I'm going to change my response. I initially said FLASH: REBIRTH. However, I recently went back and tried to re-read Infinite Crisis, and it was not very good. There's a lot going on for sure and a lot of references to past DC history but it's really just a mess of a story. So I'm going to say Infinite Crisis.
They got built up in Young Justice a bit before that, IMO. I didn't like the personality change-up or the change in Kon's history (though it proved popular).Wasnt Wonder Girl (Cassie) and Superboy (Conner) in the Johns TT Books?
This was my favorite DC relationship ever...
I really liked them as couple..
I don't care for the idea of the spectrum of rings (except maybe Yellow) or for the idea of Sinestro training Hal. I really disliked retconned personal connections to villains (or other heroes) and the "everything is always connected" mindset (newly revealed secret societies influencing you all along, Talons wanted Dick, Joker setting up Jason's life, Ra's training Bruce, Joker killing Bruce's folks, Clark knowing Lex in Smallville, etc. - yes, I know these aren't all in comics). But both of those seem like popular decisions, and I wasn't actually reading GL at the time (and still am not), so who am I to judge? Neither of those really effect the stories I read that much.
I love Barry. I like the idea of having him back. I don't like his new backstory. Or the universe reboot. I mean, I didn't want a universe reboot at all, but if I did it wouldn't be the way it was. But giving Barry a tragic backstory was the worst. And The Flash: Rebirth wasn't good besides that (I didn't like what happened with Jai and Irey in there, either).
Last edited by Tzigone; 07-10-2019 at 11:45 AM.
What he did to Swamp Thing in Brightest Day.
His early stuff was a little try-hard, but you could see a lot of potential in it.
Personally for me I just think it's ... and it's partially not his fault, making lemonade and all that ... the initial New 52 Justice League Darkseid arc. Just ugh. Bad Darkseid costume. Bad Steppenwolf costume. Bad Desaad costume. Bad Jim Lee art everywhere. And no Starro the Conqueror in sight.
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IC doesn't even read like a story, it mostly feels like a series of 2-page long bullet points, occasionally punctuated by pages of brutally forced exposition.
I tend to think of this as the worst thing he ever wrote. That would most likely change if I finished Darkseid War, but I start vomiting blood a few issues in and I can't imagine I'll ever feel the need to finish it.
"Has Sariel summoned you here, Azrael? Have you come to witness the miracle of your brethren arriving on Earth?"
"I WILL MIX THE ASHES OF YOUR BONES WITH SALT AND USE THEM TO ENSURE THE EARTH THE TEMPLARS TILLED NEVER BEARS FRUIT AGAIN!"
"*sigh* I hoped it was for the miracle."
Dan Watters' Azrael was incredible, a constant delight and perhaps too good for this world (but not the Forth). For the love of St. Dumas, DC, give us more!!!
This is a pretty big problem with DC in general the last 20 years, and it will only get worse now that DC is slave to the movie and merchandising departments.
I'll add his devotion to the Donner/Reeves Superman movies coupled with the Silver Age love was devastating to the character. I still find Frank depicting Superman AS Reeves (which I bet was Johns' idea) as both disrespectful to Superman and just plain creepy since Reeves passed.
"Has Sariel summoned you here, Azrael? Have you come to witness the miracle of your brethren arriving on Earth?"
"I WILL MIX THE ASHES OF YOUR BONES WITH SALT AND USE THEM TO ENSURE THE EARTH THE TEMPLARS TILLED NEVER BEARS FRUIT AGAIN!"
"*sigh* I hoped it was for the miracle."
Dan Watters' Azrael was incredible, a constant delight and perhaps too good for this world (but not the Forth). For the love of St. Dumas, DC, give us more!!!
That doesn't sound plausible...at all. Most likely, DC wanted the same opportunity reinvent Barry for the modern age that they took with all the other classic JLA characters. That's reason enough.
Simply bringing back the Waid Barry, Cary Bates Barry or Gardner Fox Barry - and not making any other changes - would really just please just longtime fans who want a status quo. And beyond that, the mythology and motivations needed to be reset. (If anything, I think they were a little too faithful.)
The Flash TV show, for all its many flaws, got Barry Allen right - that character is a compelling modernization. And if you squint real hard, you can see that character someday evolving into a Cary Bates-ish Barry Allen.
A bat! That's it! It's an omen.. I'll shall become a bat!
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I think he’s played the “power up card” way too often. Look at Flash..the powering up of all the main characters was remorseless..all the key rogues, not just Flash himself.
And I think he also become over dependent on his artists producing large scale splash pages for significant chunks of the comic.
I’ve been near gob smacked when I’ve picked up some of his trade collections in library in recent years. Page after page features one panel or very few panels, accompanied by almost naff all dialogue.
I appreciate in comics..a large part of story is carried by the pictures...but the paucity of dialogue, the startlingly low number of panels...in a fair amount of his work in last 10 years, it feels to me like there’s not much story.
In re to Johns love for the old Silver and Bronze Age characters, my main beef with that is that his version of "updating" them usually just means adding a whole bunch of decapitations.
Keep in mind that you have about as much chance of changing my mind as I do of changing yours.
Geoff turning the rivalry between Hal Jordan & Sinestro into a doomed bromance.
And yet, in the decade since he has returned, they have done nothing with Barry Allen except make him, at very best, a watered-down Wally West ripoff. I'm all for having Barry Allen back in the DCU but I've yet to see any reason what this particular version of the character has contributed to the Flash mythos and the DCU at all. Ten years and all we're left with is aa a dull, unlikeable version of Barry Allen that we kept being told is, like, the greatest Flash ever with absolutely no evidence for that actually appearing on the page, while the rest of the Flash family have either disappeared or been completely ruined. Bart Allen aside, of course. At least Bendis has done something to undo the damage that Johns did to that particular character years before even Flash Rebirth.
Plus, I hate to say it because I really like Grant Gustin, but TV Barry has become increasingly insufferable with each passing season.
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