Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities DC comics have lost me

I've been in a comic funk overall. Been doing vacations, been working hard, been having more family time. Haven't posted in ages here or anywhere else.

I am interested in Marvel somehow. While I don't like some things they do they DO have my interest.

DC? What happened? I am so over Crisis stuff. After LOVING Geoff/Frank's Action Comics I admit I am not that interested in the current Legion. I am waiting for Legion of Three Worlds.

Teen Titans lost me soon after Geoff left. The new Atom and Blue Beetle while are solid don't interest me at all. I was a fan of the old characters instead. I AM still interested in BOOSTER GOLD.

Green Lantern? It was on a serious high and then another boring retelling of Hal Jordan's origin. I'll wait for the next big thing to happen. The Corps still have my interest.

Superman/Action also lost my interest after the Legion stuff. The Flash is back to average again.

JSA while I love (like the Legion) I am not digging the Gog stuff. Other titles lost me long ago and I never checked out again. I usually collect anywhere between 3 to 7 titles. I read most of the titles from a friend that collect about 80 comics a month.

I've been digging some Marvel more. Writers leaving DC also affected me. Rucka leaving Checkmate made me lose interest in the title. Dixon leaving Batman and the Outsiders, etc.

Batman is good but this crossover just overwhelmed and I will read it when it's all over.

If it wasn't for Geoff Johns DC would die it seems. I have been enjoying JLA.

Didio should get fired.

I agree on your last sentence and second many of your other feelings. Didio should be looking for another job if only for the "Countdowns story does not fit into Morissons Finals Crisis story at all" debacle.

My personal feeling though is that Marvel doesn't fare much better - I liked Civil War but did not care much for anything which came after - only enjoying New Avengers nowadays.

My reading goes into Independent comics right now - lots of old stuff like Valiant Comics, Moores WildC.A.T.S., Love & Rockets, Stray Bullets and some new stuff like Ennis' "The Boys" or Project Superpower or Noble Causes. Going to get into Graphic Novels like "Box office Poison" and "Freddie and me" which I just bought.

Storywise, DC often annoys me. Apart from "Sinestro Corps War" and the recent Legion stuff in Action and from Shooter, there hasn't been much to be satisfied with in the last few years...

I'm still a DC fan though interest is waning... I've been dropping titles like Wonder Woman and Infinity Inc and never bothered to pick up others like Batman/Outsiders (the first Outsiders book I have ever skipped). I'm skipping all Final Crisis stuff except for the FC mini itself and the Legion/3 Worlds mini.

But I *am* excited-- VERY, in fact-- about upcoming stuff like Ambush Bug and Power Girl. The TERROR TITANS arc on Teen Titans was surprisingly good, and I'm still digging JSA.

There needs to be a long period of event-free stuff and a focus on individual title quality control.

I keep saying I don't like the new DC, but my pull list keeps growing. Maybe I'm self-delusional (or a masochist).

Currently pulling:

LSH, LSH31C & FC:Lo3W - obviously

All Star Superman - I enjoy it every time it comes out, but I don't find myself waiting impatiently for it (which is good given its schedule)

Batman - I'm liking Morrison's spin, but its been up and down for sure.

Booster Gold - It's been fun, but the payoff for Blue and Gold was disappointing (all the teases of the villains here and in JLA/JSA just for... that?). Jumping off before Chuck Dixon gets on.

Final Crisis - Loving this, actually. Just pitch perfect follow up to Seven Soldiers.

Infinity Inc. - This is a tough one. I love the characters, love the concept, but the execution has been draggy. Read the whole series in one shot last week and it flowed much better.

Justice Society Of America - Still a favorite but man is it just crawling along.

Madame Xanadu - Not sure what to think after one issue, but it has promise.


On the horizon I've got: Reign In Hell, Secret Six, Ambush Bug: Year None and Power Girl.

Here's hoping things pick up.

Which we won't see as long as Didio is running the show.

Which is how I'm choosing to see this, as well. MUCH more enjoyable that way.

Still enjoying Booster and JSA, looking forward to Secret Six, AB: YNone and PG, and wondering why I'm sticking with LSH and WW.

So what is this "Seven soldiers" all about - never got into that cause I never cared much for Morissons writing...?

Jorge, sounds like you're going through what I went through six months ago. DC frustrated me so much that I started feeling disgusted with comics all together. So I've switched my attention to some independents and Marvel, which like you, is also appealing to me much more right now.

Even though Civil War was horrible, Secret Invasion IMO is quite excellent thus far. There are also a variety of suprinsgly excellent comics to chose from right now, like Hercules, Captain America, Daredevil, X-Factor, and yes, even most of the Avengers titles. Not everything they do is great, such as some of the X-relaunch and One More Day, but overall across the line they are far superior than DC right now. That's probably the first time I can say that since I've been old enough to buy them off the rack.

DC, on the other hand, has become a joke. The output is IMO as bad as the early 1990's Image/Marvel craptacular era, and DC Comics has become antithetical to the spirit of the company it once was during the Golden, Silver, Bronze and 80's ages. Some books are still good, such as Green Lantern, Batman, Booster Gold. Yet some of their usual good books are suffering, such as JSA, while the large majority of them are major dissapointments, like the new Atom, the Superman books, Nightwing, Green Arrow & Black Canary and many others.

So in an effort to remind myself that I do in fact still love comics, I've tried to get into other companies, genres, etc. (while also reading old stories such as Simonsin's Thor run right now). I'm been picking up Vertigo stories (which is 100% a different company in spirit, thank God that Didio has no control there), and the new House of Mystery has been excellent thus far, as is Fables always. Virgin Comics has some interesting books, some hits, some misses. Image continues to release quirky books that get little love yet have immense quality, like the Walking Dead and others.

Stick with it Jorge, and like you, I'll be sitting this era of DC out until someone with some more brains, heart & soul and quite frankly, balls, comes forward and takes the reins.

I gotta agree. Friend of mine lent me his first few issues of Invincible and some other recent Image series and I've been following them more loyally than the stuff I used to grab from DC and Marvel...

While my pull list is still huge, (I order three months ahead from Mycomicshop.com) my must read NOW pile is shrinking...

LSH is no longer the first read, it's been replaced by Trinity and FC, then Captain America and Secret Wars, and a few independents, like Bomb Queen, Dynamo 5, and Noble Causes.

Though I agree in general about the decline in quality at DC, I think there is a lot of good stuff and more on the way. I disagree very much with those who think JSA's gone south. I guess a lot of that has to do with the length of the Kingdom Come-related storyline. But I've found it quite entertaining thus far and like all the new characters that are popping up over there.

I also feel the Super-titles are in for a Renaissance with James-frickin'-Robinson on Superman and Geoff really starting to hit his stride on Action. I'm also planning to try out Supergirl again once the new creative team starts. Robinson and Johns are working with the new writer to make her more relevant, and Jamal Igle is a very talented artist. So there's hope.

I'm also looking forward to Robinson's new Justice League title coming soon. It looks like its gonna be a hoot! Hell, Robinson returning is reason enough to keep hopes high.

Still don't understand why people here are hatin' on Shooter's LSH. I'm enjoying it a lot more than I've enjoyed LSH since the DnA days. Frankly, I think most people here thought Shooter'd rehash all his old characters stories and concepts, and when it turned out he wanted to build on what was already there and tell new stories instead, it left people cold. People will deny it 'til the cows come home, but I believe it more every day.

But, cheer up--I think Didio's days are numbered, so I'm sure things'll look brighter soon.

I also have high hopes, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I'm a huge fan of Robinson.

The current Legion, much as it pains me to say this about Shooter since I admire him greatly, is really not doing it for me. And its mainly the writing which I find boring, uneventful and with little soul. I also find the same problem with Teen Titans and McDuffie's JLA these days. Moments of quality but in an otherwise slow crawl of mediocrity.

I hope Didio's days are numbered and its always a little embarrassing to admit wanting someone to lose their job. But he's reached a level that is far beyond other EiC's in the past, and far beyond Joe Quesada. He simply appears to not understand DC as a company and has succumbed to every excess in comics history.

We are definitely from different planets you and I. I've been following the book from nearly the inception.

"Boring" is so subjective, that I can see any person having that POV.

"Uneventful?" I could make a long list of the goings on since Shooter started writing, that thought I cannot fathom?

"Little soul," I suppose depends upon from where one finds their soul. Little can, could, or should be debated. Personally, these stories resonate with me. They have quirked my imagination by hitting my SciFi buttons, provided some good laughs and most importantly, sparked my interests in learning more about the characters. Seeing comics stories as a decades long process, I expect characterization to go slowly. Like most though, I do suppose I wouldn't want to have to wait for a graphic novel's amount of material to be supplied before an encounter is completed.

I'm liking LSH well enough and am especially enjoying new takes (that make SENSE) on old powers.

But like Lardy I'm surprised to hear about so much disinterest in JSA. It's rawking as well as ever for me. The giant Gog thing (DOES he really wanna save the world?) is thus far very interesting to me, and I like how Johns is tying in stuff from Kingdom Come and Final Crisis to the storyline.

I'm a little surprised at the WW ennui. I think the storyline going on now is a good one- complete with guest-starring turns by 1970's sword-and-sorcery types not seen in some time.

And a group of intelligent talking gorillas living in WW's apartment- that's fun.

Is it Nemesis as a love interest for Diana? Personally, I find him more interesting than Steve Trevor ever was.

Or is it the tacked-on Diana Prince ID that's part of the character once again? That I can understand, as I'm sort of reading all the D.P. stuff through half-shut eyes.

The art's pretty terrific, I think.

Anyway, I pretty much agree about the state of DC. I can't bring myself to purchase every issue of TRINITY, though I want it to succeed. It hasn't sparked my imagination yet.

TEEN TITANS is getting interesting again, I think. (Though it could be that I'm just a sucker for KID ETERNITY 'news'- which was promptly undermined by the writer).

I'm still hoping that TITANS will find its footing. (I'm ignoring your laughter.)

JSA-- I'm beyond ready for the end of KINGDOM COME-ization, though I've enjoyed each issue as it comes out.

JLA is never as great as I want it to be- but then it never has been (for me).

I want more METAL MEN, more FREEDOM FIGHTERS, a new BLACK ORCHID mini or back-up feature, an INFINITY reunion, follow-up to YOUNG ALL-STARS... nothing indicates DC's going to be moving in those directions.

That said, I'm looking forward to Giffen's DOOM PATROL, if that's actually going to happen. And the SECRET SIX, whenever that comes out. MANHUNTER's worth checking out, if it maintains its old 'spark', that is.

Well trying to explain it won't do it much justice, but essentially the over-arcing story is that in order to stop the conquest of Earth by a mysterious race known as the Sheeda, the equally mysterious "Seven Unknown Men", need to put together a team of seven soldiers. Unfortunately the Sheeda know this and neutralise these teams before they can interfere (the Sheeda move through time). So the Unknown Men put together a Team who never actually meet each other or even know they are on a team.

As a result each Soldier plays their part in stopping the threat, each in their own mini-series done in a different style. Though the characters never meet (well, two do in the end), events from one story will have repercussions in another and in the Final issue we get the fight with the Sheeda from each character's perspective.

The relevance to Final Crisis is in the Mr. Miracle series, where Shiloh Norman is the title character who's a world famous celebrity escape artist. During an escape attempt from a mini-black hole, Shiloh encounters a strange being called Metron who shows him a War in heaven that alters reality. When he returns he begins having encounters with beings that appear to be more than they seem (The New Gods), eventually running into "The Dark Side" who uses Anti-Life to put him in the "Life Trap" where he dies over and over again, usually in horrific ways (Kalibak certainly lives up to his "Cruel" moniker). Anyway, eventually Shiloh frees himself only to be killed by "Dark Side" while setting his part of the plan to stop the Sheeda in motion. The last page of Seven Soldiers has him escaping his own grave.

Basically Mr. Miracle introduces these new aspects of the "New Gods" and given a better (and creepier) feel for what they are all about. It certainly informs a lot of what is happening in Final Crisis.

Between Secret Invasion at Marvel and the various Countdown books at DC, I'm buying fewer comics than ever before, and enjoying them more.

I used to think that you had to stay on top of general continuity in order to enjoy other books within a given publisher. Then I find out that Death of the New Gods apparently never took place, and Marvel doesn't bother to have a story that doesn't leave you saying "Who was that?"... So I read what I enjoy, and say to Takron-Galtos with the rest.

At least, as long as books like The Twelve, LSH, Usagi Yojimbo, PS238 and Knights of the Dinner Table continue to get published.

Well, I guess where we differ is entirely subjective then, BB. Rather than subject the entire board to a Legion topic here in Gym'lls, I'll leave it at that. Needless to say, I feel mighty let down by Shooter's run thus far, and I love both Shooter and the Legion.

As for JSA, I'm not going to cancel it or anything, but I find the whole Gog storyline a little drawn out right now and having a hard time staying interested in it. I think its suffered from too many new faces too soon, but I do hope Geoff can do some more with them eventually.

To touch on my own Wonder Woman ennui...

It's not that I wasn't enjoying Gail Simone's run, it was good thus far and the art was great as always. I really like Nemesis as a love interest. And talking gorillas? Look who you're talking to. The only thing I was less interested in was the Diana Prince ID, and even that was actually different and neat for Wonder Woman of the past couple decades.

Yet I dropped the book. There's a simple reason why. Wondy, unfortunately, is kinda like Batman and Superman for me, in that, while I like these characters fine, I just don't have any great urge to follow their title. There's too many other ways to keep up with these top-tier characters.

And with AMBUSH BUG, SECRET SIX, POWER GIRL and the new JUSTICE SOCIETY INFINITY or whatever it is on the horizon, room had to be made on the pull-list.

Which is why I didn't respond to CK's question. You did a much better job than I'd have ever thought possible, rouge. Kudos!

I haven't cut WW yet... but I'm wondering(heh) why not, exactly. I'm enjoying it enough for all the reasons you mentioned, but it's just not a "must read" for me. I read the last three issues in one sitting, AFter reading (sometimes REreading) all the other titles in the shipment my most recent issue of WW (with the Lopresti Claw cover?) came with... not damning necessarily, but not exactly a strong endorsement, either.

There IS good stuff coming out of DC. Just not the titles the company seems to be pushing.

I'm about the same with Wonder Woman as Pov is. Its pretty good but its just not wowing me.

I agree, DC does have some good stuff still. Just a large quantity of what they do is beyond crap and bordering on offense at how truly awful it is, and the generally direction of the company is akin to the direction of Michael Jackson's career after that Pepsi commercial.

I'd like to see DD's head on fire, myself...

... and other random body parts as well!

I got to sit down with him on Sunday at San Diego. And I had been waiting all weekend to give him a verbal bitch slapping the likes of which only a drunken STU could comprehend.

But I liked the guy. He has a genuine love of comics. He's not trying to destroy the books, merely bring in more readers in every possible way. That said, I think he's grasping at straws. New readers are almost a myth these days. And this thread alone shows how much the industry is hemorraghing fans. Didio is making mistakes, but he does seem to be trying to do good.

In my limited experience with him, I do not doubt his enthusiasm or intent... only his executions (pardon the pun).