Identity Crisis: 15 Years Later (Spoilers)

[caj]

Also, Zatanna's powers didn't work the way they were written.

Not going to get into all the different timelines, but in the original Pre-Crisis JLofA, not long after Zatanna changed her look from the Dick Dillin ponytail costume to the George Perez costume used in IC, Zatanna's powers had been reduced to only working with the elements of fire, water, etc... She no longer could just conjure things out of thin air or mind-wipe anyone. Her powers were much more limited by that point.

[Güicho]

Curious if anyone wants to compare how much (or not at all) the Oh!pinions / Arrrhguments / and discussion has "grown" / evolved or been "dead-horse beat" -
Today - https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post5063528
15 Years later - https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post4211322
14 Years later - https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post3926302
Original Was it worth buying - https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post3394547

[witchboy]

No one’s saying that men haven’t served the role as hostages or murder victims in superhero comics but it doesn’t happen as often with women. For every Steve Trevor, there are about a hundred Sue Dibnys being killed off or Lois Lanes being kidnapped and in need of rescue.



In fairness, the male characters have been raped. Just not as often as female characters do.

Jack Knight and Dick Grayson have both been raped by women.
Are there other men who've been raped in DC?

[Psy-lock]

Jack Knight and Dick Grayson have both been raped by women.
Are there other men who've been raped in DC?

Aquaman, Green Arrow, Kyle Rayner, even Batman at one point.

[witchboy]

Aquaman, Green Arrow, Kyle Rayner, even Batman at one point.

Wow I did not expect that.

Batman, that was Talia in Grant Morrison's story. I forgot that, it was later retconed back to the original story that it was consensual.
edit - I'm researching. Apparently the JLA/Hitman crossover implied Kyle was raped by a man named Bueno Excellente. Also the DC Wiki has Bueno listed as good?!?
Arrow was raped by Shado while he was injured.
Aquaman was raped by Mera's twin sister.
Of course, it's worth pointing out that I know men being raped - especially by a woman - is often not taken seriously.

[Psy-lock]

Wow I did not expect that.
Can you tell me who raped them, and what issues/stories that took place in?
Batman, that was Talia in Grant Morrison's story. I forgot that, it was later retconed back to the original story that it was consensual.
edit - I'm researching. Apparently the JLA/Hitman crossover implied Kyle was raped by a man named Bueno Excellente. Also the DC Wiki has Bueno listed as good?!?
Of course, it's worth pointing out that I know men being raped - especially by a woman - is often not taken seriously.

Aquaman was raped by Siren who was disguised as Mera in his New 52 run #44.

Green Arrow was raped by Shado while he was delirious with fever, believing her to be Black Canary, don't remember the issue.

Kyle Rayner was date-raped by Bueno Excellente, but yeah, that one was only implied IIRC.

Remembered two more: Lobo was raped by a villainess in his New 52 run, Golden Eagle (Hawkman's former partner) became a sex slave to some blue alien chick after she defeated him.

And I guess you can also count Cosmic Boy. When he was in a coma Saturn Girl tried to use her telepathic powers to bring him out of it. It appeared that she'd succeeded, but instead she was subconsciously animating and controlling his comatose body. They began dating and having sex, and then he woke up at their wedding.

[Cyberstrike]

I was under the impression that the Justice League also mind wiped Sue so she wouldn't remember Dr. Light raping her.

[achilles]

Let's see, terrible fifteen years ago, check. Just as terrible today, check. Honestly, along with Amazons Attack, that was one of the worst stories I've seen for a while. Well, until the nu52 came along and said "Hold my beer".

[Timber Wolf-By-Night]

Let's see, terrible fifteen years ago, check. Just as terrible today, check. Honestly, along with Amazons Attack, that was one of the worst stories I've seen for a while. Well, until the nu52 came along and said "Hold my beer".

How does it compare to "Cry for Justice" in terms of suck, though?

[godisawesome]

How does it compare to "Cry for Justice" in terms of suck, though?

*There* I would say it doesn’t suck as much at all in the comparison.

Identity Crisis is still mean spirited towards its characters in a pursuit of angst, has a sloppy mystery resolution that undermines that part of the story, and an overpowered showing by a villain, but Meltzer manages a largely competent handling of his premise until late in the game.

Cry for Justice, on the other hand, pretty quickly became something of a trash can fire with many of the same issues, but with sloppier writing, characterization, and arguably even more of a mean-spirited rush for angst.

I mean, at least Jack Drake showed up in a few panels before he was killed off, and at least the Identity Crisis story started in a conventional manner. Cry for Justice hit the ground already trying to hard and started hurtling into poor taste pretty quickly.

It also didn’t help that Identity Crisis wound up having the Jason Rusch Firestorm series, 52, and Infinite Crisis (far from perfect, but still better than it could have been) as follow ups, while Cry for Justice had “Rise” of Arsenal and that Green Arrow series everyone decided it would be good to forget about in the aftermath.

[achilles]

How does it compare to "Cry for Justice" in terms of suck, though?

And here I had almost forgotten CFJ! Thanks for reminding me...

[Hol]

I still love IDC. I read it as it came out and I probably read it once a year since it was published. It is one of my favorite events. I think Meltzer really nails the voices to these characters. I love his Wally West and how he stood up to the "Power Pact". His Oliver Queen is perfect as well. I think he wrote the relationships great and there was some really cool moments. It is a story with some dark moments for sure but I would say there is also a lot of heart in their as well.

[Hol]

Lets not forget the glaring pothole of Jean being tied up....by someone else. Thats never mentioned or ackowledged.

That was her hands just wearing gloves. If you look at the panels again (in issue 7) she is wearing gloves while she is getting the rope together....then shrinks into Ms Atom and increases her size again to hang her self. So I suppose she put them in her pocket or shrunk them during the staged scene. But she is wearing the gloves that you see hanging her in the issue she is "attacked".

[Hol]

I think people read the "just in case" line too literally. You don't believe everything the bad guys says. Jean always knew she was going to kill Sue or that she may have to. But she couldn't outright say that to Ray so she said something stupid like "I shrunk other weapons down just in case".

[Edwin30]

Is mindwiping different from brainwashing?
World's Finest (Vol.1) #148.jpg

Its been 15 years but I still feel like DC owes Zee for what they made her do.

They eventually gave her a solo series but Paul Dini only wrote 10 issues and the substitute writers just wrote the goofiest crap that made me feel like I was reading a children's novel. It got canceled after issue 16 to make way for New 52.

I hope one day she gets another solo series.