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Michael Casselman
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 14 January 2006
Location: United States
Posts: 1246
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 11:20am | IP Logged | 1
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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
--------------------------- I've heard this before, but it seems so implausible to be true. WIth DC putting out about 10-12 comics a week, I can't see them releasing only those two issues over two months. "So, boss, we have this idea... y'know all the revenue we generate quarter to quarter with these funny books... well, how about we purposely only release two comics in the last two months of the year. Sure, we'll have a light final quarter earnings, but, boy, we'll all have our shit together when it comes to continuity!" "Security will be along to help you box up your personal items..."
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4620
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 2:44pm | IP Logged | 2
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Crisis for me was a good jumping off point. I found the mini-series itself to be a poorly-written, gimmick-laden fanboy wank-off. At that point it had become clear that killing off a major character would generate a nice bump in sales in the direct market, and Crisis was filled with wall-to-wall superhero deaths in an attempt to cynically milk that sales base. And the overall concept of Crisis was poorly-planned, poorly executed, and completely unnecessary. At that point I was starting college and the amount of free time I had for comic reading had dwindled dramatically. Crisis was one of the things that led me to decide I'd rather put the comic-buying dollars I was still spending into back issues rather than DC's new product.
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Dave Phelps
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4184
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 9:37pm | IP Logged | 3
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Short version: At the time, I loved the Crisis series itself and my feelings for the changes ranged from wholesale enthusiasm to general indifference, depending on the character. Most of the characters I had strong opinions about/fondness for (Firestorm, the Outsiders, etc.) were left unscathed by the Crisis, and the new versions of several major characters "fixed" some of the things that bugged me about the old versions. Since then, I've read a lot more Silver/Bronze Age DC, so I have more affection for some of the things that were lost, to the point where I wish more could have been preserved. In terms of history if not in the day to day of a given series, anyway. But then you have situations where I love both the multiple Earth Justice Society and the single Earth Justice Society and I don't know what to think. :-)
Long version: I was about 13/14 when Crisis came out. I'd been reading comics for a few years by then (equal parts Marvel and DC), assisted by my paternal step-Grandmother who'd give me a pile of comics everytime I saw my Grandparents. She wasn't particularly choosy about what she got for me so I had a pretty wide range of exposure to the DCs of the time, from Action Comics and Amethyst to Warlord and Worlds' Finest. I noticed the Monitor popping up at random occasions, but didn't pay much attention to ads so the first time I knew the series existed was when I saw #1 on a spinner rack. I got it because I really liked Batman & the Outsiders and Crisis #1 had Geo-Force on the cover.
The series itself won on tonnage, especially when paired up with the Who's Who series which was coming out at the same time. Every month I got to "meet" a gazillion new characters so I was in hog heaven. Some weird bits I didn't really notice at the time but in hindsight are fairly questionable - see what the Anti-Monitor's "weakened" power blast did to Wonder Woman in #12. I still really like the series (heck, I've bought two hardcovers of it), but I'm not sure how much of it is nostalgia and how much is objective appreciation.
When you get down to it, the only thing the series really did in and of itself was take away the Multiverse. And what I appreciate about Crisis is that they did it by doing the "ultimate multiple Earths story." One last full-on embrace of the concept. (That was one of my annoyances about Flashpoint - the series they used to wipe out the multi-generational DC Universe did it by a tacked on reboot at the end of an alternate reality story.)
I liked the multiverse, didn't find it too confusing, and kind of missed the Golden Age Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman. But at the same time, I really liked having the Justice Society on the same Earth as the Justice League. It made the team more "central" to the DCU and it gave them a more direct role as inspiration for the "modern" generation, from Superman on down (which had the added benefit of giving characters like Superman and Batman an opportunity to show a more deferential side, which I think helped make them seem "younger"). So while the merge set them up as cannon fodder for Zero Hour, overall I think the merger helped get them some respect in the long run. Of course, it's also true that Crisis gutted my beloved All-Star Squadron, but that was more because of TPTW at DC wanting to Embrace the New. So all of the sudden Roy Thomas was discouraged from using actual Golden Age characters (not just the retroactively wiped out ones), which made the All-Star series pretty pointless. If DC had gone with the original notion of leaving the book in its own corner with the Golden Age intact, or failing that, had only forced him to ditch the members who had "modern day" careers (i.e., Superman, Batman, Robin, Wonder Woman, Green Arrow, Speedy and Aquaman), it would have been fine. Heck, I think Roy would have gotten a kick out of recasting some of his old favorites, ala All-Star #64.
Creatively, I liked most of the reboots. I preferred the George Perez Wonder Woman to the Pre-Crisis version. I preferred the John Byrne Superman to the Julius Schwartz one. I liked the Truman/Ostrander Hawkman. I liked the Cary Bates Captain Atom. Both Pre and Post-Crisis Batman worked for me. Most series didn't really "derailed" to me. Donna Troy was probably the worst hit, IMO. For the Legion, Superboy hadn't been much of a player in the series for a few years at that point, I thought Paul Levitz took the opportunity for a "Death of Superboy" story and knocked it out of the park, and I disagree that losing Superboy "killed the backstory." For one thing, IMO the key part of the origin was the three kids saving RJ Brande, not the namedropping of Superman during RJ's pep talk. For another, you could leave the speech unchanged and it still works on the metafictional level. So whenever Waid and Giffen claim they "had to reboot the Legion because they couldn't use their origin anymore", I think they're full of crap.
At the same time, since the 80s I've soured on the notion of reboots in favor of purer "look to the new while leaving the old stuff alone" revamps. Perez would have had to skip the "naive" period with Wonder Woman, but he could have introduced the notion of her being an "ambassador for peace" without it. Retire Katar and Shayera and give Ostrander's Hawkpeople new real names and not too much would have been different there. Ditch some of the more dodgy aspects of the backstory by the time-honored tradition of ignoring it. But if you want a "new young Flash," I definitely prefer introducing a "new young Flash" over de-aging Barry Allen. The latter is just the worst of both worlds to me because you effectively lose the pre-rebooted character since you don't want to "confuse new readers". (A phrase I will forever loath...)
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John Byrne
Grumpy Old Guy
Joined: 11 May 2005
Posts: 133317
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 9:44pm | IP Logged | 4
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...de-aging Barry Allen...••• Who should not have aged in the first place. Looking back on the Seventies it's hard to believe so many mistakes were made WITHOUT a conscious plan -- culminating in CRISIS which, of course WAS a conscious plan. Well, a plan.
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Chris Durnell
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 26 February 2005
Location: United States
Posts: 1235
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 9:55pm | IP Logged | 5
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I think Crisis should have ended with the creation of a new Earth where everything was together, but not acknowledge any characters from the existing Earths crossed over into the new world. They should have kept it open that Earth 1 and Earth 2 still existed, but never confirmed it. When the time was right, they would have the opportunity to reveal that everyone's Golden Age and Silver+Bronze Age characters were the same as ever.
It would have saved so much trouble later on.
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Dave Phelps
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4184
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 10:00pm | IP Logged | 6
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The Barry Allen mention was intended as more of a hypothetical than an actual situation. Basically, he was an established professional from Day One. So if you wanted, say, a college age Flash, you could either reboot the series and start off with a younger guy calling himself Barry Allen or you could call the new guy something else. My opinion is that the latter is better since that way you also have access to the original Barry if you needed it. Opinions vary, of course.
(But, having read all of the Barry Allen Flash, I'd disagree that Barry was aged all that much during his run. In the early days he wasn't much of a "swinging single," so marrying Iris didn't come across as much of a change for him. And bumping off Iris pushed him back in the dating pool, so he almost seemed younger (albeit sadder) after that. Of course, everything pre-#321 was retroactive for me so I wouldn't have your perspective on it.)
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Jason Czeskleba
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 30 April 2004
Posts: 4620
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 10:54pm | IP Logged | 7
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I never got the impression Barry Allen had aged across the course of the 70s, and I don't think anyone at the time intended to suggest that he had. The problem of course was that in the late 60s all the Teen Titans were abruptly aged from being around 12 or 13 to suddenly being 18. And then when Wolfman and Perez started the New Teen Titans series they began aging them even more, to the point of being in their early 20s. So there was this weird situation where Batman, Green Arrow, Flash, and Aquaman were apparently not aging, but their sidekicks were. It was possible to ignore the late-60s one-time sudden age spurt, but it was harder to ignore the ongoing aging being done in the NTT book (which was a mistake in my opinion).
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Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2364
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 11:50pm | IP Logged | 8
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I remember enjoying CRISIS at the time, but there were so many missteps afterwards that it turned out to be my jumping off point--though delayed by a number of months as I got more and more disappointed by all the patchwork-ness of it all.
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Matt Reed
Byrne Robotics Security
Robotmod
Joined: 16 April 2004
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| Posted: 23 January 2014 at 11:54pm | IP Logged | 9
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I've said it many times here before, but I'm a Marvel guy. I followed DC sporadically, mainly Batman titles and the occasional Superman, but nothing with regularity. Until The New Teen Titans. More than likely that was because it felt so much like a Marvel title in the DCU. Loved that early stuff by Wolfman and Perez. So when Crisis came around, I was hooked. I haven't read it in an age. I'm sure it doesn't hold up as well as my memory thinks it does, but that's fine. I enjoyed it a ton for what it was at the time and not knowing enough to think better. In fact, it was the "jumping on" point for me with Wonder Woman, Blue Beetle, Firestorm and The Blue Devil to name a few titles, so it's a time I remember fondly.
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Eric Jansen
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 27 October 2013
Location: United States
Posts: 2364
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| Posted: 24 January 2014 at 2:57am | IP Logged | 10
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CRISIS ended up ruining my favorite books at the time:
NEW TEEN TITANS--By removing Wonder Woman's history, that completely messed up Wonder Girl and then we had to suffer through a revised origin (explanation) for her, and then horrible redesigns. (Troia? Really?) Ironically, CRISIS by Wolfman and Perez ended up ruining Wolfman and Perez's major DC accomplishment.
LEGION OF SUPER-HEROES--One would think that removing Superboy from the Legion wouldn't really affect things too much, but somehow it really derailed things and we ended up with way too many reboots, all worse than what they were replacing.
ALL-STAR SQUADRON--Eliminating so many Earth 2 heroes like the original Superman and Batman, poor Roy Thomas had to reinvent his Earth 2-based books into weird things that there was no reason to care about.
INFINITY INC.--This was my favorite book before CRISIS hit and I think there could have been a whole Earth 2 imprint, with this, the Huntress, Power Girl, the Spectre, and the JSA at least all carrying their own books. But removing Earth 2 ruined the origins and the raison d'etre for both the Huntress and Power Girl, and who needed this team taking over for the JSA when the JLA now filled that position?
I don't know if there was some rivalry going back to their days at Marvel, but the Wein/Wolfman-led CRISIS really ruined everything that Thomas was doing at DC.
Edited by Eric Jansen on 24 January 2014 at 3:17am
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Robert White
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 16 April 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 4560
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| Posted: 24 January 2014 at 3:36am | IP Logged | 11
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QUOTE:
| I've said it many times here before, but I'm a Marvel guy. I followed DC sporadically, mainly Batman titles and the occasional Superman, but nothing with regularity. Until The New Teen Titans. More than likely that was because it felt so much like a Marvel title in the DCU. Loved that early stuff by Wolfman and Perez. So when Crisis came around, I was hooked. I haven't read it in an age. I'm sure it doesn't hold up as well as my memory thinks it does, but that's fine. I enjoyed it a ton for what it was at the time and not knowing enough to think better. In fact, it was the "jumping on" point for me with Wonder Woman, Blue Beetle, Firestorm and The Blue Devil to name a few titles, so it's a time I remember fondly. |
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This is pretty much my story, though I didn't start regularly reading comics till around 1986, just after Crisis happened and Post-Crisis was heating up. Even then, I rarely read anything DC as I was obsessed with Marvel. Only retroactively, probably in the early 90's, did I get around to actually reading Crisis. I liked it mainly for Perez's brilliant art, but having no knowledge of Pre-Crisis DC, I had no emotional connection to the characters.
Recently I've been exploring Pre-Crisis DC and my opinions have changed over the years. While DC certainly needed an infusion of new creators and ideas (One need only to look at Superman's pathetic sales pre-JB to see this.) it didn't need a wiping out of their unique take on the superhero universe to do it.
What I would have done is simply let Byrne, Miller, etc, do their thing with the existing characters but do it in a very soft way. Allow them to organically move the characters as they were in 1985 to where they needed to be in 1986. Also, if the DC universe was really all that hard to understand, why not release a History of the DC Universe, similar to what they did anyway, explaining how Earth-2, etc, works for all those Marvel fans that followed JB over?
Edited by Robert White on 24 January 2014 at 3:36am
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Ed Aycock
Byrne Robotics Member
Joined: 05 May 2004
Location: United States
Posts: 1004
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| Posted: 24 January 2014 at 8:41am | IP Logged | 12
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I was 13 when Crisis started. Since they had been building up to it for a few years at that point (though the Monitor seemed to go from a bad guy supplying supervillains to ... The Monitor), I was interested in it. As a standalone story, (and it read very well without needing to read the crossovers) with the story by Wolfman and art by Perez, it was indeed a beautifully, epic work that was extremely entertaining and touched the entire Universe. (Except, of course as JB has mentioned, Captain Carrot) I felt that the years afterward were a bit messy although again, the Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman reboots were all extraordinary and will we ever get to see such talent on those three heroes again? And then it just got messier and messier. At this point, I don't even know who anybody is supposed to be.
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Topic Closed)
