What do you think of Bendis' work so far?

[Celgress]

I'm going to be brutally honest -

I hate what I've seen so far and I've stopped buying the books (my boycott began last month) as a result.

[beetee]

I'm really enjoying it and the world building. I never read Bendis much at Marvel, so I don't have Bendis fatigue like other readers.

[Vordan]

Of the two books I think Action Comics is the stronger one. I love how he’s building up the Metropolis supporting cast again and giving some focus on life in Metropolis with stuff like the Invisible Mafia. I also greatly enjoyed his Red Cloud plot and have enjoyed the lead-up to Event Leviathan.

The Superman book nails Superman’s voice imo, but oftens feels very thin on plot with the story decompression hurting it in places. Rogal Zaar has not been a very compelling villain because Bendis has yet to give us the details on his backstory. His design making him look like another not!Doomsday who can talk doesn’t help matters. I’m not a fan of the aged up Jon plot but I try not to let it bother me too much since I think it will eventually get undone. The art is gorgeous however, Reis draws the hell out of every issue.

Bendis also got Matt Fraction on a Jimmy Olsen book and Greg Rucka on a Lois Lane book which I greatly appreciate. Bendis is really trying to push Superman’s world however he can, which is the first time in a long time it feels like DC is trying to push Supes. So even though I enjoyed the Tomasi/Gleason era on Superman I’m still content with the Bendis era status quo.

[Yoda]

I’m enjoying it quite a bit on the whole. There are a lot of great ideas in the entire run, but the early execution was pretty shakey with a lot of plot points that weren’t really set up well. Now that we seem to be getting out of the first act that stuff is less important to me and I’m enjoying it more. I’ll echo a lot of people and say that he really does nail Superman’s voice and characterization right from the jump, and has gotten a lot of the supporting cast right for me.

Bendis’ Lois in Man of Steel, Action Comics 1004, and Superman 7 is surprisingly bad though. Cringey dialogue (“Baby”) and character beats that could have worked but were rushed so much that they don’t really. He needed to set up this new status quo for her, and the foundation is there, he just made some really odd choices that undermine a lot of it. Now that we are past that though, he has really, really improved his take on her and her voice has improved dramatically. If you like Smallville’s take on her and Erica Durrance’s Lois Lane, there’s real echoes of that in Bendis’ I think.

Jon is touchy. Again, it’s something that definitely could work and there are some really weird choices and a massive squandered opportunity for a story in there. I was a big fan of the Rebirth status quo and young Jon, but I can see this having some valuable storytelling potential.

Action on the whole has been the better book I think. Superman has been too decompressed and there are too many weird story choices that have really worked against the story. Also all the arcs so far have kind of just stopped and have not had any true resolution yet. The only one that worked for me was Leviathan Rising.

I think the best thing about Bendis so far is that he is really reinforcing the overall importance of Superman to the DCU and we are about to have 6 books in the Superman line and one miniseries all tied into a general direction. That’s kinda amazing to me.

And the Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane books both look and sound amazing to me. I can’t wait for both of them.

[Jackalope89]

The Man of Steel mini had awful characterization, Lois has been written horrifically out of character, Jon was pointlessly and stupidly aged up, the "new family dynamic" makes no sense, Rogol Zaar is blander than mayo, other members of the JL are very poorly written...

Yeah. I'm very much hoping his run is erased by the next author.

I'm sorry, but "he just gets Superman's voice!" is only a part of what I'm looking for. And the destruction of everything else far outweighs it. So I've been boycotting it since the Lois reveal back on Earth (and after only a couple of weeks? Really!?).

[Sacred Knight]

Getting Superman is about 80% of the job description as far as I'm concerned. There are other important things, but he's the most important. All day every day. Not to say I think everything else sucks, not even close. He's only had one major problem as far as I'm concerned (Lois) and that's getting better, even if the stank of what came before can't be easily remedied. But in a situation where everything else was great but Superman himself was bad? That's not it. Ever.

[StrikeJP]

I'm way behind on my Superman comics, but just started catching up on Bendis' run. I'll echo most of what has been said so far.

He's got Superman's voice down. He also has some interesting story ideas. But Lois and Jon are a disaster and it really sours the things Bendis is doing right.

[JasonTodd428]

His Superman run is a horrible mess of decompressed stories, bad characterization, huge plot holes and important plot elements left unexplored or unexplained. He has some good ideas under the mess but the execution is very poor and that's why I had to drop it.

His Action run, by comparison, has been great with almost none of the problems that characterize his Superman run.

[Kuwagaton]

Both.

And just to clarify, I did not say that everyone who likes this was necessarily anti-Rebirth. But I notice that people who were (not just here) are usually in favor of Bendis's run. For me, that's just another reinforcement that I'm not the audience DC seeks. I'll leave it at that.

I can see that. And even though I thought those books had real pacing issues, it's disappointing to see those kind of flaws pointed out there when they're worse with Bendis.

I like it though. There are "asleep at the wheel" moments where the character handling, plot points, and dialogue are the bad kind of random, but overall I think I'd say it's top shelf in raw power. Bendis and crew really seem to care and it gets me invested. The new characters are pretty cool,

Binge reading I think it's a B+. It gets lesser scores issue by issue but I don't have the patience for trade waiting. Superman vs Action... eh, even. They just outdo each other one month or another. Leviathan is awesome but the Legion will be at least as cool.

[jason white reborn]

"bendis really got supermans voice down"


really though? I find his superman so awful that if i had to point to the reason why superman is not as popular as batman i would point to bendis

[new_onslaught]

Getting Superman is about 80% of the job description as far as I'm concerned. There are other important things, but he's the most important. All day every day. Not to say I think everything else sucks, not even close. He's only had one major problem as far as I'm concerned (Lois) and that's getting better, even if the stank of what came before can't be easily remedied. But in a situation where everything else was great but Superman himself was bad? That's not it. Ever.

I am of the same mindset. I read Superman Vol.1 and Man of Steel on Comixology and I see the issues people have with them. If I have to put in order it would be Action > Man of Steel > Superman. I will probably stick with Action as I liked vol. 1 a lot. Are there any plans for a deluxe HC edition with the content of the first 2 volumes, like they did for Rebirth?

[Steven Caldwell]

It would have been nice to keep one marriage in comic books not messed up....but apparently writers cannot write a decent story about a happily married couple. I loved the directions Action Comics was going in right till Bendis took over, then I dropped the books. Not to boycott, just to save money on books I don't like. I think it would have been smart to put Bendis on one book and another writer on the other. That way, for readers who doesn't like the decompression that Bendis enjoys, along with his other faults, readers would still have had the option to have a second book to read. Alas, it was not in the cards.

[carguy2403]

The Man of Steel mini had awful characterization, Lois has been written horrifically out of character, Jon was pointlessly and stupidly aged up, the "new family dynamic" makes no sense, Rogol Zaar is blander than mayo, other members of the JL are very poorly written...

Yeah. I'm very much hoping his run is erased by the next author.

I'm sorry, but "he just gets Superman's voice!" is only a part of what I'm looking for. And the destruction of everything else far outweighs it. So I've been boycotting it since the Lois reveal back on Earth (and after only a couple of weeks? Really!?).

Amen to that.

[JonSBF]

Not very fond of it.
Action Comics was the best of his Superman titles but the underwhealming Event Leviathan first issue managed to quite severely shoot my enjoyment down. Superman is a mess, not going to touch again anytime soon.
And I will never forgive him for what he did to Lois. I mean, really? He broke them up for some hot six months (two years after they got back), made her into an awful person, made her leave Jon with a psychotic, not in control of himself death cultist/terrorist. You know what makes me really angry? The fact I can say that Jon spending 6 years in jail is both Clark and Lois fault, doubly Lois'.

[carguy2403]

Bendissaleschart.jpg
Bendis's sales are dropping because more and more people are fed up with the direction those books are going. The fact that his sales for Superman at this point in his run are lower that Tomasi's were at the same point is an indicator of how people feel. The market is speaking.