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Sam Houston
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Joined: 26 March 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 1693
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 8:10am | IP Logged | 1
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As an offshoot of my thread regarding Marvel's frequent reboots/restarts I got to thinking back to my first exposure to this situation in comics. I grew up in the 70's and 80's and collected both Marvel and DC comics, but mostly Marvel. When DC decided to do "Crisis on Infinite Earths" I welcomed it because, for me as a reader, it gave me an opportunity to get a fresh start to the DC universe with changes, for the most part, that I enjoyed (especially with John's Superman). The changes overall were not drastic as with the New 52, but I was wondering, for those of you who did collect DC back in the early days, how did you feel about the overall "Crisis" and the changes that were made?
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Greg Woronchak
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Joined: 04 September 2007
Location: Canada
Posts: 1631
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 8:27am | IP Logged | 2
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I remember at the time that the overall DC line was a bit stagnant; Superman, Flash, Batman, Wonder Woman all felt like they were trapped in creative ruts (New Teen Titans and Legion of Superheroes were the top sellers propping up the line).
Crisis ended up acting as an excuse to 'shake things up', which did help a lot of the titles. However, at the time, I found the Crisis limited series confusing and rather lame; I didn't see any reason for it, besides the cash grab mentality born from Secret Wars.
If DC had simply revamped titles with top-notch talent and clear editorial vision, they could've generated buzz without relying on the Crisis gimmick.
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Robbie Parry
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 8:35am | IP Logged | 3
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I was quite young when it came out and still naive about behind-the-scenes stuff, politics, etc. I saw it as another crossover - but even at the age I was at, it felt odd that they were wiping away history. For what, exactly?
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Roy Johnson
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Joined: 19 May 2013
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 8:37am | IP Logged | 4
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I was 16 when it came out, and pretty much just getting out of comics.
I enjoyed the series itself (heroic sacrifice always makes be tear up), but it was unnecessary and, at the end when the New Earth came up, a bit confusing. I never found the Multiverse confusing, even when I was 5.
I've reread it since, and still enjoy it as a story, but it opened the bottle and the reboot genie got out.
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Robbie Parry
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 8:41am | IP Logged | 5
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Yes, I never found the multiverse confusing, either.
Some aspects of the multiverse were pointless (did we really need to be told that the Superman/Spider-Man team-ups had taken place on Earth-Whatever-It-Was?). But it never baffled me.
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Matt Hawes
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 9:39am | IP Logged | 6
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I didn't have an issue so much with "Crisis" itself, as much as what happened with editorial decisions afterwards.
Every time, it seems, DC does something like this ("Crisis on Infinite Earths," "Zero Hour," "Infinite Crisis," "Flashpoint'/"New 52") they are really sloppy in the follow-up. You'd think they would carefully plan out things, but it is obvious they don't.
That's why we got the problems after "Crisis" with Hawkman, Legion of Super-Heroes, and the Justice Society, where apparently no thought went into how to make those things fit in the new universe until it was too late, and then seemed forced and complicated.
The New 52 has its own issues, especially with that "5 year" thing, such as Batman having been operating for five years yet has went through as many sidekicks in that time.
I was more of a Marvel fan growing up, and "Crisis" was seen by many as DC's attempt to "Marvelize" their characters, so it appealed to me then. As I've gotten older, though, I appreciate the distinctions that once separated Marvel from DC, or vice-versa.
"Crisis" did have nice art, though!
Edited by Matt Hawes on 23 January 2014 at 9:40am
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Greg McPhee
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Joined: 25 August 2004
Location: United Kingdom
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 9:40am | IP Logged | 7
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At the time it seemed to give DC a shot in the arm that it needed. It brought me back to reading Superman which I had given up on almost entirely after the Wolfman / Kane run in Action, and made me a big Wonder Woman fan.
On the negative side it ruined titles that relied on the Multiverse or Earth-One history and could exist in their own niche like All-Star Squadron, Infinity, Inc. and Legion of Super Heroes. If anything it felt like Roy Thomas, Paul Levitz and Keith Giffen spent too much time trying to tidy up the state Crisis had left their titles in. In his LOC in his titles it seemed to become more evident through responses Roy had lost some of his zest and was now trying to salvage what he could.
The Multiverse was just too good a concept to lose.
****Funnily enough another title that seemed to lose its edge post-Crisis was The New Teen Titans, and it never seemed to recover.
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Jesse Perkins
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Joined: 14 April 2013
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 10:28am | IP Logged | 8
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If DC had simply revamped titles with top-notch talent and clear editorial vision, they could've generated buzz without relying on the Crisis gimmick.
-------------------
I agree with this statement.
Man Of Steel and Batman: Year One were the first DC comics I ever bought. Before those, my impression of DC was that they were basically a printed version of the Superfriends cartoon, and by age 12 I no longer had any interest in that. As far as I was concerned, Blue Beetle was always a DC character becasue he was in JB's Legends.
But the actual Crisis mini-series itself just seemed extremely confusing, and I never bought it, and didn't read it until years later.
Edited by Jesse Perkins on 23 January 2014 at 10:29am
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Brian O'Neill
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 10:44am | IP Logged | 9
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The only problem I had with CRISIS at the time was that it got rid of Earth-2. I didn't really care about the other Earths; they had either been created for the old JLA-JSA team-ups(with the exception of 'Earth-Shazam', although I think it was a JLA story that first shortened that name to 'Earth-S') and then had mostly been forgotten, or they were created to be discarded in CRISIS(DC had just acquired the Charlton characters, so it designated their world as 'Earth 4', and a futuristic 'Earth 6' was briefly seen, in order to introduce Lady Quark, a character who made few appearances after CRISIS).
Something bugged me about the Earth-2 Superman having to 'disappear' after saving the day. When I learned that JB was taking over Superman a few months after CRISIS, I wished that he could have made the 'modern day' Superman the son of the original!
I've read that the original plan was for CRISIS to end with issue # 10(the destruction of the multiverse), then the only comic DC would have published in the last couple of months of '85 would have been the HISTORY OF THE DC UNIVERSE two-parter. That would have set the stage for a complete relaunch of DC's heroes,all getting brand-new 'first issues' at the start of '86. Instead, DC scrapped that plan, and we got the jumbled results of CRISIS #s 11 and 12. Then came about 6 months of what was essentially the 'Earth 1' versions of the characters, until the summer of '86. Even the last of the 'Earth 2' titles, ALL-STAR SQUADRON, didn't acknowledge the change for several months, as Roy Thomas was allowed to finish a long storyline which featured the 'departed' Golden Age heroes, with a plot device that was 'preventing' the results of Crisis from taking effect!
If DC could have done a better job scheduling the reboots of Superman and Batman, CRISIS might have had even more impact. Wonder Woman, at least, stayed 'dead' until DC was ready to launch the post-Crisis version. Superman, of course, was 'allowed' to go out with an 'imaginary story', and Batman's solo title was allowed to go to # 400 before the post-Crisis 'edgy' version took over the following month, although # 400 hinted that Batman's outlook was 'changing' due to the events of that story...a 'transitional' moment that Superman never had.
Edited by Brian O'Neill on 23 January 2014 at 10:46am
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Vinny Valenti
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 10:47am | IP Logged | 10
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"That's why we got the problems after "Crisis" with Hawkman, Legion of Super-Heroes, and the Justice Society..."
It failed even sooner than that. At the end of Crisis, the heroes were clearly mourning the loss of Wonder Woman, Supergirl, and Barry Allen...yet just a few months later, Supergirl is forgotten (and years later a "new" Kara appears), and there's another "new" Wonder Woman with no recollection of the previous one. At that same time, everyone still remembered Barry Allen. Clark Kent was still a television reporter at the end of Crisis, also. Did they ever explain this? I mean, they went out of their way in Crisis to say "continuity matters!", so it's a fair question when you hold them to that...
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Greg McPhee
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Joined: 25 August 2004
Location: United Kingdom
Posts: 5089
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 11:07am | IP Logged | 11
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I thought Batman was mishandled by Denny O'Neil after Crisis. Whereas, Superman and Wonder Woman (seemed) to have a fairly clear direction, Batman was all over the place. Both Batman books at the time went through multiple writers, and seemed to lack focus. Maybe then, as it is now sales were the bigger driver, and O'Neil did drive sales up (helped by the movie and the death of Jason Todd), but I think I preferred Len Wein's tenure as editor.
That said we did get great runs by Barr/Davis and Grant/Breyfogle under O'Neil.
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John Byrne
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Joined: 11 May 2005
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 11:13am | IP Logged | 12
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"Reboot"/"Relaunch" is another way of saying "Fans have disposable income."Take a character like Superman. Before MAN OF STEEL he was "rebooted" many times, the character I "met" in 1956 being very different from the one who graced the pages of ACTION COMICS 1 in 1938, and the one who was in the books right before the reins were handed to me. But the reboots in days of yore were subtle and organic. There was no hoopla when Superman started to fly. His "oath" against killing was introduced retroactively, not as an "event". In those early days, the closest you're likely to find to "event marketing" as we know it today was the introduction of Robin in DETECTIVE COMICS 38. EVERY issue was an "event" in those days, you see. There was no reason to announce it on the cover. In fact, it was extremely foolish to do so, as it effectively also announced that the OTHER comics were NOT events, and not worth bothering with. Before the Seventies, it was highly unlikely you would ever have heard anyone asking what was a good "jumping on point" for a title. They ALL were.
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Topic Closed)
