It feels pretty redundant to blog about solicitations right after a weekend when so many of these titles were discussed at conventions, but here we are. DC’s September solicitations contained three big topics: the Green Arrow/Black Canary wedding, creative-team changes on Justice League and Flash, and hey … wasn’t Countdown supposed to be more compact?
Lots of pleasant little surprises too, so let’s get right to ‘em.
A LOT OF SHOES, A LOT OF RICE/THE GROOM IS NERVOUS, HE ANSWERS TWICE
It’s not that it doesn’t make sense for The Wedding to be in Countdown; but it does feel a little out of place amongst all the Jimmy Olsen and Eclipso and Challengers From Beyond. I know it’s supposed to lighten those things up. However, lumping it in with all the rest makes it just another Event. As much as it seems like an idea whose time has passed — really, doesn’t Ollie and Dinah’s living-in-sin relationship just scream “1970s?” — if they’re gonna get married, it should be special.
Instead, here’s the bachelorette party in Countdown, the wedding-planning (with Oracle, presumably) in the Wedding Planner Special, more parties in the JLA Wedding Special (which also leads into an Injustice League storyline), the Wedding Special itself, and ultimately a Green Arrow/Black Canary ongoing.
Nevertheless, as far as I know, DC hasn’t made up “wedding invitations” so you can “register” for any of these issues at your LCS. Come on, people, focus!
MAKE MINE McDUFFIE
As we all know by now, the aforementioned JLA Wedding Special is Dwayne McDuffie’s first issue of what will hopefully be a long, fruitful run on Justice League of America. (Going from a bachelor party to the Injustice League sounds rather disjointed, but if anyone can do it….) This particular announcement may well be the best news out of the superhero side of DC’s solicits, since McDuffie did so well with the animated League. Still, I’m reminded of the abortive runs that Mark Waid and Kurt Busiek each had on JLA. Here’s hoping the McDuffie Era lasts a while. The only downside might be his possible departure from Fantastic Four, which he has greatly improved.
Meanwhile, good grief — JLA Classified presents yet another “J’Onn’s heritage comes between him and the rest of humanity” story? Please tell me the DC inventory isn’t as full of these as it looks. On the other hand, if JLA/Hitman is an inventory story, I’m glad it’s finally seeing the light of day.
COUNTDOWN TO OVERSATURATION
The book advertised as the “spine” of DC’s superhero line looks more and more non-essential. Why do I have the feeling it’s going to devolve into just a collection of vignettes leading into other titles? Adding to Countdown to Adventure are Countdown to Mystery (the Steve Gerber/Justiniano Doctor Fate relaunch, plus an Eclipso backup no one requested) and Countdown Presents The Search For Ray Palmer. I hadn’t planned on reading C. To A., I’m marginally interested in C. To M., and I will probably get the Ray Palmer miniseries … but wasn’t the Ray Palmer stuff supposed to keep me interested in the main Countdown book? If there are fifty-two issues of the main book, and the plots were all planned out TV-style, shouldn’t the plan have been to (gasp!) fit all of the story into those fifty-two issues? Otherwise, Countdown looks like a $2.99 weekly infomercial, and the whole project looks bloated. Ye gods.
ABOUT TIME
Ten months after it should have come out, here’s Wonder Woman Annual #1, by Allan Heinberg and the Dodsons. I note that there’s no new issue of the regular Wonder Woman book this month, but we take what we can get. In other delayed-gratification news, the second Justice League Elite paperback (the first came out in 2005) is on the schedule, as is “Wonderland,” Geoff Johns’ first Flash arc from 2001.
‘80s REVIVALS
Might have to check out Infinity Inc. and the new Suicide Squad miniseries. Infinity especially doesn’t look like a straight-up revival, and I’ve been intrigued by the Amanda Waller developments in Checkmate. As for the end of Outsiders (presumably to pave the way for “Batman And The…”), I’m all for a nicer, more friendly Batman, but I’ll have to be convinced that, even in this more mellow period, he could mentor another team.
GREEN LANTERN
Also excited about the Sinestro Corps stuff. Speculation doesn’t look good for Kyle, with fans wondering how he can die (or something) in the Sinestro arc but be back in his old crab-mask in the Ray Palmer miniseries. My guess is that he gets “demoted” to just being a regular Green Lantern again: his new costume has the more generic gloves, boots, badge, and shoulder-yoke of an ordinary GL outfit. In other words, crab-mask does not equal 1994 black-and-white outfit. I kinda like the new duds.
Speaking of 1994, though, there’s Ring-Happy Hal and another Parallax special. Again, based on what the Internets tell me, I don’t think Kyle will be the new Parallax, despite the solicitation copy. If the rumors bear out, I expect a lot of carnage.
COLLECTIONS
The 52 Companion paperback sounds like a good idea, but I can’t help but notice the wild swings in style and tone. “Eclectic” may be too mild a term for a book that runs the gamut from post-Marvel Ditko to full-blown Silver Age wackiness and gritty Greg Rucka noir.
In fact, the 52 Companion is practically a sampler for a few of the other collections; namely, the Denny O’Neil/Denys Cowan Question revival, and the Showcase volume on the Metal Men. The Atomic Knights/Hercules Showcase book also looks intriguing, mostly for a study in how a benign ’60s concept got duded-up for the more jaded ’70s.
WORLD’S FINEST
Batman and Superman show up in this month’s Black Adam, and of course they’re front and center (with Wonder Woman) in the Four Horsemen miniseries. A couple of shaggy storylines also see some movement: All-Star Batman #7 may explore some actual plot points, and Superman’s “Camelot Falls” finally starts to wrap up.
The Bottle City of Kandor collection … I don’t know. If I want to read sci-fi-influenced Batman and Robin stories from the Silver Age, I could, you know, read the sci-fi-influenced Batman and Robin stories from the ‘50s and early ‘60s. The idea doesn’t lack potential, but I have a feeling that once you’ve seen one Nightwing and Flamebird adventure, you’ve pretty much seen them all. I say that, and next month watch me gush over Grant Morrison doing a Nightwing & Flamebird story….
ODDS AND ENDS
Aquaman: Sword of Atlantis must be on the brink of cancellation: its solicit trumpets the new Aquaman’s longevity.
This month’s Justice Society of America solicitation uses the same Power Girl cover from last month, this time for an issue that seems to be more about Power Girl.
In Teen Titans, DC gets around having another “Superboy” by making its alternate-timeline adult Kon-El an evil Superman. I’m also intrigued by the new Wonder Girl miniseries, mostly because it doesn’t appear to do anything critically wrong with the character. Given DC’s track record with its young female heroes, my expectations are pretty low. However, the writer is J. Torres of the Johnny DC line, so maybe there’s hope.
FINALLY, THE FLASH
The Flash solicit (for Waid’s second issue; his first issue and All-Flash are retrosolicited here) mentions Keystone City, which solidifies my Wally theory. If Green Lantern is any indication, DC goes all-in on the Silver Age revivals. Barry would live in Central City and nowhere else, you betcha.
I have to say, these past few days have been rather surreal, even for a guy who spends much of his free time obsessing over corporate-owned superheroes. If DC really did plan all of this a year ago, I give it credit for keeping everything under wraps so well. Still, it’s hard not to see the rapid-fire weekend announcements — FMA cancelled! The Black Flash claims Bart! Waid returns! — collectively as a massive act of contrition. Plans notwithstanding, I feel pretty confident in saying that no one at DC wanted FMA to go from the 120,000 copies issue #1 sold a year ago to the 47,800 #12 moved in May. If Bart’s title had kept its numbers high, I doubt we’d have heard a peep about Waid, All-Flash, etc.
Instead, with the book having lost most of its relaunch bump, I find myself agreeing with Marc-Oliver Frisch in the link above: “DC have recognized that there are fundamental problems with Flash at present, and that they’ll have to go beyond their usual bag of tricks to fix them, in terms of content as well as sales incentives.” DC made FMA #s 14 and 15 fully returnable if retailers doubled their initial orders, and that carries over to the “new” title, so we’ll see if that gooses the numbers on what are now Waid’s first two issues.
Even if that bounce evaporates too, at least DC knows it can count on a certain core Flash number, and that’ll give it time to figure out the next stunt. After all, there’s always Final Crisis, next year….
Anyway, more on the Flash on Thursday. How’s September look to you?
June 19th, 2007 at 8:41 pm
Can’t say I’m excited about the new Infinity Inc series (one of my first purchases after getting back in comics a couple years ago was a complete set of the 80s series, and despite the meritless use of the name, Steel and the Everymen hold no appeal for me), but I’m really looking forward to Suicide Squad, the GA/BC wedding stuff (sounds like fun), and the Sinestro Corps event.
Never a big Flash fan, but I’m ready for the ride - the title had been improving, but a shake-up is welcome nonetheless.
Finally, I have to agree with you in Countdown - I say “have to” because I’ve been one of the series’ biggest supporters, but if it merely becomes a launching pad for other series (rather than the “spine” that connects many of the existing series), that support will wane. 52 did this once - with World War III - and we all know how that turned out. These spinoff series had better be better than that (though they can hardly be worse)…
June 19th, 2007 at 8:47 pm
*snore* September looks boring at DC with nothing catching my eye. You’re right Tom, Countdown looks to be nothing but a bloated way to keep the “52″ hype machine going. “Ray Palmer” sounds interesting (Donna and Kyle visit Wildstorm. Neat, it’s the ’90s again!), but I’m afraid that the concept will run long and lose steam by the time they reach Earth-Tangent. Mark Waid being back on the “Flash” will earn my $2.99, but most of my DC orders will be from Vertigo.
June 19th, 2007 at 11:48 pm
Flash, GL, and JLA have me really excited. I just wish I could get Chuck Dixon back to writing Nightwing.
June 20th, 2007 at 12:34 am
Sinestro Corps. GA + BC. GA Y1. Everything else is just gravy. Or filling, your choice.
**sigh** Guess I’ll give Flash a whirl…again.
The new, young Aquaman under the pen of Busiek was incredibly good. The new, young Aquaman under the pen of Williams is credibly bad.
So far, Countdown blows. And I’m like Jimmy Olsen fan #1.
June 20th, 2007 at 1:06 am
The Countdown bleed out into other minis, specials and etc. is a pathetic money grab which I will refuse to indulge. I would have greatly preferred on large squarebound 100 page comic for the Ollie and Dinah wedding with all the stuff in one volume. Something tells me a TPB will be out very quickly containing the whole deal so I’ll just pass until then.
On the positive side, Flash is going to improve dramatically and Suicide Squad should be a gem of a comic and I’ll pick up the new Infinity Inc out of curiousity.
June 20th, 2007 at 10:17 am
“DC made FMA #s 14 and 15 fully returnable if retailers doubled their initial orders, and that carries over to the “new” title, so we’ll see if that gooses the numbers on what are now Waid’s first two issues.”
That was a clever trick, in hindsight–I mean, DC had to make the issues fully returnable anyway, with all the changes, and now at least some retailers will have doubled their orders.