From the looks of the announcement, Superman's identity is still public, Jon is still a teenager, the new supporting cast is the focus, plot points from Bendis' run are being followed up and the backup ties into Midnighter's future state story which I'm not interested in. Until someone pushes a hard reset on Bendis' grievous changes, I doubt I'll have an ongoing Superman comic on my pull list for a long while.
The only thing I want gone and at the same time has a legit shot at going away is the secret ID outing. If that gets put back in the box, its pretty much the best I can hope for. And I do think that'll happen but only at the conclusion of this big event they're pushing. But not every single thing Bendis did is going to be jettisoned. That's just reality.
"They can be a great people Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you. My only son." - Jor-El
Who said I'm not. I could but I don't think they are frankly worth continuing because most people hate them as the sales data confirms (an average 30% something percent drop higher certain months). Why continue with ideas that have been a well-documented commercial and critical failure?
Last edited by Celgress; 12-16-2020 at 01:39 PM.
"So you've come to the end now alive but dead inside."
Not surprising, but I agree with you here. The announcement was fine, the interview is a mess.
Checkmate and Lois' involvement in the United Planets in the Lex Future State book *hopefully* takes her out of the "Daily Planet/Metropolis" cast that he handwaves away in that interview. He says that the Future State stuff is hints to what is to come in Superman/Action. But this is the same writer who is working on House of El, and the fact that he doesn't really mention Lois in either that context or this one is a red flag for me.
Plus, they've been doing that New Creative Team-New Cadre of Characters bit with Wonder Woman to her great detriment for literally decades now, and that is a quagmire I don't want Superman to fall into.
To be the devil's advocate though, sales data didn't reflect Rebirth was this massive resurgence for Superman either. Frankly nothing of the past twenty years has performed that great within a main continuity structure. If we're going to hold Bendis' run to not performing up to snuff, we can't pretend there's been any gold standard in modern times, because there hasn't been. Its really sad, but the last time Superman was genuinely the cream of the crop alongside Batman was the triangle era.
None of this is to say I suddenly hold Bendis' run in any higher esteem. I don't. But there is some double standard regarding it and its mediocre sales.
Last edited by Sacred Knight; 12-16-2020 at 01:43 PM.
"They can be a great people Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you. My only son." - Jor-El
All I care about is “do I like this” and “is it selling well enough so that I can continue to enjoy it if I do like it”. Unless you get an Al Ewing Immortal Hulk tier smash hit, sales rarely rise for anything just because it’s a good comic.
Yeah, the more I think about it the more I think I'll follow your lead. I'll wait for a few issues to see if things improve but all the Bendis love makes me very hesitant to return in January. Bendis wrote IMO the worst modern Superman comic by far. I don't want to read about the changes he has made, sorry.
"So you've come to the end now alive but dead inside."
There is a core audience for Superman books with a floor of 30,000 - 35,000. That is the mean that pretty much everything reverts to. Bendis' sales weren't abysmal by DC's metrics. And all you need to look at is the announcement of Naomi getting her CW show to see where WB's places value on Bendis. That alone is worth more to them than if he goosed the sales up to 80,000 a month.
Agreed, but at least I could tolerate those other runs and their ideas not so Bendis' run and ideas. I hated nearly everything he did and I'm glad he commercially failed to reinvigorate Sups or even maintain past readership. His ideas were terrible and poorly executed, sorry but it's how I feel.
"So you've come to the end now alive but dead inside."
I feel you. Everyone feels that way about certain runs. I STILL miss the New 52 and am not ashamed to admit it, despite knowing that it didn't light the world on fire either. At this point its really just about what grabs the reader. Like Vordan and Yoda alluded to, sales numbers are pretty much set at this point regardless. It would probably take a very unforseen consequence to change it. Something outside of the comics that really just jettisoned the character back up into previously charted levels of popularity. Minus that, sales will be what they are and only an unprecedented dip really would show much. Just gotta hope whatever a creative direction is at one point fits your ideals, or at least a decent amount of them.
"They can be a great people Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you. My only son." - Jor-El