Make DC better

[Green Goblin of Sector 2814]

Disagree. It wasn't that editor's brushed off fans' concerns, because if they didn't they just wouldn't be able to print anything, it was that they failed to give anything adequate for fans to latch onto. The stories were ****, end of story.

The stories were **** largely because the changes to the continuity were shitty.

It was still a large scale reboot, fans still complained at the time - but the stories were good.

Again, it still didn't change nearly as much as New 52 changed.

No, not really. How many events don't build the universe? How many events change stuff in a bad way that requires years to undo? Whether you want to admit it or not that's not what attracts the fans or makes those events sell - they sell because they're big, loud, bombastic events. The continuity doesn't matter, the shock and awe matters. How many of these events actively ignores characterization over decades of continuity to tell a story*coughHeroesInCrisiscough*?

Well, since nearly every event that ever published by DC or Marvel is usually accompanied with the tagline of "this will change the ______ universe for good", I'd say that you're more than likely wrong on this point. People buy these big, bombastic events with all the shock and awe because they want to see what goes down and the consequences it'll have on the universe. See Avengers vs. X-Men, which killed off Professor X for a while or Final Crisis and Batman: RIP which led to Bruce's extended absence from the DCU or Infinite Crisis, after which the entire Trinity took off from heroics for a year and led to the entire 52 series. So, uh yeah, the Big Two market and use these events to shape their universes.

Also, HiC did rely a large part on continuity if only to explain why all those heroes were in Sanctuary in the first place.

And again, you seem to be so focused on New 52 you're missing what I'm actually arguing for - I'm not rebooting the universe, I'm just removing adherence to continuity. You already largely know who these characters are and the general backstory. You didn't need to read a whole new version of Batman's origin and history of the Robins and previous encounters with the Joker to get the all new continuity of Batman: The White Knight did you? That's what I'm talking about here. Maintaining a big decades long narrative isn't needed any more. You can keep all the back stories only know they're fluid and optional. Past stories aren't being thrown out, only adherence to them is.

And I'm saying that's still not going to work because, yes, fans care about the universe. Again, they tried this with DCYou and it did not work.

No, it only shows the importance a certain loud segment of the fanbase has on wanting their stories in universe, because they feel if it isn't in continuity it somehow doesn't matter

That should be telling you all you need to know.

Yes, but most don't. How often has Long Halloween really affected the Bat books that came after? How many of the affects it did have on later books actually matter or are memorable?

Well since it served as the definitive origin for Two-Face for a long time and really defined the whole relationship between Batman and Two-Face by giving that rivalry a sense of tragedy and lost friendship, I'd say it was incredibly influential.

And hell, now that Babs is Batgirl again, when has Cass or Steph had a good story since? Now that they share continuity in a world where only one Batgirl can exist at a time they've become, at least temporarily, redundant.

And do you not remember how the fanbase was up in arms over their absence for so long? Again, they've only been rendered that way BECAUSE they erased their continuity. So, again, your choice to ignore that is enabling TPTB to do the same thing down the road.

Again, there's a lot less out of continuity stories than in continuity ones, so your math is off there. Percentage wise, a higher proportion of elseworld type stories seem to be good vs their in continuity counterparts. If there were as much stuff out of continuity as there is in, then you'd have an argument.

Uh, agin, you are conflating correlation with causation and assuming things you have LITERALLY NO WAY of knowing.

And again, some of those stories like Death of Superman and Knightfall really don't require continuity to work, continuity adds nothing to them.

Actually, yeah, they do. Because those stories had massive repercussion that were felt in the books for years afterwards. How many times has Bane been referred to in-universe as the "man who broke the Bat"? Doomsday's entire claim to fame as a villain and the only reason that, whenever he shows up, its seen as a serious threat is because he once killed Superman.

As for the ones that do? So what? I never, ever said continuity couldn't make for great stories. I never made that argument. But if there's nothing special about being non-canon as you so elegantly put it, it is equally true that there is nothing special about being in canon either. There just isn't.

And yet you're arguing for doing away with continuity. So, if you're going to do that, you actually have to be able to prove that continuity and the idea of a shared universe is somehow either harmful or not important to superhero comics. That, however, is not likely to happen when the Big Two largely rely on their shared universes to sell comics.

And when you mark the things against canon, how it stymies creativity for writers to adhere to what other writers did ten years ago, and how it intimidates some people from even looking into superhero fiction to begin with, it just makes more sense to phase it out. Is a world without adherence to continuity going forward really bad? Will you hate every DC book for not being in canon any more?

Yeah, I've seen this argument before, but I've never seen any actual proof for the notion that continuity either unnecessarily shackles writers or discourages new readers. In fact, more creators than not were mad at things like the New 52 and at DC for not removing seemingly having no idea what was canon and what wasn't. Likewise, I've never really seen many people unable to penetrate superhero comics because of continuity.

And, actually yeah, I'd have to say that, if there were no shared universe, my enthusiasm for DC would take a severe downturn.

Movies don't lead to increased circulation true - but it does lead to a short term bump. People buy a few books when a movie comes out. They might never become regular readers, but if there's more books out that are newbie friendly when the movie comes out, they might at least purchase more books in that one time search through Amazon while their interest is piqued, and that's still profitable for DC. And again, the fact that crossover events sell has nothing to do with continuity and everything to do with shock, awe, and spectacle, if not a morbid fascination to see who gets killed off this time.

Market research does not support what you're saying here. Many people have reported how movies literally have almost no impact on sales for the analogous books, either in the short term or long term.

And as I've explained, Marvel and DC literally market events on the "consequences" they'll have on the larger universe.

I could be wrong, I didn't read DCYou but from what I heard, wasn't the problem with DCYou the fact that people thought they weren't in fact good stories? Can you honestly name a legitimately good story that failed solely because it didn't bother with continuity?

DCYou failed also because people got fed up with DC just putting out random books without any seeming concrete direction for their shared universe.

But they brought Wally back, with his history intact...and then had him act entirely out of character. I don't think the problem was ever about continuity with Wally, I think that blame is entirely on the management/editorial side of things.

His history isn't intact. It's all still out of continuity. In fact, the entire justification for what he did in HiC is because he remembers a life that apparently never happened.

[Sacred Knight]

Get them out from under WB's leadership. That's impossible of course, but I really think it'd be the only thing that could change anything.

Or at the very least somehow convince WB to leave DC Comics alone to their own devices, and stop using the division as just a bad movie mining source. But fat chance of that either.

[Vakanai]

The stories were **** largely because the changes to the continuity were shitty.



Again, it still didn't change nearly as much as New 52 changed.



Well, since nearly every event that ever published by DC or Marvel is usually accompanied with the tagline of "this will change the ______ universe for good", I'd say that you're more than likely wrong on this point. People buy these big, bombastic events with all the shock and awe because they want to see what goes down and the consequences it'll have on the universe. See Avengers vs. X-Men, which killed off Professor X for a while or Final Crisis and Batman: RIP which led to Bruce's extended absence from the DCU or Infinite Crisis, after which the entire Trinity took off from heroics for a year and led to the entire 52 series. So, uh yeah, the Big Two market and use these events to shape their universes.

Also, HiC did rely a large part on continuity if only to explain why all those heroes were in Sanctuary in the first place.



And I'm saying that's still not going to work because, yes, fans care about the universe. Again, they tried this with DCYou and it did not work.



That should be telling you all you need to know.



Well since it served as the definitive origin for Two-Face for a long time and really defined the whole relationship between Batman and Two-Face by giving that rivalry a sense of tragedy and lost friendship, I'd say it was incredibly influential.



And do you not remember how the fanbase was up in arms over their absence for so long? Again, they've only been rendered that way BECAUSE they erased their continuity. So, again, your choice to ignore that is enabling TPTB to do the same thing down the road.



Uh, agin, you are conflating correlation with causation and assuming things you have LITERALLY NO WAY of knowing.



Actually, yeah, they do. Because those stories had massive repercussion that were felt in the books for years afterwards. How many times has Bane been referred to in-universe as the "man who broke the Bat"? Doomsday's entire claim to fame as a villain and the only reason that, whenever he shows up, its seen as a serious threat is because he once killed Superman.



And yet you're arguing for doing away with continuity. So, if you're going to do that, you actually have to be able to prove that continuity and the idea of a shared universe is somehow either harmful or not important to superhero comics. That, however, is not likely to happen when the Big Two largely rely on their shared universes to sell comics.



Yeah, I've seen this argument before, but I've never seen any actual proof for the notion that continuity either unnecessarily shackles writers or discourages new readers. In fact, more creators than not were mad at things like the New 52 and at DC for not removing seemingly having no idea what was canon and what wasn't. Likewise, I've never really seen many people unable to penetrate superhero comics because of continuity.

And, actually yeah, I'd have to say that, if there were no shared universe, my enthusiasm for DC would take a severe downturn.



Market research does not support what you're saying here. Many people have reported how movies literally have almost no impact on sales for the analogous books, either in the short term or long term.

And as I've explained, Marvel and DC literally market events on the "consequences" they'll have on the larger universe.



DCYou failed also because people got fed up with DC just putting out random books without any seeming concrete direction for their shared universe.



His history isn't intact. It's all still out of continuity. In fact, the entire justification for what he did in HiC is because he remembers a life that apparently never happened.

Yeah, I'm tired and I'm just seeing a huge wall of text now, but I'm out. But from what I can tell, you seem to be arguing/saying the same things as if that will somehow disprove the arguments I already made to all those points (again, just my impression from a quick scan) so if I did respond it would only be to reiterate my same points again, to which you'd probably respond with your same points again, and it's just a circle I'm hopping out of now before it drags on. Besides, I never planned to debate my ideas anyways in this thread, just state my opinion and what I would do, and I did that. So yeah, my only argument here is I disagree with everything you just said (probably, eyes tired and I'm not reading the full thing) and I'm out.

[married guy]

Bring back the creative freedom!!
DC had infinite Earths once upon a time.
Let's bring it all back.
Story doesn't fit with the current continuity? - No worries!! Elseworlds!!
More adult orientated? - Black Label.
Hire the best writers, artists and editors you can get your hands on and tell them to do whatever the hell they want.
JLA, JSA, Outsiders, Freedom Fighters, Doom Patrol, Metal Men, Blackhawks - open the floodgates!

[numberthirty]

Bring back the creative freedom!!
DC had infinite Earths once upon a time.
Let's bring it all back.
Story doesn't fit with the current continuity? - No worries!! Elseworlds!!
More adult orientated? - Black Label.
Hire the best writers, artists and editors you can get your hands on and tell them to do whatever the hell they want.
JLA, JSA, Outsiders, Freedom Fighters, Doom Patrol, Metal Men, Blackhawks - open the floodgates!

You can keep all of the money, and do whatever you want at Image. Right now.

It's just not as easy as it used to be to make the pitch you mentioned. While you will get some takers(Ellis/The Wild Storm or the current Green Lantern run), there's also a pretty good reason to be elsewhere.

[iron chimp]

You misunderstand me - I don't doubt sales are dying/diminishing. I want to follow the history of that and see when the dips occurred and so forth. Mostly to see what I want to attribute the decease in sales to. Did tv make a big difference (it did to radio shows)? VCRs? Video games? Do we have statistic on kids purchasing v. adults purchasing (that's a lot more difficult I know). Did the marketing to older ages alienate younger ones or were younger readers already abandoning comics before that. And so forth and so on.

Jim shooter has a good blog post here

http://jimshooter.com/2011/11/comic-...ribution.html/

From the cadence letter he has on there sales were utter car crash on newsstand in the 80s. I am sure he has another post on DC newsstand books in 70s and it was even worse than ones he shows for 1985.

Boom of mid 90s books were probably selling as well or better than 1960s and companies shift as many books today as they did 20 years ago.

[DCStu]

With everything out of wack... schedules, books, creative teams, editorial... How would you fix DC's problems?

Give them time and they'll fix it themselves. They always do eventually. This isn't the first time DC have gone through a rough period and it won't be the last. They've got to produce a lot of content in a limited time, they're not always going to get it 100% right.

[Sandy Hausler]

Just let Grant Morrison and Cecil Castellucci write everything.

Having Grant Morrison writing half of everything would definitely turn me off. While he's done some good stuff in his career, I haven't like most of his recent work.

[married guy]

Jim shooter has a good blog post here

http://jimshooter.com/2011/11/comic-...ribution.html/

From the cadence letter he has on there sales were utter car crash on newsstand in the 80s. I am sure he has another post on DC newsstand books in 70s and it was even worse than ones he shows for 1985.

Boom of mid 90s books were probably selling as well or better than 1960s and companies shift as many books today as they did 20 years ago.

I feel Jim Shooter really does cop a lot more **** than he should.

[Midnight_v]

Reading this thread I start to get the idea... Only I can save DC comics. smh.

Hey if I suddenly got the job, "Top guy at D.C."
...
...
..

I'd start wtih an apology letter. Written on Dc Official Twitter, and performed aloud on youtube like those Eisner videos from disney back in the day.


I'd talk about taking the failures that have occured, the hopes that I have for the company, and how much it means to have stewardship of this modern mythology I'd
inherited.

Stewardship. Not ownership.

I'd talk about how the treatmeant certain characters and properties has been from many fans unacceptable and while its not possible for any company to be everything to everyone.
That I'd be up to the task of making things BETTER.

I'd ask people to come back.

I'd talk about what has to happen to bring more people in... My responsiblity to bring great stories and I ask the fans to help take up the responsibility to bringing no people IN to comics.
-end

I'll write about the brass tacks later. But thats how I'd start. an Olive branch.

[boltmonster]

Give them time and they'll fix it themselves. They always do eventually. This isn't the first time DC have gone through a rough period and it won't be the last. They've got to produce a lot of content in a limited time, they're not always going to get it 100% right.

Reduce the number of books to a level that does not interfere with the quality and common sense of the overall books.

[Ulysses]

Just coming across this image, another thing I will say is that, generally speaking, the art needs to be better.

I don't know who drew this, but I don't find it inspiring, exciting, or even pleasant to look at. It isn't "wrong", and it isn't "bad", but it also isn't good, relatively speaking. It's just getting the job done and not doing anything beyond that. I see this type of thing a lot at DC and Marvel. Uninspired art that's just "there". It's done by people who can get the job done, but that's all they're doing. This isn't anything I'd accept in my own comic, and I'm only one person without a budget. If an average joe on the internet can shame you up and down the street, you need to reconsider some things.

*looks at it again" No, it's not something I'd accept. The coloring is too flat. The pickup truck is okay. It's dynamic and clear, which is good, but somehow, I'm just not excited or giddy to look at this. Something is missing.

I mean, this is the last thing I did. The difference, in my opinion, at least, is very apparent. I wouldn't publish a lot of the stuff they do:

You know, I disagree with the art style you presented being a suitable alternative but I think you make a good point about how DC art style in general could use an uplevel. The quality is inconsistent and has pretty low valleys despite the high peaks.

[SecretWarrior]

See: https://community.cbr.com/showthread...a-reboot/page5

[Falcon16]

HAPPY CYBORG

Revive Scorch

Introduce Black Vulcan

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GOOD TERRA

BARBARA WILSON