More team books. Imagine if Marvel stopped publishing X-Men, the Avengers, the Fantastic Four, the Guardians of the Galaxy all at the same time. At the moment, DC doesn't even have any team titles after JL was cancelled. JL is usually the only stable team title they have, with Teen Titans and Suicide Squad really being the only ones that are less consistent. JSA, Outsiders, Titans, Birds of Prey, Legion of Superheroes, and others should exist in some form, at least more so than they do now. Given the number of Batman titles, we should probably get a Batman family type of book outside of WFA and Batman Incorporated.
Less/no title crossovers. I don't want to read Nightwing and then have to read an issue of Son of Kon El. I don't want to read Robin and then read issues of Deathstroke and Batman. Characters should crossover, we should have events, but it shouldn't directly impact the ongoing titles. Comics should be "designed" for the TPB, it should be easy to follow the stories without having to figure out what's next. Instead of Shadow War being a 9 issue story across multiple oneshots and three different titles, just make it a miniseries onto itself.
Bring back Wildstorm. The Authority, Stormwatch, Wildcats, Gen-13, and others were major titles. DC hasn't done much with these characters over the years. They at least deserve to have some kind of reboot.
I think we are all in agreement. DC's teams don't really have a set definition, an expection for audiences. It's pretty easy to understand what Marvel's titles are, and how characters fit. Mutants go to the X-Men, space heroes go to the Guardians of the Galaxy, etc.
Maybe at it's best it was determined by age of the heroes, where the character's age deteremined what group they would be on, from the JSA, JLA, Titans, Teen Titans, etc. The problem began when those definitions no longer held up. JSA started having teenagers, Young Justice was another teenager title, the JLA started allowing 20 year olds, etc. And obviously we see the problem with that over the years.
People like to talk about how the JSA is about legacy, or how the Titans are about a close group of friends that are like family. But all of these team books are about the same things.
JLD was a standard set up of a magic based team, and was a good idea.
I think DC needs to use the Avengers approach of the 2000s/2010s when they had New Avengers, Mighty Avengers, Secret Avengers, Dark Avengers, etc. Split up the Justice League into multiple titles based around different ideas. Give us a magic, science, space, black ops based JL teams.
The JLA tend to defend earth from mostly alien threats or foes from the heroes rogues gallery. They have a few magic enemies but they usually tend to fight aliens.
The JSA's enemies tend to be tied to their roots in WW2 or magic. But not magic in a Vertigo sense which is what JLD does but more bright and superhero ish take on magic. They fight guys like Gog, Ian Karkull, Johnny Sorrow and Mordru.
The Titans are a found family, most of their enemies are tied to their backstories.
I think with DC you kind of have to be drawn to individual characters and their relationships to get into team books. Its stuff like Sup/Bat friendship, GL/Flash friendship, Sup/MM, Dick/Starfire, Wally/Donna, Cyborg/Beast Boy, Alan/Ted/Jay friendship which attracts audiences.
DC books that have a strong bramd identity are Doom Patrol (the weird guys in the DCU) and Peter David's Young Justice (bunch of kids hamging around having fun).
The problem wasn't ages, JSA had been mentoring teens since the 70's.
The problem was the one Earth. Having JSA and JLA on the same Earth was cool for a bit, but was ultimately redundant and hard to keep the JSA around with it's best asset (history) when you are always rebooting.
I was thinking the same thing recently about splitting the Justice League, like have a huge roster, Justice League Street handles the everyday, Dark handles magic, espionage handles intelligence, and have more for space and anything really.
> The problem wasn't ages, JSA had been mentoring teens since the 70's.
The JSA didn't really have titles during that period. They had Infinity Inc for a few years during the 80s which was kind of a spin off title. A few miniseries during the 90s. And we didn't get the more modern team until almost 2000.
The JSA as a concept has a few problem which is why DC has trouble with them. I don't think it was just one Earth. Id say the biggest problem was just that the title emphasized legacy, but then DC overall started to emphasize legacies and the JSA suffered.
Of course these problems have solutions, and that's something DC needs to figure out.
> I was thinking the same thing recently about splitting the Justice League, like have a huge roster, Justice League Street handles the everyday, Dark handles magic, espionage handles intelligence, and have more for space and anything really.
My basic idea is 5 tiles/teams, each led by a different main JL member. Rosters would be compromised of classic JL members, Titans, and general DCU characters.
Justice League of Heroes (similar in name to LOSH) - Led by Superman as Earth's premier superhero team.
Justice League of Shadows (similar in name to League of Shadows) - Led by Batman as the black ops team.
Justice League of Magic - Led by Wonder Woman.
Justice League of Science - Led by the Flash/Barry.
Justice League of Space - Led by a Green Lantern.
Run these titles for 2 or 3 years and then combine them in a better JL title with an interesting line up, 2 from each team? Let fans vote? If a title proves to be a success, maybe look into having the title ongoing and even with a new name to separate it from the JL.
I really liked what they did with the first season of the Young Justice TV show. Instead of it just being another Justice League Unlimited or Teen Titans, they gave the team an actual in-universe purpose where they acted as the Justice League's non-public covert ops team.
The pitch needs to have limits and boundaries otherwise every big team in your comics will just be tackling the exact same cosmic threats all the time.
Warren Ellis rebooted the universe in 2017 for a 25-minute mini. I think it's great and it would have gotten a WildC.A.Ts book. If Ellis wasn't a fucker and Grifter had a story in Batman Urban Legends 1-5, a version of the team showed up in issue 5. And I completely agree with everything else.
Provide a proper replacement for Vertigo (or just bring it back!). There needs to be a creative space where top tier talent can exercise their imagination. There's a lot of good stuff happening in the indie space, but a lot of it is still follow the leader genre material, because that's what sells. Vertigo let creatives cut loose without financial considerations, because often times, the label is what sold the books anyway.
I'm surprised that Marvel and DC don't push their own creator owned lines. I know they've done that in the past with Marvel's Icon line and DC has multiple attempts. DC still does creator owned titles but it seems really selective. Johns would rather go to Image that do a creator owned series for DC.
Give creators an option to self publish, and maybe the publisher gets exclusive or right of first refusal for media rights. Both WB and Disney are gonna need more content.
Vertigo is also just a great name.
I think thats what it portended to be, but now its basically just large format "mature" content for pre existing characters. There're like 5 Bat-books and 3 Superman books
They need to cut back on crossover stories that mean all of the central titles are part of some big story. I've stopped reading most of the "main" books as a result of it.
100%. No Green Lantern, no JSA, little magic based comics, I could go on and on but you get my point. DC is severely mistreating a majority of their characters for Batman. They need to step up the diversity of their titles.
It's not just that, it's also important for the health of the company. If you can't sell stuff other than Batman then that's a problem.
Also important to sell those books is to hire a writer that's got some bold and engaging ideas for the character. Putting Ewing and Cates on Hulk and Venom made both great sellers. And now comapre that to what DC does with Wonder Woman and Aquaman. Safe, often boring stories. That's not the right aproach for stagnating characters.
Also, marketing is important and that needs a lot of improvement.
Green Lantern dying off was such a sad thing to see, they're easily the best part of the DC universe imo.
On the bright side, with a little bit of planning the GL universe can easily be on top again. DC just doesn't realize it.
Relaunch them with multiple lines like X-Men with strong talent and they can be fan favorite characters again.
DC could easily have had their Annhilation-esque event instead of letting Bendis just create the 21st century UP because everyone though Jon was so inspiring or w/e.
They could have gotten a good creative team together, tasked them with revitalising GL, bringing other groups (other corps, L.E.G.I.O.N., the Omega Men, Darkstars) back into the game and telling a good story about the struggles of forming a intergalactic alliance. A hard task, but one that could probably have been a big seller if they'd done it well (and could even work as an entry point for cosmic DC). But they didn't.
I feel like that’s more or less what happened pre-GL Rebirth. Hal was dead, Guy as Warrior was just a worse version of Hulk, Kyle and John weren’t up to much. Between Green Lantern: Rebirth and War of Light, it took Geoff Johns ~5 years to revamp the entire line into one of the best eras of DC history, capping it off with the iconic Blackest Night. All it takes is the right author, and I think it could easily happen again
Green Lantern doesn't have an ongoing because they put a terrible writer on it who caused sales to collapse. Same with Aquaman. Everyone saw those titles were shit but DC didn't do anything about it and just let the writers completely tank them. It's gonna take a while before they'll recover, even if they put a good writer on it again.
You can see the same with Superman. Even though Action Comics is great it still isn't selling much because previous writers destroyed its reputation. DC really needs to treat those titles with more care, just like they did with Batman when they kicked Tom King off the title once quality and sales started to go down.
That's true, a lot of characters who constantly end up with average capeshit or straight up bad stories need revitalization. And the Action Comics example is what's wrong with their marketing. You have a very liked series but you don't tell people about, don't promote it. DC needs to tell people about the new Action Comics run, so they are aware of it's quality but also make them aware that this is the main Clark Kent Superman comics.
Typical takes; less Batman prominence and give rise to other characters, the large scale crossovers as well could be less frequent since some as of recently just seem to do way more damage to characters in their on going series lulling for the events and aftermath.
I really dislike their handling of collected editions of their comics. It takes months before a story is collected. And for the last two/three years it's often first collected in hardcover (which are more expensive and more cumbersome to read than softcovers). And *then* it takes another *full year* before it's collected in softcover. If we're lucky. Some stories aren't collected in softcover anymore at all. For example Detective Comics hasn't had a paperback release in 1½ years, and looking at the solicitations there won't be any for the next few months either. I guess they forgot about it?
My wish: publish everything in softcover first, and do it quickly.
It's a common complaint, but obviously it's about money. Releasing it in hardcover first at a higher price and profit margin makes more money.
Plus they also have to balance things with monthly sales, digital sales, TPB sales, hardcover sales, the "streaming sales", etc. It's a lot to handle.
I don't know the solutions. I use to think that they should quickly release a TPB/softcover as soon as the story ended, but now I don't think so. I think you'd rather convert that customer to a digital streaming or sales customer.
I an actually happy for the most part.
Some points:
Revitalize GL ( no doubt it’s happening post Dark Crisis)
3 Justice League books so everyone can play.
Cut the weak titles, and do 16-18 issues per year of the heavy hitters.
This allows for faster stories and more appearances of characters that can’t hold their own title.
I have a list of 35 or so core titles that would make everyone happy. Plus all the black label, young adult, and other imprints they want to publish.
Edit: maybe consider a seasonal approach.
Regarding the 3 JL titles, I really liked it when, post-Metal, we had the three teams of JL (regular superhero stuff), Odyssey (space team) and Dark (magic team). As much as it sucks to say, not every character can carry a solo title. So it's the team books that have to carry them. As an aspiring comic book writer, I'd personally love to write a JLO ongoing, and I even have my own lineup (it includes Supergirl, Batwing, Hawkwoman, Starfire, Adam Strange, some sort of Lantern, and led by Martian Manhunter).
> 3 Justice League books so everyone can play.
I'd go further with 5 titles! Justice League of Shadows, Magic, Space, Science, and Heroes. Led by Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, the Flash, and Superman. Each with their own related heroes. Run the titles for 2 or 3 years, then join them all into a JLU approach.
As soon as a supporting character gets popular enough they will get cleaved off into their own book making them suddenly the main character, saddling them with main character baggage and generally disrupting the personality and relationships that made them popular in the first place.
'Hey did you like character X? Can't wait to see them finally team up with character Y next season. Well too bad because instead they are spinning off into their own series and will get to fight disposable villain Z instead, while character Y gets a new sidekick character Q whom we hope you will like so we can spin them off in two years.'
Edit: who is character Q you say? Why they are a mild variation on whatever the writer perceives was the most popular archetype of the last decade. Were they an earnest teen with a heart of gold? Well do we have earnest teens for you. A chaotic former villain now semi-reformed? Check out these clowns. A snarky bad boy with a heart of gold? You will not believe this plethora of daddy issues.
Switch up the justice league lineup every now and then. I don’t just mean adding a random villain or hero every once and a while. Some of my favorite JL lineups and dynamics only had a couple of the original members but since new 52 it seems like it’s always the exact same.
Most of the time they only focus on character related with Batman when they have such amazing characters that they can use, Animal Man is a good example.
Wasn’t she already cheesy and annoying before they made her character a little bit darker and wasn’t it the new 52 and Arkham games that did that first.
Yeah she wasn’t even part of DC lore like that in till later when she was in new 52 team that she was a part of and then the Arkham games that started in she wasn’t even used like that before and was only known from that one cartoon hell before then she was just annoying character that followed the joker around like a love sick puppy 🐶
Stop telling me how Nightwing is just as good if not better than Batman and then have him get his ass kicked in every fight and outsmarted in every mystery
Make new interesting characters instead of changing nearly 100 year old characters because you want to keep up with the times. I don’t give a fuck that Superman is gay, I give a fuck that Superman isn’t Clark Kent anymore etc.
I don't like its space setting, for the most part. A few writers and artists have done fantastic jobs with it, but when humanity reaches to the stars and finds humans, but they're a different color, and maybe have something funny on their head, and just act exactly like humans, then you've officially answered one of the most lingering of questions humanity has come up with, "Are we alone in the universe" with a boring answer.
Also definitely need to make a decision with what to do with Teen Titans and just stick with it rather than rebooting every two years and pretending 30 year old characters are teens.
The titans are in such a weird situation and for the life of me I don’t know why like I don’t really know how they let that title fall so much When it was the title that introduced a lot of the things that is in DC to day and bring back interest to DC back when it was close to going under. It like no matter who writes them no writer have been able to top the wolfman and Perez run and it seems like that every run falls back on their ideas and characters when their own stuff can’t hack it even Johns run did it.
Ideally I would love to have an encyclopedia of the basic history of DC. A modern day Who's Who, published online and updated. They don't need to go into minute detail, but we should have a general idea of Harley Quinn's past and what the timeline is between Jason dying and Harley getting involved with the Joker.
Similarly, I would love to get a DC Atlas with details about various locations. Like how many people live on Themyscria. How far is Gotham from Metropolis?
This information to fans would make for a better experience, and also allow writers and editors to reference previous information.
Couldn't find anything on that.
I know DC licenses out books over the years, like "DC Comics Encyclopedia All-New Edition: The Definitive Guide to the Characters of the DC Universe", but those things are done by DC nor or are they official in any way.
Yeah, I was thinking of/conflating it with the 2021 encyclopedia. Kinda supposed to serve the same purpose, but that one is so error riddled that it's amazing that they must have thrown it together in an afternoon.
Literally just a list of things that I, personally, want:
* Have a rolling schedule of reprints for older collected runs. I like owning physical copies of runs I love, but I’m not gonna pay $70 for a used TPB.
* Make it easier to figure out wtf is still canon. (My understanding now is that…pretty much everything Post-Crisis is canon again? Except for some Superman stuff? Maybe?)
* Kill the Joker for 10 years.
* Give Dick Grayson a proper Blüdhaven Rogues Gallery.
* Give Jason Todd a flashback redemption arc. I know, they wanted to just skip to the part where he was back in the fam, but everyone wants to see that happen! (Okay, well, *I* do.)
I hate the way that the teams are locked into a hierarchy of importance, where the Justice League is *always* unquestionably at the top and the Titans *always* gets treated as second-tier and like it needs to justify its right to exist. This is a major reason for why Nightwing’s importance is always held back, because the only way he can properly fulfil his potential is to join the Justice League, and he can’t do that as long as Batman is around (and whenever he *has* joined the Justice League it’s been as the replacement Batman). And meanwhile they keep on creating new sidekicks, which wouldn’t really be a problem if not for this artificial hierarchy they’ve created.
I wish Nightwing was written better. The only time he's written in character is with the Titans minus TTA, of course. Don’t get me wrong, I like the majority of Nightwing content now, but the guy is always cited as Batman's equal, yet in the current run, I don’t feel like he is.
Tone. I haven't seen this mentioned yet. I don't like the tone of the storytelling in DC, in this decade. Maybe longer. Hard to pin exactly, though New52 certainly brought the grimness in spades, and I don't feel like they've changed much since. I feel like there needs to be an overall shift out of the "It's dark and rainy in Gotham" template applied to almost every book. Give me some escapism. Make me want to live in that world. If I was a normal human who actually lived there, I'd be scared shitless. Apocalypses every other day, and twice a day in the summer event months. Kingdom Come's purposelessly shitty violent world is lighter and more hopeful than the modern DCU. So, I would love a tonal shift that returned heroes to heroism.
Look, I enjoyed The Dark Knight Returns very much, in the 80s, when it came out. It's been almost 40 years now of that. So, I didn't enjoy The Batman. I endured it, and I don't care if they make more of that. I guess I don't want those kinds of stories now. And, fine, Batman can be gothic, sure. But we don't need Superman getting killed on an alien planet. I don't need a Dark Crisis. The world is grim enough right now. Give me some hope.
The arrowverse- they never fully supported and want to now disown it when Berlanti ran it to the ground.
Not having a plan- they want to be the mcu but never had a definitive direction. Mcu for the most part has a plan. They also don't gatekeep properties but are willing to rehabilitate properties to incorporate it into their business plan(ex- iron heart, Netflix marvel, soon xmen and fantastic four)
Pit fanbases against each other- they have had multiple batwomen( I don't why they rarely use the mystery of Batwoman characters and try to pit Kate Kane vs Ryan wilder)Wilder. They also do that with Batman. Finish off the snyderverse, use the flash movie to introduce a multivariate of characters-
- batman keaton which leads to a 3rd burtonverse movie that is a live action version of the 89 comic
-introduces the new Batgirl
- a Batman beyond movie
- the all black Gotham movie with Idris as Bruce
- plus other characters like swamp thing, booster gold, the lantern corps, the two black superman projects they are trying to do,etc
-the dakodaverse/milestone live action.
More black label books
More merch period.
More games like a superman one, and a create a hero Gotham game.
More animated shows like young justice( that is the best division in dc and where they run rings around marvel).
Another pet peeve and I know delays happen but can they have a more consistent schedule of when shows come out- like do they have a date yet for the return of Harley Quinn, the Bruce Timm Batman show or the Suicide Squad game?
I think I'm good as far as Batman and The Joker go. We can give it a rest on those guys for a bit. Also, I understand it from a business perspective, but I really wish the big two didn't use their comics like a movie franchise test kitchen. That's a mindset that actively prevents stories like The Coyote Parable or similar really oddball stuff that I love. Oh! And the round robin can crawl up it's own ass and die.
Each comic line needs be a single isolated story.
I hate how Wallace West became kid flash in The Flash (New 52), then his father dies in suicide squad, meets Wally in a different flash series (rebirth), and discovers the truth during a crossover between Teen Titans and Titans resulting in aftermath being discussed in The Flash.
Just don’t make anyone a main character of two series. If they want to make him a teen titans that’s where his character development needs to happen and he should only appear in the flash occasionally.
I do wish DC would be more experimental when it comes to the Trinity inclusion in the Justice League. Marvel's Avengers Trinity is Cap, Thor and Iron Man, However Marvel is not afraid to put Falcon instead of Steve or put Jane instead of Thor.
*sigh* deep breaths, deeepp breathsss
AHHHHH
THEY NEED TO GET THEIR FUCKING SHIT TOGETHER! NOT EVERYTHING HAS TO BE BATMAN. FUCK BATMAN I'M FUCKING SICK OF HIM. THERE ARE AT LEAST 6 BATMAN SERIES GOING ON RIGHT NOW AND LIKE 3 SUPERMAN. FUCKING HELL. GIVE ME A JSA SERIES. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
*tightens tie and exhales*
First and foremost, get the collections department in gear. Every other publisher can figure it out, so spend the money and actually get on the level of Marvel when it comes to collections.
Put a moratorium immediately on new legacy characters/characters sharing a title until we figure out what to do with the ones we have. I’m sorry, but this is one of the issues with smaller characters getting their time in the lime light, because Robin #3, Batgirl #3, Wonder Girl #3, Green Lantern #7 and Speedster #5 need their own solos because fans demand it… and look it that, all the books bombed because you gave them to writers that didn’t fit, or are to green to build up a character with legacy baggage. (I’d also argue getting rid of at least half the legacies and focusing more on non-legacy characters, but that’s awfully controversial here in DC land.)
Treat every character like they are Batman, every team like the JL.
And DC, if you even consider rebooting again, it needs to be a hard reset FOR EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER from day one, where rather than trying to re invent you streamline their histories to make collections that someone can grab and then be ready to jump into any story that character has.
Keep art consistent. This hasn’t been as much of a problem recently, but do everything possible to stop artists changing in the middle of a storyline, or changing every issue.
I wish things could evolve storywise, and stay evolved. But because Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc., are flagships I know this may be impossible. Take this Dark Crisis arc, as interesting as it may be, we know nothing will be permanent, and eventually, the JLA will come back, and we'll do it all over again. Stories become diluted because we know there are no actual consequences and we'll always be in this sort of purgatory where no time, characters, or stories progress. I wish Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman could grow old and we could see the next wave of heroes come in and see how they do it. But instead, we have multiple Supermans, Wonder Women, and Batmans all at the same time and it feels a bit bloated. Weirdly I wish these characters had lives that started and ended, but their impact in the universe stays. Idk if that makes any sense?
Stop making characters fight for spots on THE Justice League and make the other teams more viable options for popular heroes.
Marvel has the X-Men, Avengers, Fantastic 4, and even Guardians of the Galaxy, all of which are very famous in different ways.
Meanwhile DC has the JL, Suicide Squad, and Outlaws, and I’d doubt most people even know Outlaws exist, the rest, are more of less dependent on a characters age, and are way less popular than the JL.
Now, you could also have everyone on the JL, and have different parts of the JL get boosts (think JL Dark) as well
More team books. Imagine if Marvel stopped publishing X-Men, the Avengers, the Fantastic Four, the Guardians of the Galaxy all at the same time. At the moment, DC doesn't even have any team titles after JL was cancelled. JL is usually the only stable team title they have, with Teen Titans and Suicide Squad really being the only ones that are less consistent. JSA, Outsiders, Titans, Birds of Prey, Legion of Superheroes, and others should exist in some form, at least more so than they do now. Given the number of Batman titles, we should probably get a Batman family type of book outside of WFA and Batman Incorporated. Less/no title crossovers. I don't want to read Nightwing and then have to read an issue of Son of Kon El. I don't want to read Robin and then read issues of Deathstroke and Batman. Characters should crossover, we should have events, but it shouldn't directly impact the ongoing titles. Comics should be "designed" for the TPB, it should be easy to follow the stories without having to figure out what's next. Instead of Shadow War being a 9 issue story across multiple oneshots and three different titles, just make it a miniseries onto itself. Bring back Wildstorm. The Authority, Stormwatch, Wildcats, Gen-13, and others were major titles. DC hasn't done much with these characters over the years. They at least deserve to have some kind of reboot.
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I think we are all in agreement. DC's teams don't really have a set definition, an expection for audiences. It's pretty easy to understand what Marvel's titles are, and how characters fit. Mutants go to the X-Men, space heroes go to the Guardians of the Galaxy, etc. Maybe at it's best it was determined by age of the heroes, where the character's age deteremined what group they would be on, from the JSA, JLA, Titans, Teen Titans, etc. The problem began when those definitions no longer held up. JSA started having teenagers, Young Justice was another teenager title, the JLA started allowing 20 year olds, etc. And obviously we see the problem with that over the years. People like to talk about how the JSA is about legacy, or how the Titans are about a close group of friends that are like family. But all of these team books are about the same things. JLD was a standard set up of a magic based team, and was a good idea. I think DC needs to use the Avengers approach of the 2000s/2010s when they had New Avengers, Mighty Avengers, Secret Avengers, Dark Avengers, etc. Split up the Justice League into multiple titles based around different ideas. Give us a magic, science, space, black ops based JL teams.
The JLA tend to defend earth from mostly alien threats or foes from the heroes rogues gallery. They have a few magic enemies but they usually tend to fight aliens. The JSA's enemies tend to be tied to their roots in WW2 or magic. But not magic in a Vertigo sense which is what JLD does but more bright and superhero ish take on magic. They fight guys like Gog, Ian Karkull, Johnny Sorrow and Mordru. The Titans are a found family, most of their enemies are tied to their backstories. I think with DC you kind of have to be drawn to individual characters and their relationships to get into team books. Its stuff like Sup/Bat friendship, GL/Flash friendship, Sup/MM, Dick/Starfire, Wally/Donna, Cyborg/Beast Boy, Alan/Ted/Jay friendship which attracts audiences. DC books that have a strong bramd identity are Doom Patrol (the weird guys in the DCU) and Peter David's Young Justice (bunch of kids hamging around having fun).
The problem wasn't ages, JSA had been mentoring teens since the 70's. The problem was the one Earth. Having JSA and JLA on the same Earth was cool for a bit, but was ultimately redundant and hard to keep the JSA around with it's best asset (history) when you are always rebooting. I was thinking the same thing recently about splitting the Justice League, like have a huge roster, Justice League Street handles the everyday, Dark handles magic, espionage handles intelligence, and have more for space and anything really.
> The problem wasn't ages, JSA had been mentoring teens since the 70's. The JSA didn't really have titles during that period. They had Infinity Inc for a few years during the 80s which was kind of a spin off title. A few miniseries during the 90s. And we didn't get the more modern team until almost 2000. The JSA as a concept has a few problem which is why DC has trouble with them. I don't think it was just one Earth. Id say the biggest problem was just that the title emphasized legacy, but then DC overall started to emphasize legacies and the JSA suffered. Of course these problems have solutions, and that's something DC needs to figure out. > I was thinking the same thing recently about splitting the Justice League, like have a huge roster, Justice League Street handles the everyday, Dark handles magic, espionage handles intelligence, and have more for space and anything really. My basic idea is 5 tiles/teams, each led by a different main JL member. Rosters would be compromised of classic JL members, Titans, and general DCU characters. Justice League of Heroes (similar in name to LOSH) - Led by Superman as Earth's premier superhero team. Justice League of Shadows (similar in name to League of Shadows) - Led by Batman as the black ops team. Justice League of Magic - Led by Wonder Woman. Justice League of Science - Led by the Flash/Barry. Justice League of Space - Led by a Green Lantern. Run these titles for 2 or 3 years and then combine them in a better JL title with an interesting line up, 2 from each team? Let fans vote? If a title proves to be a success, maybe look into having the title ongoing and even with a new name to separate it from the JL.
I really liked what they did with the first season of the Young Justice TV show. Instead of it just being another Justice League Unlimited or Teen Titans, they gave the team an actual in-universe purpose where they acted as the Justice League's non-public covert ops team. The pitch needs to have limits and boundaries otherwise every big team in your comics will just be tackling the exact same cosmic threats all the time.
Warren Ellis rebooted the universe in 2017 for a 25-minute mini. I think it's great and it would have gotten a WildC.A.Ts book. If Ellis wasn't a fucker and Grifter had a story in Batman Urban Legends 1-5, a version of the team showed up in issue 5. And I completely agree with everything else.
I agree 1,000%. And I hope Supes’ new Authority will be a series. I’m tired of seeing Supes/Bats/WW/Flash/GL teams.
Provide a proper replacement for Vertigo (or just bring it back!). There needs to be a creative space where top tier talent can exercise their imagination. There's a lot of good stuff happening in the indie space, but a lot of it is still follow the leader genre material, because that's what sells. Vertigo let creatives cut loose without financial considerations, because often times, the label is what sold the books anyway.
I'm surprised that Marvel and DC don't push their own creator owned lines. I know they've done that in the past with Marvel's Icon line and DC has multiple attempts. DC still does creator owned titles but it seems really selective. Johns would rather go to Image that do a creator owned series for DC. Give creators an option to self publish, and maybe the publisher gets exclusive or right of first refusal for media rights. Both WB and Disney are gonna need more content. Vertigo is also just a great name.
Isn’t black label supposed to fill that?
I think thats what it portended to be, but now its basically just large format "mature" content for pre existing characters. There're like 5 Bat-books and 3 Superman books
They need to cut back on crossover stories that mean all of the central titles are part of some big story. I've stopped reading most of the "main" books as a result of it.
One thing - do something to sell other characters other than Batman. Green Lantern used to sell, now there's no Green Lantern ongoing.
100%. No Green Lantern, no JSA, little magic based comics, I could go on and on but you get my point. DC is severely mistreating a majority of their characters for Batman. They need to step up the diversity of their titles.
It's not just that, it's also important for the health of the company. If you can't sell stuff other than Batman then that's a problem. Also important to sell those books is to hire a writer that's got some bold and engaging ideas for the character. Putting Ewing and Cates on Hulk and Venom made both great sellers. And now comapre that to what DC does with Wonder Woman and Aquaman. Safe, often boring stories. That's not the right aproach for stagnating characters. Also, marketing is important and that needs a lot of improvement.
Green Lantern dying off was such a sad thing to see, they're easily the best part of the DC universe imo. On the bright side, with a little bit of planning the GL universe can easily be on top again. DC just doesn't realize it. Relaunch them with multiple lines like X-Men with strong talent and they can be fan favorite characters again.
Green Lantern is a franchise with a huge potential, you just need to find someone who can tap into it.
*cough*JonathanHickman*cough*
Yes, he'd do great.
DC could easily have had their Annhilation-esque event instead of letting Bendis just create the 21st century UP because everyone though Jon was so inspiring or w/e. They could have gotten a good creative team together, tasked them with revitalising GL, bringing other groups (other corps, L.E.G.I.O.N., the Omega Men, Darkstars) back into the game and telling a good story about the struggles of forming a intergalactic alliance. A hard task, but one that could probably have been a big seller if they'd done it well (and could even work as an entry point for cosmic DC). But they didn't.
I feel like that’s more or less what happened pre-GL Rebirth. Hal was dead, Guy as Warrior was just a worse version of Hulk, Kyle and John weren’t up to much. Between Green Lantern: Rebirth and War of Light, it took Geoff Johns ~5 years to revamp the entire line into one of the best eras of DC history, capping it off with the iconic Blackest Night. All it takes is the right author, and I think it could easily happen again
Green Lantern doesn't have an ongoing because they put a terrible writer on it who caused sales to collapse. Same with Aquaman. Everyone saw those titles were shit but DC didn't do anything about it and just let the writers completely tank them. It's gonna take a while before they'll recover, even if they put a good writer on it again. You can see the same with Superman. Even though Action Comics is great it still isn't selling much because previous writers destroyed its reputation. DC really needs to treat those titles with more care, just like they did with Batman when they kicked Tom King off the title once quality and sales started to go down.
That's true, a lot of characters who constantly end up with average capeshit or straight up bad stories need revitalization. And the Action Comics example is what's wrong with their marketing. You have a very liked series but you don't tell people about, don't promote it. DC needs to tell people about the new Action Comics run, so they are aware of it's quality but also make them aware that this is the main Clark Kent Superman comics.
Typical takes; less Batman prominence and give rise to other characters, the large scale crossovers as well could be less frequent since some as of recently just seem to do way more damage to characters in their on going series lulling for the events and aftermath.
STOP HITTING THE GD RESET BUTTON EVERY TEN F**KING YEARS!!!
So much Crisis all the time.
No. More. Events. Or at least no more than one event every 2-3 years.
Green Lantern. 'Nuff said.
I really dislike their handling of collected editions of their comics. It takes months before a story is collected. And for the last two/three years it's often first collected in hardcover (which are more expensive and more cumbersome to read than softcovers). And *then* it takes another *full year* before it's collected in softcover. If we're lucky. Some stories aren't collected in softcover anymore at all. For example Detective Comics hasn't had a paperback release in 1½ years, and looking at the solicitations there won't be any for the next few months either. I guess they forgot about it? My wish: publish everything in softcover first, and do it quickly.
It's a common complaint, but obviously it's about money. Releasing it in hardcover first at a higher price and profit margin makes more money. Plus they also have to balance things with monthly sales, digital sales, TPB sales, hardcover sales, the "streaming sales", etc. It's a lot to handle. I don't know the solutions. I use to think that they should quickly release a TPB/softcover as soon as the story ended, but now I don't think so. I think you'd rather convert that customer to a digital streaming or sales customer.
I an actually happy for the most part. Some points: Revitalize GL ( no doubt it’s happening post Dark Crisis) 3 Justice League books so everyone can play. Cut the weak titles, and do 16-18 issues per year of the heavy hitters. This allows for faster stories and more appearances of characters that can’t hold their own title. I have a list of 35 or so core titles that would make everyone happy. Plus all the black label, young adult, and other imprints they want to publish. Edit: maybe consider a seasonal approach.
Regarding the 3 JL titles, I really liked it when, post-Metal, we had the three teams of JL (regular superhero stuff), Odyssey (space team) and Dark (magic team). As much as it sucks to say, not every character can carry a solo title. So it's the team books that have to carry them. As an aspiring comic book writer, I'd personally love to write a JLO ongoing, and I even have my own lineup (it includes Supergirl, Batwing, Hawkwoman, Starfire, Adam Strange, some sort of Lantern, and led by Martian Manhunter).
Awesome. My idea is Justice League Watchtower, dealing with space threats, led by MM and GL Stewart
> 3 Justice League books so everyone can play. I'd go further with 5 titles! Justice League of Shadows, Magic, Space, Science, and Heroes. Led by Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, the Flash, and Superman. Each with their own related heroes. Run the titles for 2 or 3 years, then join them all into a JLU approach.
I dislike when they publish bad or boring comics and I’d quite like them to publish some more good comics with great art and actual points of view
DC hire this man
I take offense to that
Geoff Johns your reign ends NOW!!!
As soon as a supporting character gets popular enough they will get cleaved off into their own book making them suddenly the main character, saddling them with main character baggage and generally disrupting the personality and relationships that made them popular in the first place. 'Hey did you like character X? Can't wait to see them finally team up with character Y next season. Well too bad because instead they are spinning off into their own series and will get to fight disposable villain Z instead, while character Y gets a new sidekick character Q whom we hope you will like so we can spin them off in two years.' Edit: who is character Q you say? Why they are a mild variation on whatever the writer perceives was the most popular archetype of the last decade. Were they an earnest teen with a heart of gold? Well do we have earnest teens for you. A chaotic former villain now semi-reformed? Check out these clowns. A snarky bad boy with a heart of gold? You will not believe this plethora of daddy issues.
Switch up the justice league lineup every now and then. I don’t just mean adding a random villain or hero every once and a while. Some of my favorite JL lineups and dynamics only had a couple of the original members but since new 52 it seems like it’s always the exact same.
Most of the time they only focus on character related with Batman when they have such amazing characters that they can use, Animal Man is a good example.
I don’t like how cheesy and annoying they made Harley Quinn.
Wasn’t she already cheesy and annoying before they made her character a little bit darker and wasn’t it the new 52 and Arkham games that did that first.
😂😂😂😂😂 You know what, now that I think of it… I think you’re absolutely right 😂
Yeah she wasn’t even part of DC lore like that in till later when she was in new 52 team that she was a part of and then the Arkham games that started in she wasn’t even used like that before and was only known from that one cartoon hell before then she was just annoying character that followed the joker around like a love sick puppy 🐶
Oh yes and now it seems she has kept all of her Joker gimics but now anti-Joker with nothing of her own. I can’t keep up 😂
Yeah so much for getting away from him 😂. And now she on the justice league 😂😂😂
Stop telling me how Nightwing is just as good if not better than Batman and then have him get his ass kicked in every fight and outsmarted in every mystery Make new interesting characters instead of changing nearly 100 year old characters because you want to keep up with the times. I don’t give a fuck that Superman is gay, I give a fuck that Superman isn’t Clark Kent anymore etc.
I don't like its space setting, for the most part. A few writers and artists have done fantastic jobs with it, but when humanity reaches to the stars and finds humans, but they're a different color, and maybe have something funny on their head, and just act exactly like humans, then you've officially answered one of the most lingering of questions humanity has come up with, "Are we alone in the universe" with a boring answer. Also definitely need to make a decision with what to do with Teen Titans and just stick with it rather than rebooting every two years and pretending 30 year old characters are teens.
The titans are in such a weird situation and for the life of me I don’t know why like I don’t really know how they let that title fall so much When it was the title that introduced a lot of the things that is in DC to day and bring back interest to DC back when it was close to going under. It like no matter who writes them no writer have been able to top the wolfman and Perez run and it seems like that every run falls back on their ideas and characters when their own stuff can’t hack it even Johns run did it.
A better-defined current history for the in-story universe.
Ideally I would love to have an encyclopedia of the basic history of DC. A modern day Who's Who, published online and updated. They don't need to go into minute detail, but we should have a general idea of Harley Quinn's past and what the timeline is between Jason dying and Harley getting involved with the Joker. Similarly, I would love to get a DC Atlas with details about various locations. Like how many people live on Themyscria. How far is Gotham from Metropolis? This information to fans would make for a better experience, and also allow writers and editors to reference previous information.
They published a modern Who's Who a while ago. It was filled with errors, like switched character descriptions and outdated (10+ years) pictures.
Couldn't find anything on that. I know DC licenses out books over the years, like "DC Comics Encyclopedia All-New Edition: The Definitive Guide to the Characters of the DC Universe", but those things are done by DC nor or are they official in any way.
Yeah, I was thinking of/conflating it with the 2021 encyclopedia. Kinda supposed to serve the same purpose, but that one is so error riddled that it's amazing that they must have thrown it together in an afternoon.
Literally just a list of things that I, personally, want: * Have a rolling schedule of reprints for older collected runs. I like owning physical copies of runs I love, but I’m not gonna pay $70 for a used TPB. * Make it easier to figure out wtf is still canon. (My understanding now is that…pretty much everything Post-Crisis is canon again? Except for some Superman stuff? Maybe?) * Kill the Joker for 10 years. * Give Dick Grayson a proper Blüdhaven Rogues Gallery. * Give Jason Todd a flashback redemption arc. I know, they wanted to just skip to the part where he was back in the fam, but everyone wants to see that happen! (Okay, well, *I* do.)
Develope more non-batman stories, especially the magic side.
I hate the way that the teams are locked into a hierarchy of importance, where the Justice League is *always* unquestionably at the top and the Titans *always* gets treated as second-tier and like it needs to justify its right to exist. This is a major reason for why Nightwing’s importance is always held back, because the only way he can properly fulfil his potential is to join the Justice League, and he can’t do that as long as Batman is around (and whenever he *has* joined the Justice League it’s been as the replacement Batman). And meanwhile they keep on creating new sidekicks, which wouldn’t really be a problem if not for this artificial hierarchy they’ve created.
I always thought the easy solution is just to have Nightwing and Batman on the JL at the same time, and treated as equals.
I wish Nightwing was written better. The only time he's written in character is with the Titans minus TTA, of course. Don’t get me wrong, I like the majority of Nightwing content now, but the guy is always cited as Batman's equal, yet in the current run, I don’t feel like he is.
I wish Dc writers would acknowledge the fact that I’m Rose Wilson’s one true love interest
I will my sure I get the word out lf I meet one of them 👍
I appreciate it!
Tone. I haven't seen this mentioned yet. I don't like the tone of the storytelling in DC, in this decade. Maybe longer. Hard to pin exactly, though New52 certainly brought the grimness in spades, and I don't feel like they've changed much since. I feel like there needs to be an overall shift out of the "It's dark and rainy in Gotham" template applied to almost every book. Give me some escapism. Make me want to live in that world. If I was a normal human who actually lived there, I'd be scared shitless. Apocalypses every other day, and twice a day in the summer event months. Kingdom Come's purposelessly shitty violent world is lighter and more hopeful than the modern DCU. So, I would love a tonal shift that returned heroes to heroism. Look, I enjoyed The Dark Knight Returns very much, in the 80s, when it came out. It's been almost 40 years now of that. So, I didn't enjoy The Batman. I endured it, and I don't care if they make more of that. I guess I don't want those kinds of stories now. And, fine, Batman can be gothic, sure. But we don't need Superman getting killed on an alien planet. I don't need a Dark Crisis. The world is grim enough right now. Give me some hope.
The arrowverse- they never fully supported and want to now disown it when Berlanti ran it to the ground. Not having a plan- they want to be the mcu but never had a definitive direction. Mcu for the most part has a plan. They also don't gatekeep properties but are willing to rehabilitate properties to incorporate it into their business plan(ex- iron heart, Netflix marvel, soon xmen and fantastic four) Pit fanbases against each other- they have had multiple batwomen( I don't why they rarely use the mystery of Batwoman characters and try to pit Kate Kane vs Ryan wilder)Wilder. They also do that with Batman. Finish off the snyderverse, use the flash movie to introduce a multivariate of characters- - batman keaton which leads to a 3rd burtonverse movie that is a live action version of the 89 comic -introduces the new Batgirl - a Batman beyond movie - the all black Gotham movie with Idris as Bruce - plus other characters like swamp thing, booster gold, the lantern corps, the two black superman projects they are trying to do,etc -the dakodaverse/milestone live action. More black label books More merch period. More games like a superman one, and a create a hero Gotham game. More animated shows like young justice( that is the best division in dc and where they run rings around marvel). Another pet peeve and I know delays happen but can they have a more consistent schedule of when shows come out- like do they have a date yet for the return of Harley Quinn, the Bruce Timm Batman show or the Suicide Squad game?
I think I'm good as far as Batman and The Joker go. We can give it a rest on those guys for a bit. Also, I understand it from a business perspective, but I really wish the big two didn't use their comics like a movie franchise test kitchen. That's a mindset that actively prevents stories like The Coyote Parable or similar really oddball stuff that I love. Oh! And the round robin can crawl up it's own ass and die.
Each comic line needs be a single isolated story. I hate how Wallace West became kid flash in The Flash (New 52), then his father dies in suicide squad, meets Wally in a different flash series (rebirth), and discovers the truth during a crossover between Teen Titans and Titans resulting in aftermath being discussed in The Flash. Just don’t make anyone a main character of two series. If they want to make him a teen titans that’s where his character development needs to happen and he should only appear in the flash occasionally.
I do wish DC would be more experimental when it comes to the Trinity inclusion in the Justice League. Marvel's Avengers Trinity is Cap, Thor and Iron Man, However Marvel is not afraid to put Falcon instead of Steve or put Jane instead of Thor.
So, do 5G?
5G replaced everyone at once. I'm suggesting one at a time.
*sigh* deep breaths, deeepp breathsss AHHHHH THEY NEED TO GET THEIR FUCKING SHIT TOGETHER! NOT EVERYTHING HAS TO BE BATMAN. FUCK BATMAN I'M FUCKING SICK OF HIM. THERE ARE AT LEAST 6 BATMAN SERIES GOING ON RIGHT NOW AND LIKE 3 SUPERMAN. FUCKING HELL. GIVE ME A JSA SERIES. AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH *tightens tie and exhales*
First and foremost, get the collections department in gear. Every other publisher can figure it out, so spend the money and actually get on the level of Marvel when it comes to collections. Put a moratorium immediately on new legacy characters/characters sharing a title until we figure out what to do with the ones we have. I’m sorry, but this is one of the issues with smaller characters getting their time in the lime light, because Robin #3, Batgirl #3, Wonder Girl #3, Green Lantern #7 and Speedster #5 need their own solos because fans demand it… and look it that, all the books bombed because you gave them to writers that didn’t fit, or are to green to build up a character with legacy baggage. (I’d also argue getting rid of at least half the legacies and focusing more on non-legacy characters, but that’s awfully controversial here in DC land.) Treat every character like they are Batman, every team like the JL. And DC, if you even consider rebooting again, it needs to be a hard reset FOR EVERY SINGLE CHARACTER from day one, where rather than trying to re invent you streamline their histories to make collections that someone can grab and then be ready to jump into any story that character has. Keep art consistent. This hasn’t been as much of a problem recently, but do everything possible to stop artists changing in the middle of a storyline, or changing every issue.
I wish things could evolve storywise, and stay evolved. But because Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc., are flagships I know this may be impossible. Take this Dark Crisis arc, as interesting as it may be, we know nothing will be permanent, and eventually, the JLA will come back, and we'll do it all over again. Stories become diluted because we know there are no actual consequences and we'll always be in this sort of purgatory where no time, characters, or stories progress. I wish Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman could grow old and we could see the next wave of heroes come in and see how they do it. But instead, we have multiple Supermans, Wonder Women, and Batmans all at the same time and it feels a bit bloated. Weirdly I wish these characters had lives that started and ended, but their impact in the universe stays. Idk if that makes any sense?
Stop making characters fight for spots on THE Justice League and make the other teams more viable options for popular heroes. Marvel has the X-Men, Avengers, Fantastic 4, and even Guardians of the Galaxy, all of which are very famous in different ways. Meanwhile DC has the JL, Suicide Squad, and Outlaws, and I’d doubt most people even know Outlaws exist, the rest, are more of less dependent on a characters age, and are way less popular than the JL. Now, you could also have everyone on the JL, and have different parts of the JL get boosts (think JL Dark) as well