My thoughts on the DC Comics Reboot...
Why?
Okay, I know the reasons DC Comics is giving. Readership has been in decline, and they feel that by "refreshing" the characters, they can bring in new followers. It sounds reasonable...but...
Here's the thing: While I do believe that things have gotten muddled over in the DC Universe, I think it could have been avoided in the first place quite simply. The whole thing started to get out of hand, in my opinion, around the time of Infinite Crisis. I've said it once, and I'll say it again: it is has been a case of those in charge suddenly deciding to try and revive the Silver Age, disregarding that their readers have moved passed that sort of story-telling, and then they seemed to try and fuse it with the grim, gritty feel of the 1990's. To top it off, they threw in a bunch of "change for change sake" and decided to ignore countiuity if it was the least bit inconvient. Basically, it ended up pretty much being a mess.
Now, you might ask, if I'm so bright, how should they have fixed this mess? Alright, I won't pretend I've got a lot of experience in the writing or editting of comic books, but here's my ideas:
First, I would round up all the creative teams and remind them that the books they help to put out don't really belong to them, and that they can't just change things to show that the comic they work on is "theirs".
Second, I would set up the next cross-over event to start getting rid of the unstable patchwork that came out of Infinite Crisis, Final Crisis, and so on. My idea is that the heroes learn that the reason that so many disasters have been occurring, and their own personal countiuities seem to be in flux, is because there isn't suppose to be the 52 universes. When Alex Luthor Jr. split the universes appart in Infinite Crisis, he unbalance reality. Thus, they have to put things back to rights, with there being the one main universe. I believe that Hypertime should be re-instated. However, I'll go into more details another time.
Third, I would set up a group of workers to act as "countiuity cops", reviewing stories to make sure that a writer doesn't just suddenly ignore any major events. For example, if Superman traps Bizarro in the Phantom Zone, another writer can't just use him, and must address the fact that Bizarro was in the Phantom Zone.
Just some thoughts...
Okay, I know the reasons DC Comics is giving. Readership has been in decline, and they feel that by "refreshing" the characters, they can bring in new followers. It sounds reasonable...but...
Here's the thing: While I do believe that things have gotten muddled over in the DC Universe, I think it could have been avoided in the first place quite simply. The whole thing started to get out of hand, in my opinion, around the time of Infinite Crisis. I've said it once, and I'll say it again: it is has been a case of those in charge suddenly deciding to try and revive the Silver Age, disregarding that their readers have moved passed that sort of story-telling, and then they seemed to try and fuse it with the grim, gritty feel of the 1990's. To top it off, they threw in a bunch of "change for change sake" and decided to ignore countiuity if it was the least bit inconvient. Basically, it ended up pretty much being a mess.
Now, you might ask, if I'm so bright, how should they have fixed this mess? Alright, I won't pretend I've got a lot of experience in the writing or editting of comic books, but here's my ideas:
First, I would round up all the creative teams and remind them that the books they help to put out don't really belong to them, and that they can't just change things to show that the comic they work on is "theirs".
Second, I would set up the next cross-over event to start getting rid of the unstable patchwork that came out of Infinite Crisis, Final Crisis, and so on. My idea is that the heroes learn that the reason that so many disasters have been occurring, and their own personal countiuities seem to be in flux, is because there isn't suppose to be the 52 universes. When Alex Luthor Jr. split the universes appart in Infinite Crisis, he unbalance reality. Thus, they have to put things back to rights, with there being the one main universe. I believe that Hypertime should be re-instated. However, I'll go into more details another time.
Third, I would set up a group of workers to act as "countiuity cops", reviewing stories to make sure that a writer doesn't just suddenly ignore any major events. For example, if Superman traps Bizarro in the Phantom Zone, another writer can't just use him, and must address the fact that Bizarro was in the Phantom Zone.
Just some thoughts...