Wrong turns made in storylines for DC Comics

[caj]

You're reading a DC Comics book and LOVING it. Then something happens and the story takes a wrong turn that ruins it for you.

What are some examples of wrong turns writers (or book editors) have taken in DC Comics (your opinion only)?

[D.Z]

Most stuff with relationships.

[Timber Wolf-By-Night]

Whoever made the decision (Didio) to cancel the often promised Speed Force title that was supposed to accompany the Barry-Allen-and-only-Barry-Allen-starring Flash book in the oughts, just to try to force fans of Wally and other members of the Flash Family to swallow that they would support Barry and nobody else.

The whole "Young Justice heroes aren't SERIOUS enough, they need to be traumatized/forced into 'growing up' and becoming SERIOUS" debacle.

[Gaius]

Max Lord neck snap pretty much derailed all the more interesting stuff that was going on in Rucka's WW run and the character for pretty much the remainder of the Pre-New 52 years.

[John Venus]

Nightwing Annual #2: Cute, a little melodramatic, still think Dick as Robin stuck in a safe with Batgirl was hilarious. Then the whole scene with Dick sleeping with Babs on the night of his wedding with Kory then inviting Babs to the wedding the morning after scene happens and ugh.

Dick and Kory's wedding in the original telling was like that too. The relationship was really well done under Wolfman's pen then as they get closer to the wedding, shit just starts falling apart, you got Mirage sleeping with Dick while disguised as Kory, Kory being mad at Dick over it, Dick being a huge jerk as well, etc, etc. The whole thing's a mess.

[caj]

Booster Gold leaves JLA to form the Conglomerate in JLA #38. You can't separate Blue and Gold. The book was never as good afterwards.

[BohemiaDrinker]

The whole "Young Justice heroes aren't SERIOUS enough, they need to be traumatized/forced into 'growing up' and becoming SERIOUS" debacle.

This.

Nightwing Annual #2: Cute, a little melodramatic, still think Dick as Robin stuck in a safe with Batgirl was hilarious. Then the whole scene with Dick sleeping with Babs on the night of his wedding with Kory then inviting Babs to the wedding the morning after scene happens and ugh.

Dick and Kory's wedding in the original telling was like that too. The relationship was really well done under Wolfman's pen then as they get closer to the wedding, shit just starts falling apart, you got Mirage sleeping with Dick while disguised as Kory, Kory being mad at Dick over it, Dick being a huge jerk as well, etc, etc. The whole thing's a mess.

Jesus, yes, all of this.

In fact, Titans are a recurring one here. Rebirth Titans were fine till Lazarus' Contract and then it was all downhill. And there was Sean McKeever's Titans; poor guy.

Other examples: cutting Gail Simone's BoP short in order to remove Dinah from the Team and make her marry Ollie. Forcing Morrison's Batman's INC to finish under Nu52 continuity. OYL Outsiders, OYL Titans, OYL Cass and OYL Nightwing were all examples of things that were running just fine and then "BAM: SUCKY NEW DIRECTION!" The integration of Wildstorm characters into the New 52 had a lot of potential - even if flawed - and then for some reason all of it was mandated to have a crossover centered around Eclipso. That killed it. Everything concerning Chris Kent.

And of course, Williansom, after jumping trough every possible hoop, being the one guy with the faintest concern about continuity, out of some miracle writting being able to put the Flash franchise back in some sort of shape... to be handed Heroes in Crisis. Yeah, that one was tough!

[Agent Z]

Max Lord neck snap pretty much derailed all the more interesting stuff that was going on in Rucka's WW run and the character for pretty much the remainder of the Pre-New 52 years.

I'd say the issue was less the killing of Max and how DC handled the fallout. Especially since they dragged it out past Infinite Crisis while letting Batman and Superman off the hook for their failures.

[WonderScott]

Truncating the War of the Gods event instead of letting Diana and other characters shine as the heroes most involved in the story.

Doing what was done in Amazons Attack instead of having the themes play out in an organic way with the plot points Rucka was sharing in the pages of WONDER WOMAN.

Giving Diana a twin brother.

Far too many Who is Donna Troy? stories.

As you can see I have a lot of Amazon agonies.

Not having Bruce and Selina tie the knot.

Making Kate Kane’s dad a villain.

De-aging Raven.

Not establishing Katar Hol and Shayera Thal as another pair of Hawks during the Return of Hawkman storyline.

[The tall man]

Having Cyborg, Starfire and Azrael be the leads of Justice League Odyssey then do a complete 180 by sidelining them to effectively make it a Jessica Cruz solo book. This was Vic's time to shine, to step up in a major way by going against Darkseid, but he gets tossed to the side and instead it turned into the mary sue Jessica show. Major wrong turn.

[Sacred Knight]

This isn't really an example of a wrong turn rather no turn. The complete lack of solid explanation for what it was that made Superman's powers turn energy based in the first place. There were possibilities thrown out, but nothing ever concretely proven. They just did the Superman Blue/Red angle and the cause of the change really never brought up again.

[MakeNightwingGreatAgain]

1. Seeley/King's Grayson series was doing excellent at taking Dick into a new direction and making him more of a solo hero! His build up with Helena was going fantastic and it truely was a masterpiece for a while despite its flaws. However, it started to go downhill real fast once they started to return Dick back to the Batfam status quo and the entire book was torpedoed by the new writers when they completely most of the development Dick had made thus far and his relationship with Helena was effectively pushed aside again for a forced Babs reference.

2. Kyle Higgins N52 Nightwing of course is infamous for being derailed due to all the Batfamily crossovers. It started to get ridiculous.

3. I always tell people to skip the last three issues of Tomasi's Nightwing run for the simple fact that DC had Tomasi nix all the solo development Dick had as a character and had him push Nightwing back to the Batfam to get him ready to take over the Batman mantle.

4. NTT is also infamous for going downhill in quality right around Titans Hunt.

[All Star Superman]

Whew...let's see.

Identity Crisis

Infinite Crisis' various missed opportunities and especially, its mistreatment of Kal-L, Lois, Superboy Prime, and Alex Luthor.

The New 52.

War For New Krypton: New Krypton could have EASILY been shunted off to another corner of the galaxy via Phantom Zone or a network of Mother Boxes and wouldn't have had to be used again. Instead, everyone's killed.

Missing the opportunity to explore a de-powered Superman for a while after Superman #82. If Clark had worn his regeneration suit with a cape and had to work with only Golden Age power levels, a lot of cool stories could have happened and the status quo could have been pushed off for a bit.

Damian Wayne surviving Batman & Son (or even existing at all).

DiDio and Bendis' treatment of the Super Family after Rebirth, especially Jon Kent.

Clark Kent's "outing" to the public.

Choosing Snyder's Death Metal, etc. nonsense over Johns' Doomsday Clock Metaverse approach to continuity.

Retconning Wonder Woman to be the "first" superhero in the DCU.

Jason Todd's resurrection.

Bringing back the Silver/Bronze Age heroes at the expense of their successors.

[WonderScott]

Max Lord neck snap pretty much derailed all the more interesting stuff that was going on in Rucka's WW run and the character for pretty much the remainder of the Pre-New 52 years.

Definitely one of mine too. Diana was shoehorned into a plot point that didn’t reflect her character.

[SonOfBaldwin]

Max Lord neck snap pretty much derailed all the more interesting stuff that was going on in Rucka's WW run and the character for pretty much the remainder of the Pre-New 52 years.

It certainly took Diana down a dangerous road that I don't think she's ever recovered from. And what was worse was how awfully it was followed up on. There was no real redemption for Diana. The evidence never really surfaced that cleared her name completely. So it leaves a stain that many writers since have exploited, making things worse.