Fans more Interested in Old DC than Current DC?

[Electricmastro]

The cover of the very first issue of Captain America got Stan Lee and Jack Kirby death threats. People actually gathered outside their office to terrorize them only to run away when Kirby himself came down to face them.

Comics have always used polarizing material and readers have reacted with varying degress of hostility in response.

That would be Captain America, who was shown punching out Hitler on the cover of his #1 issue, a full year before the bombing of Pearl Harbor.

As well as Captain America punching out Hirohito on the cover of Captain America Comics #13, released after the attack on Pearl Harbor.

[Tzigone]

2011 truly was a deal changer in my perception of DC.

I wonder if people felt similarly about 1985.

Moreover, the characters "felt" like they truly knew one another and there was a real camaraderie;

Now I'm thinking of early post-COIE when Batman confronts Superman that he's learned his identity. It just is so strange in tone if you go from pre-COIE to post.
batman supes post coie1.jpg
batman supes post-coie 2.jpg
How long did the new dynamic last between them, anyway? Before they went back to them having been friends, Dick knowing Supes well in his youth, etc.?

[Electricmastro]

I wonder if people felt similarly about 1985.

Now I'm thinking of early post-COIE when Batman confronts Superman that he's learned his identity. It just is so strange in tone if you go from pre-COIE to post.
batman supes post coie1.jpg
batman supes post-coie 2.jpg
How long did the new dynamic last between them, anyway? Before they went back to them having been friends, Dick knowing Supes well in his youth, etc.?

I think it was Alan Moore that said that he never understood why older comics portrayed Superman and Batman getting along and being best friends, reasoning that in a "realistic" society, they wouldn't get along as well, calling back to situations such as this:

[SiegePerilous02]

I think it was Alan Moore that said that he never understood why older comics portrayed Superman and Batman getting along and being best friends, reasoning that in a "realistic" society, they wouldn't get along as well, calling back to situations such as this:

I think that may have been Frank Miller justifying his reasoning for TDKR

Moore may feel the same way, but he always seemed to approach the DC universe as being fantasy first and foremost even though a wide range of human stories could be told in it. and he wrote Bruce and Clark as friends, what with Bruce going to hang out with him and bring him flowers on his birthday.

[skyvolt2000]

I get the feeling the accusation of "readers don't like these new comics because they hate politics and are racist, sexist, etc." is largely unwarranted.

I mean, can anyone explain to me why 1980s stories like The Dark Knight Returns are so praised and widely remembered to this day despite containing politics?

They fall into two categories

1) as long as the mouth piece is not certain demographics they don't care.
2) They NEVER read a lot of those books.

It's more of NUMBER 2 than number 1.
All these complainers fall into the same pit-they don't READ the books that they bitch about or claim were politics free.

However, in today's comics that go political, there tends to be a lot of differing reactions among the readership. Maybe that's because today's comics readers are older and have had more years to form their private political opinions. Therefore, they're more likely to notice when a writer is shoehorning his or her own political opinions into the stories, or worse, using established characters as mouthpieces for the writer's political views.

You can't know that if you don't READ the books. Because if one READ the books they could EXPLAIN what was shoehorned.

They look at those covers or titles and throw FITS.

Example Champions #25. Miles school had a gun shooting. Before it came out you saw trolls galore scream this book was going to attack the NRA and be so offense that Marvel was going to catch heck for it. And they were SERIOUS. The book came out-it spent the entire issue with Miles upset he was not there to HELP. Not one comment on gun control.

These are fictional characters not real people so YES that would fit into whatever view a WRITER has or wants to tell.

[skyvolt2000]

DiDio (via Bleeding Cool):



Reading those words, I'm very unsure about what message he is taking out from that observation.

First, DiDio has been leading DC for what, 10 years now? So I think that observation should be rather humbling for him and his leadership. I don't read that there.

Yes it should be humbling.

Your new stuff should be adding on to great reads of the past. If it's not there is an issue.

[Marvell2100]

So if an archaeologist studies the Inca, he's being nostalgic. Or if a theoretical physicist examines the red shifts at the furthest reaches of the unvierse, he's not living in the now. Or what about literary scholars that write papers on William Shakespeare and Fyodor Dostoevsky?

Oh but these are comic books and their history doesn't deserve study, we're just supposed to be consumers of entertainment and we always need to have a new thrill. If we have an interest in the past, then that's nostalgia, but only if that interest is undervalued. If it's valued then it's inquiry.

I get why Dan DiDio has this skewed opinion, because he's being paid to sell new content and build new markets for that content. But are other comic book readers that naive about the artform that they claim to love?

It happens that some of us love the medium and the artform of comics and we're interested in how that came to be and what developments shaped it and changed it. And studying that kind of thing can be our entertainment. It's not nostalgia, because we're always learning new things and coming to greater understanding about the work.

Looking into the future is the realm of science fiction--we can ony look into the past and observe what was there, to understand where we are now. No one really lives in the present--time moves past us and everything we know has already happened. We are all driving down a highway looking in the rearview mirror, because that's the only perspective that the laws of the universe allow us.

Yeah this.

I buy Golden age stuff because I'm interested in reading about stuff that Iwasn't able to get when I was younger and there are some good stories that I'd like to read.

I just picked up Kirby's New Gods not too long ago along with Lee, Kirby and Steranko's Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD.

[Lee Stone]

Batman has, indeed, changed a lot.





Another thing I think is that both Crisis on Infinite Earths and New52 gave the DCU 'end points' that felt more like the end of a book instead of an end of a chapter.
While the fresh start opened up a new entry point for readers, it also began the process of turning the Pre-Crisis version into iconic versions. And when you have the '60s Batman show, the '50s Superman show, the '70s Wonder Woman show, the Filmation cartoons and Superfriends all coming from pre-Crisis they help instill the idea that pre-Crisis is the definitive era.

Sorta like how Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle is considered the definitive version, Bond by Fleming, the Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew of the original series of books...

When DC closed up those eras with Crisis and New52, they effectively created choices for readers.
Three flavors.
Pre-Crisis, Post-Crisis and Post-Flashpoint.

Post-Crisis did at least rise up to be as prestigious as Pre-Crisis before it came to a close.
Post-Flashpoint really hasn't reached that same level, yet, as far as I can tell.

Of course, we're only eight years into Post-Flashpoint.
But eight years after Post-Crisis was 1994 and Zero Point. Much of DC's best Post-Crisis runs happened between 1986 and 1994.
They've spent those eight years in Post-Flashpoint either spinning tires or changing direction.

[Electricmastro]

They fall into two categories

1) as long as the mouth piece is not certain demographics they don't care.
2) They NEVER read a lot of those books.

It's more of NUMBER 2 than number 1.
All these complainers fall into the same pit-they don't READ the books that they bitch about or claim were politics free.

That's interesting, because I've seen older comics such as Black Panther vs. the KKK praised as well. For those that complain about a lot of political comics, but never read them, what stories would you cite as being good at mixing political/social issues with consistently good storytelling and good characterizations?

[Vampire Savior]

Of course, we're only eight years into Post-Flashpoint.
But eight years after Post-Crisis was 1994 and Zero Point. Much of DC's best Post-Crisis runs happened between 1986 and 1994.
They've spent those eight years in Post-Flashpoint either spinning tires or changing direction.

That is due to comics not selling nearly as well as they once did. The industry is a shadow of what it was in the 1980s and 1990s, due to a lot of reasons, but possibly mostly due to the abusive strip mining Ron Perelman and Carl Icahn did to it in the 1990s, which I don't think the industry ever really recovered from. Well, the actual publishing hasn't, but, of course, they've since been able to utilize the characters very effectively in other media.

Thus, instead of letting stories naturally play out, DC has had to keep falling back on relaunches, new initiatives, and attention grabbing gimmicks that disrupt status quo to stay afloat. They're totally reliant on outdated tactics that were employed during that strip mining phase, except they happen much more often now. Ultimately that gets them nowhere, damages the quality of their storytelling and products, and makes it so people don't want to read the comics...even regular comics readers. So people go back and revisit periods when they could simply enjoy stories without them having to be artificially propped up by gimmicks that disrupt their enjoyment.

[Vampire Savior]

Also, regarding the above discussion, let's get real here. There is quite a difference between Black Panther vs. the KKK, and Black Panther and the Crew vs. the idea of White people moving into Harlem.
https://io9.gizmodo.com/in-black-pan...e-m-1796181847

And if you can't tell the difference let me spell it out for you.

Black Panther fights the KKK, a white supremacist hate group that has employed terrorism, which most reasonable people can agree is bad.

Black Panther fights gentrification. How is this supposed to make the regular potential white guy reader who happened to move to Harlem feel?

[9th.]

That's interesting, because I've seen older comics such as Black Panther vs. the KKK praised as well. For those that complain about a lot of political comics, but never read them, what stories would you cite as being good at mixing political/social issues with consistently good storytelling and good characterizations?

To be fair this would also probably receive backlash if it came out today.

[Electricmastro]

To be fair this would also probably receive backlash if it came out today.

I think practically every series with a well-known hero faces some form of backlash, with a lot or a little, but I think what matters in the end is if any of the criticisms made are constructive and worth taking into account, because I think, ideally, every writer wants to get better at telling the stories they're telling, even political ones.

[Godlike13]

I don't see a problem with Black Panther beating the shit out of the clan. Its like Captain America beating up Nazi's. The KKK are obvious villains in this day in age.

[Electricmastro]

I don't see a problem with Black Panther beating the shit out of the clan. Its like Captain America beating up Nazi's. The KKK are obvious villains in this day in age.

I don't have a problem with it either. Criminals are still criminals after all, even in comics, so it can be satisfying to see superheroes defeat them, especially in compelling and interesting storylines.