact in the first place.
This book you made, this tome of tomes, it’s disappointing. You could have really pointed people in the right direction with some of your mainstream books, but you didn’t. There’s no New Teen Titans on there. Batgirl: Year One, probably the best Babsgirl story of all time, was left out entirely (bring this book back into print, DC. People will buy it!). And while I understand that you’re really, really trying to ignore the fact that Cassandra Cain, Stephanie Brown, and Wally West existed, you can’t ignore the fact that the trades of their books sold like crazy. Aside from the stupidly expensive Geoff Johns omnibus versions of Wally’s series, my LCS can’t keep Wally-era Flash books on the shelf. And I dare you to try and find Batgirl: Silent Running or Batgirl: Batgirl Rising in a comic shop. Can’t be done around here, totally sold out. Hell, the same can be said for the amazing No Man’s Land Batman story! That thing was recently reprinted, and people went nuts over it. You lot have so many great stories that aren’t under your New 52 banner (Crisis on Infinite Earths! Judas Contract! Sins of Youth! All of Gotham Central! The Harley Quinn series! Cooke and Brubaker’s Catwoman! Manhunter! Connor and Palmiotti’s Power Girl! The JLI volumes! Jaime’s first series! Impulse! 90s Superboy! Booster Gold!), but no new reader is even going to know any of it exists unless you tell them.
DC, you say certain characters are iconic, that these are the characters that everyone knows. Well, of course they are! My grammy hasn’t picked up a comic book in at least 50 years, and she knows who Dick Grayson is. My mom read Wonder Woman comics back when she lost her powers and ran a mod clothing store. My neighbor remembers Hal Jordan back when his weakness was a banana to the face. If you keep showing people the same characters over and over, that’s all they’re gonna know. Take some chances. You made Under the Hood into an animated movie, and guess what? It was a hit! Why not do the same with, say, No Man’s Land? Make a series of films! You did it for that Frank Miller book, your “Greatest Batman Story Ever Told”. Do a Gotham Central live-action series. Get New Teen Titans: Judas Contract out of development hell and into the studio already. Try something new! You may not have a hit every time…but then again, maybe you will.
There are new audiences out there, DC. Young and old. Male and female and both and neither. Folks of all races, and religions, and walks of life that wanna be entertained.
Take a chance. Stop betting on the same old horse and tell a good story. The response may surprise you.
I did it, I did the thing!
Now you too can play the game of DCnU! If you fill out the entire card, congratulations! All hope is lost.
Have fun!
(spoiler alert: depending on your position on the Batwoman, Wonder Woman, Supergirl, and Flash books, you may not fill out the entire card)
To make your own game of DC bingo, go here.
I like to check the Wikipedia list of New 52 titles, just to see what’s been cancelled.
They’re being replaced by a Superman book, a Superman/Batman book, a Larfleeze book, two books focusing on the rich and the poor of the DCU (those are gonna last like, 8 issues. Calling it now), and a book featuring that lady Pandora. Hold on.
I just did a quick count. With all the titles that aren’t being cancelled, that makes for fifty books. There are going to be two new titles announced this month.
Come on time-traveling Batgirls, c’mon c’mon…
I love and hate it when figures are store-exclusive. On one hand, there hasn’t been a K-Mart in my area since 2003, so anything from there is immediately inaccessible to me. On the other hand, look what Target made us!
Mattel and DC have teamed up once again to put out a line of Justice League figures based on the designs of the DCnU…and they don’t look too bad?
Design-wise, the figure itself looks like a cross between a Justice League Unlimited figure and a Batman: The Brave and the Bold figure, with a hint of Action League for good measure. It has the wide shoulders and narrow waist of a JLU figure, but the sturdy legs and feet of a BtBatB figure, with the same neat whirlwind accessory that one of the Action League Flashes came with.
Aside from the Flash, Green Lantern, Superman, Batman, and Lex Luthor are all available as single package figures. Or, if you prefer, you can buy the set of seven Justice League members, including Aquaman, Wonder Woman, and Cyborg. The set itself is $50, whereas the individual figures are $8.
I haven’t taken it out of the box just yet, mainly because I don’t feel like it. I have a couple of other figures to unbox, may do it in a week or two. Still, if you’re a collector of Flash things or just of action figures, this looks like a nice addition to any collection.
Okay, people who don’t look at my sidebar may not be aware of this, but I have a comic review blog that isn’t this Tumblr. I decided that, since more people read me here than there (and ouch, isn’t that a kick in the v), I’d copy/paste yesterdays Batman Inc review. Warning: This is full of spoilers for the issue, pointless personal stories, and a look directly into my brain when I don’t sit down and actively plan out what I’m going to write beforehand.
No one’s getting out alive
In tribute to the many, many young children DC has fridged, shelved prior to the reboot, or lost in the reboot. While there is no shortage of dead teenagers, thank you Teen Titans, I wanted to focus on the truly young children of DC.
No one in this photoset is over the age of twelve.
Pictured here:
Okay, so I was going through Vibe and
So, just from what I can immediately see, I spy Gypsy, a Qwardian (possibly the Weaponer), Pariah, possibly Cyborgirl, and Krakkl of Kwyzz, from The Human Race.
What if…everyone that has gone missing is actually chilling in those tubes?
I mean, the ones for Batgirl (topics to avoid: that time she got shot), Cyborg, Wonder Woman (“owns a lasso that will make you tell the truth” is listed under cons, for fuck’s sake), and Black Canary are terrible, naturally, but look at the one for Barry:
THE FLASH
Pros: Honest. Noble. Very friendly. Full of random facts. Job title is “Police Scientist.” How awesome is that?
Cons: Habitually late despite being the Fastest Man Alive. Has a strange relationship with his Rogue’s Gallery. Could leave, go do about 10 other things, and come back and you wouldn’t even notice.
Good First Date Topics: CSI. How long it takes him to do things. Treadmills. The existence of Gorilla City and how that’s a thing.
Topics to Avoid: His mom. Explaining the Speed Force.
Ideal First Date Venue: The Flash Museum
