Tuesday, January 8, 2013

New Year, Old 52

I always seem to end up reading Marvel Comics.  Even as a kid.  But I always liked Batman and found Wonder Woman interesting but poorly written.  But it was Iron Man and Captain America that I would read over and over again.  I like the idea of Superman, but the actual Superman in the comics usually bored me.

As I got older, my tastes stayed the same.  I would dip into DC territory once in a while.  Hey Green Arrow got interesting for a bit.  Green Lantern got good for a while.  But mostly it was Batman that was worth reading.

So when DC announced the New 52 "reboot" of the DC Universe, I gave it a try.
I read dozens of their number 1's, and as the year went by I was reading fewer and fewer DC books.  I wanted to like Birds of Prey, but it went nowhere.  Flash has had great page layouts, but not a good plot to be seen.  Superman had all sorts of potential and just left me yawning.  Green Lantern (which I had been enjoying before the reboot) enslaved Hal Jordan to Sinestro and put me into blackest boredom.  Green Arrow just sucked... The only surprise was Wonder Woman, whose book has stayed very good all year by basically remaining independent from the rest of the DC Universe.  I am convince the Wonder Woman kissing Superman in Justice League is a different Wonder Woman than the daughter of Zeus who has been kicking ass in Hades and Olympus.

There were a few sparks of interest on Earth 2, but I'm not sure that book will ever stick with any of those characters long enough to make it really interesting.

And there has been Batman.  Batman, especially the Synder/Capullo series, has been fantastic!  I can't say enough about how good Batman has been.  That maze of the Owls sequence will go down in comics history.

But that's it.  Batman and Wonder Woman.

DC said this was a great time to jump in.  DC said we didn't have to know all the back story to understand these characters.  But it didn't turn out to be true.  The "reboot" didn't reboot nearly enough for me.  And the end result was kind of a wash.  I back down to reading Batman and Wonder Woman again.  Sorry DC.  I tried.  Maybe it isn't you.  Maybe its me?
Thankfully, there is still Marvel and other comics companies.
-- Jay

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