Comics are awesome.

[andersonh1]

http://www.comicsalliance.com/2011/06/0 ... nimal-man/

Some of those look interesting, some not so much, but all I've got to say is that holy crap, John Constantine is on a Justice League team. That is one of the crazier ideas I've seen in a comic.

I used to enjoy Animal Man when Morrison wrote it, and for a little while afterwards. I don't know that I care enough about the character these days to buy a new series, and that's the book out of that list that caught my attention the most. I guess "none of the above" interests me out of that list.

I find all of the new #1's irritating though. Green Lantern is only up to issue 61 or so... is it really necessary to reboot? Green Arrow is only up to issue 10 or so. Xombi, a book I don't read, is only 3 or 4 issues into its run. And on the other end of the spectrum, we've got books like Wonder Woman and Adventure Comics, which made a big deal out of picking up numbering from previous runs, or all previous runs combined. Action Comics has just hit 900 issues, which is pretty impressive. All of this is being junked in favor of new #1s. This lack of consistent numbering/renumbering/trumpeting longevity only to do the opposite a year later just tires me out. It doesn't entice me to read the books in question, because there's such a lack of stability. How much of what I read and invest my time and money into is going to mean anything a few months down the road?

I had wondered if this would be like the Zero Hour 0 issues, where we got a month of all 0s, and then books went back to normal numbering. I don't think this is quite the same though, given what I've been reading. Anyone heard anything different?

[Sparky Prime]

DC is so absurdly cyclical at this point that saying their books will continue to progress is something of a contradiction.

Not at all. They aren't changing everything with this "revamp", so there's no reason they can't continue to progress the stories, as they've already indicated with many of the announced relaunch titles.

"Final Crisis" changed at least as much as "Zero Hour" (aka "Crisis in Time") did.

No, it did not. As I keep saying here, "Final Crisis" was not written to be a big retcon event. Morrison even said in interviews when asked if "Final Crisis" would have any reboot or continuity changing ramifications that: "No, it's not going to be that at all. That sort of stuff is what people do when they need to fix continuity, and we don't need to do that here".

"Zero Hour" on the other hand was written to try to fix several problems and inconsistencies they had with the stories after CoIE, and thus it made several big changes to characters and titles.

On another note, if you were going to drop an "Avengers" title, would you drop "Avangers" or "New Avengers"?

Personally, I'd choose to keep the book with the characters and storylines I like the most. But I know you're not a character-centric person.

[Dominic]

The only real fix post-"Zero Hour" that I recall was Hawkman, and we all know how well that worked.


I decided to drop "Avengers". When I sat down and thought about it, I realized that I had a hard time remembering much of what happened in either series. Granted, they are both filler. But, that is pretty damning. But, "New Avengers" is mid-arc and has Bendis writing Power Man, so it has a slight edge. (The fact that it is the one most likely to get cancelled in the next reboot also helps. No need for a filler book to be an indefinite ongoing.)

My current pull-list:
-Transformers
-TF Heart of Darkness (concluding in a few weeks
-Cobra
-New Avengers
-Moon Knight
-Batman Inc


Dom
-keeping that list to 5 until the "unread" pile is largely gone. This will take some time.

[Sparky Prime]

The only real fix post-"Zero Hour" that I recall was Hawkman, and we all know how well that worked.

Some of the biggest changes thanks to "Zero Hour": they completely rebooted the Legion of Superheroes ("Zero Hour" changed a lot of alternate reality/future timeline stuff), changed Batman's origins so that he never caught his parents killer (something "Infinite Crisis" changed back), Guy Gardner discovered his alien heritage (which "Green Lantern: Rebrith" undid), Connor Hawke was introduced as Green Arrow's son, and as you said, they tried to fix Hawkman's history. And there were some other tweaks to origins and continuity beyond that as well.

[BWprowl]

My best friend likes to read whole books online (like the entire Harry Potter series). I personally can't stand to stare at a computer screen for that long. Besides, I like being able to sit down and read an actual paper with words on it as opposed to staring at some screen. I really don't understand why everyone is flipping their nuts over things like Kindle. And just to make sure I understand this device: It's basically a device that displays the contents of books in text format on a screen and that's it? What does the thing only have like 1 meg of memory? Cause that's about all you would need for text documents. So it's hundreds of dollars for a device that is so limited it can only display text and that's it? No videos, no mp3's or music, no internet access? Honestly, what's the point? If you're gonna shell out that much money on something just buy a damned laptop and download books in pdf format and then get the added capabilities. /rant.

E-reader screens are actually a lot nicer for text-format stuff than regular phone/laptop LCD screens. They've got that e-ink stuff that results in a softer, easier-on-the-eyes, more eh...'book-like' look. More and more of them are also gaining the ability to display web pages (in or out of color, depending on the model), as well as other options. It's also a serious matter of convenience for some people; I'm not enough of a book nut to warrant the need for an e-reader (though the idea that some of these things can do manga now has me at least mildly interested), but some people go through so much reading material that one of these things really is more convenient than a pile of paperbacks every other week.

Just thought I'd throw that in there, since you seemed to think you might have the whole e-reader thing misconceived, and I felt like clearing it up, since a friend of mine did the same thing to me when I talked down the devices myself a while back.

[Onslaught Six]

I've got one thing to say about DC right now:

RRRAAARRGHHHHHH YOU ARE SO STUPID WHY ARE YOU SO STUPID WHY

[138 Scourge]

I take it you just saw that DC's new "Hawk and Dove" series features the art of Rob Leifeld?

Yeah, this might be a bad idea after all.

[Dominic]

I admit, I might actually buy that "Hawk and Dove" book. Maybe if we reward enough stupid behavior, DC will eventually just cut their own damned throats?


Okay...

New Avengers #13:
Made the decision to drop "Avengers" yesterday. This issues wraps up the previous arc. The link between the past/present settings is the McGuffin being fought over in the past and used in the present. Bendis is continuing what looks to be a stylistic riff on capes and tights books, complete with a "what is Hand going to do next?" plot. Good use is made of Spiderman not having his spider-sense and of the recent Osborn series. While it does not read like a standard "Avengers" title, (though no less than any other "Avengers titie for the last decade or so), "New Avengers" is a damned good "team of a-listers" book.
Grade: B/C


Dom
-is still so far behind on comics.....

[Onslaught Six]

I take it you just saw that DC's new "Hawk and Dove" series features the art of Rob Leifeld?

Yeah, this might be a bad idea after all.

Just this whole thing. So stupid. So so stupid. So much stupid.

[138 Scourge]

And now, the only comic from DC that I'll be buying: http://www.comicsalliance.com/2011/06/1 ... an-comics/

I'm pretty happy to ignore DC on most things, but there's no way that a Grant Morrison Superman comic is going to come out without me buying it.