TF Views

If you want to know why we're getting "Rebirth" from DC, it doesn't take much to figure out that poor sales are the issue. DC You was a failure, no doubt about it.

Things were bad for DC in January. How bad? With records going back to March 2003, DC had its second worst average sales on record of 21,845, just barely beating the March 2009 low point of 21,792. The Vertigo line had its lowest average sales on record by far: 6,832, beating the previous average low of 7,055 in March 2015. And the median sales for both lines was even lower: 24,624 & 5,802 respectively.

DC shipped twenty fewer comics in January as compared to December (74 versus 94). Two titles not shipping in January were two of DC’s top sellers, Dark Knight III and Justice League. They moved a total estimated 1,616,524 comic units in January, compared to 2,640,519 in December, a difference of over a million units!

http://www.comicsbeat.com/dc-comics-mon ... nt-bureau/

Holy crap, that is a drop.

I’m also told that the reason creative teams weren’t announced is that many were still being decided on. This kind of seat of the pants roll-out worked for the New 52, but not as well for DC You. The anxiety among observers is certainly understandable, and internally there has been a lot of disagreement as well.

Okay, now, I am worried. DC is doing this re-launch this year, and they have not even figured out who is running what series?

I actually disagree with the article that "seat of the pants" worked for DC in 2011. There as a spike in sales, and then a precipitous drop. (Artificial spikes are not "success".)

Readers dropped comics and more credible writers left the company because they were unable to function. This was not even a chance for younger writers to step up, as DC would not let them shine.

I’m told even some at Marvel are worried about the effects of Rebirth.

This should worry everybody.


Gonna stick with "Earth 2", assuming DC does not completely derail the series again. But, if DC cannot keep me through this year, it is going to take something exceptional to get me back.

Green Lantern #50
"Reflections"

I've been looking forward to seeing how this story would play out, with Renegade Hal coming face to face with his younger self, Parallax. I found the end result disappointing, largely because Parallax is written as confused, unreasonable and stubbornly hostile. Sometimes that is indeed the way the character was written, but it was always more interesting to see him as he was written during Zero Hour or Final Night, where some traces of Hal's old personality still remained, and he could exhbit some remorse or empathy from time to time. He's largely a very one dimensional ranting villain here, intent on killing renegade Hal and taking his place. A war of words between Hal and Parallax could have been good, but what we get is a fairly standard fight full of ranting and macho posturing. There is a bit of dialogue where Hal tells Parallax that there's a sickness inside of him, referencing the fear entity, and the entity manifests itself a bit in Parallax's physical appearance once or twice, and that could have gone somewhere. But it never really does.

The book starts out with a flashback to Green Lantern #48 from the 90s, where Hal, still in his older GL costume and with his broken arm, is kneeling in the ruins of the destroyed Coast City. The scene flashes forward to the modern day, with Parallax amazed that Coast City exists. He finds his brother's family in the park, flying a drone that Renegade Hal had given his nephew as a present. Renegade Hal warms Jim and his family to get to safety before confronting Parallax, who he assumes is a fake of some sort. They fight, Hal figures out that Parallax is really him, and just like Convergence, Parallax claims that he killed all 3600 Green Lanterns and took their power. Only he didn't kill any Green Lanterns other than Kilowog in the original story. Bad continuity? Retcon? Who knows? Parallax does refer to being from another universe, and the dialogue really does treat Hal and Parallax as two different individuals from different realities rather than one person at different points in his life. Parallax is overpowering Hal pretty easily, until Hal fires up the gauntlet and becomes a being of green energy, which disconcerts Parallax enough that he retreats, promising to find more power and return. The last page of the book shows energy-Hal telling his brother that something seems to be happening to him...

So, not bad by any means, but it's a missed opportunity to explore the character of Hal Jordan, and how he's changed over the years. Less action and more characterization was called for and it didn't happen.

andersonh1 wrote:They fight, Hal figures out that Parallax is really him, and just like Convergence, Parallax claims that he killed all 3600 Green Lanterns and took their power. Only he didn't kill any Green Lanterns other than Kilowog in the original story. Bad continuity? Retcon? Who knows?

There were a few more than Kilowog. While on the way to Oa, Hal also fought Ke'haan, Laira, Tomar-Re, Jack T. Chance, Kreon, Hannu, Graf Toren and Boodikka. After defeating them, Hal took their rings and left them to die in space. Course, they'd all be revealed to have survived, having been taken prisoner by the Manhunters, but Parallax wouldn't know that part. And once he took the energy from the Central Battery, any Lantern left in space or some hazardous situation would likely have been killed. So in Hal's mind, he probably feels he may as well killed them all.

Sparky Prime wrote:There were a few more than Kilowog. While on the way to Oa, Hal also fought Ke'haan, Laira, Tomar-Re, Jack T. Chance, Kreon, Hannu, Graf Toren and Boodikka. After defeating them, Hal took their rings and left them to die in space. Course, they'd all be revealed to have survived, having been taken prisoner by the Manhunters, but Parallax wouldn't know that part. And once he took the energy from the Central Battery, any Lantern left in space or some hazardous situation would likely have been killed. So in Hal's mind, he probably feels he may as well killed them all.

That's another thing... there weren't 3600 Lanterns at the time of Emerald Twilight. The Corps had just barely begun to be rebuilt.

When he fought those Lanterns you list he didn't kill any of them. In fact, he went out of his way to be sure they were alive when he left them without their rings... not that they wouldn't have died when the power ran out, or he took all the power from the battery. I guess I could read it as Hal thinking he had killed them all when he did that, but he didn't kill them when he fought them in space.

Kilowog: Can't let ya do it Hal. Can't let ya kill the corps. Can't let ya kill anybody else.
Hal: Kilowog! I didn't... didn't kill the Corps. Just took their rings, because... I needed their power. I left them enough to survive.
Kilowog: Fer now maybe. I know what yer thinkin' Hal. Yer lookin to get into the central battery again, so's ya can take all the power fer yerself. But what then? What happens to the corps members out in space, or maybe in a scrap somewheres?

It was likely a back-write to a run of comics that had been over-written at least once.


On a personal note...

Today, for the first time since last April (close to a year), my pull file is empty, save for a few tear sheets. Since April of last year, I have always had at least one unpurchased comic waiting in my file at the comic shop. Today, I grabbed the last 3. Next week, when new comics ship, anything in my file will be current. (My current pull-list is 12 series, and dropping,)

andersonh1 wrote:When he fought those Lanterns you list he didn't kill any of them. In fact, he went out of his way to be sure they were alive when he left them without their rings... not that they wouldn't have died when the power ran out, or he took all the power from the battery. I guess I could read it as Hal thinking he had killed them all when he did that, but he didn't kill them when he fought them in space.

I don't see that it matters if he didn't kill them in the actual fight or not. Either way, Hal is leaving them for dead. Despite what he tells Kilowog, there is no indication Hal went out of his way to make sure they were alive. All we see him do after the fights is take their rings and leave. And as Kilowog points out, once Hal takes the power from the Central Battery, any Lantern in space or whatever is going to die when they loose power. So even if Hal did make sure those he fought were still alive, he had to know they'd still die in the vacuum of space by just leaving them like that. It's a direct result Lanterns died by Hal becoming Parallax, and he knows it.

Green Lantern Corps: Edge of Oblivion #3
I guess Ethan Van Sciver is off this mini-series to work on Rebirth after this issue. Too bad, I've been enjoying his return to Green Lantern. We get an actual estimate for the end of this universe in this issue: four more days. The Green Lanterns are dispatched to look for ways to escape the death of the universe, while Princess Iolonde continues to lead another group towards Mogo. I wonder just how many of the Corps are still alive at this point? And will any of it matter, or will Rebirth wipe everything away? As Captain Marvel said in his Convergence issue, enjoy the moment while you have it. Who knows how long it will last? Kilowog and Guy fight over the apparent deaths of Arisia and Bd'g, and Guy has his ring stolen by the creepy villain at the center of the planet, leaving him wearing just his boxer shorts.

I have to say, I'm enjoying this series more than Lost Army, as good as that story was. I do wonder if we'll ever find out what happened to Krona and Relic, or if that's a dropped plot thread that will never be picked up again. And where are the templar Guardians? There's a lot to cover in the final three issues, and I don't know if this series will wrap up everything, or if the main Green Lantern book will do that. Or if it will all just be swept under the rug, which is entirely possible.

Whatever happened to Cowgirl, anyway? Talk about dropped plot threads...

Speaking of dropped plot threads, if Guy had his Green Lantern ring stolen, what about the Red Lantern ring he had in Lost Army? Last we saw of it, it had also become charged with Green energy after he was hit with energy from one of the local batteries...

I seldom have reason to post in this thread, but that may change. Anyway, picked up Superior Spiderman vol 1. I'm only 10 pages into this but so far, I'm REALLY liking it. It doesn't mess around with the premise, it jumps right into exploring what makes a good super hero (both in terms of intent and effectiveness). And the pacing so far has been great. We immediately see Doc Ock trying to best Peter Parker at being Parker in every aspect of his life. Not just as Spiderman, but being a better scientist and even wanting to be a better boyfriend to MJ. It's well written, the art is good (I never have trouble telling what's going on), and... yeah. It's good. I'm glad I made this my first story in attempting to get back into non TF comics.