COMMENT: One Year Later Preview
Thanks to Jason Richards for boiling down the DiDio interview over at NEWSarama:
Plastic Man is CANCELLED.
Gotham Central is CANCELLED.
Batman: Gotham Knights is CANCELLED.
Batgirl is CANCELLED.
JLA is CANCELLED. (wha? huh?!)
Adventures of Superman is being CANCELLED and the Superman title is being reverted back to its original numbering (starting with #650).
Flash is ENDING (not yet sure what the difference is with being CANCELLED).
the “current run” of Wonder Woman is ENDING as well.
Plastic Man is no surprise and actually has nothing to do with One Year Later. I believe low sales and Kyle Baker’s contract ending took care of that one. Regardless what you might think about it – I wasn’t a fan – kudos to DC for sticking with it as long as they did.
Gotham Central was Greg Rucka’s decision to kill off, saying he felt like it was wrong to keep going without Brubaker and Lark. I’ll buy that, although I’m not feeling the Corrigan/Spectre/Infinite Crisis tie-in that will apparently wrap things up.
Gotham Knights jumped the shark a few months back, IMO, so I won’t miss it at all. I’d say a couplafew less Batbooks is a good thing, but I’m sure it will be quickly replaced by another series or two. I’d prefer they pared things down to the primary Batman title, Detective Comics and All-Star, and then publish 3-4 mini-series/year to tell creator-driven side stories that don’t fit into any of those.
Batgirl‘s cancellation is very disappointing, and I hope Andersen Gabrych is able to pull of a satisfying conclusion that doesn’t involve killing her off. ‘Cause, you know, the Batfamily doesn’t need yet another female sacrifice. I’m guessing we’ll be seeing Barbara Gordon healed and back under the mask, which is an even bigger disappointment, a step backwards in the midst of what seems like several steps forward for the DCU overall.
Can’t bring myself to care about the JLA cancellation since I never read a single issue, but like the Avengers, you know the flagship team title will be back pretty quickly in some form. It would be interesting if that ends up being the Brad Meltzer/Jim Lee project I suspect is in the works.
The Superman tweaks are a good thing, a la my comments about Batman, but I still don’t see myself ever picking any of his titles up. Rucka hooked me for a few months with Adventures of Superman, but the story took too long to develop and I quickly lost interest.
Flash ending? Yawn. I know people swear on their mothers that Mark Waid and Geoff Johns both had remarkable runs with the character (no pun intended), but I’ve never cared for him.
Ditto for Wonder Woman, though Rucka almost got me onboard before Infinite Crisis took over. And I don’t see that changing with the return of Donna Troy, either.
The problem with DC’s big seven – Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern and, um, Green Arrow, Hawkman and/or Aquaman? – is that beyond Batman, I don’t really like any of the other characters on a fundamental level. The feet of clay thing only works for me when they’re supporting a somewhat relatable character, which few of DC’s icons are. Most of them are gods (and goddesses) amongst men. Green Arrow should be appealing to me, but I’ve never liked “super” archers. (The O’Neil/Adams run is the subject of Buzzscope’s first “Book of the Month Club“, though, so that opinion might change.)
Interestingly, if the rumors of Dick Grayson replacing Bruce Wayne are true, it will really test my loyalty to the character, as I’ve never cared for Grayson/Nightwing outside of the Wolfman/Perez Teen Titans. They’ve kind of painted themselves into a corner with Bruce, though, paranoid asshole that he’s become, so other than a convenient flash of white light resetting things, I don’t see how he stays credible under the cowl after Infinite Crisis.
Say what you want about Marvel’s editorial decisions over the years, but one thing that remains true in my mind all these years later is that, while DC has the more iconic characters, the House of Ideas has the more interesting ones.
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For me the Batgirl cancellation is the big (actually only) one that matters. I much prefer Barbara Gordon as Oracle and leave the steet justice to a vastly superior fighter (Cassandra), especially when you consider she’s still learning.
The thing I don’t get is, having regained use of her legs, Barbara would choose to go right back to risking that by fighting crime actively instead of helping others by providing intel. She always struck me as being smarter than Batman, and as someone who would be able to “walk away”, so to speak.
Two issues in to Infinite Crisis and I’m not very impressed. Combine that with what’s been churning in the rumor mill and my trumpeting of DC’s 52 has dampened.
These cancellations underline what I’ve heard: Wally West dies, JLA disbands, and the role of Batman will be played by Dick Grayson.
Say it isn’t so…ah who gives a $#@%!
I’m just not overall interested in this story DC wants to tell. The whole idea of fixing the mistakes of the original Crisis just seems like something only Mark Waid and a couple of the editors really care about (but how does Lori Lemaris fit into Clarks past now?!?! boo). I’m more interested in some of the individual characters, but this large scale story being forced down everyones throat – meh.
The more I hear about this, the less interested I am in reading any of it. And since I pretty much gave up on Marvel this year, looks like the DCU books aren’t getting any of my money anymore either. Yay comics?