What is Crisis on Infinite Earths Legacy

[JThree]

Have to second someone's statement: Constant Revisionism and a lack of respect for what's gone before.

==jthree

[Robotman]

I think that more and more people are accepting the fact that it was original sin that started the destruction of DC universe.

I think that’s a bit melodramatic. As was already stated, pretty much all the major changes caused by CoIE have been undone.

The one thing I’m still not a fan of is having the JSA on the same earth as the JLA. It really lessens their significance and makes it strange that Superman is so revered when apparently super powered gods have been public for 80 years prior.

[superduperman]

COIE itself wasn't really the problem. It was the rebuilding of the universe that they ran into problems (cough) Hawkworld, Superboy (cough). Had they started at zero for everybody like New 52 did, they might have avoided some of these problems. It's obvious that by the end of the last century, they were running out of ideas with the restrictions that the reboots put on them.

[lgcruz]

Honestly i'd say that death of superman was ultimately far more damaging to DC than COIE. The kind of events dc can't stop doing nowadays are much closer to the former than the later, they aim at making some sort of shocking new development that changes something forever (like viciously killing a few beloved characters), that ultimately means nothing because there's very little stories to tell it if it isn´t undone. By comparison COIE was far more focused on trying to give some satisfying conclusion to worlds and characters that they knew would be replaced as they weren't profitable enough to keep selling (although it did kill plenty of little known secondary characters, many of them were created specifically to die in the event), in practise the only thing modern events borrow from it is the multiple book crossover aspect.

[Doctor Know]

COIE on its own is a fine story. It’s the mismanagement of various DC titles afterwards that’s sunk the various characters.

Speaking anecdotally for a moment; as this is my own conversation with a CB shop owner who used to work for DC back in the 80s. Additionally the fact that’s it’s been nearly 40 years since Crisis.

What he told me was that COIE was intended to be a flash-in-the-pan event to compete with Marvel’s 1984 mega crossover series Secret Wars. Using COIE as a vehicle to reset the universe came afterwards. Just like we saw with Flashpoint and the New 52. Flashpoint was a 5 issue story only meant to effect Barry Allen. But they it was altered late in the story to reboot the universe.

With regards to the Crisis reset however, was the intention that the revisions/reimaginings of the Post-Crisis DCU would not last. Like we saw with the New 52, DC was going to give the Post-Crisis changes a few years and if things went bad, they would put the universe back the way it was.


But you look at things like:
Perez’s WW. Which has almost become the definitive version for Diana and the Amazons.

The reinvigorated popularity of Batman from Frank Miller’s two titles (TDKReturns and Year One) and the 1989 Burton movie.

Messner-Loeb and Mark Waid’s runs on Wally West’s Flash title. Barry was kept dead for 23 years because Wally worked out so well.

Byrne’s revisions on Superman. Which didn’t get undone until John’s restored the Silver Age history in 2009, and then undone again by Morrison in 2011 New 52.

The success of the JLI era titles in the immediate aftermath of COIE.

New Teen Titans still still running strong and not quite hitting the stagnation the title saw in 1989 and beyond. Plus Wolfman and Perez being the team behind both NTT and COIE’s success help inflate the prestige of both books.

Mike Grell’s Green Arrow run.

Hawkworld miniseries and follow-up.

Captain Atom 1987 series.

Question 1987 series by Denny O’Neil.

Dr. Fate by DeMatties and Giffen.

Etc


A lot was going good for DC at the time. As you can surmise, no one wanted to rock the boat. Things turned sour for the Post-Crisis DCU the same way they turned sour for the New 52. Certain writers and editors referencing and or reintroducing element from the previous defunct continuity.

JL Europe was especially bad at this. Constantly referencing the Satellite Years of the JLA from the late 70s pre-1984 (Detroit) era. When none of that could have happened to the characters we were reading.

Other things like Superboy’s history with the Legion, Donna being Wonder Girl before Diana debuted as Wonder Woman, retconning in real time the Hawkman and Hawkgirl on Earth to be the same ones from Hawkworld. Then later revealing the Hawks on earth were imposters who were just palling around with the League members and fighting Katar and Shayera’s enemies for kicks.


Zero Hour (1994) was supposed to clear things up. But that only added to the confusion. Since Zero Hour is too preoccupied being a Hal Jordan is the universe’s biggest dickus. That fixing the timeline becomes and afterthought.

I digress. The point is, COIE was never meant to be the axis which the DCU hinged on. The changes weren’t intended to be permanent but a lot of them worked so well that they became integral to their characters. DC editorial and writing teams slowly introduced their favorite pre-crisis elements back into the universe and rather than laying down strict rules on what’s canon and what’s not. DC decided to do what they always do. Split the difference and hope they land on the side that makes them the most money. Not what makes fans happy or makes the most sense.

[wonder39]

Zero Hunter has the right of it. Batman was on a sustained upswing, but almost every other one of DC's major brands was in trouble. Their best sellers were heavily continuity-dependent titles that weren't an easy onboard for new readers, and names almost anyone would recognize were weighed down by their history rather than enriched by it.

Personally, I think DC could have retooled without burning everything to the ground first. The Batman titles did it in 1969. However, Wolfman and Perez may have been right in thinking a late 80s reader wasn't going to swallow a soft-reboot as readily as a cusp-Bronze Age fan had done.

It did motivate some new and exciting talent to come aboard and do some cool stuff. Flash wasn't only exciting because it was the fulfillment of a sidekick's potential, but because the stories were very different than Barry's adventures. Superman had a whole different vibe with Ma and Pa Kent to talk with about his struggles.

Assuming we couldn't cold boot the whole thing b/c Titans and LoSH were too lucrative, I can only see 1 thing they should not have done: Remove Wonder Woman from the Golden Age. She could have been the continuity piece, and what Perez did with the relaunch couldn't have been set in 1942 could have fit into a 1980s return story.

Wonder Woman hadn't been part of World War 2 since the Silver / Bronze Age with the creation of Earth One. That version never had ties to the War, only the Golden Age / Earth Two version was connected to the war.

[HsssH]

I think that’s a bit melodramatic. As was already stated, pretty much all the major changes caused by CoIE have been undone.

The one thing I’m still not a fan of is having the JSA on the same earth as the JLA. It really lessens their significance and makes it strange that Superman is so revered when apparently super powered gods have been public for 80 years prior.

Problem is not some specific continuity change that can be expanded upon or reverted at later date. Problem is this idea in general that you can mess with continuity in such a manner and do half-reboots.

[Username taken]

Crisis worked, the problem is the way folks write superhero comics.

A lot of writers constantly look backwards instead of forwards so some pre-Crisis elements started slipping back in, in some of the worst ways possible.

There's nothing with re-introducing those elements but they should have been done within the existing status quo. To read Justice League and see a Hawkman that's different from what's been established in-universe is just horrible.

Nostalgia for the past is good but it shouldn't poison the present, thats a problem that both DC and Marvel, the inability to truly move forward and innovate with what they are working with.

[Holt]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought it was the exact opposite: Hawkman and Hawkgirl showed up in the Giffen/DeMatteis Justice League (I just reread that arc last week!) more or less as their classic Silver Age selves, only for that to necessitate confusing retcons after Hawkworld rebooted the characters and made those appearances impossible to reconcile chronologically.

Like others have said, one of the biggest problems with the reboot was not committing to an across the board clean slate for everyone. I can see why they did it and I’m glad that they didn’t wipe everything, but choosing to keep some parts of the history while removing others didn’t really make things less confusing in the long run.

[Thor-Ul]

The positives outweigh the negatives?

That's a matter of opinion.

I feel the positives are in the past and the negatives are in the present with accumulated interest.

The negatives are consequence of the nostalgic retcons which tried to undo Crisis.

[Thor-Ul]

COIE itself wasn't really the problem. It was the rebuilding of the universe that they ran into problems (cough) Hawkworld, Superboy (cough). Had they started at zero for everybody like New 52 did, they might have avoided some of these problems. It's obvious that by the end of the last century, they were running out of ideas with the restrictions that the reboots put on them.

I can agree with this.

[godisawesome]

Problem is not some specific continuity change that can be expanded upon or reverted at later date. Problem is this idea in general that you can mess with continuity in such a manner and do half-reboots.

Again, though, that had already been started back when DC first even introduced the multi-Earth concept so that they could treat the Silver Age Green Lantern and Flash as separate entities entirely from the Golden Age ones, but only do some minimal house cleaning with Batman and Superman.

Fact of the matter is that COIE just makes a clear landmark event for the continuity inconsistencies that use it as an excuse, but the Silver Age transition has the same type of impact, just without the specific landmark event and instead a smaller series of stories carrying out the change.

The real creative difference comes down to the advantages and disadvantages of how the Multi-verse works versus an integrated timeline.

[king of hybrids]

I feel like writers seeking to relitigate/complain/rage about COIE over nostalgia was as much if not THE greatest negative that’s come out of COIE

[Doctor Know]

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I thought it was the exact opposite: Hawkman and Hawkgirl showed up in the Giffen/DeMatteis Justice League (I just reread that arc last week!) more or less as their classic Silver Age selves, only for that to necessitate confusing retcons after Hawkworld rebooted the characters and made those appearances impossible to reconcile chronologically.

Like others have said, one of the biggest problems with the reboot was not committing to an across the board clean slate for everyone. I can see why they did it and I’m glad that they didn’t wipe everything, but choosing to keep some parts of the history while removing others didn’t really make things less confusing in the long run.

Post-Crisis Hawkman and Hawkgirl showed up on JLI and Byrne’s Superman run (Action Comics #588 and Superman vol 2 #18), and they were their Silver Age selves. The confusion came with the popularity of Hawkworld. Instead of setting that series in the past and following up to present day. Hawkworld was set present day and those versions of the characters were introduced to the current DC continuity. DC wanting to supplant the existing Hawks for a version they felt were more popular.

So the versions of the Hawks we saw assisting Superman and the JLI got retconned into be a Thanagarian sleeper agent named Fel Andar and a civilian human woman named Sharon Parker. Sharon who was brainwashed by Fel to assist him and believe she was Shayera.

When Fel is exposed, he kills Sharon and flees back to Thanagar.

This is covered in JLI #24 when Fel and Sharon quit the League and on Hawkworld Vol 2 #22 and #23. Martian Manhunter makes a guest spot on Hawkworld to help tie the events to the League and help solve the murdered Sharon.

[BatmanJones]

I think that more and more people are accepting the fact that it was original sin that started the destruction of DC universe.

I’ve been thinking that since somewhere around ‘86 or ‘87.