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Ed Love
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Joined: 2004 October 05
Location: United States
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 7:34am | IP Logged | 1
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And, somehow had a couple of kids working with him as Robin... or is he on his third one now in less than five years?
Frankly, that preview doesn't excite me at all. The Bat costume is overly complex and works against the artwork being readable and clear. What's lost is the aspect that the costume is meant to spook crooks, not just intimidate them.
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Brian Joseph Mayer
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Joined: 2009 December 10
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 8:33am | IP Logged | 2
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It only matters if you think about it too much. Time has been one of those conventions of comic books I knew to give up as a kid and I never needed back to contionue enjoying them. You should never compare a timeline given by business men in a press release to seeing how things play out in a comic book. Business men will always suck the fun out of anything. I largely ignore them and just enjoy my books when I read.
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Kevin Brown
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 8:54am | IP Logged | 3
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And, somehow had a couple of kids working with him as Robin... or is he on his third one now in less than five years?
********************************************* Not less than 5 years. Apparently Batman has been around for a long time in this new DCU, he was just more of an "urban legend". I am still saying that DC is keeping Thomas Wayne alive after Flashpoint and that he operated as Batman for years before Bruce took over. Obviously I could be wrong, but the way things are seeming to shape up here, it seems to "fit".
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Ed Love
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 8:56am | IP Logged | 4
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In some ways that suspension of disbelief has to be a game played by both the creators and the readers. I am willing to suspend my disbelief as long as they don't call attention to the fact. In this case, everything they are doing with Batman and his relationship with the reboot fights against what they want me to accept.
And, my counting was wrong... he'd be on his FOURTH Robin in five years unless some of those Robins were also urban legends. Teenage sidekicks are something that modern sensibilities has to fight against to begin with. Batman and Robin works because it's an iconic relationship at this point, an accepted conceit by itself of the genre. However, a steady stream of them becomes a caricature and joke, it calls attention to the unreality of what it's asking readers to ignore, to suspend their disbelief over.
How is this less complicated and going to be appealing to those new readers they want to bring in? If anyone's history needed streamlining at this point, it's Batman. Instead there are four books with him as star, he's in two Justice League books, then a Batwoman and Batgirl book, and four different books featuring four different boys who are/were Robin... oh and a black Batman sponsored by Bruce Wayne. You're someone who is aware of who Batman is and want to read a Batman comic, where do you start? And, God help you, if your kid liked the recent B&B cartoon and wants to read a Batman comic.
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Brian Joseph Mayer
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 10:48am | IP Logged | 5
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"How is this less complicated and going to be appealing to those new readers they want to bring in? " It all depends no how much attention they draw to it in the book. Right now they are drawing a lot of attention to the fan market because it is the anal retentive types that need to know so much of how could this happen or how does that relate to the other thing now. If they can come up with an out of story answer to appease them, they possibly win over readers and bring them back. For the casual reader, they won't care.
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Ed Love
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 12:13pm | IP Logged | 6
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"in the book"? It's there before the readers get that far. Again, look at how many Batman books and Green Lantern books being offered. Completely impenetrable to a casual reader. Almost all of your casual readers know Robin as Dick Grayson (unless they've seen recent cartoons). You really think they aren't going to care when they pick up "Batman and Robin" and it's some kid they never heard of who's also Batman's SON? I'm a comicbook and continuity fan and I find them too complicated to bother.
You have DC talking out of both sides of their mouths here. They give all sorts of rationales for the reboot and changes being made to the characters but is thrown out the window when it comes to other characters. Just like all the talk about their "iconic" characters whom they are giving more "modern" costumes, when what is a "modern" design today is dated tomorrow. I've long come to the conclusion that all Didio knows how to talk is spin, largely true but only in a skewed type of way. Either that, or he really just does not know what it is he's talking about or why the company does the things it does but he has to say something.
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Brian Joseph Mayer
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 12:22pm | IP Logged | 7
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I think you are confusing a casual reader and a fanboy. Why would a casual reader even think that Dick Grayson is Robin? Why would a casual reader even know who Dick Grayson is or was? Fanboys tend to need continuity and history and explanations. I am a casual reader. I just need to know that Robin is Batman's partner and they are beating up the badguy of the month. It's pretty simple really. The talking out of both sides of their mouth, well that is DC trying to ive explanations for the fanboys to keep their heads from exploding. Casual readers don't read these websites, generally, and they don't care what DC Business Man has to say, they only are interested in Batman.
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Ed Love
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 2:33pm | IP Logged | 8
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Why would a casual reader think Dick Grayson is Robin? Let's see, because he was for four decades. That's who was Robin on the television show and cartoons that were in syndication for decades. In fact, that's who Robin was the last time he appeared in the Batman movies. Outsiders coming in, if they know who Batman is, they probably think they know who Robin is. I don't expect casual readers to be total ignoramuses. Casual readers don't necessarily mean people that have never read comics nor ever been exposed to the characters before in their lives. It means they might pick up an issue here and there. They might have last read comics when they were in their teens, ten, twenty years ago and are checking them out again. But, their last Batman comic may have been when Jason Todd was killed, or know the character only through other media.
Back when Jason Todd was killed and it made the news, partly because most people outside of comics thought that it was Dick Grayson getting killed. Never mind that Dick hadn't been Robin for years and a "Dick Grayson" Robin (and Batman) had already been killed without a blip. Some of the stories did catch on and bury somewhere in them that it was a different guy being killed off. But, then that aspect was hardly news. Non-comic readers knew Dick Grayson, not Jason Todd. Since then, Dick Grayson has appeared in two movies and there's all this news about this being a fresh start and for people to check back in on the ground floor... and find out that Batman is on his fourth Robin who is actually his son.
It's the fanboys that will know the minutae, that can explain who Damian is, who his mother is and why she's not around and how this previously unknown bastard kid is suddenly Robin. Thus, it's the fanboys that will be drawn in. The casual reader they are claiming to try to be enticing... that sound you heard was them closing the door on the way back out.
Edited by Ed Love on 2011 July 20 at 2:36pm
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Michael Todd
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 4:16pm | IP Logged | 9
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My Dad who is 83 years old and who read comic books as a boy knows that Clark Kent is Superman, but didn't know Batman is Bruce Wayne. I'm sure that he probably did as a child but he has forgotten it despite all the media that Batman has appeared in over the decades. I'm sure that he has no idea of what Robin's real name is.
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Craig Bogart
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| Posted: 2011 July 20 at 9:08pm | IP Logged | 10
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A friend told me recently that he was reading a Batman reprint volume to his young son which included the story wherein Dick Grayson leaves for college, effectively ending the Batman/Robin partnership. He was surprised by the date of the issue; he realized that Dick Grayson has never been Batman's partner in our lifetime (he was born late 1969, me in mid-1970). Someone more familiar with DC may correct me, but it appears he's returned from time to time but never as a permanant fixture in the series. Strangely enough, I still think of him as the "proper" Robin and was hoping that status would be restored with the reboot. No such luck.
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Dave Phelps
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| Posted: 2011 July 21 at 2:38am | IP Logged | 11
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Dick went directly into a solo back-up series, so he was still in the public eye as Robin pretty much continuously. But yeah, from that point on he was more a "recurring character" in the Batman strip proper rather than a fixture.
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Stephen McGrath
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| Posted: 2011 July 21 at 6:34am | IP Logged | 12
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I apologize in advance since I've lost track of this thread a while back... My main issue with this "rebootinviginumberfest" is the fact that it only goes halfway. The powers-that-be have already said that not much will change, continuity wise, with books that were "succeeding". Green Lantern...Batman to a great degree...things like that. Superman? Justice League? Teen Titans? TOTAL REBOOTS. Buuuuut...GL? Batman...don't worry...we'll figure it out. Seem to recall having to clean off the fan in a similar fashion back in the 80's when DC did the same thing. Hawkman, anyone? Anyway...doesn't bother me that they're doin' it...I just wish they'd REALLY do it, and not half-ass it like they're gonna...but...gotta make sure Geoff Johns has his cake AND can eat it, too....
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Topic Closed)
