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

[Comic-Reader Lad]

I posted this in the Wally West Appreciation thread, but I think it belongs here, too:

For those of you who are speculating about Dan DiDio's reasoning and motivations and are also blaming Tom King, I think that Patrick Gerard's post from the " Jeph Loeb's Superman Run Being Collected Soon--- Thoughts on hs run?" in the Superman forum clearly explains everything so that fans no longer need to question themselves or speculate. Gerard was an aspiring writer for DC at the time of the Our Worlds at War event and later and saw a lot of inside stuff from before DiDio's hiring and after.

https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post4317583

Here are the relevant paragraphs:

- Here's what you should know about event stories -- whether something is planned as an event or gets "upgraded" into one. Publishers have lists of characters they want dead or changed and a condition of doing an event is that you have to hit those marks. Often 10-20 characters the company wants to kill off. Maybe some they want to de-power. This doesn't originate with writers. If you take something like Identity Crisis, Brad Meltzer scripts the scenes and writes the dialogue and comes up with the mysteries but he's ASSIGNED to kill off Firestorm and Ray Palmer and Jack Drake and so on. Events are assigned so that you get "kill lists" and "change lists" and you have to shove those into a story that was envisioned without them or without ALL of them. Sometimes a writer can get a stay of execution by writing a character into retirement or having them just vanish. (Like Ray Palmer in Identity Crisis.)

- On top of all of this is that I think there's a lot of folks who misread DiDio in part because, well... He's a troll. A bonafied troll. Yes, he wanted Nightwing dead for years and planned it various ways. But all the stuff about hating Nightwing was playacting. He did it because he thought it would upset the most people. He has a very soap opera/pro-wrestling view and he's more of a Silver-Age/Bronze-Age Marvel guy than DC. So he's always trying to inject that 70s Marvel "Hank Pym becomes a wifebeater" type stuff in. Because he has a view that the more comics upset or provoke people, the more they sell. Honestly, if he wants a character dead, he probably likes that character and is picking on them because he wants to stir up pitchforks and torches. He's backed off that SOME largely because outrage works differently online now. But he operates very much from kind of a Bill Jemas worldview: "If you're happy with what we're doing, our sales will suffer." That's... a difficult thing for some folks IN COMICS to mesh with. Some folks just want a clean and fairly neutral status quo so they can tell clever one off stories kind of like Batman: The Animated Series.

- So, basically, it might not be fair to blame Tom King for this as, like Brad Meltzer, he may have had a "kill list" from DiDio to work off of.

- DiDio is a troll who LIKES to piss off readers because he feels that reader apathy and ambivalence is worse than readers hating him or the comics.


In a way, this is true. DiDio specifically initiated the Rebirth direction because he said that at a Comics Convention where he was on the panel, when it came time to talk about the future of the DCYou initiative, fans either got up and left or didn't care. He said in interviews regarding the Rebirth One-Shot that fan apathy was "palpable." And, let's face it, the DCYou line was NOT really polarizing or controversial in any way. It was just dull. So, it might be true that nicey-nice fun comics just don't sell. Otherwise, the Bizarro comic would be on its 50th issue.

Well, given that most people haven't read HIC 8 yet, the fan reaction is already anything but apathetic. So, in that sense, he is getting people talking.

However, I feel that there is a limit to the number of times you can tweak the fans' collective nose and have them keep coming back for more.

I'm very curious to see how many people who say they are swearing off DC will really do so. With Batman: Last Knight on Earth and Year of the Villain coming up, it will be interesting to see if fans really penalize DC for HIC or if they just shrug it off by assuring themselves that in comics nothing is permanent and that Wally will be back one day fully redeemed.

I'm also very curious what Geoff Johns feels about all this because Johns says he only wrote the DC Rebirth special in the first place on the condition that he was able to bring back Wally.

I'm also starting to wonder if the delays on Doomsday Clock have anything to do with the events in Heroes in Crisis. Maybe Johns got wind of what HIC is doing and wanted to delay DClock so that he can write an ending that brings Wally back and undoes HIC.

One thing is for sure. The remainder of the year will be very interesting at DC -- more for any behind the scenes fallout than anything else.

[Dred]

He thought he was alone. Even though Roy, his close friend he knows has serious issues was there. Yep.

[king81992]

I expect another twist next issue absolving Wally. Reverse Flash? If leave as it's, Wally is going to need a reboot to be back as a regular hero (though there were rumors about him joining the Suicide Squad). Maybe some time travel to fix everything and him being the only one that remembers it takes him to the SS? Still, everything is too convoluted

At this point, I'm convinced that Doomsday Clock is being retooled into a reboot. Wally to Suicide Squad is an interesting rumor, since DC has plans for 'Year of the Villains' and it seems like Lex will be making 'offers' to the younger generation of heroes in the coming months.

[Denirac]

He used Wally because many times mental health issues go unnoticed. That was the entire point of Wally's breakdown. He thought he was alone and that everyone was fine. He had been shouldering the responsibility of representing "hope" while the things that mattered to him were gone, and he felt alone and isolated.

After hacking the system and seeing he wasn't alone he snapped, made a rash decision to cover it up at light speed, and then spent 5 days coming to grips with the fact that he snapped.

Using Harley wouldn't have had the same impact since we are constantly told she's "crazy". And really she's more like a caricature of what mental health issues look like.

I can see why people are divided on this issue, and I'd guess that it's primarily due to their own connection to established characters.

"The Wally I know would never do that!"

That's what a lot of people say after a tragedy.

Its also what people say after Character Assassination which is EXACTLY what was done here, This is Worse than Emerald Twilight was for Hal Jordan

[KOSLOX]

Its also what people say after Character Assassination which is EXACTLY what was done here, This is Worse than Emerald Twilight was for Hal Jordan

*shrug*

And?

[Denirac]

*shrug*

And?

Its a Middle Finger to Johns and Rebirth, Giving DiDio EXACTLY what he wants, guy hates Wally West and anyone younger than his Silver Age Characters because they make Barry or Batman look old. He’s literally said this about Wally and Dick Grayson, Its not neccessaeily King’s Fault but he’s practically DiDio’s Hitman for the Characters Dan doesnt like

[Personamanx]

I think I'll check this out when it's released on Hoopla. I'm not current on the goings on in the DC Universe, and I have a feeling that with that lack of attachment I will be able to see the value of HIC in isolation. Perhaps there is a story here that makes a worthwhile exploration of the effects of heroics on an individual's mental health. But as someone who has liked certain characters in the past, I do not appreciate the fact that this plot is likely to define them for the foreseeable future.

[Denirac]

I think I'll check this out when it's released on Hoopla. I'm not current on the goings on in the DC Universe, and I have a feeling that with that lack of attachment I will be able to see the value of HIC in isolation. Perhaps there is a story here that makes a worthwhile exploration of the effects of heroics on an individual's mental health. But as someone who has liked certain characters in the past, I do not appreciate the fact that this plot is likely to define them for the foreseeable future.

No This Will Stick Permanently Until DiDio is gone, He’ll take Joy in making sure it does so he can taunt fans and make them feel inferior for not liking his Saintly Barry Allen

[KOSLOX]

I think I'll check this out when it's released on Hoopla. I'm not current on the goings on in the DC Universe, and I have a feeling that with that lack of attachment I will be able to see the value of HIC in isolation. Perhaps there is a story here that makes a worthwhile exploration of the effects of heroics on an individual's mental health. But as someone who has liked certain characters in the past, I do not appreciate the fact that this plot is likely to define them for the foreseeable future.

That's basically how I am. I read Green Lantern, Doomsday Clock, and HIC and that's it.

I've broadly kept abreast of Wally's storyline via articles, so I know about Flash War, etc, but I'm not overly invested in it.

I think if King had told the same story (with the caveat that you'd have to add in some issues to set up "the Flash" via exposition) but with Watchmen like expys it would be much better received.

[Tenzel Kim]

Also another big plot hole if present Wally went into the future and had his future self kill his past self then future Wally shouldn't exist right?

The issue had quite a few problems but this was not one of them. It was not future Wally that killed past Wally. It was past Wally who travelled to the future and killed his future self and then took his future dead self back to the present to place in his stead.

[Jekyll]

I posted this in the Wally West Appreciation thread, but I think it belongs here, too:

For those of you who are speculating about Dan DiDio's reasoning and motivations and are also blaming Tom King, I think that Patrick Gerard's post from the " Jeph Loeb's Superman Run Being Collected Soon--- Thoughts on hs run?" in the Superman forum clearly explains everything so that fans no longer need to question themselves or speculate. Gerard was an aspiring writer for DC at the time of the Our Worlds at War event and later and saw a lot of inside stuff from before DiDio's hiring and after.

https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post4317583

Here are the relevant paragraphs:



- So, basically, it might not be fair to blame Tom King for this as, like Brad Meltzer, he may have had a "kill list" from DiDio to work off of.

- DiDio is a troll who LIKES to piss off readers because he feels that reader apathy and ambivalence is worse than readers hating him or the comics.


In a way, this is true. DiDio specifically initiated the Rebirth direction because he said that at a Comics Convention where he was on the panel, when it came time to talk about the future of the DCYou initiative, fans either got up and left or didn't care. He said in interviews regarding the Rebirth One-Shot that fan apathy was "palpable." And, let's face it, the DCYou line was NOT really polarizing or controversial in any way. It was just dull. So, it might be true that nicey-nice fun comics just don't sell. Otherwise, the Bizarro comic would be on its 50th issue.

Well, given that most people haven't read HIC 8 yet, the fan reaction is already anything but apathetic. So, in that sense, he is getting people talking.

However, I feel that there is a limit to the number of times you can tweak the fans' collective nose and have them keep coming back for more.

I'm very curious to see how many people who say they are swearing off DC will really do so. With Batman: Last Knight on Earth and Year of the Villain coming up, it will be interesting to see if fans really penalize DC for HIC or if they just shrug it off by assuring themselves that in comics nothing is permanent and that Wally will be back one day fully redeemed.

I'm also very curious what Geoff Johns feels about all this because Johns says he only wrote the DC Rebirth special in the first place on the condition that he was able to bring back Wally.

I'm also starting to wonder if the delays on Doomsday Clock have anything to do with the events in Heroes in Crisis. Maybe Johns got wind of what HIC is doing and wanted to delay DClock so that he can write an ending that brings Wally back and undoes HIC.

One thing is for sure. The remainder of the year will be very interesting at DC -- more for any behind the scenes fallout than anything else.

This is just me personally, but his vision and what he's pushing has created my apathy for all things DC. Traditionally DC has been my universe much more than Marvel and even when something made me upset, there were plenty of other things in the DCU for me to turn my attention to. Now? There is nothing, with the exception of Shazam! by Geoff Johns.

I've collected the Flash all my life and I straight up quit with the New 52 and then quit again after Flash War and I don't miss those holes in my collection one bit! My favorite DC characters are either: missing or dead and I straight up don't care anymore and haven't for some time. It freed up my money to spend on books that I enjoy and look forward to from other companies. I don't even bother browsing the DC section in my LCS or other shops that I visit.

A few years ago I would have been ranting and screaming about this HIC nonsense, this morning all I did was laugh and shake my head. Didio created the apathy for me and I'm sure I'm not the only one.

[Talon1load]

That's basically how I am. I read Green Lantern, Doomsday Clock, and HIC and that's it.

I've broadly kept abreast of Wally's storyline via articles, so I know about Flash War, etc, but I'm not overly invested in it.

I think if King had told the same story (with the caveat that you'd have to add in some issues to set up "the Flash" via exposition) but with Watchmen like expys it would be much better received.

Once you read the story you’ll realize that it’s the writing that sucks. It wouldn’t matter what characters are put in, it’s a convoluted mess that just doesn’t make sense.

[KOSLOX]

Once you read the story you’ll realize that it’s the writing that sucks. It wouldn’t matter what characters are put in, it’s a convoluted mess that just doesn’t make sense.

I've read it. I think it's pretty interesting, though I think they could have probably cut some of the earlier issues that involved Harley and Booster's "investigation".

[WallyWestFlash]

The issue had quite a few problems but this was not one of them. It was not future Wally that killed past Wally. It was past Wally who travelled to the future and killed his future self and then took his future dead self back to the present to place in his stead.

So then when those days catch up Wally should be dead since he killed his future self when those five days pass, past Wally will come and kill him. Wally should be dead now.

Once you read the story you’ll realize that it’s the writing that sucks. It wouldn’t matter what characters are put in, it’s a convoluted mess that just doesn’t make sense.

Exactly. As upset as I am it's not as much as I thought I would be just because this is all written so horribly it's laughable. I can't really take it serious. From the meaningless plot, to the convoluted motivations, to the cringe worthy dialogue and terrible characterization it's all just so pathetic I can't even care that much.

[reis9999]

Also, the "hope" for the DC universe just commited murder and suicide...
I think we all know what to expect for the future now