Originally Posted by
John Venus
Damn. I wish him the best of luck. I know we complain about his handling on Zatanna a lot but outside of that I think he is a solid writer and I enjoyed most of everything that he has written.
Aside from Constantine has she had that many bad boyfriends/relationships? Bruce was good to her even if he has other issues. Constantine only appeared as much as Jeff Sloane did in Zatanna stories until Nu52 happened and DC decided they were going to be OTP.
While I think it is within her character to fall for someone like Constantine (pre-dead father of course), I wouldn't like it for it to be something that happens to her regularly much less sticking with a toxic relationship for a long time without any growth or progress. I rather she grows out of it. My perception of Zatanna is coloured by the works of Paul Dini use of her in 'Tech and in her own ongoing, Conway's Satellite era JLA and Morrison's Seven Soldiers.
To me, she is the 'Superman' of the magical world in that conflict stems from *how* she uses her power. Even though I dislike Identity Crisis, the question of whether she should use her powers to alter villains and whether it would be wrong for someone like her to utilize her power felt like the perfect moral dilemma for her character (too bad the story wasn't about that). She is a performer and magician and while she has sold-out shows and saved the world a few times, her life style has brought her little personal happiness. In fact, even though she's saved other people's lives and the world numerous times, she has failed to save the lives of those closest to her (father, mother) and that chips away at her core. Added to that she also has a need to prove herself both as a hero and the daughter of a reputed magician. Hence why I like Seven Soldiers, because of course at some point, she is going to break down and become a 'spellaholic' just to make herself feel better and of courseshe ends up misusing her powers and end up unleashing a terrible mess that she has to fix herself.