Is another reboot coming?

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

At this point i feel like they should give up with any ongoing continuity. Just seperate into smaller imprints with their own individual continuity.

[captchuck]

Just my guess, but I bet they simplify the DCU to the basics. This will work better for merchandising and movies/cartoons...

[Last Son of Krypton]

It's DC, reboots are always coming.

[Celgress]

It's DC, reboots are always coming.

Yup, which is laughably sad at this point.

[Dreaded Porcupine]

I don’t care what the mismanagement at DC does as long as there are plans for multiple JSA books.

[Rod G]

Another reboot?

Eh.

We’ll see if this one is any good.

[Laufeyson]

It's DC, reboots are always coming.

Well, if Marvel modus operandi is shaking shits up then DC is reboots when everything fell apart.

[scary harpy]

Reboots/relaunches are cash grabs...meaning a temporary sales boost with no vision for the future.

So, as long as they pay $$$, then TPTB will do reboots/relaunches.

[Doctor Bifrost]

So very true.
They had the means to fix everything for good four times now: Convergence, Multiversity, Rebirth and Doomsday Clock.

Any one of those four could’ve put things into order with a narrative hand wave.

One of the problems is that, even though they made use of the "narrative hand wave" - making arbitrary changes to the past, mainly as a way to undo the parts of The New 52 that just weren't working, and to bring some things back from pre-Flashpoint that were valuable - it's like they couldn't really admit that that was what they were doing and just go with it. They kept trying to "explain and justify" aspects of The New 52 even as they were getting rid of it.

Wonder Woman is a key example. They gave her and the Amazons a new backstory that got rid of most of Azzarello's run (although they kept the Zeus Daddy part, which may be the part I disliked the most, although it's hard to choose between that and the "feminazi" Amazons, which are thankfully gone). But for some obscure reason they felt the need to "explain" The New 52 Wonder Woman story in an in-new-continuity way, so it became a set of false memories and holodeck-like encounters with false gods and false Amazons ("The Lies"), all imposed by the "real" gods. And, by the story's logic (I use that term lightly), Diana had been carrying around those false memories and having those fake experiences for, let us say, the first ten years of her career as a superhero.

That means that if you want to do a flashback to the earlier days of Wonder Woman, you need to remember that in those days she had no idea who she was, thought her Amazon sisters were murderous man-hating rapists, and in fact never set foot of Themyscira or talked to her actual mother in all that time. What a lot of crazy baggage to put into a character's backstory when you're doing a retcon anyway! And for what purpose? They should have just moved The New 52 to another dimension and said: "And here's Diana's history in the new continuity, which doesn't include any of that stuff in any form." (If they want to include something from The New 52 - such's as Zeus's paternity - they can do it because it's a new continuity and they can include what they like. But to hold onto something they're getting rid of as "years of false memories"? DC, why do you do this to yourself?)

Donna Troy got caught up in this as well. In The New 52, she was a magical construct, created in adult form, to be a weapon against Diana. (Then a bunch of other stuff happened.) Then Titans Rebirth came along, and in the new continuity, it's clear that she was a member of the original Teen Titans.as a teenager, which would seem to obviate her New 52 origin. Then Diana comes along and encounters the Titans, and reacts with disgust to Donna because of her New 52 origin, which Diana describes. And then Donna - once a cheerful teenager in the Teen Titans - has to cope with being a magical construct, created in adult form, to be a weapon against Diana. Yes, there are convoluted, bizarre, comic-booky ways to reconcile this stuff (I don't think they ever did), but why keep the New 52 origin in the first place when you're bringing back her career in the TT?

(Of course, this has all been retconned again with "GA Wonder Woman," but I don't know if anyone knows the details. Or can keep up.)

Wally West got the worst of it. The Wally West we're familiar with didn't exist in The New 52 (having been replaced by young Wallace). Post-Rebirth, it was clear that they wanted Wally back as part of the Titans. But somebody apparently said, "Well, he didn't exist in The New 52, so we need to come up with an explanation for why he didn't exist and now does." They then proceeded to create one of those wildly complicated, largely incomprehensible storylines involving reality-altering magic and stuck-in-the-Speed-Force time-travel shenanigans (I call it chronobabble). We get Wally back - but some people remember him (or aspects of him), and some don't, and any exploits he had either don't exist in the new continuity, or they did but everybody forgot them (and remembered something else, which was false), and... I would argue that this was not good for the character. And a lot of devoted Wally fans would argue more strongly than that.

And it was unnecessary. Here's something they could have said: In the post-Rebirth continuity, Wally West was a sidekick, of Barry Allen's, but now he's grown up and has taken a new superhero name (like Dick, Roy, Donna, and Garth did), and he's married and has two kids. He also has a younger cousin named Wallace, who is the new Kid Flash.

Or (and I like this one better): post-Rebirth, we are in a continuity where Barry Allen was the Flash, but died heroically to save the universe in some Crisis-like event. His sidekick, Wally West/Kid Flash, took over for him as the Flash, had many interesting adventures, and got married and had kids.

Now Barry Allen comes back to life, in the way that people sometimes do in comic books. (I could come up with three ways off the top of my head, and so can all of you.) And after a joyful reunion, Barry and Wally start to figure out their future as co-existing superheroes, and what to do about the naming rights.

Isn't that a little more coherent (if I say so myself) than what we got? Wouldn't that have caused less friction between the Barry fans and the Wally fans.? (You can add Wallace in too, if you want. He has fans.)

I know I've gone on, but here's my point: If you're going to do a retcon/reboot, do it. Figure out what you want the new continuity to include. Think it through carefully so that it fits together and makes narrative sense. (Rather than fumbling with it in public, as your mismatched pieces encounter each other in the comics.) As for anything else - don't worry about it. Move it to another dimension. Remember it fondly, but don't saddle the characters with it if it doesn't fit.

End of rant.

But that's just me. YMMV.

P.S. Apparently some readers think that "fumbling with it in public, as your mismatched pieces encounter each other in the comics" is actually the coolest part. I do not agree. But I think I'm suffering from Multiverse Exhaustion.

[scary harpy]

...

I know I've gone on, but here's my point: If you're going to do a retcon/reboot, do it. Figure out what you want the new continuity to include. Think it through carefully so that it fits together and makes narrative sense. (Rather than fumbling with it in public, as your mismatched pieces encounter each other in the comics.) As for anything else - don't worry about it. Move it to another dimension. Remember it fondly, but don't saddle the characters with it if it doesn't fit.

End of rant.

But that's just me. YMMV.

P.S. Apparently some readers think that "fumbling with it in public, as your mismatched pieces encounter each other in the comics" is actually the coolest part. I do not agree. But I think I'm suffering from Multiverse Exhaustion.

It's not just you.

Most of us are suffering from Multiverse Exhaustion.

Sadly, TPTB don't think it through...beyond the money-grad from the temporary sales boost.

[scary harpy]

Just my guess, but I bet they simplify the DCU to the basics. This will work better for merchandising and movies/cartoons...

hmm...sounds pretty good to me...

It's DC, reboots are always coming.

Yup, which is laughably sad at this point.

yep, sad but true.

[Badou]

No. I don't think DC is going to reboot again. They will just do relaunches and mess around with trying to make sense of their continuity like they usually do, but the more they try and make sense of it the worse it gets. So I think that DC is just going to downsize more like what Rebirth did in cutting out some books while double shipping their most important books twice a month for their main continuity stories, but they will also shift focus even more towards OGNs and non continuity driven stories. Then just let the focus of the main continuity driven stories lessen over time.

Honestly, I'm as less interested in DC continuity than I ever have been. Pre-Flashpoint, New 52, or Rebirth I feel like I'm at my limit of trying to make sense of it and I just don't care anymore. I'd actually welcome a full on reboot because I feel so detached to the current continuity that I wouldn't be bothered if it all got rebooted. I wouldn't expect it to be good, since DC would obviously mess it up, but I don't enjoy the current continuity so I wouldn't be losing anything important.

[CTTT]

So, if things are back to basics continuity wise, does that mean Dick will be Robin again, and Roy Harper will be Speedy? The OG Teen Titans will be back?

[scary harpy]

So, if things are back to basics continuity wise, does that mean Dick will be Robin again, and Roy Harper will be Speedy? The OG Teen Titans will be back?

Not quite.

Thanks to Teen Titans Go (and it's predecessor), the roster for Titans will be: Beast Boy, Cyborg, Raven, Robin and Starfire....for the foreseeable future.

Now, who's Robin can vary.

[Lee Stone]

Not quite.

Thanks to Teen Titans Go (and it's predecessor), the roster for Titans will be: Beast Boy, Cyborg, Raven, Robin and Starfire....for the foreseeable future.

Now, who's Robin can vary.

And as we’ve seen from the early episodes of Young Justice, we could get mixed up versions.
In Young Justice Robin was Dick Grayson but acted more like Tim Drake and Kid Flash was Wally but acted more like Bart.