The Days DC Comics Died…By Drowning In Commercial Excrement.

First we had the great volume 1 of DCs Who’s Who that showed us the villains and heroes of DCs 50 year history.  In fact, this was the ground work for Marv Wolfman’s and George Perez’s -along with inkers  Mike DeCarlo, Dick Giordano, and Jerry Ordway- Crisis On Infinite Earths. 

 

Crisis was the series supposed to sort out 50 years worth of DC history into solid continuity.

 

This was the series in which Barry Allen’s Flash died.  That really did make an impact on fans and it was a real shock when Supergirl was killed off.  What was it now…”Heroes will live.  Heroes will die.  Nothing will ever be the same again.”  We saw the crew of The Haunted Tank and many others that fans had come to know and love killed off.

In 1985 that was almost the equivalent of…well, was there anything it was equivalent to as far as comickers were concerned?  Distribution was still poor in the UK so when brother Mike (Knowle Chapter) and I stumbled across an issue in a newsagents one day it became a quest to get the other issues.  There will never ever be fan reaction to a comic event now that there was in 1985.

Marv Wolfman did leave a “get out” loophole in Crisis, as he mentioned in his CBO interview. So there was hope…

Of course, DC said “**** continuity!” even as Crisis ~12 was being distributed.  Lois Lane, a two part mini series by the great Gray Morrow appeared.  Out of continuity. This is something we would see again later as John Byrne’s Doom Patrol (a great series) was allowed to be “out of continuity.”

In fact, even as Byrne was “rebooting” the Superman series and others were “rebooting” older characters for new DC the continuity the continuity was slipping.

Now do not misunderstand me, comic publishing is a business and publishers are there to make a profit.  But up until 1985 DC was struggling.  Its faithful long term fans were getting older and in some cases getting a life (I’ve heard of this).  DC, like Marvel at the time, were dying.  DC and Marvel began trying to buy in creative talent that would bring a new angle to their comics.  Under Dave Gibbons the Green Lantern Corps was a joy.  Then there was…there was…Watchmen.

There was nothing wrong with Watchmen -it was the sensation of the time.  I’m not sure what story Alan Moore is coming up with these days (he has so many) but the characters were originally meant to be the recently purchased (yeah, uh, all above board and legal) Charlton Action Heroes.  However, DC did not want them immediately killed off (it waited to do that and reboot them years later when it became clear just how, uh, “shady” Charlton deals were). There is an interview where Moore stated he was sorry for what Watchmen did by being successful: everyone wanted to write and produce negative super heroes.

As it stands, Moore and Gibbons did a great job and it is not the fault of either man that less creative leeches just tried copying.

But DC, with Crisis, hopping quickly back to the main subject, had cross-over fever.  I recall, before collecting all the series, finally paying twice the cover price for an issue of Action Comics billed as a “Crisis On Infinite Earths cross-over”.  I read through it.  Once…twice. I turned to Mike and told him I didn’t get it -there was only a panel with Superman looking up at the sky and mentioning its strange colour. Yes, that was the cross-over.

DC executives began to employ more illegal Hispanic cleaners to try to cope with the excessive drool of greed.  Then someone at DC had the guts to say it out loud: “Boys -we can milk those geek ******* for every red cent!”

They twisted.  they toyed.  They issued more volumes of DCs Who’s Who so you knew which character was which now in the DCU.  Oh, let’s not forget the pointless cash in that was History Of The DC Universe in 1986 to, uh, set you right on continuity by telling you what had happened in Crisis!




In 1994, we had another crisis series with multiple cross-overs, and by this time I had quite playing DCs game like many others.  I didn’t even buy Zero Hour -it was sent to me by someone who wrote “Enough is enough! I’m finished with DC!”




Hal Jordan, the former Green Lantern was now the mass killer called Parallax and to be honest I can’t even be bothered checking how many issues there were. It stank. It was another cross-over money spinner and I could not believe other comic fans were still falling into this.

There were always glimmers of hope as the odd series appeared but then got rebooted.  Anal regurgitation is probably the best way to describe it.

Then we had…Identity Crisis in which DC adopted the rape and murder of a character as worthwhile entertainment.  We also learned that the Justice League had been secretly lobotomising it’s enemies for years.  This piece of crap showed us how the good guys were no better than the villains -psychotic, fascist criminals and killers.  I stood in the middle of Travelling Man Bristol and raised my face and fists to heaven and yelled:

“BRIAN MELTZER SUCK MY BIG FAT ARSE!!”

I actually have that tattooed on my right buttock.





And the crap rolled on down the sewer.  I’m sure I’ve missed some crises out -the ‘death’ of Superman (who fell for that?) as well as Batman having his back broken which ended his career as Batman (if he’d asked, the fans would have told him to just wait until he got rebooted in a few issues) -it was at this point that my afore mentioned big fat arse spoke to god…god not from the original Bible which DC and later Marvel rebooted to make it more modern and relevant but the third rebooted God DC presented (I may have been ill at the time and imagined it all but I am sure it happened. I think.).


Then, Infinite Crisis, which I just found buried in a box and re-read.  There’s 30 minutes of my life I’ll never get back…until I’m rebooted.

Not using Wolfman’s loophole, or they may have been in a twisted way, what DC did was smear its legendary original heroic icons -the original (Earth 2) Superman and the original (Earth Prime) Superboy with several layers of shit and turn Superby into a twisted killer. Oh, and Superman was an accomplice for the most part.  The parallel Earths that had vanished during Crisis On Infinite Earths for continuity sake suddenly re-appeared. Cross-over money-spinning crazed heaven was back (God from the Bible was not in this one as someone suggested Charlton Comics may have sold him to DC less than legally).

52 Earths.

 

If DC comics had been clever they could have made another money-spinner out of that alone.  Oh. They did.

 

Yes, one new comic each week for 52 weeks after which DC had a big party to celebrate how clever they had been to produce a weekly comic -the UK and other countries had been doing that for over a 100 years by then. But let’s not spoil DCs greedy little moment.

 

Any erectile disfunction amongst DC executives soon vanished as the cash worked far more effectively than a viagra pill (whatever that is).  DC executives rolled around on boardroom floors and tables naked, rubbing sales figures into each other.

 

But that was done and dusted and what a mess it left.  What could possibly be the next follow-up?  No, I’m sure DC would draw the line and –what the—?!!  After 52 what happened? One Year Later happened.
There isn’t a “crisis” in that title??



And on it went.  But if you thought Infinite Crisis and its explanation had finally sorted things out well you simply have not gotten the point I’ve been making.

We had, of course, Flushpoint Flash Point…No. never even looked at it. Is Barry Allen back as the Flash or dead again? Is he a killer now or does he sit back and drink lots of probiotic yoghurt?  Arses need to know.

I never followed the 52 series though I did manage to get the trades very -VERY- cheaply. The art varies from very good to excellent to piss-poor at the turn of a page.   1 Year Later I never went near.  Identity Crisis I just did not like the artwork on at all.  However, despite their plots and all they entail, all the other series’ had excellent artwork which is what pisses me off -Infinite Crisis had some knock out art.
DC rebooted all of its series with the flagship title, Justice League of America, being the eipomy of not having the slightest clue what you are doing while attempting everything to screw more money out of…well, they cannot be “fans” because if they were…what would they be fans of if everything changes completely each year?

JLA was pure crap.  I’m told one Batman title is quite good but I buy very few, hardly any, DC comics now.

52 reboots what next -a series with cross-overs explaining what really happened to create 52 universes?  hahahahaha-choke.  WHAT??!!!  Oh, you are sticking a toilet plunger up my arse!  I’ll just check and prove you wro—-

oh.

Hey, there is only one guy to blame here. Dan Didio. He seems to have had sewerage pipes diverted into DC offices when he got washed up as the new boss.

I think Howard Chaykin summed it all up a couple years back at a Bristol Expo when an audience membered said DC seemed to have no real continuity now and it was all over the place.  Chaykin, gentleman that he is, responded:”Fuck continuity!”

No. Fuck DC.

But so long as suckers buy and cheer as the next con comes along DC will still rip them off.

Until Darron Northall writes and Paul Ashley Brown produce Return Of The Zine Zone Zoot Suit Crew In Crisis On Multiple Exploitatives…

Make Mine….can I say “Black Tower”?