View Poll Results: Does the Rebirth era do justice to the original Wally West?

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  • Yes, it's exactly what Wally needs

    21 35.00%
  • No, he's been underused

    39 65.00%
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  1. #46
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    Quote Originally Posted by GlennSimpson View Post
    Sure, we can say it's editorial. They are the ones whose jobs depend on sales. Not that a few random examples of creatives wanting things makes up any sort of strong desire on the part of creatives as a group to bring back those characters. Creatives want to tell a great story but I don't believe high sales are their highest priority and something like splitting the audience isn't really their concern. Sure, they might want to use some character in their story, but it's because they like that particular character, not because of some greater meaning.

    And I believe the New52 was only alienating to a small segment of the audience. An audience who was loud enough to give DC an idea of how they could do something to get some attention. I think a big part of Rebirth's success isn't what they specifically did, but the fact that they did something attention-getting at a time when it was needed, not to mention Marvel's quality being so bad.

    So all in all, I don't believe the sales are a result of bringing back some huge audience that was out there waiting. Outside of these boards, I've never encountered a comics fan who was so invested - they usually have no idea what is going on, and are just buying something a friend told them was good, or whatever the big new thing is. Things advertised on posters in the comics shops actually sway their decision-making. That's the bulk of the audience. And they couldn't care less whether the Flash is Barry Allen or Wally West (although they do get confused if Wally isn't black like on the TV show).
    I disagree with most of you said here, but I want to focus on the bolded point.

    Namely how I'm curious how the Hell you could think that. Unless you're talking about mainstream audiences who don't even realize that there IS more than one Flash, you're way off. Back in 2011, EVERY DC Comics fan was throwing a **** storm, either out of principle, because their favorite characters were being erased, or just because they thought all the new books sucked.
    Me personally, I fell into all three categories.

    I have not met a single person who started reading DC before 2011 who was not furious with the New52.

  2. #47
    It sucks to be right BohemiaDrinker's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by GlennSimpson View Post
    Sure, we can say it's editorial. They are the ones whose jobs depend on sales.
    Hmm, ok.

    Not that a few random examples of creatives wanting things makes up any sort of strong desire on the part of creatives as a group to bring back those characters.
    Look, I could go all day flooding this thread with links that would prove exactly that (as individuals, not as a group, though).

    Creatives want to tell a great story but I don't believe high sales are their highest priority and something like splitting the audience isn't really their concern.
    Sure it is. That's how they build a name so they can go to Image, that's how they negotiate their contracts and page rates, their job depends on sales as much, hell, much more than the editorial and management.

    Sure, they might want to use some character in their story, but it's because they like that particular character, not because of some greater meaning.
    Google "HyperCrisis", or "Superman: 2000" or any Morrison interview, and so on. Go look for what the guys who are in a fortunate enough position to not have to worry about their jobs have to say.

    And I believe the New52 was only alienating to a small segment of the audience. An audience who was loud enough to give DC an idea of how they could do something to get some attention. I think a big part of Rebirth's success isn't what they specifically did, but the fact that they did something attention-getting at a time when it was needed, not to mention Marvel's quality being so bad.
    At the end of the day, the New 52 was a beautiful shell with no soul. You may disagree because all you want is "Superfriends", but the thing had no staying power because it lacked what made DC "DC". If you loose your diehard fans and can't keep "new" ones, as much noise as you make, you will be in trouble soon enough. What's more, if your die-hard fans have nothing good to say about your company, that's even worse. You'll cap your growth right there.

    So all in all, I don't believe the sales are a result of bringing back some huge audience that was out there waiting. Outside of these boards, I've never encountered a comics fan who was so invested - they usually have no idea what is going on, and are just buying something a friend told them was good, or whatever the big new thing is. Things advertised on posters in the comics shops actually sway their decision-making. That's the bulk of the audience. And they couldn't care less whether the Flash is Barry Allen or Wally West (although they do get confused if Wally isn't black like on the TV show).
    Well, I do freelance work for a comics site here in a Brazil for about ten years, so a lot of fan perception gets to me. I actually covered ComiCon here 2 years and a row, talked to hundreds of fans (and quite a few pros) and I have to say, you may have to question your perception of what the "bulk" audience is; because there is no bulk audience as far as preferences go, and what you are describing are casuals, and casuals are very, very far from being the bulk of the audience in any way I can see.

    If someone gets confused by Wally's skin color, chances are that they didn't pick a Flash comic (or, hell, a DC comic) before and will not pick one again.
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  3. #48
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    Quote Originally Posted by BohemiaDrinker View Post
    Hmm, ok.



    Look, I could go all day flooding this thread with links that would prove exactly that (as individuals, not as a group, though).



    Sure it is. That's how they build a name so they can go to Image, that's how they negotiate their contracts and page rates, their job depends on sales as much, hell, much more than the editorial and management.



    Google "HyperCrisis", or "Superman: 2000" or any Morrison interview, and so on. Go look for what the guys who are in a fortunate enough position to not have to worry about their jobs have to say.



    At the end of the day, the New 52 was a beautiful shell with no soul. You may disagree because all you want is "Superfriends", but the thing had no staying power because it lacked what made DC "DC". If you loose your diehard fans and can't keep "new" ones, as much noise as you make, you will be in trouble soon enough. What's more, if your die-hard fans have nothing good to say about your company, that's even worse. You'll cap your growth right there.



    Well, I do freelance work for a comics site here in a Brazil for about ten years, so a lot of fan perception gets to me. I actually covered ComiCon here 2 years and a row, talked to hundreds of fans (and quite a few pros) and I have to say, you may have to question your perception of what the "bulk" audience is; because there is no bulk audience as far as preferences go, and what you are describing are casuals, and casuals are very, very far from being the bulk of the audience in any way I can see.

    If someone gets confused by Wally's skin color, chances are that they didn't pick a Flash comic (or, hell, a DC comic) before and will not pick one again.
    New52 had no staying power because nothing has any staying power. Fans leave as soon as the next big thing comes along. Even if there are a bunch of old-school DC fans, the minute DC actually tries to take a chance they obviously flee.

    Morrison is Morrison. He's not typical of anything.

    And Comic-cons are still not representative of anything. They are the hardcore fans, just like message boards like this. They don't make up the bulk of the audience.

    If the bulk of the fans were hardcore, then there would be no need for posters or house ads - they'd all just read Previews and decide if they were interested. There's be no need for rack copies, because they would all be using pull boxes. TPB's wouldn't be such a huge part of DC's profits, because all of the readers would be picking the stories up monthly at the shops.

    I remember being in a shop when Perez was leaving the New52 Superman and Lobdell was coming on. People in the shop were all talking about how they liked Perez and hoped he was staying on. But the news Perez was leaving had been on comics web sites for weeks. But nobody in that shop apparently was reading such things.

    And yes, the TV shows do influence people who already read.

    At the end of the day, the fact that the OP feels that DC is not doing enough with Ginger WW proves my point - that DC never had any intention of doing much with him. They threw you a bone and convinced you that you were going to get a steak, but a bone is all you really got.
    Last edited by GlennSimpson; 03-06-2017 at 06:33 PM.

  4. #49
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    Quote Originally Posted by unclepulky View Post
    I disagree with most of you said here, but I want to focus on the bolded point.

    Namely how I'm curious how the Hell you could think that. Unless you're talking about mainstream audiences who don't even realize that there IS more than one Flash, you're way off. Back in 2011, EVERY DC Comics fan was throwing a **** storm, either out of principle, because their favorite characters were being erased, or just because they thought all the new books sucked.
    Me personally, I fell into all three categories.

    I have not met a single person who started reading DC before 2011 who was not furious with the New52.
    If every DC Comics fan was throwing a **** storm (which, given that I am a DC fan and was not, that's clearly not a true statement) then why did sales go up?

  5. #50
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    Quote Originally Posted by GlennSimpson View Post
    At the end of the day, the fact that the OP feels that DC is not doing enough with Ginger WW proves my point - that DC never had any intention of doing much with him. They threw you a bone and convinced you that you were going to get a steak, but a bone is all you really got.
    Look, you're obviously not going to contemplate anything other than the way you see things to be the absolute reality. I know it's not, but ok, leave at that, and assume that the only representative slice of the comic buying audience is you and the very mis-informed people who frequent the same comic shop as you do.

    Just keep in mind this:

    I remember you tackling 10 posters at a time (me included), like an enraged Kratos, going on about how Wally West was not popular and there was no evidence of his popularity whatsoever.

    I remember a post from you from about 2 weeks before before NuWally debuted going "DC has no reason to bring back any version of Wally West".

    I remember when you changed your Simpsons comic guy avatar to your current one and something about "fanboys heads exploding when they discover pre-FP Wally is not returning".

    I remember you saying, little after Rebirth Special, that you were mildly annoyed that DC "caved".

    Maaaaaaaaaaaaaaybe you should be a little more analytical of stuff outside your bubble of belief.

    In time: you missed the point of most of my post, but that's fine. I do have to clarify, though, that I never said hardcore fans was the bulk of the audience. I said that losing, or worse, alienating those fans will bite you in the ass.
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  6. #51
    Mighty Member upgrayedd's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by BohemiaDrinker View Post

    I remember when you changed your Simpsons comic guy avatar to your current one and something about "fanboys heads exploding when they discover pre-FP Wally is not returning".

    I remember you saying, little after Rebirth Special, that you were mildly annoyed that DC "caved".

    .
    I remember the "I hope they don't cave in part (and the Comic Book Guy Simpsons avatar) because I responded "I hope they cave in like Cave Carson in elevator during an earth quake in the town of Bedrock" because that would be a lot of caving. And they brought back Wally, after Rebirth sales increased, good thing they caved.
    And on a side note they brought back Cave Carson too with the Young Animal line.
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  7. #52
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    Quote Originally Posted by GlennSimpson View Post
    If every DC Comics fan was throwing a **** storm (which, given that I am a DC fan and was not, that's clearly not a true statement) then why did sales go up?
    They went up in the short term, but by the end of the New 52, they were lower than they were in 2010. The only reason they went up at all is because DC launced 52 new #1's, thus motivating non comic readers and speculators to come in and by them up.

  8. #53
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    Quote Originally Posted by unclepulky View Post

    I have not met a single person who started reading DC before 2011 who was not furious with the New52.

    Not trying to jump in your debate but I did want to say that I have been a DC fan since the early 70's ( pretty much my whole life ) and I was pretty jazzed for the New52 reboot. The only thing that came close to making me mad about it was that they didn't start completely from scratch. Other than that, I enjoyed quite a few of the books through the whole thing.

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  9. #54
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    Quote Originally Posted by Gladiator X View Post
    Not trying to jump in your debate but I did want to say that I have been a DC fan since the early 70's ( pretty much my whole life ) and I was pretty jazzed for the New52 reboot. The only thing that came close to making me mad about it was that they didn't start completely from scratch. Other than that, I enjoyed quite a few of the books through the whole thing.

    Pleased to meet you.
    I was furious either, I actually was all for a reboot.

    I just think think we got a really horrible one, overall.
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  10. #55
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    I wasn't furious about the reboot either. I enjoyed a lot of the books I was picking up back then. I only became irritated by certain aspects of it at a later date mostly due to boneheaded editorial moves and/or books whose quality just wasn't there. In fact I was so irritated by the former that I believed for awhile that Rebirth was yet another of those "boneheaded editorial moves" and that was why I was so against it.
    Last edited by JasonTodd428; 03-06-2017 at 07:39 PM.
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  11. #56
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    Quote Originally Posted by GlennSimpson View Post
    The Lanterns are a Corps, and Batman is their most popular character so spinoffs are understandable.
    And there are many, many fans of the different members of the Flash family as they were before Flashpoint, from Jay to Wally to Bart. So, how does it make sense to alienate fans and erase them from existence or completely and irrevocably alter their characters?

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    Quote Originally Posted by upgrayedd View Post
    I remember the "I hope they don't cave in part (and the Comic Book Guy Simpsons avatar) because I responded "I hope they cave in like Cave Carson in elevator during an earth quake in the town of Bedrock" because that would be a lot of caving. And they brought back Wally, after Rebirth sales increased, good thing they caved.
    And on a side note they brought back Cave Carson too with the Young Animal line.
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  13. #58
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    Quote Originally Posted by Zeeguy91 View Post
    And there are many, many fans of the different members of the Flash family as they were before Flashpoint, from Jay to Wally to Bart. So, how does it make sense to alienate fans and erase them from existence or completely and irrevocably alter their characters?
    THIS

    My favorite speedster in DC isn't Barry or Wally, it's Bart, closely followed in second by Max Mercury: Zen Master of Speed. These two don't get anywhere close to the exposure even Wally gets, let alone Barry, and I really wish they did.

    Bart has been more mishandled over the years than Barry and Wally put together, and Max Mercury just doesn't get respect at all.

    Batfamily, Flash Family, Lantern Corps, it makes no difference. I want them big, I want them bloated, and I want them all to have a bunch of books coming out.

  14. #59
    Ultimate Member dietrich's Avatar
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    They are not treating him badly they just have zero use for him. This what happens when fans force the hand of a company. Wally is back but DC never wanted him back and have no plans for him so his just there while they use the characters they made plans for and chose themselves.

    I'm sure they soon crave out a role for him.

  15. #60
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    Quote Originally Posted by GlennSimpson View Post
    Sure, we can say it's editorial. They are the ones whose jobs depend on sales. Not that a few random examples of creatives wanting things makes up any sort of strong desire on the part of creatives as a group to bring back those characters. Creatives want to tell a great story but I don't believe high sales are their highest priority and something like splitting the audience isn't really their concern. Sure, they might want to use some character in their story, but it's because they like that particular character, not because of some greater meaning.

    And I believe the New52 was only alienating to a small segment of the audience. An audience who was loud enough to give DC an idea of how they could do something to get some attention. I think a big part of Rebirth's success isn't what they specifically did, but the fact that they did something attention-getting at a time when it was needed, not to mention Marvel's quality being so bad.

    So all in all, I don't believe the sales are a result of bringing back some huge audience that was out there waiting. Outside of these boards, I've never encountered a comics fan who was so invested - they usually have no idea what is going on, and are just buying something a friend told them was good, or whatever the big new thing is. Things advertised on posters in the comics shops actually sway their decision-making. That's the bulk of the audience. And they couldn't care less whether the Flash is Barry Allen or Wally West (although they do get confused if Wally isn't black like on the TV show).
    So, explain why, by the end of the New 52, the sales had diminished to such an extent that not only had Marvel, DC's traditional rival, attained about double DC's market share, but DC was even in a position where Image and indie publishers were making gains on them.

    And it wasn't just fans and consumers that had expressed their discontent with the New 52, it was professional reviewers and critics. The New 52 was probably one of the most critically panned moves in DC's history and save for a few diamonds in the ruff, most of the titles were maligned by most professionals in the field. There were articles upon articles on sites dedicated to comic book news that basically said what Geoff Johns said: that the New 52 broke the connections that they had to the characters. And it makes sense that when you erase the history that defined the mythos of the DC Universe, you erase the connection that many people felt with that mythos. If people are fans of the Wolfman/Perez New Teen Titans run or even just the 2003 Teen Titans cartoon, are they going to want to pick up a Cyborg solo where the character they loved as a member of the Titans (because of the development and relationships he formed) doesn't even remember being one?

    Believe it or not, but the majority of the audience didn't like that the New 52 erased not only characters from existence, but also developments. Believe it or not, Superman fans mostly didn't want to see Clark and Lois's relationship dialed back to the point where not only were they no longer together, but Lois didn't even know Clark was Superman. And believe it or not, Batman fans didn't want to see characters like Steph and Cass and Azrael erased from existence. And believe it or not, most people didn't want to see the DCU canon make no sense because half of the things they kept in continuity relied on most of the stuff they threw out of continuity to have happened in the first place.

    So, if after all of that, and even people who work at DC saying that they regretted the New 52, your response is still that people who didn't like it were just a "vocal minority," then I don't know what to tell you. Maybe pigs also fly.
    Last edited by Green Goblin of Sector 2814; 03-06-2017 at 10:05 PM.

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