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hsiehdy · 04-02-2012, 11:58 PM

Still picking up and enjoying Aquaman, Batman, Resurrection Man, The Shade, and Wonder Woman.

Close to dropping Demon Knights, Flash (love the art, but Barry Allen is so boring), Justice League.

Dropped Action Comics after issue 6.

**BIGREDROBOT** · 04-03-2012, 03:05 AM

I'm still on Demon Knights, Shade and Action. And that's it.

jason1749 · (This post was last modified: 04-03-2012 04:25 AM by jason1749.)

Still on Demon Knights, Action, Shade (which is only kind of New 52 but still), Batwoman (maybe not for long), Wonder Woman, Frankenstein (though that new inker, woof), Flash, and Birds of Prey. Also hopping on Batman, Inc., World's Finest and Dial H next month.

GL 2814.4 · (This post was last modified: 04-03-2012 05:43 AM by GL 2814.4.)

Do you guys want to hear updates on some of your favorite missing characters? I am going to tell you updates on your favorite missing characters. And other things I can remember about what DC said at the ECCC panels.

A lot of people asked about where Wally West and Donna Troy were, as well as what they had planned with Stephanie Brown and Cass (more specifically, the complaint was that there were three male Robins in Bruce Wayne's now much shorter time as Batman, and none of the ladies are present, so the fuck is up with that?).

The question was, "Are we going to see Wally West and Donna Troy at all, in any incarnation, in any of the books, in my lifetime?"
The response was, "Well, life is a long time..." And they basically left it at that. Cue lots of cheering from the audience for Wally to come back.

In another panel, Francis Manapul and Brian Buccellato revealed that they had introduced Wally in Flash #6 but editorial had them take it out. I talked to Mr Manapul about it later and he said it was a small cameo role, mostly to see if they could get away with it and to see editorial's reaction. From the way he talked about it, I think they tried to introduce Wally as a kid. He said he'd really like to introduce Wally (rather than another artist/writer do it), but there was so much to consider--does Wally's introduction make Barry old, would he be The Flash and how old would he be, where does that leave Barry, come the demon Etrigan. But it sounded like Mr Manapul and Buccellato were fans of Wally and would really like to do him in the future, and they said they'd keep trying to introduce him.

People talked about Stephanie Brown in two of the panels. The response to the first question above was basically panic: "Uhh I have no idea if I can talk about her, and the editor (or whomever he was) is giving me a no-go sign, so uhhhh yeah sorry?" They did actually reveal something about her future role, but really the whole thing was confusing as fans tried to yell their love for Steph and the DC guys were trying to figure out what, exactly, they could tell people, so I kinda forgot what was said (something along the lines of "if it was real"). Sorry. The next day, another person asked about Stephanie Brown, and the response was, "Were you at the panel yesterday? No? Welp, an addendum was added to my contract saying I couldn't talk about her (a joke, but certainly got the point across), sorry!"
So who knows what's going on there. They didn't really talk about Cass at all.

I also thought their reaction to questions like "how have fans reacted so far, and what do you say/think about people responding negatively? You've lost long time readers in trying to get new readers, why do you think that is?" was a little... weird. Mostly, it sounded like "Well you guys just don't understand what we're doing. You don't get it." They definitely thought it was all a really good idea, and it doesn't sound as though they regretted the reboot.

Another odd thing was the reaction towards someone asking about Hal Jordan and the GL timeline; why wasn't that rebooted the same as the others (minus Batman)? The response was, "If it ain't broken, don't fix it," which I think is a little ridiculous as we have no idea what pre-reboot events have still occurred, and where does that put other GLs like Guy and Kyle Rayner and John Stewart into Hal Jordan's much shorter timeframe? The GL timeline is about as confusing as Batman's.

They directed a lot of questions to "wait for May's new series" for their answers about what happened to so-and-so, where is this storyline going, et cetera. They avoided the "what the hell happened on Static Shock?" question with something about always looking for new opportunities for Static now that the series is cancelled, and pointed to OMAC's appearance in JLI as an example of continuing cancelled characters.

**Koltreg** · 04-03-2012, 05:54 AM

Is anyone buying more DC titles than they had been (currently)?

GL 2814.4 · 04-03-2012, 05:59 AM

(04-03-2012 05:54 AM)Koltreg Wrote: Is anyone buying more DC titles than they had been (currently)?

I am, only because I was too cheap and fucking confused by the Blackest Night and other events to get into it until long after they were released into trades (thank you, local library). But mostly I've been supporting the Batman Beyond/Superman Beyond series, and very few of the main titles (and even then, very sporadically).

jason1749 · (This post was last modified: 04-03-2012 06:03 AM by jason1749.)

(04-03-2012 05:40 AM)GL 2814.4 Wrote:
I also thought their reaction to questions like "how have fans reacted so far, and what do you say/think about people responding negatively? You've lost long time readers in trying to get new readers, why do you think that is?" was a little... weird. Mostly, it sounded like "Well you guys just don't understand what we're doing. You don't get it." They definitely thought it was all a really good idea, and it doesn't sound as though they regretted the reboot.

I guess they were probably confused by that question as there's no evidence that they have lost long-time readers. Sure, there's the occasional dude on the internet yelling "I'M NEVER READING BATMAN AGAIN BECAUSE HE HAS NO TRUNKS" but dude's have been shouting that since the dawn of the letter column and actual sales charts show all of the titles selling more or at least the same as they were before. Regardless, the point was to get new readers, because quite frankly there aren't enough of the current ones to make comics a profitable endeavor. While you can argue whether they succeeded, at least they tried.

(04-03-2012 05:54 AM)Koltreg Wrote: Is anyone buying more DC titles than they had been (currently)?

Oh yeah, prior to the reboot I was only on the Batman books and really nothing else. Probably buying twice as many DC books now.

Maxy Barnard · 04-03-2012, 06:49 AM

(04-03-2012 05:54 AM)Koltreg Wrote: Is anyone buying more DC titles than they had been (currently)?

Yeah, if only because I went from Power Girl to over ten series.

I think we're now at the point where most series in the DCnU have an arc under their belt, so it's kinda this perfect moment to look back at the series you're buying and see what ones work issue to issue and which ones work arc to arc.

Like, Red Hood & The Outlaws is a weird example of a series that just doesn't have arcs (see also: all of Lobdell's DC output right now, because arcs? Bleh, let's keep introducing new stuff and not giving it sufficient closure), but on just an issue to issue basis provides the most raw enjoyment to me (save for OMAC) despite its various shortcomings, whilst Demon Knights felt so lacking in substance until I went back and read the first arc, which as a whole product is this insanely great escalating situation with the most bitter ending it could possibly have, perfectly formed and enthralling all the way.

Whadda you lot think? Got any series that kinda have either of those things going for them in your hauls still?

MoustachePants · 04-03-2012, 07:17 AM

Yeah, I am certainly on board for Dial H and Inc., but I have pretty much stuck to my guns, dropped a few titles such as Nightwing and possibly JLI. I have really liked more or less everything I started out with and never really saw anything that made me stop and think, 'Well jeeze I should pick that up.' I have, however, in this stretch of time started reading about 4 more Marvel comics than I had been and 3 more independent titles. Not say that DC is losing me, except on the titles that I feel have either declined or never got off the ground creatively, but I have really expanded recently and the books that don't pull clout, no matter who is writing, drawing, or publishing, get axed by my wallet.

jason1749 · 04-04-2012, 01:25 AM

I'd have dropped a lot more of the books if not for the price-drop. Thinking of switching all of my Dark Horse, Image & DC digital books to one-month-later. As for Marvel, well it says something that I'm only reading one of their comics ([i]Winter Soldier[i]) regularly and dropping that as soon as it switches to double-shipping after the first arc. Whenever I go to Comixology and see a six-month-old comic still priced at $3.99 I laugh and pass right by.