I flipped through both JL & Flashpoint.  I did like warm scene at the end of FP.  And Thawne's rationale actually made sense without coming off moustache-twirly.  I didn't buy them, though I hope droves do.  My LCS guy said he was open until 2am after the midnight release and it was basically a party.  He said he was only one of a handful of Indiana comic shops to even do a midnight release.

I hope that this move really captures a new audience (my 13 year old is not interested, but he's more of an X-Men & Spider-Man guy).  I am not opposed to this new direction as I was at first, but me'thinks I'll focus on my backissues.  I give them credit for doing something new, whereas Marvel seems to just be chasing Disassembled's tale for the last 10 years.... 

I was just reading some of the relaunch discussion in DC's Batman thread and ran across an interesting comment: Batman is light hearted because Killing Joke and Death in the Family have not happened yet.  And it struck me: nor should they this time around. 

If DC decides to not kill Jason and/or not paralyze Barbara, my faith in this will be renewed.  Renewed is not really the right word, as in I did not have much faith to begin with.  My faith will go +1.

So now I'm thinking: what other blights upon the last 20 years should they undo?  I would love to see them defy expectations and avoid that continuity so everyone is not just waiting for No Man's Land, Knightfall, RIP, et al, 2.0.

If DC decides to not kill Jason and/or not paralyze Barbara, my faith in
this will be renewed.  Renewed is not really the right word, as in I did
not have much faith to begin with.  My faith will go +1.

----

Barbara will still have had a past as Oracle in the new Batgirl series.
As far as I can tell, Batman's continuity will be the least impacted. Of
course, with the new five year scale, that means Batman is on his
fourth Robin (fifth if they keep Stephanie's run) in five years.

A backhistory as Oracle I can buy, but that doesn't mean they have to (or should) paralyze her and put her in the chair.  This is such a golden opportunity to break away from those kinds of continuity anchors. 

If they just start shoehorning in Post Crisis events as bullet points to this new backstory, I'll be highly disappointed.  Wasted opportunity.  LOST style flashbacks which are essentially cliff notes of past events are not really all that new-reader friendly.

Re. Robin;  Yeah, head scratcher.  If Batman goes through Robins that fast, who in the world would want to be Robin? 

If it were me, I'd have Dick breaking away from Bruce to become Nightwing at that 5 year ago JL #1 point (the both of them having operated in secrecy in Gotham prior to Superman going public).  Bruce can then take on Jason, then Tim.  See no particular need for Stephanie as Robin.  Tim leaves to go be Red Robin with the Titans and Damian comes in as new Robin at the 5 year later (current) mark that the solo titles will presumably pick up with this month.  That way, you're really using two Robins (Jason & Tim) in that 5 year span in between.

*Yeah, what Brad said.

Oh, there's probably no conflicting info here, Kip.  I'm fairly uninformed about the shape of the new continuity, I'm just thinking aloud.  I had not heard one way or the other before now, so I'm just armchair booking.  If wishes were fishes...

I am actually surprised that they have been open about these un-changes.  Seems like there'd be more suspense if they just let the books tell the story.