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DC Comics: Rebirth

I would add to that that Johns never intended Flashpoint to reboot the DCU as it did. His story was hijacked to serve an entirely different purpose, which I suspect is why there's a bit of dialogue in the Rebirth special how Flashpoint didn't cause the DCU to go dark like it did.

Right if you takeout the two page spread with Pandora in Flashpoint #5, you basically get another crossover story and not some reboot.
 
Lee and Harras were the point men for Nu52. They were the ones that had plans for Pandora and who dreamed up a crossover with the Wildstorm elements that had been incorporated into the Nu52 (which was never implemented after those books went into the toilet and were cancelled). You can pretty much chart the demise of that crossover with the diminishing forced appearances of the daemonites (barring Future's End). But Johns was absolutely not an architect for Nu52. His people on Firestorm and Hawkman were fired and their proposals tossed into the garbage. Snyder and Lemire only kept their jobs on Swamp Thing and Animal Man because DC had to have Karen Berger sign off on those books. Nu52 screwed with Johns longtime plans for the DCU. He was at best towing the company line by taking the Justice League job, but he was absolutely not some point man. His influence at DCU actually dropped after Nu52.

Rebirth killing Pandora is equivalent of Johns middle finger to all the Nu52. But it 's very clear now that he has disliked Nu52 for some time but has been massively passive aggressive airing his grievances.
Thanks for the post. I didn't know all that. I equate Johns with Bendis over at Marvel. Both guys have their fingers in so many properties, that when something big happens, I assume they are responsible.

I just saw the Pandora death, and I thought to myself, "Pandora is still around?" She dropped over the Earth after Trinity War and Forever Evil back in 2013, and hasn't mattered since. Hehe, I guess they needed that coda.
 
I like how everyone keeps acting like DC hasn't been some what dark for years.
You can trace both DC and Marvel going dark back to the same year, 2004.

2004 at Marvel brought us Avengers Disassembled, and at DC it was Identity Crisis. Things have been graphic and in your face violent ever since.
 
You can trace both DC and Marvel going dark back to the same year, 2004.

2004 at Marvel brought us Avengers Disassembled, and at DC it was Identity Crisis. Things have been graphic and in your face violent ever since.

I wouldn't say Marvel is super dark or "in your face violent". At least, I can read books from Marvel from, say, 2000 and don't see a significant difference in overall tone or violent then the books in 2004 or 2016. There are always going to be darker or more violent individual books, and imprints like Vertigo and Marvel MAX, but Marvel and pre-New 52 DC weren't haven's or darkness and ultraviolence or anything like that. Having a dark story or two doesn't make a comic company "dark". Its about overall tone to the universe, at least in my opinion.
 
You can trace both DC and Marvel going dark back to the same year, 2004.

2004 at Marvel brought us Avengers Disassembled, and at DC it was Identity Crisis. Things have been graphic and in your face violent ever since.

Yeah, lets just ignore the 90s grimdark period with its influx of anti-heroes why don't we.

Or how Joker and Green Goblin are probably responsible for making the Silver Age die screaming.
 
Yeah, lets just ignore the 90s grimdark period with its influx of anti-heroes why don't we.

Or how Joker and Green Goblin are probably responsible for making the Silver Age die screaming.
I forgot all about the 90s to be honest. That era is pretty much best forgotten. I can think of only a handful of titles that made it out ok during that time period.

Identity Crisis and Avengers Dissassembled did define much of the DC and Marvel universes going forward. And while both DC and Marvel have tried to wibbly, wobbly away those stories (although Didio tried to keep IC canon to New 52), you can still see the effects today.
 
The 90s period had a lot of posturing but generally nothing as violent what Johns himself wrote so he's difficult to take seriously as the saviour of 'hopeful' comics.
 
Well, Blackest Night did become Brightest Day.

But really the whole period from Countdown to Final Crisis and Final Crisis fiasco put a spotlight on Didio's incompetence and still the guy is in charge of making even bigger mistakes. Final Crisis--was a great story--it was the supporting material that made that whole endeavor a laughing stock.
 
True it is kind of funny that the guy behind Blackest Night is the guy everyone expectes to bring optimism back.
I mean - who can point me towards anything in this grimdark period of the 90s as bad as Superboy ripping off the arms of people or black adam poking his fingers through the eyes of the psychopirate in such a way his eyeballs fly towards the reader?

It's a lovely bridge Johns is trying to sell but i ain't buying
 
Well, Blackest Night did become Brightest Day.

But really the whole period from Countdown to Final Crisis and Final Crisis fiasco put a spotlight on Didio's incompetence and still the guy is in charge of making even bigger mistakes. Final Crisis--was a great story--it was the supporting material that made that whole endeavor a laughing stock.

Well, I thought that Final Crisis was terrible.Don't get me wrong, Countdown was a lot worse, and DiDio calling it "52 done right" is literally the stupidest thing I've ever heard of someone in charge of making comics say. But FC needed, what, two different series to even remotely make sense of the story (seriously, a Superman Beyond tie in was essential reading?) and it was pure, unadulterated crazy Grant Morrison. The Morrison where he really realized that his stories don't have to make any sense, because DC will pay him regardless.

I'd actually say that, comparing events, FC is worse then Identity Crisis. At least Identity Crisis had a story you could follow. FC was terrible and convoluted (Counbtdown gets to be the worst of all because of its length). FC was also responsible for (even though Morrison didn't write it) Death of the new Gods, which is one of the stupidest, most pointless worst mass character killing stories. I'd really say FC was incompetence from everyone, from DiDio to Morrison to most everyone in between (outside of the writer of the Legion of Three Worlds "tie-in", which was great).
 
I think this is the first time that I agree with you kirk55555, at least 90 percent. If you read Final Crisis as an "Morrisonverse" story and sequel to his Seven Soldiers, the story is well done. Treat it as out of universe the same way the Darkseid War should be treated and don't read all the tie ins and it works fine on its own. It is, however, something that never should have been connected to everything else that is going on. And that is DIDIO's fault 100%.
 
Final Crisis is an interesting out of continuity what-if story full of Morrison Madness, but as a major company wide summer crossover it was a massively bad idea. And the unfortunately and contradictory tie-ins just made it so much worse.

I thought Geoff Johns was the chief creative consultant for the DCU. How is he so powerless to set the direction?
 
Johns was working on GL (prelude to Blackest Night), JSA, Booster Gold and was setting the groundwork for New Krypton and Flash Rebith at the time. He had plenty on his plate. Plus, Final Crisis wasn't meant to be a big event for the year. Didio is responsible for overexposing Final Crisis with Countdown and the New Gods prior to FC's release. Morrison submitted a draft for FC back in 2005, when DC was doing Infinite Crisis. Based on that draft, Didio commissioned Countdown in 2007, since we all know he infamously stated he had 2006's 52. Didio also got Jim Starlin (Creator of Thanos and writer of Infinity Gauntlet and Infinity War) to write Death of the New Gods. Add to Morrison pretty much being able to write his own ticket at both DC and Marvel, there were no checks or balances with what he could do with his story.


Funny anecdote though. If you were reading Johns' Booster Gold series at the time, you saw this Easter Egg on Rip Hunter's chalkboard. Look at the one on the right.

tumblr_o7v9mhzgCe1r4pq4io1_1280.jpg
 
Who *IS* Doctor Thirteen?

The most absurdly stubborn character in DC comics. Seriously, The Spectre could turn him into cheese, and he'd still say its a trick, and Spectre did it with mirrors :lol:

On the off chance that the question isn't rhetorical, Doctor Thirteen is a paranormal investigator in the DC Universe (this is all pre-New 52, I don't know if he's shown up since the reboot) who doesn't believe in the supernatural. He started out as a back up in Phantom Stranger's first ongoing book, debunking ghostly cons like he was the scooby gang. He then went on to keep meeting actual supernatural beings like Phantom Stranger, and kept insisting that they were also just con men. It got pretty old, at least when it came to Thirteen's appearances in Phantom Stranger's book. His daughter who was introduced years later became a sorceress, and I never did find out how he reacted to that.
 
Been posted on CBR reguarding my thoughts on Nu 52 and I thought I'd share I'd share them over here too:


Personally, I've often thought that the problem with the new 52 versions of the main characters is a lack of imagination in that they reversed/condensed a lot of back history of the "Big Seven" (well Big Six, no J'onn) to set it up in the first place rather than develop new or existing younger characters. If the New 52 JL had - for instance - between made up of Superman II (either Kon-El or Lar-Zod), Wonder Woman V (Cassie Sandsmark, the "Daughter of Zeus"), Flash IV (Bart Allen), Batman III (Grayson)/Batman IV (Drake)), Cyborg (Vic Stone), Aqualad (Kaldur'ahm) and Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner/Simon Baz), maybe throw in Miss Martian as well, then you could have had the best of both worlds, a new younger line-up (apparently desireable) that you tell new, fresh different stories (including the authories' limited trust/support for the League) but still preserving the integrity of what came before.


Does that make sense?
 
So I wonder if they'll be giving Dr. Mahanttan pants? Or maybe he'll just look like a ken doll? I can't see them putting a anatomically correct naked blue guy in the mainstream DCU books.
 
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