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  1. #196
    Uncanny Member MajorHoy's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzigone View Post
    I can't agree with you at all and found the insult to the people living today and the implication that prior generations were superior (especially as it seems more directed at the young) completely unnecessary, but it's irrelevant whether the world (or country) would be better or worse - the point for me is that it's a real hard sell that it's the same as in our world.
    Man, talk about taking things the wrong way!

    I was only implying that maybe the U.S. politics of today wouldn't be quite so polarized if some of those people had lived through things like the Great Depression and World War II. There might be a bit more compassion and willingness to compromise for the benefit of the entire country, not as much as an "Us vs. Them" mentality like we're stuck with.

  2. #197
    Astonishing Member Tzigone's Avatar
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    Oh, and my sister just pointed out that the Trigger Twins and John Tane and other characters from the western DC comics should still be living. If Bruce actually looks like he's only aged 10 years since his debut (unsure, but they want him prime of life), then it's about 8.2 years passing to 1 year's aging. They were seemingly in their 20s in the 1880s, so should look less than 10 years older than Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, etc., and be perceived as guys in their 40s.

    Obviously if Bruce looks like he's aged 20 years, it's a different story.

    The absurdity is almost kinda fun now.

    EDIT: I know the post-COIE origins had the Twigger twins in the Civil War, but I hated it as it got the characters entirely wrong. The original comics were less than consistent, to say the least (especially that wild mention of the wireless in Johnny Thunder), but overall 1880s seemed most likely to me.

    EDIT again: Oh, at a 1/8 speed, the 80+ year-old lookers would remember before the Americas were found by most of Europe. Black Death. Some even the founding of Tenochtitlan. The invention of Gutenberg's printing press. So many implications.
    Last edited by Tzigone; 02-25-2021 at 03:36 PM.

  3. #198
    Astonishing Member BatmanJones's Avatar
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    Did they meet on a boat or on the street? That question from King’s Batman, with the answer being both, seems very much like what we’re talking about here and I don’t see what’s so confusing about that. A writer can choose to make things confusing or they can do something like King did which wasn’t confusing at all.

  4. #199
    Astonishing Member Tzigone's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by BatmanJones View Post
    Did they meet on a boat or on the street? That question from King’s Batman, with the answer being both, seems very much like what we’re talking about here and I don’t see what’s so confusing about that. A writer can choose to make things confusing or they can do something like King did which wasn’t confusing at all.
    I found King's answer an absolute cop-out and really quite stupid, but I guess not confusing.

  5. #200
    Astonishing Member BatmanJones's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzigone View Post
    I found King's answer an absolute cop-out and really quite stupid, but I guess not confusing.
    I loved King's resolution as I loved his whole run, but that's just a matter of taste.

    I was talking more about the question than the answer though. The question presupposes that a story from 1940 could coexist with a story from the 80s which could coexist with 2019.

    King did a lot of this when he'd reference past stories including costumes going way back and otherwise, but he's not the only example.

    As others have noted, Morrison's Batman is a great example of taking a character's entire history and making it relevant.

    Neither of these things are precisely in tune with the new status quo but each makes it a little easier to imagine how it might be made to work with elegance. You can hate King's use of past eras, for example, but still see how things needn't be as confusing as many here are making them out to be.

  6. #201
    Astonishing Member BatmanJones's Avatar
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    Since I care a lot more about great stories than great continuity, I only see this as giving creators more freedom while past continuity was only restrictive. That's a clear win in my book.

  7. #202
    Astonishing Member Tzigone's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by BatmanJones View Post
    Since I care a lot more about great stories than great continuity, I only see this as giving creators more freedom while past continuity was only restrictive. That's a clear win in my book.
    See, I think great stories can be done with (a functioning) continuity, and I just do not typically enjoy stories that ignore or rewrite previously established events, especially important ones. It makes them bad stories to be, because they ignore or contradict the information we already had. I often think of them as lazy, too, to be honest.

    I really do hate if the "if they're good stories, why do you care about continuity" argument, because to me, adhering to continuity is part and parcel of a good story. It's not a story absolutely can't be good with bad continuity, but it's a high, high bar to overcome. Characters being out of character is an even bigger one. When I see a writer say "I came up with the story and then let DC told which characters to use in it" (Heroes in Crisis), it's absolutely horrific-sounding to me. It's the exact opposite of what writing in a ongoing should be.
    Last edited by Tzigone; 02-25-2021 at 04:37 PM.

  8. #203
    Ultimate Member j9ac9k's Avatar
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    There's something funny about the idea that all the horrible mindgames Superman played on Lois in the Silver Age "actually happened." It would make them the most dysfunctional couple in the world, if that's the case.

  9. #204
    Ultimate Member SiegePerilous02's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzigone View Post
    See, I think great stories can be done with (a functioning) continuity, and I just do not typically enjoy stories that ignore or rewrite previously established events, especially important ones. It makes them bad stories to be, because they ignore or contradict the information we already had. I often think of them as lazy, too, to be honest.

    I really do hate if the "if they're good stories, why do you care about continuity" argument, because to me, adhering to continuity is part and parcel of a good story. It's not a story absolutely can't be good with bad continuity, but it's a high, high bar to overcome. Characters being out of character is an even bigger one. When I see a writer say "I came up with the story and then let DC told which characters to use in it" (Heroes in Crisis), it's absolutely horrific-sounding to me. It's the exact opposite of what writing in a ongoing should be.
    I think comics that share a continuity but still contradict each other can be very frustrating.

    But if they want to be upfront about publishing more self contained stories that aren't tied to any particular iteration of continuity and allow more creative freedom, I think it will be better in the long run. Some of DC's most enduring classics and evergreen sellers are either firmly outside the main canon or on the fringes of it that they might as well stand alone (the Sandman). Sometimes it's good to just pick up a trade collecting 12 issues and know you just have to read that and not 20 other books or preceding runs to understand what is happening, or have it ruined by a follow up run by a different writer.

    That can be done with comics in continuity, but I think it's becoming increasingly more difficult the more baggage gets accumulated and how many reboots and retcons we have.

  10. #205
    Astonishing Member Tzigone's Avatar
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    But if they want to be upfront about publishing more self contained stories that aren't tied to any particular iteration of continuity and allow more creative freedom, I think it will be better in the long run
    I agree with that*. This isn't that. I'm not saying it would be my favorite thing, but I think it has longer-tem potential. I kind sorta sometimes feel that way about much less shared universe (and shared universe where they paid attention to where other characters were was so cool when I first learned how it worked when reading about the early days of Marvel). It's just the more of them there are, and the more writers, the more unwieldy it gets. Kinda doubt that cat could be put back in the bag, though.

    That can be done with comics in continuity, but I think it's becoming increasingly more difficult the more baggage gets accumulated and how many reboots and retcons we have.
    Honestly, I rather wonder if there's about a 10-year max on a really consistent continuity when more than a dozen creators and more than a dozen titles are involved. Broader strokes can hold together longer, even with some retcons. More episodic storytelling makes it easier, but with the interconnections and storylines that build on other storylines, it gets more difficult. Seen many television shows go to pot and have incoherent and contradictory mytharc much more quickly. One creator (or a very small group of of them) or even just limiting characters can keep it much cleaner almost indefinitely (I've seen some that didn't and some that did), but the more pieces and the more people, the difficult it is to manage.


    *Though really I think more shorter, self-contained stories would be a good thing even if they were all in the same continuity. If a (potential) fan could pick up an issue and read a story instead of needing to collect a dozen issues for a story. Much better access for new readers. Though I do still think putting them places like Walmart and so forth is a big thing if you want kids. Even with adults, it's easier, but kids don't have credit cards and can't buy digital, and they aren't going to know they exists if they don't see them (how do comic books advertise books, anyway). I'm knocking on 40, and until I was 12, I think I thought comic books were something used to exist. They just weren't around in any of the stores I went to, I don't think.


    EDIT: I really do think one continuity (or at least tone) per title (not character) is good, though, because consistency of product is good. A person who likes one version of a character may not like another (definitely applies to me). So separating the version by title helps them get the one they want. And is good DC wants to continue the subscription model.
    Last edited by Tzigone; 02-25-2021 at 05:37 PM.

  11. #206
    Extraordinary Member Restingvoice's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzigone View Post
    I found King's answer an absolute cop-out and really quite stupid, but I guess not confusing.
    His answer was my answer because those two scenes don't contradict the other. Bruce and Selina met on the street then Batman met The Cat on the boat. It's the question that's wrong because it sounds like they forgot and set it up like it's a continuity problem caused by Dr. Manhattan.

  12. #207
    Extraordinary Member Restingvoice's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzigone View Post
    Oh, and my sister just pointed out that the Trigger Twins and John Tane and other characters from the western DC comics should still be living. If Bruce actually looks like he's only aged 10 years since his debut (unsure, but they want him prime of life), then it's about 8.2 years passing to 1 year's aging. They were seemingly in their 20s in the 1880s, so should look less than 10 years older than Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, etc., and be perceived as guys in their 40s.

    Obviously if Bruce looks like he's aged 20 years, it's a different story.

    The absurdity is almost kinda fun now.

    EDIT: I know the post-COIE origins had the Twigger twins in the Civil War, but I hated it as it got the characters entirely wrong. The original comics were less than consistent, to say the least (especially that wild mention of the wireless in Johnny Thunder), but overall 1880s seemed most likely to me.

    EDIT again: Oh, at a 1/8 speed, the 80+ year-old lookers would remember before the Americas were found by most of Europe. Black Death. Some even the founding of Tenochtitlan. The invention of Gutenberg's printing press. So many implications.
    That's the kind of thing I just ignore to be honest... or... if I wanna, then the answer is Metaverse. That every single Earth was created the moment Kal-El was born. The history and timeline created in that second to accommodate this world that Superman will live in. So all the content before Superman was born was never part of a living, progressing timeline. Just a past you can go back to if you're time traveling, and the rules are different, since it's a back story.
    Last edited by Restingvoice; 02-25-2021 at 09:45 PM.

  13. #208
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    Quote Originally Posted by Tzigone View Post
    It's frustrating. While I don't expect DC to think about it, some (not nearly all) societal/political/etc. changes come largely from the old dying off and/or a new generation coming into positions of authority: a sort of gradual attrition of the things being done the old way. And so I don't think society would look the same in 2021 if the bulk of people alive lived through the Great Depression and WW II (in appropriate countries), and we have living people who were slaves in the 1800s and so forth and so on.
    Well again...I don't think they mean that if you pick up a guy from the street in the 2021 DCU he literally remembers WW2. That seems to be how a lot of people interpreted what Waverider said. I interpreted it on a more abstract level.

    I think what Waverider said is the same thing that Manhattan explained in Doomsday Clock...that the Superman and Batman we have today are the same guys who first appeared in the comics of the late 30's. Due to a quirk of time in the DCU, they keep evolving and changing over the decades, while staying relatively young. Doomsday Clock explains this in a bit more depth - you literally have 'resets' that push forward the origins and careers of these characters, but they are the same people. In Doomsday Clock, we see Clark making his debut as Superman in 1938, and then we see that event 'slide' forward to 1956, then to 1986...and so on. That's what Waverider means when he talks about Batman changing over the decades.

    When it comes to current continuity though, I think the DCU is at a point where it is acknowledging this multi-faceted past, in all its variations. Is this because, as of Death Metal, the characters remember everything? Or is it because 'everything' (or as much of it as it is humanly possible to fit) is now back as part of the current timeline? We don't know.

    I think basically DC is trying to move towards something akin to the Marvel approach to continuity, wherein FF # 1 is still in canon, but so are modern retellings. In some sense, the FF origins happened in 1961 in the universe, but its been 'moved' forward by certain forced and thus also happened around 12-15 years ago.

    Quote Originally Posted by BatmanJones View Post
    Did they meet on a boat or on the street? That question from King’s Batman, with the answer being both, seems very much like what we’re talking about here and I don’t see what’s so confusing about that. A writer can choose to make things confusing or they can do something like King did which wasn’t confusing at all.
    Honestly, they can both be true in the same continuity.

    Bruce Wayne encounters Selina Kyle in the East End and has a quick fight with her. Months later, as Batman, he encounters the jewel thief known as 'the Cat' on the boat.

    This might be the kind of continuity DC is going for - trying to make everything fit together in a coherent timeline. It may work for some things, but for others, they'll have to make choices. Jonathan and Martha Kent are either alive or dead when Clark becomes Superman. The JSA are either from a previous generation or contemporaries of Superman and Batman. But there are a lot of things they can be vague about.

  14. #209
    Astonishing Member Tzigone's Avatar
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    Well again...I don't think they mean that if you pick up a guy from the street in the 2021 DCU he literally remembers WW2. That seems to be how a lot of people interpreted what Waverider said. I interpreted it on a more abstract level.
    I don't see what else
    In the Linearverse, “people age far more slowly, living much longer than elsewhere,” Waverider (a gatekeeper of DC’s timelines) explains to Batman in the final pages of Forged. “Your youth and vitality will endure for decades, enabling you to be effective far longer than the universal norm.”—
    can mean. If that's not what they meant, then they've explained it very, very poorly.

    Even the article itself says
    It's a simple, straightforward way to explain why fashions and technology changed, contemporary characters that are active in 2021 lived through historic events like World War II, and the heroes had far more adventures than can be reconciled within the 10-15 years that DC and even Marvel Comics superhero careers are generally regarded to be/

  15. #210
    Astonishing Member Stanlos's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by blunt_eastwood View Post
    Isn't this essentially what hypertime is? Or am I misunderstanding that concept?
    I have been asking this question for the longest. Literally there is no need for any of the Crises, infinite or otherwise, as Said and company had already brilliantly and elegantly solved this problem.

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