“Heroes in Crisis” Limited Series by Tom King & Clay Mann to Start in September

[kjn]

I still think she's at the top of the list for trauma survivors even though there are dozens or more characters who have died and come back to life. Your point about her being an architect/designer for Sanctuary rings true, but King's obviously playing the trinity as the top three dogs. It would be nice to have had someone knowledgeable about counseling techniques and in the field on this.

What I think bugs me about Sanctuary is that Tom King included some modern therapies for PTSD, like exposure therapy, but did so in a extremely simplified and simplistic way, from what I can tell as a layman. And also that not all mental issues are PTSD, not even among superheroes. The one that Superman exposed most certainly isn't PTSD. And Arsenal might suffer from PTSD, but it's complicated with addiction, and would thus need treatment of both.

[Confuzzled]

I can see Babs' emphasizing with Harley's loss, and I guess she might miss Ivy since they were on two different versions of the Birds of Prey together.

(Will King actually remember that? Who knows).

Babs and Ivy also had two adventures just by themselves fairly recently (Simone's Batgirl Annual #2 and Rebirth's Batgirl #6).

[Frontier]

Babs and Ivy also had two adventures just by themselves fairly recently (Simone's Batgirl Annual #2 and Rebirth's Batgirl #6).

I know, that's what I was mentioning.

The latter issue was around when Ivy was moving into hero territory and joined Harley and Selina in the "causes trouble but gets away with it because she's good at heart" club.

[skyvolt2000]

Here’s hoping those sales keep dropping!

Not going to happen. It is an event and those tend to stay over ordered no matter how many copies sit on shelves as I have seen.

That is mainly due to hopes of one of the future issues will attract new readers who will go back for the rest.

[Talon1load]

Not going to happen. It is an event and those tend to stay over ordered no matter how many copies sit on shelves as I have seen.

That is mainly due to hopes of one of the future issues will attract new readers who will go back for the rest.

I don't know man, the sales are already not great and still dropping. These sales are almost half of what Metal was at this point.

[married guy]

I don't know man, the sales are already not great and still dropping. These sales are almost half of what Metal was at this point.

My local store in Brisbane has a pile of every issue sitting on the shelves at the moment (except #1).

[TheSupernaut]

So what do you guys think is the culprit for the declining sales?

[LordUltimus]

So what do you guys think is the culprit for the declining sales?

Poor word of mouth.

[Doctor Bifrost]

So what do you guys think is the culprit for the declining sales?

That's an interesting question. I think it's well-crafted, from the point of dialogue, pacing, and the like. And the art is good.

But the question is: Would readers who are fans of (or simply interested in) these characters think it is a good, necessary, or interesting story for these characters? I have no argument with those readers who do, but mainly I don't. And certainly starting the series with the slaughter of some characters that I like, and have been hoping to see get better treatment than they have since the start of The New 52 days, turned me off, and didn't predispose me to give the long, slow series a lot of slack. (Although I am still reading it, and I'm willing to be wrong. And frankly I don't expect those deaths to still be in effect at the end of the series.)

I also find the set-up very artificial: an AI-driven, holodeck-style "therapy center" created using - to the extent I remember correctly - Superman's Kryptonian tech, Batman's computer skills, and Wonder Woman's compassion. Look, I know those three are "the Trinity," but that's basically a publishing/marketing concept. It doesn't mean they're the best three people on DC Earth to create this.

If they're going to write a story (or stories) about superheroes dealing with trauma, I'd prefer to see the characters dealing with it in their own ways, in their own storylines. Reifying the concept into "Sanctuary" and then building a murder mystery around it - well, I'm not saying that a priori it's a bad idea. But it's not working so well for me.

[married guy]

So what do you guys think is the culprit for the declining sales?

To be fair, I don't think the sales are too awful.
I'm sure DC are pretty happy to sell 80+ thousand copies a month.
That said, I get the feeling we're going to see a pile of these books in the $1 bin before too long.

[CaptCleghorn]

I also find the set-up very artificial: an AI-driven, holodeck-style "therapy center" created using - to the extent I remember correctly - Superman's Kryptonian tech, Batman's computer skills, and Wonder Woman's compassion. Look, I know those three are "the Trinity," but that's basically a publishing/marketing concept. It doesn't mean they're the best three people on DC Earth to create this.

If they're going to write a story (or stories) about superheroes dealing with trauma, I'd prefer to see the characters dealing with it in their own ways, in their own storylines. Reifying the concept into "Sanctuary" and then building a murder mystery around it - well, I'm not saying that a priori it's a bad idea. But it's not working so well for me.

The direction I'd want to see this take is for the lesser names to actually call the Trinity out and let them know they aren't all that and a bag of chips. Bats, Supes, and Wonder Woman all have their reps and for the most part those reps are earned, but this is them trying to do something they are amateurs at. Kryptonian tech and Amazonian magic are black boxes capable of coming up with any plot you want to fill in the blank on. Batman there's at least a chance of sticking in the real world, but the other heroes and select villains would, no should, be looking at these three with doubt and asking questions.

[BohemiaDrinker]

And certainly starting the series with the slaughter of some characters that I like, and have been hoping to see get better treatment than they have since the start of The New 52 days, turned me off, and didn't predispose me to give the long, slow series a lot of slack.

That is sort of the point for me as well.

If this series was to make an impact, it should have killed some editorial darlings. Then I'd believe in it's importance/necessity. But killing characters that editorial has been trying to get rid of for 12 or so years takes me out of the story and into the meta story. As soon as I saw Wally's body, it ceased being about these characters issues and became about "what Dan Didio pulled this time". And then it ceased interesting me.

If the bodies were, say, Babs Gordon or Jason Todd or Hal Jordan, I'd buy it. They screwed Wally again? Meh...

[kjn]

The whole setup feels more for shock than real emotional impact. See also one dead person is a tragedy, a million is a statistic.

A closed room puzzle murder mystery involving superheroes is a great idea. But here they killed almost all of the likely suspects on day one, and the mystery is much more "how" than "who". And the virtual reality and artificial nature of the setting makes the "how" more a matter of what the writer tells us than a proper puzzle.

A story involving mental health and trauma among superheroes (and supervillains) is also a great idea. Except that the a lot of the character work feels shallow or based on poor understandings of the characters (I reacted at the Wonder Woman booth session, and others have complained about the Booster Gold characterisation). It'd need a much deeper understanding of the characters and a lot more screentime to dig into each character. And of course that not three-quarters of those characters have been killed off in the first issue.

Having a single murdered superhero who mattered in Sanctuary (but not Babs! The poor woman has already been fridged twice by DC!) would give all the emotional impact needed. Let Batman be a proper detective for once, interviewing everyone, investigating everything, drawing conclusions. Dig into the characters. Take a hint from how Tynion handled Detective Chimp in Justice League Dark #5 and #6. Use the therapy and counselling sessions to discuss "why".

[tako]

HiC #7 coming soon to a website near you

[Badou]

So what do you guys think is the culprit for the declining sales?

This even feels more gimmicky than most I think. It hasn't been marketed or constructed well. So interest has fallen off for it compared to other more recent events. Plus I think everyone is still focused on Doomsday Clock and that kind of casts a shadow over the whole DC line where that feel like the "main event book" and events like HiC feel secondary.