Original or New Golden Age: what’s your fancy??

[Captain Britain of Earth 20]

What do you think of DC’s “New Golden Age”? Do you like it better than the original version or do you think it will bring back attention to the original to compare it? My curiosity is peaked.

[Factor]

I’m not a fan of the new characters and retcons, to be honest. Especially the one about the JSA having been active in the 70s on the main Earth, or bringing back Golden Age Aquaman as a separate character, making Arthur Curry a derivative legacy who looks just like the “original”.
But I do hope this new push can help bring more eyes to the JSA and other Golden Age concepts. They just need a writer who can bring fresher takes than Johns.

[Jim Kelly]

I fell out of using labels like "Golden Age" and "Silver Age" a long time ago; however, if comic book collectors are going to use these labels, there has to be some conventions for how they are used. The more that a label like "Golden Age" is thrown around haphazardly, the less useful it becomes. You guys who use that label often should be holding feet to the fire when it's badly employed.

Obviously, a commercial enterprise can do whatever the hell they want with a label (so long as it's not violating trademark or advertising regulations)--and if the publisher wants to call something "Golden Age" they can. But that doesn't mean their consumers have to accept this abuse.

[DrNewGod]

I'm of two minds here. I rather like untold story approaches to vintage characters, that's mainly what Thomas' All-Star Squadron was all about. I'm not great fan of rewriting the past, particularly for the purpose of shoehorning in new characters (even Thomas was guilty of that every so often), or entirely redefining characters.

Ultimately, I have enjoyed the few issues that I've read, and that's what matters most I think.

[Sutekh]

I'm of two minds here. I rather like untold story approaches to vintage characters, that's mainly what Thomas' All-Star Squadron was all about. I'm not great fan of rewriting the past, particularly for the purpose of shoehorning in new characters (even Thomas was guilty of that every so often), or entirely redefining characters.

Ultimately, I have enjoyed the few issues that I've read, and that's what matters most I think.

Total agreement with the bolded.

I love 'untold stories' of a team or character's past exploits. A dozen new stories of stuff the Justice Society did during WW2 (or after) would be very much my cup of tea.

I do not love retellings of classic stories, at all, *especially* when they kind of suck compared to the original.

And I am not a big fan of introducing never-before-seen characters to the character's history retroactively, since it's rarely done well, IMO. It can work, as long as it doesn't make the protagonist look terrible, which, too often, it does. "Here's my grown up kid, which I totally knew about all this time, and never once mentioned or was a parent to! Woo! I'm a deadbeat dad / child abandoner!"

[scary harpy]

I'm of two minds here. I rather like untold story approaches to vintage characters, that's mainly what Thomas' All-Star Squadron was all about. I'm not great fan of rewriting the past, particularly for the purpose of shoehorning in new characters (even Thomas was guilty of that every so often), or entirely redefining characters.

Ultimately, I have enjoyed the few issues that I've read, and that's what matters most I think.

Total agreement with the bolded.

I love 'untold stories' of a team or character's past exploits. A dozen new stories of stuff the Justice Society did during WW2 (or after) would be very much my cup of tea.

I do not love retellings of classic stories, at all, *especially* when they kind of suck compared to the original.

And I am not a big fan of introducing never-before-seen characters to the character's history retroactively, since it's rarely done well, IMO. It can work, as long as it doesn't make the protagonist look terrible, which, too often, it does. "Here's my grown up kid, which I totally knew about all this time, and never once mentioned or was a parent to! Woo! I'm a deadbeat dad / child abandoner!"

I accept and expect some light refreshing of DC's golden age characters. It's a necessary adjustment.

I am not impressed by the 'new' villains created for the golden age. Why not use villains that were in the golden age?

Instead they create villains they think should have been in the golden age of comics...but weren't!

[andersonh1]

I rather like untold story approaches to vintage characters, that's mainly what Thomas' All-Star Squadron was all about. I'm not great fan of rewriting the past, particularly for the purpose of shoehorning in new characters (even Thomas was guilty of that every so often), or entirely redefining characters.

This is how I feel. And I have not been enjoying the new characters or changes to existing characters at all. I like the approach that the 2000s JSA series took: children and grandchildren of the originals are introduced and work to live up to the legacy of the original heroes. I do not favor inserting new characters into the past or drastically rewriting the history or characteristics of Golden Age characters. So the "New Golden Age" has been a major failure for me.

[Robotman]

I’ve enjoyed the New Golden Age concepts but now that Johns is on his way out of DC I’m sure most of it will be reconned or forgotten.

[DrNewGod]

Further, giving (veritably) every Golden Age character a sidekick devalues every sidekick that existed, and seems like a bankruptcy of ideas.

[Jon Clark]

Further, giving (veritably) every Golden Age character a sidekick devalues every sidekick that existed, and seems like a bankruptcy of ideas.

It also overcomplicates things. More characters to account for that no one remembers. At least the original sidekicks had printed stories that sort of set their lives until now in stone. This group Johns introduced are whatever the next writer says since there is nothing set in stone about them.

The worst offender has to be Judy Garrick who is a 1960's character travelling back in time to the 1940's to become her father's sidekick but now has been lost in time until the 2020's.

[Robotman]

It also overcomplicates things. More characters to account for that no one remembers. At least the original sidekicks had printed stories that sort of set their lives until now in stone. This group Johns introduced are whatever the next writer says since there is nothing set in stone about them.

The worst offender has to be Judy Garrick who is a 1960's character travelling back in time to the 1940's to become her father's sidekick but now has been lost in time until the 2020's.

Yeah, Jay totally didn’t need a daughter/sidekick and we sure as hell didn’t need yet another speedster.

There seems to be a new Flash or Green Lantern every 6 months.

[Digifiend]

Funny you say that, because out of everyone created for New Golden Age, The Boom has the best chance of sticking around. Next time there's an event like Finish Line or One Minute War (the last arcs respectively from Williamson and Adams' runs on The Flash), she's likely to be used in it. Where would everyone else appear once the current JSA run finishes?

It also overcomplicates things. More characters to account for that no one remembers. At least the original sidekicks had printed stories that sort of set their lives until now in stone. This group Johns introduced are whatever the next writer says since there is nothing set in stone about them.

The worst offender has to be Judy Garrick who is a 1960's character travelling back in time to the 1940's to become her father's sidekick but now has been lost in time until the 2020's.

Everyone from Stargirl The Lost Children except Stargirl herself, Red Arrow, the Newsboy Legion and Secret are lost in time (the Newsboy Legion was the 90s version and Secret is also from the 90s, but since that's also when Courtney debuted, they can be treated as present day). There's a lot of characters there who'd have Captain America's silver age man out of time thing going on.

[Aarkus]

the Red Lantern bits are too Johns-ian for my liking but the rest of it is fine by me

[DrNewGod]

The Golden Age as written is a bit of a double-edged sword. There's a kind of innocent purity to it, even when it was taking on public corruption, corporate greed, and genocidal fascism. On the other hand, characters like Flash or Green Lantern versus the kind of minor thugs that made up most of their adversaries for the bulk of their original runs seems a rather bad mismatch. Sure, there were plenty of mad scientists and cult leaders, but for every Dr. Droog or Wotan in the early days there seemed to be several dozen hopelessly outclassed mooks.

All that to say, I can see why New Golden Age needs to field some more threatening talent against our heroes. As scary harpy says, I'd rather they used villains of the time, but I get that those were in pretty short supply until nearly the end of the Golden Age, unless they want to do a complete historical rewrite.

[Sutekh]

Yeah, Jay totally didn’t need a daughter/sidekick and we sure as hell didn’t need yet another speedster.

There seems to be a new Flash or Green Lantern every 6 months.

Yeah, this. The more people with Green Lantern rings or Flash speed are running/flying around, the less cool Hal and Barry seem. Like there's a dozen of them around.

"Flash! (One of the dozen or so...) Fastest Men Alive! Doesn't have the same ring to it, yanno?