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

[Rakzo]

Er, what is happening here now?

[Lee Stone]

Dude, think five minutes about this question and you'll arrive at the answer by yourself.

That said, people are making way too much of a fuss about this. A cover got changed. this happens almost monthly. It's not a censorship conspiracy.

True.
There's nothing wrong with not approving of a piece of work if it's being paid for.
That's what editorial is for.

And it's not uncommon for editorial to request multiple drafts and then pick one the best represents the title and/or story.

If the artist was being paid to be 'expressive of their own work', that would be different.
But in this case, they are being commissioned to do a job, which is to design a cover to sell the comic and the editors must agree on the final design.
And in some cases, the writer is included in the approval process.

This is hardly 'censorship'.

And I can see why King didn't want to use it.
The comic is pretty high profile and having a cover with a dead Poison Ivy laying in a provocative position would be tasteless. On multiple levels.
All the artist had to do was lower her butt. But chances are, the original draft wasn't shown, or if it was, it wasn't vamped up to that degree.

On the bright side, the artist will make a mint selling the original art and prints at cons. Especially with the extra publicity.

[LordUltimus]

Er, what is happening here now?

A typical conversation on the CBR forums.

[kjn]

Thoughtful attempt to reason around the Poison Ivy cover, her general history, and her role: The Writing on the Wall: Poison Ivy and HEROES IN CRISIS:

If we can accept the idea that Poison Ivy, as just one example out of the myriad of DC villains, is capable of being handled in a multi-faceted manner, I have to just ask: who thought she was more compelling as a dead figure than as anything else?

Who thought, having decided that ‘dead!’ was the most compelling means of advancing her story, that her death needed to be a cover?

Who thought, having decided that she needed to be dead and that her death needed to be zoomed in on across shelves and digital store fronts, that she also needed to be posed?

[byrd156]

Thoughtful attempt to reason around the Poison Ivy cover, her general history, and her role: The Writing on the Wall: Poison Ivy and HEROES IN CRISIS:

I would say this about most dead characters. There are few that had purpose and importance in death.

[Güicho]

Here is the cover. Sorry about the mark. Got it from google. Edit-if this is a spoiler then please add the picture in a spoiler tag. (I can't get pictures in spoiler tags on this site.)

Er, what is happening here now?

Apparently reverse Zorro is killing everyone in the DCU

[Lee Stone]

It's Superboy-Prime and it'll lead into EXtreme Crisis ClimaX.

[Green Ghost]

Thoughtful attempt to reason around the Poison Ivy cover, her general history, and her role: The Writing on the Wall: Poison Ivy and HEROES IN CRISIS:

Spot on!

I would say this about most dead characters. There are few that had purpose and importance in death.

Yeah, pretty much!

In Ivy’s case it is one of the worst kind of deaths, because it will just be there to motivate one singe character: Harley. She was her own character for years and was created 26 years before Harley but now got killed off so that DC’s favorite moneymaker can have a tragic hero-making moment.
It is sad to see an interesting character with so much untapped potential turned into a plot device without value.

Same goes for other characters who were killed for the sake of shock value too of course.

[OBrianTallent]

This entire series has for me, been a massive heart break. I'm not even sure of the correct word to use as there has been such a distaste from the beginning. For what could have been a great concept it has been marred as nothing more than a bloodbath of quite a few popular and even favorite characters. No matter how good the writing is, how great the artwork is...it has come across as nothing more than an opportunity to kill a bunch of characters for nothing more than a sensationalist attempt. I do hope that in the end, King and crew find a way to undo at the least a majority of what has occurred. As it is, I have dropped the series from my pull list. I was going to try to finish it, but the Ivy cover has done in what ever minimal interest i had. Maybe if it comes out great in the end, I can pick up the remaining issues in a back issue bin or something.

[skyvolt2000]

1. Poison Ivy fans
2. Wally fans
3. Feminists (and those branded as SJWs by other people)
4. Comicsgate (pissed off at the 1 & 3)

They can't be because they don't read Marvel or DC.

Ticked off fan bases would be

1) Wally West
2) Poison Ivy
3) Titan fans
4) Harley fans (to a point)
5) Anyone who is tired of death march books
6) Anyone who saw potential in any of the killed
7) Tom King fans-who understand he is WAY better than this
8) Fans of the artist who deserves better.
9) Folks who wanted King's original pitch
10) comic book stores who are seeing larger piles of this book unsold than the New Age books.
11) Fans tired of this quest for every person to have an Uncle Ben moment to get motivated. Especially when the one in question (Ivy) was her OWN person for years.

Why is that acceptable but objectifying female characters isn't?

You really want a image of a female being in a sex pose in a book with this death march topic?

Yes covers do get changed every month. We get that. Someone should have laid down the law and dismissed that one before it was finished or sketched.

I will put it to you like this-if that cover was included in the trade of this mess and somehow made it into CERTAIN schools. Because the librarian doesn't know comics and orders it because of the Trinity.
That book is BANNED. (Never mind the dead bodies everywhere.)

[LordUltimus]

They can't be because they don't read Marvel or DC.

Ticked off fan bases would be

1) Wally West
2) Poison Ivy
3) Titan fans
4) Harley fans (to a point)
5) Anyone who is tired of death march books
6) Anyone who saw potential in any of the killed
7) Tom King fans-who understand he is WAY better than this
8) Fans of the artist who deserves better.
9) Folks who wanted King's original pitch
10) comic book stores who are seeing larger piles of this book unsold than the New Age books.
11) Fans tired of this quest for every person to have an Uncle Ben moment to get motivated. Especially when the one in question (Ivy) was her OWN person for years.

12) People tired of powerful characters suddenly made weak to make other characters look better.

[Johnny]

You really want a image of a female being in a sex pose in a book with this death march topic?

Yes covers do get changed every month. We get that. Someone should have laid down the law and dismissed that one before it was finished or sketched.

I will put it to you like this-if that cover was included in the trade of this mess and somehow made it into CERTAIN schools. Because the librarian doesn't know comics and orders it because of the Trinity.
That book is BANNED. (Never mind the dead bodies everywhere.)

I thought we moved on from this topic. No, I don't need to see that image, but the point stands. Objectification shouldn't be a one-way street, otherwise the message is lost. When I see people start complaining about Grayson always miraculously finding himself shirtless in every issue, then I can start taking their complaints about an objectified Poison Ivy at face value. That's my final say on this subject.

[BruceWayneJr.]

I can't say that any of this has come as a surprise to me. This is the same company that published Cry for Justice and Countdown to FC after all. They can reboot and rearrange deck chairs forever but we'll still end up back here when management is the same.

[hareluyafan1]

If the heroes had real detectives:



This case would have been cracked by now.

[BohemiaDrinker]

1. Poison Ivy fans
2. Wally fans
3. Feminists (and those branded as SJWs by other people)
4. Comicsgate (pissed off at the 1 & 3)

Hey, I'm a Wally fan and I piss off comic-gaters in a somewhat regular basis.