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“Having been told to read Lazarus by multitudes of people who say it’s one of the best comics ever and failing to get past the second volume” – What?! It’s a dense book, and honestly hard to keep track of at times, but it’s an amazingly great book!

With that said, I was so unimpressed with the Wonder Woman Rebirth issue. The entire thing was just WW walking around saying “The story keeps changing.” 96 times. I was like “Wait, is this the same guy that’s writing Lazarus? Given his past with DC, did he take this book on as an inside joke to see how long it would take the upper management to notice?” I thought it was just badly written…. but maybe with this issue it gets better.

If you have no basis of her 75 years of history and iterations, maybe at least read some wikis before coming in clueless and “reviewing” a #1 issue? Is it really too much to ask that someone use the internet to inform his or herself before critiquing a new book about a really old character?

Thank you for your comment, London! I don’t know if this is necessarily the “best” argument, but I want to pose another question to your question: is it really expected for a new reader to do research before they jump on to a FIRST issue, regardless of how old the lead character of that series is? When I first started reading comics, I was hesitant to dive into anything too heavily based in continuity because I knew I wouldn’t understand it and it seemed strange to me that I should have to read through wikipedia summaries of 75 year histories before reading a single story. Compare that to a series of films or more aptly, TV Shows. Sure if you’re diving into season 6 of Game of Thrones you should know what happened in the previous five seasons before doing so, but that’s not how Wonder Woman #1 or other DC Rebirth books are being sold to us. They are being sold as starting points…hence number 1. If your START requires research, you have to ask: is this book really going to attract new readers?

Imagine that, corporate-owned superhero garbage is largely the same as it ever was. Will fanboys ever learn?

Well, given the plummeting sales, maybe they finally have.

Alex,
Not being snarky at all but can you explain what you mean by “house style”? Personally, I believe that comics from the Big 2 should have a somewhat consistent look ( if we’re on the same page with the term). Not a cookie cutter approach where everyone is drawing like Jim Lee but I grew up with Byrne on the X-Men while Perez was on the Avengers, Starlin, the Buscemas, etc… Using current artists, I prefer a Fabok or a Pelletier to be on DC books rather than the sketchier, cartoonier artists that I prefer on indie books or a book like Gotham Academy.

based on feedback from our customers, they are off to a very good start, each title had over 100 people adding the comics (all 5) to their reserve/hold. same performance as last week, DC is on to something here. these comics are getting a much stronger “word on the street” then the last batch of Marvel Now titles

“I prefer a Fabok or a Pelletier to be on DC books rather than the sketchier, cartoonier artists that I prefer on indie books or a book like Gotham Academy.”

Not every title has to appeal to your very limited, shallow tastes. But looking at DC’s poor output, that’s what they’re going for now.

Easy there, Brave Keyboard Warrior….

Hi Shawn,

I think we have the same understanding of the term “house style”– a look that, while not necessarily 100% homogeneous, has a large number of consistent features across all titles. May I ask why you prefer this look?

Personally, I dislike the idea that a large publishing company could ever have a house style because it leads to creative stagnancy across a large line. You can have stores that only sell bone broth or one kind of artisanal bagel because they’re small boutique outlets that target a small corner of the market. A company like DC or Marvel, who wants to and does capture the largest market share among comics publishers, is not a boutique brand. Paradoxically though, in DC’s case, they target the audience for house style books as though it’s the totality of the market rather than just one niche in a greater whole. Their strategy is what MacMillan’s would be like if they only published horror novels or Simon and Schuster acted like they were Harlequin.

I believe that the art style of a comic dictates its tone. I also believe that superheroes are not just a vehicle for action stories, but can be used to tell a variety of tales. Having a house style limits that possibility because personally, I don’t think a romance book with Jim Lee on art would fare as well as something drawn by Joelle Jones. Large publishers like DC and Marvel should and finally are diversifying their visual lineups to accommodate the fact that they are, in fact, large publishers with a wide variety of audience members who want to read different things.

We’re probably not too far apart in thinking, we may just be viewing it from opposite preferences. I like a house look probably because that is the way my brain is wired for superhero comics. Like I previously wrote, I was raised on John Byrne, George Perez, Frank Miller, John Buscema, Sal Buscema, John Romita Jr., and others who were popular (and doing regular work) from the late 70’s through the 80’s. Just using Marvel as an example, Peter Parker looked like Peter Parker in not only the Spider-Man titles, but also when he guest starred in other books. Depending on the artist, he can look different in his own book these days. For a while, Captain America’s costume looked different from book to book. Of course these are just personal preferences (which I’ve heard are “shallow and limited” lol) but they take me out of the story. I agree that the tone of a book is dictated by the art, I think that Neal Adams would me a bad fit on Invincible just as I agree Jim Lee wouldn’t be a good choice for a romance comic. And preferences change, as a kid I HATED Bill Sienkiewicz on the New Mutants but now I look at those issues and love them.
I appreciate your opinion and your willingness to have these conversations in the comments section helps make this sites one of the great ones.

I’m just glad to see The Flash drawn by someone named Carmine again!

DC should just call itself “Bloodlines Comics” to better reflect where its priorities are (spoiler: stuck in 1993).

Survivors’ Club and Last Gang in Town ended last week.

Slash & Burn, by virtue of Vertigo’s lowest-selling title for April 2016, ended that month.

Seriously — are trade sales of Doctor Fate what keeps that book going? Paul — come back to the Legion!

I’m curious why Midnighter and Martian Manhunter, both great books that are being cancelled, are being kicked to the curb while Doctor Fate, selling worse than both of those, is apparently continuing post Rebirth? Makes no sense. Maybe you’re right, Steve, and it’s trades sell well?

RE: Green Lantern: Edge of Oblivion – I am still for about the 3rd month wondering why the numbers for GL: Lost Army are not included in the past counts.

As for Bloodlines, I remain convinced that DC has to do things with titles every once in a while for some reason in the family of trademarks/copyrights. There are too many times when older names get thrown out for no reason. Like “Star-Spangled Comics featuring G.I.Zombie” – why not just “G.I.Zombie”?

Alexander, perhaps in your rush to write up a few more snarky comments about Batman v Superman, the facts got lost along the way. Collider reported that the extended version of the film will be released *digitally* on June 28th, while the Blu Ray and DVD editions will be on sale starting July 19th.

For the record, I liked the movie and look forward to seeing more of it.

Egg on my face, you’re right and I’m wrong!

I’m glad you enjoy the film. I didn’t, particularly. Not trying to take the piss out of anyone who likes it. I was really looking forward to it and was sorely disappointed, so I find my peace in criticizing the work. I won’t ever criticize its fans.

What a gracious reply. Thank you for the distinction. Sorry the movie wasn’t your cup of tea.

I just looked it up on BoxOffice Mojo – Deadpool droppd 57% in it’s 2nd weekend.

Movies are supposed to drop in their second weekend. I fail to see how a 68% drop is somehow shocking or cause for concern.

@MonstrousReporbate Most films that open big and have good reviews generally don’t drop over 60%. Over 60% generally indicates that interest among general audience (especially those who are waiting) may drop rapidly week to week, So a film may not have long legs. Under 60% means there is a chance good word of mouth. Look at Deadpool again, notice how the weekends afterwards its falling under 40%, showing a high interest usually this means repeat business from its biggest fans. A better example might be Zootopia. One of the top reviewed movies of the year held under 40% drop for a few weekends, Disney actually added theaters for one weekend.

Carl: Disney didn’t add any theatres as they don’t own any but it may well that they requested from the cinema chains that extra screens would be a good idea. More likely even is that extra screens are added automatically if certain ticket levels are maintained.

I’ve no idea how BvS will do long-term but I wouldn’t bet against it making money for the Warner Brothers buy the time overseas income, DVD sales, cable tv contracts and other revenue streams are figured in as film accounting is an arcane art that borders on magic for better or worse. Neither Warner or Disney have any reason to tell anyone the truth about what their films actually make.

Ye gods, can we stop with the excuse-making?

BvS is currently running well behind Iron Man 3, Avengers: Age of Ultron and The Dark Knight Rises at the box office. When all is said and done, BvS will probably wind up making a good bit over $300 million in the U.S. and at least $450 million overseas.

It’s not a bomb. It’s not a disaster. But it is not doing any thing close to what Warner Brothers expected or wanted it to do.

Mike

MBunge – correct me if i’m wrong, but BvsS had the 7th biggest opening weekend of all time right?

I find all of this desire for the film to fail to be very odd. If comic books and comic book properties fail, we all fail.

If you didn’t like the movie, don’t see it. I just don’t understand this bizarre cynical tribalism.

looks much stronger than the initial new52 pool of creators. let’s hope for the best.

Looks stronger than the initial new 52? Except for bringing in Rucka, it’s the same gang of idiots.

PRE-FLASHPOINT SUPERMAN IS SUPERMAN!!!!!

Hey, Scott Lobdell is down to one book a month now. That alone is a victory. Maybe Harras will finally have to not give him any more writing assignments after he runs Red Hood further into the ground.

Overall I like Snyder, King, Jurgens and Seeley staying on the Batverse side of things and it feels like the books will just organically grow into the new status quo for some reason. Otherwise until I see some real descriptions of concepts behind the titles not really overly interested in any of these titles just based on a marketing burst.

And so we have Barbara Gordon still as Batgirl. So much for the hopes of a return to the old continuity.

Can’t say I’m blown away by the old-new mismash going on above, but I can see a couple of books I’m definitely picking up and a couple more I’ll keep an eye on. That’s more interest than I was able to scrape up for Marvel post-Secret Wars.

Also, how the hell did DC managed to score Christopher Priest on Deathstroke?! That’s amazing.

Comics are synonymous with habits. For those of us who’ve been away, it might just be easier to maintain the habit than go out of the way to look in on DC’s characters again. Especially since such irrevocable damage has been done to them.

That includes the travesty of the cinematic universe.

More for everyone else, I guess. :)

Yep, I sure do remember Tom King, Christopher Priest, Hope Larson, Gene Luen Yang, Simon Oliver, Phil Jimenez, and Dan Abnett’s total of 0 comics in the New 52 launch.

Yes, many of these writers are *now* writing DCU books (though not Larson, Priest, Oliver, or Jimenez, let alone relatively new writers like Percy, Semper, or the Bensons) but there’s a lot of people with titles coming out this summer that weren’t at DC post-Flashpoint.

Sorry to see SECRET SIX, BATGIRL OF BURNSIDE, and DOCTOR FATE go (along with the promised second PREZ series, most likely), but turnover is inevitable. Sigh.

PRIEST! HOLY CRAP!!!

[…] Source link […]

While TBG is pretty a routine joke-a-minute sitcom– that is, standing or falling on how good the jokes are–I don’t get why it would be opposed to the interests of nerds. I just saw one of the reruns that had the characters mocking superhero fans, but the prevalent targets belong to NY hipster cultures.

What’s the significance of pointing out that it’s a “multi-cam” show? I presume that if the term appeared on TBG, Max would assume it referred to Something Else.

I think her response on the focal points of the comic are indicative that she’s actually trying to do something worth reading. Now, if she spoke like some celebrity who wanted to do a cook book or children’s book…I’d totally blow it off. Let’s see what she’s got.

[…] Beat – Que Spit-take: Two Broke Girls lead actress Beth Behrs Launches Comic – And she’ll remain […]

So what you’re saying is that Ares is going to die.

“The character will make her big screen debut this spring in “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,” but the new film will mark her first time headlining a feature.”

Well, a bit of a half-truth there. This will be Wonder Woman’s first headlining role in a theatrical feature film: there was already the 1974 television movie with Cathy Lee Crosby and the DTV animated WONDER WOMAN feature, but the PR flacks won’t count those.

It’s cool how Wonder Woman is hiding out as an elf in Rivendell. That should make for some interesting story developments.

[…] Kodansha Comics Adds Hiro Mashima’s Fairy Tail Zero Prequel Manga Mike Grell Cover Gallery WONDER WOMAN cast announced, new photo released Just how much is Frank Miller contributing to this third Dark Knight series? Frank Miller […]

I hope this cover gets changed. I like the costume, but this cover needs to have WW kicking ass! And hopefully the first volume has some closure because it took waaaaaaaaaaay too long for this one (but having seen pages from this last year, it looks great!)!

I assume it’s a tribute to the frequent bondage in Marston-era WW comics.

Or the chains symbolize the limitations society has placed on women. Those limitations might seem minimal now in American society but you don’t have to go very far back to find very real restrictions on female lives.

I like. Is that Wonder Girl on the cover too?

The chains around her are vaguely disturbing at face value, but I imagine that’s the point, and Morrison does not choose his themes lightly. This is provocative for, speculatively, the right reasons.

Looks like Paquette is channeling Terry Dodson in this cover.

“Wonder Woman’s kinky feminist roots”

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/11/wonder-womans-kinky-feminist-roots/380788/

When Marston was writing the book, “feminism somehow got mixed up with bondage and spanking.”

That was…really too long an exchange of Twitters to digest for an article. I would have found a summary with one or two excerpted tweets more effective.

And, not to ignore the wider problem this article presents but enquiring minds (well, mine) want to know…will Batman ’66 and Sensation will continue to be released digitally, or will they be cancelled as well as the floppy reprints?

DC is still publishing comic books? ;)

Hi John,

Thanks for your comment. I got overzealous with the tweets– didn’t realize how long the conversation was because it seemed much shorter in my head! I’ve parred them down some.

According to solicits, the December issues for these titles will be the final issues for all formats. I will look into this further and clarify if I hear anything to the contrary.

I doubt that the Digital First comics will continue.
The numbers seem to have been calculated from “can we sell enough via digital + paper + graphic novel?”
If those numbers don’t add up to a profit, then it’s not going to continue with just one format.
In the old days, it was “newsstand + direct market + subscriptions”. Many marginal titles had better profits when newsstand copies were omitted (Ka-Zar, Micronauts, Moon Knight).

How well did DC market these new titles?
Why did Ms. Marvel become an overnight sensation, but not Prez?

I see the point TalesOfRacShade is making — I’m one of (I assume) many people who pick stuff up late, or purchase and then read late. I picked up a couple of the relaunched titles in June and didn’t get to reading any of them until Labor Day. (That’s what happens when your to-read pile is taller than the nightstand it sits on.) Now I’m going back to catch up on the ones I liked, but the damage has been done and the books that didn’t show strong interest by August will be canceled. Because most books simply don’t get a fighting chance, they’re often gone by the time their audience finds them.

It’s just the nature of the beast, though. I think it’s more of a general issue with monthly superhero comics and its sales channels than any bad decisions made at DC.

A lot of ground covered here:

Sad to see both Batman ’66 and Sensation Comics go. I bought both occasionally, but they were pretty confused packages.

The Batman book had the trappings of the TV show and good likenesses of the actors involved, but *unlike* the show it was played straight, not camp. So what audience was this for? I assume the nostalgia crowd (and in this day and age, that can’t be a very big crowd), but then it didn’t go all in. Sort of like putting on a production of Grease and taking out the songs. The stories were fine, but without the parody, it ended up being pretty mild (though the Kevin Smith/Ty Templeton mini with the Green Hornet was fun and the Len Wein/Harlan Ellison/Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez special was quite beautiful.)

Sensation Comics had a similar schizophrenic profile. Some of the best, accessible, all-ages Wonder Woman stories in a long time, unfortunately behind covers that often portrayed The Amazon Princess as a crazed warrior splattered with blood. I know covers in comics have a long history of not reflecting the exact contents, but I can’t imagine the audience for either one of those types of books being satisfied with that combination.

It makes me both sad and angry to hear these stories of sexual harassment behind the scenes. Especially when it involves people who are working on characters that are supposed to be heroes — examples of our best ideals, not our worst demons. DC, if this is going on, please get to the bottom of it and root it out. Not only for the sake of your workplace, but for Superman, Wonder Woman and all the other inspiring icons that the world looks up to.

And Torsten, I think Ms. Marvel had the advantage of a lot of media coverage outside of comics *and* being a superhero comic in the Marvel Universe. Prez is on its’ own in its’ own little corner of the world with no capes and tights.

The problem with DC is that they don’t give the smaller books a big marketing push. Although, I did notice that there was some attempt for The Omega Men with it having a big spread in the back pages for a month or two. Hopefully this is the kind of title that does alright in TPB and warrants a new miniseries in the not too distant future.

All of the Digital First titles have had limited lifespans, such as Adventures of Superman and Legends of the Dark Knight. Sensation had 48 digital weekly releases. That’s no small potatoes. After each one wraps up, a new one with a new character comes around the corner. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a Flash or GL anthology Digital First series next up to bat.

For the record, Cullen Bunn confirmed on Twitter that “Lost Army” ends with issue six.

@Hardy: Ouch. So Lost Army wasn’t just cancelled; it was stealth cancelled. That must hit hard for the creators, to say nothing of readers who invested in the story.

Yeah, the Omega Men news hit me kind of hard, particularly after having been geared up for a twelve-issue run with a clearly laid out beginning, middle, and end. Add my voice to the choir of being cheated as a reader to be paying money for what will never be more than half a story.

And Alex DeCampi’s remarks just make me sad as a consumer. I loved Sensation Comics for its diverse storytelling, its introducing me to the work of a number of spectacular creators, and its being the iconic Wonder Woman book that I’ve felt had been missing from the stands since Gail Simone’s run on the title ended. (Azzarello and Chiang are a good “alternate” take, but separated from their storytelling, the N52 character is Generic Warrior Woman #49, not Wonder Woman.) Agreed with the poster who lamented the covers never matching the tone. That’s been a real sticking point for me with the book.

Basically, what made Sensation distinct is that between its covers, it was a feminist book. De Campi’s revelations about the Superman office at DC… I sincerely wish I could say I were surprised to hear her statements out loud. And it saddens me. The DiDio / Lee / Harras regime needs to topple. It feels to me like they set this new direction up for failure from the get-go, between the timing, the horrifyingly awful marketing, and now the company’s failure to see through on their own promises to their readers…

Is there any good news to come out of DC? I mean… Batgirl, Black Canary, and Doctor Fate are cool, and they’re still going. There’s that, right…?