Final Crisis: WTF?

So, are you picking up "Marvel Zombies 3" or not? This time, it's in Florida.

DC = Deck of Cards, which is really starting to fall.

After denying claims that JG Jones was incredibly late on art and there would be no fill in artists, solicits today show that Carlos Pacheco has been brought in to assist. Carlos' is a damn fine artist, so it's not really a slap to face, but, along with Grant Morrison's scathing critique of DC Editorial, it shows how they have many hands, and not one of them is aware of the others' movements.

Also while Grant Morrison has written many stories I thoroughly enjoy, he should never be put in charge of a large crossover. As you mentioned, his stuff is the most inaccessible material in comics. You can't bring an outsider into comics and give them DC One Million or Seven Soldiers and expect them to know what the fuck is going on. Morrison seems to specifically try to confuse the reader.

link?

Another jerkoff massive crossover that ultimately leads to nothing. What a shock. If you excuse me I'll be waiting for the next Ex Machina to come down the pike.

I think this is what he's talking about.

He basically gives them shit for Countdown and Death of the New Gods totally fucking his plans for Final Crisis #1, which they already had in script form. "Scathing critique" might be a bit much. I think I read that somewhere else or just wanted to sound dramatic. But he does paint them in a bad light.

I think prior to that Didio did say that Morrison's pitch compared to what was turned in ended up being quite different.

So what is the final crisis actually about?

Fuck if I no. A bunch of New Gods are now in human form, and they stay like that for ten minutes before they rise up and destroy the DC universe or something. There's also some mystery dude in a mask, and Barry Allen is returning.

Or, more accurately, NO ONE KNOWS (other than Grant Morrison), since only the first issue has been released so far.

All the issues could be out and still only Grant Morrison will know what happened.

My Grant Morrison rule is: "If its an ongoing, give it a couple issues, if its a limited series, stick for half of it before jumping ship".
Its not a great rule, but it works most of the time.

That interview with Grant Morrsion actually makes me want to read Final Crisis. - It was an interesting piece.

Didn't Morrison once say he wanted to try and attempt a story as a kind of magic rite that would somehow bring to life a fictional universe?

Hey, if all goes right, the embodiment of Kamandi will get conjured up.

Wow. Reading superhero comics seems like a job now. Just trying to make sense of a mess of failed resets and intertwined timelines on a perpetual feedback loop.

Bingo.

And I'll be putting up a ton of DC TPB's on Ebay soon.

Watch for it, kids!*


*who would care?

Amen. I'd like to enjoy a story without referencing 20 year-old storylines, several handbooks, websites, a slide rule, and an abacus. Plus, these crossovers seldom have decent wrap-ups, and most of the ancillary books supporting the main mini-series rarelyy serve any major purpose.

I guess I'm in the minority where I do like to have a bunch of ancillary titles and stuff to flesh out the main stories, and I like the fact I have to look things up from time to time.

That being said, I'd rather all the extra work to be WORTH something. The fact that the Human Flame had been used only once in a back up tale in Detective Comics a hundred fucking years ago kinda makes the research a touch pointless.

I also have to agree with Timothy225 and say that most of the lead-ins and preamble don't really add up to anything, aside from whomever lives through them may make an brief appearance in the Main Book.

I have faith. Not much. But it seems like a mistake to out and out dismiss Morrison.

I hear he killed Martian Manhunter in this.

Which guarantees I'll never pick this up.

Between Ted Kord's brutal head-shot death, Sue Dibny's inglorious demise, MM's apparent death, I've come to the following no-shit-Sherlock revelation:

DC's comics, as a whole, just aren't fun anymore. The same can be said for virtually anything Millar or Bendis churn out at Marvel.

I'm not sure if its the sudden boost of Hollywood attention on these properties, the desire to 'grownupify' everything out of the mistaken and pigheaded idea that 'kids don't want to read comics anymore,' derived entirely from the fact that adults have made these books asininely overcomplicated, plot-knotted monstrosities of garbled continuity and 'adult' themes (read Michael Chabon's 'Maps and Legends' for a more elegant riposte to this nonsense), or what, exactly, the problem here is, but the 'funny books' that hooked me on this medium to begin with are, by and large, completely vanished from the landscape.

Sure, there are exceptions to this, but they are few and verrrrrrry far between, especially at the Big Two. The industry appears to be doing everything in its power to suck the fun and color out of the very idea of superheroes, and you know what?

It's worked. I have zero desire to read about the four-color icons of my youth engaged in rape and bloody, graphic murder, or to collect a universe of 30-50 different books just to get a complete, average, story. There is a place for maturity and adult themes in any medium, but there should also be a place for an imaginative 10 year old to get some great art, some compelling story, and some vague semblance of FUN.

That this final crisis business is coming from the pen of Morrison, who has gone on record to say that he wants to bring the fun back to comics, is ironic to say the least.

Martian Manhunter's death in this is very red herring-y. I expect we'll find out in that one shot (or two shot? I can't remember) that it was some kind of set up. I mean the guy is invincible. How many times has the dude appeared to have died? I mean it just fucking happened prior to his "new look."

My advice to Jesse is the same as my advice to anyone who's starting to feel burned by comics: try dropping all your Big Two comics (or at least all the mainstream ones) and try only reading indie, Dark Horse, Image, Oni, etc. comics for a while. Maybe hunt around for recent books and trades that recieved acclaim from comics reviewers and bloggers. See if that doesn't rekindle your love of the medium.

If it's fun, non-serious adventure comics you're looking for, Dark Horse in particular has a bunch these days (the Hellboy family, The Umbrella Academy, Conan, and the Goon) as does Image (Invincible, Godland, and a couple of other superhero comics I haven't read but which others seem to enjoy, like Dynamo 5 and Noble Causes). And the upstart Red 5 has at least two fun comics that are goofy superhero-ish without being actual superhero comics: Neozoic and Atomic Robo. There really is a bunch of good stuff out there if you're willing to step away from the Big Two.

Ironically, this may be why I don't mind Final Crisis; I have no attachment to DC right now. To me DC is a bunch of timeless characters, freed of interlinking continuity. I honestly don't give a crap if Final Crisis contradicts The Death of the New Gods or whatever. And Morrison's said that killing the Martian Manhunter is his way of acknowledging that they can't get the Silver Age back in the context of the mainstream DC Universe--I think he's trying to push the interlinked mainstream titles for the fanboys and stand-alone minis, like All-Star Superman, for new or casual readers. Kind of what Devin was talking about when he wrote an editorial about Final Crisis a while back.

That's essentially what I've done for years now - I drift into the Big Two's books from time to time, usually to check in on an old favorite character or to read a particular writer's take on things (Whedon's X-Men run was enjoyable for me).

But mostly, I don't buy Big Two books and I haven't in years, for the reasons above. I've enjoyed, and still enjoy, the Umbrella Academy (Gerard Way...who'd have thought? Not me, anyway), Rocketo, Bone (and have hopes for RASL, though the first issue didn't do much for me), Hellboy, and a few others, including Morrison's Superman, which I liked quite a bit. So you're right, it is't as if companies aren't putting out some good books - it's more that Marvel and DC especially seem to have abandoned the concept of new readership and (sorry to use this again) fun, and that bewilders me.

And thanks for the reccomendations. I'll look for Neozoic and Atomic Robo next time I'm around a shop.

All of the DC events have to include a "shocking" death, so it seems more like a stunt, although I don't doubt that he's prove a larger point.

Is his current FF run in the Lee/Kirby vein? I could see his wide-screen Authority approach working well with the First Family, but I dread the celebrity cameos, pop-culture references and dropped-ball endings that infect a lot of his work.

And yea, Bendis.....I don't get it. Great crime comic writer and Powers was a nifty book for a little while. But with the possible exception of Ultimate Spidey the man cannot write for Marvel's characters. His idea of dialogue and plotting is the antithesis of what I look for in a comic.

Millar's new Wolverine arc started off pretty well, actually. It's not very "Millar-y."

I honestly don't know about that. This notion that the Silver Age is "lost to us" seems suspect on its face.

Yes, the world is a bad, bad place. Yes, there's a lot of darkness out there. Isn't that precisely the sort of era the Silver Age heroes came into being during?

World War II was not exactly warm n' cuddly fuzzy-bear snacktime.

But maybe I'm misinterpreting the point.

Yeah, I don't see it yet. Maybe it will be illustrated better as the series progresses.

What I'm confused is, I remember when I was reading Infinite Crisis lots of people saying part of the purpose of that event was to restart the DC universe and make it seem less dark and gloomy. I guess that didn't work out well ...

Precisely. They were going to de-assholify Batman (for what, two issues?) and make the threats against our beloved heroes more Incredibles than Hostel.

DC, and it kills me to say this (I'm a huge DC Guy) is dying a slow death under Dan DiDio. The delays are just the tip of the iceberg. There is so much BS going on around there that I'm losing interest. I buy roughly 10 DC title a week, and I'm finding it harder and harder to pony up the scratch for them. To me, Marvel ain't all that better. I snag about 10 issues a month of Marvel stuff, and I have found that more often than not Marvel titles are good for about 6 issues, then suck for 6 more, rinse and repeat.

I agree with Jesse's sentiment - both DC and Marvel stopped being fun, at least for me, quite awhile back (I checked out of Spider-Man after The Other storyline - good jump-off point, just prior to the run-up to Civil War). With the exception of Ultimate Spider-Man, I don't buy monthlies anymore (and from what I read at my friend's shop, I ain't missing much). If I buy anything, it's graphic novels, and usually older collections I might've missed first go 'round (sole exception is the Sinestro War collections).

I heartlity agree with trying out other publishers - can't go wrong with Dark Horse, Dynamite, Oni, etc. Also, I'm using the drought to catch up on stuff I missed the first time around - thanks to Dark Horse's collections of the old Marvel Conan series, I'm revisiting the works of Roy Thomas and the artwork of Buscema, Marcos, Windsor-Smith, etc. in their prime. I'm also waiting for a collection of Astro City: The Dark Age to pop up.

I'm also in firm agreement to Devin's earlier asertations that eventually both Marvel and DC will likely become more licensing groups ala Disney, eschewing comics themselves and embracing TV, DVDs, and movies instead. More money to be made there than in monthlies.

They might as well make him a villain, at least that may make the character interesting again. Because he sure as shit isn't likeable or even "give-a-fuck"able.


Devin very well may be right. Marvel and DC may be allowing their comics line to die a (prolonged) natural death in order to cash in on the licensing and iconography of the characters.

I think Batman as a character isn't really written all that differently than his counterpart in the Timm-verse. Do you?

I think the Batman titles are the most consistently good books on the DC market right now! There just isn't all that much to look forward to month by month. I DO put JSA at the top of my "Read these first" list. Green Lantern has been consistently great since #1. The main Batman book is great (mostly). I have to admit the Black Glove storyline has me.

Check out this article, particularly the comments, where the recently-fired Chuck Dixon weighs in on he problems with DC. Basically it sounds like the people in charge have no idea what they're doing, and keep changing their minds on what will work, so any proposed paradigm shifts or huge, epic events get double-guessed and triple-guessed and altered at the last minute into nonsense.

And yet people still call Alan Moore unreasonable for refusing to have anything to do wth DC.

I stayed away from all that 52, Final Crisis and Countdown crap from the very beginning. Even as a sporadic comic reader, I could tell that this was just a DC patented cash grab designed to suck money out of my pocket. Who gives a damm about the New Gods, Batwoman or whatever? I doubt the average public has any idea of who Orion or The New Gods are. Everything is so confusing.

I am reading John Ostrander's Star Wars: Legacy, Hellboy and Top Cow's Witchblade (Stephan Sjejic's art is incredible and they have a consistant creative team till Issue 150) right now. That's about it.

And oh yes...Batman is an asshole. Jesus, how does Robin and the rest of the Bat-cast put up with him?

Ah, fanboys. Spent all their time ragging on Death Of The New Gods and Countdown every time a new issue came out. And yet they're still mad that Final Crisis doesn't match up with them instead of being thankful that it deservedly buried them in the garbage heap as soon as possible.

The market is overloaded with 30 and 40 year olds who care more about if something is edgy and yet doesn't contradict something they read 20 years ago. It's inbred. The market is getting exactly the comics it deserves.

I've never been this close to just dropping superheroes altogether. At least in the 90s I had Starman. I get more enjoyment these days from picking up 40 year old adventures of The Haunted Tank, which is beyond repetitive but at least boasts good art, than I do from most superhero comic books.

I think it's no coincidence that the two non-Vertigo DC books that I'm enjoying most are Jonah Hex and Tor which have nothing to do with all this event-itis.

By the way, in this interview Morrison makes an interesting implication: that Darkseid won the war between Apokolips and New Genesis, as portrayed (sort of) in The Hunger Dogs, and that this metaphysical upheaval is what has caused the DC Universe to get darker and less morally reassuring. Evil is capable of winning in a superhero universe, whereas before it wasn't.

Ah, give it a chance! The first few issues may be weak, but I'm usre by isse #74 all the pieces will fall into place and we'll have a rip-snorting adventure straight out of the Silver Age!

I sense.....sarcasm.

Erik - yeah, I said "possible exception of Ultimate Spider-Man", because I've heard many times that it was something of a success for folks who've read it.

I'm not really a Spider-Man fan though (nor, as is evident, a Bendis fan), so I haven't read it.

Weird. CBR and Newsarama are both sorta reporting that Dan Didio may get the boot in the next few days.

This could get interesting, to say the least.

I wonder if this has any relevance.
http://www.comicbookresources.com/?p...ticle&id=16885

Word coming from CBR's gossip columnist Rich Johnston today, "I understand that last week, John Nee handed his resignation in to DC Comics. As of today, however, he was still working at the company offices."

"John Nee has resigned from DC Comics. CBR News has independently confirmed this information. When contacted, a DC Comics spokesperson said the company does not comment on personnel matters.

Nee joined the company in 1998 as General Manager of WildStorm and was promoted in September of 2007 to Senior Vice President of Business Development. His responsibilities included overseeing Business Development -- working to expand core business opportunities -- the WildStorm studio, and the CMX manga imprint.

The reasons for Nee's resignation have not been made public at this time."

Seems odd that he would resign from DC Comics if he was actually going to be promoted to take Didio's place, nor does a vp of business for wildstorm sound like someone who'd be in line for a creative position.

I just find it strange that two prominent DC-types have taken their balls and gone home in the last week.

From this week's Lying in the Gutters:

"I've been told that Warner are so happy with Dan DiDio's overall performance and plan for the future that they have renewed Dan's contract, due to expire in September, for a number of years.

This isn't the first time the internet has called for Dan's head and whipped themselves into believing that a message board post was the equivalent of a shareholders' report, only for reality to bite them in the arse. I wrote something very similar this time last year and was accused of being a DC stooge. I was right then, looks like I'm right now. Look forward to the same thing come June 2009."

I still think time is running out on Didio, regardless of whatever is officially being said. DC has been stuck in the same gear since 2002. They really haven't done anything of real impact since then, I guess. Aside from All-Star Superman, of course.

Id like to add bringing back "Manhunter", "JSA", "Blue Beetle" and "Booster Gold" to "All Star Superman"; those are pretty much the only DC books I currently enjoy, although I would be lying if I wasnt looking forward to having James Robinson on "Justice League" and "Superman".

EDIT: I would also like to add having Jim Shooter on "Legion of Super Heroes" to my list.

As for Final Crisis....yeah, issue 2 did not improve much on things.

I hate to tell you, but Shooter's off the book. He wrote so many scripts that there's still going to be material from him until January. But, he got pushed off the title.