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Charles Valderrama
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Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4831

Posted: 29 October 2013 at 1:08pm \| IP Logged \| 1

CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS was a miniseries i enjoyed at the time (George Perez at his finest!) but i see the trouble it caused.... DC should've done the series and afterwards just proceeded regularly without openly referencing it so many times in their books and with all the REBOOTS.

However, the mentality is to make everything an EVENT to sell the books.

-C!

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Jason Czeskleba
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Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4623

Posted: 29 October 2013 at 1:17pm \| IP Logged \| 2

Robbie Parry wrote:

I like the idea of ordinary people thrust into extraordinary circumstances. Like Peter Parker becoming Spider-Man.

Yes, you've pinpointed one of the key problems today's superhero writers have... their difficulty with the concept of a completely ordinary person becoming extraordinary through a combination of circumstances and their own hard work and virtue. Instead, heroes have to be somehow "predestined for greatness." It's not just superhero comics either... we see it in all the Star Wars retcons (Luke isn't just an ordinary kid, he's a "chosen one" with a genetically high level of midichlorians) or in the Abrams Star Trek.

One of Stan's few missteps on Spider-Man was revealing Peter Parker's parents were actually secret agents, taking away the notion that Peter was an ordinary (albeit intellectually gifted) kid who led a completely normal life prior to becoming Spider-Man. If Ditko was aware of that story, he must have been appalled. Fortunately, Stan seemed to realize it was a mistake, and Peter's parents were pretty much forgotten in the 20 years immediately following that story. Of course in recent years the concept has been revived and overworked and even made a key part of the latest film, much to the detriment of the character.

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John Byrne
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Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133334

Posted: 29 October 2013 at 1:33pm \| IP Logged \| 3

While neither is particularly preferable (or necessary), if forced to pick my poison I would rather have a reboot-and-start-anew over an in-continuity "Everything You Know Is A Lie!" revision that overlays a negative texture on past stories.

•••

The latter is real just a stealth reboot. By pretending the story is "in continuity" or a "retelling" rather than a reboot, publishers can slip a whole lot past gullible fans.

I often point to THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS and BATMAN: YEAR ONE as, in combo, a stealth reboot. In those issues, at more or less the same time I was being crucified for MAN OF STEEL, Frank changed the backstories of Gordon, Barbara, Alfred, Catwoman and even the Joker. But having been told one was "imaginary" and the other a "retelling", Batfans accepted all without a grumble.

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