The "new" DCU and it's 52 titles.

ITs an interesting list to be sure. They have announced a few more titles today like Stormwatch. I like how the Wildstorm characters are being intigrated into DC.

I think the reason they are doing this many, is because of the signifigance of the number 52, they will show some nice profit gains until they know which books will get dropped, and they are covering a number of genre bases which will allow them wider appeal.

We will see what happens.

Been away awhile, gotten busy with school and work. I posted my thoughts on this at the ole' blog (thoughts on each title, and the reboot at large).

At first I really hated the thought of reverting the numbering back to #1. I can *kind of* understand the logic of it with the day and date digital experiment. It'll be easier to goad the ever elusive "new reader (who's dying to get into comics, if only the issue number wasn't so... intimidating)" into an impulse buy of a digital Action Comics #1 than a digital Action Comics #906 (or whichever it would've been).

That logic, however also kinda bugs me as a long time reader... I'm only 31, so I wasn't around for anything near a "real" #1... and I got along just fine. Started collecting the main Marvel titles in the mid to late 80's... so they were numbered in the high 200's/early 300's. I wasn't intimidated, or dissuaded from following certain titles. Got into DC much later... while Action and Detective were in the 600/700's I believe. Books were written a bit differently then, I guess, and weren't so co-dependent on sister/brother titles and their varying continuities.

I do think DC is a tad bit optimistic on the success of some of these titles... a Voodoo ongoing? In 2011? I guess we'll see.

I've always looked at the issue # as part of the collecting side of it. I never felt intimidated by jumping onto comics at large issue numbers just as long as where the title was currently at was making sense and entertaining me. Chances are, if I was liking the title, no matter how large the collection was, back in the day, I would start seeking out previous back issues.

With me I was entering comics when lots of GOOD comics were high in number. Fantastic Four was around 190. Avengers was around 170. Iron Man was around 110. X-Men was around 110. Daredevil was around 150. Hulk was around 200. Captain America was around 220. Batman was around 300. Detective was around 400. Superman was around 300. Action was around 400. This of course was over 30 years ago. And even today, those were some large numbers. The thing about it was was how much of a challenge did I want? There was like today certainly a lot of smaller titles out there with small issue runs at the time. Books like Machine Man, Nova, SpiderWoman, Ms. Marvel, Rom, New Teen Titans, She Hulk, etc, etc. There was always plenty of titles with short doable histories too. You could decide to go after one of these smaller ones and have them completed pretty easily. The bigger runs with the long histories were like pride collections. For instance I took a big liking to X-Men and the Fantastic Four so I started going after the back issues. I remember I had a friend who went after Iron Mans. We would go to the comic shops and I remember buying old back issues and watching our collections grow. I don't think we ever really entertained the idea that we'd ever have them all because we knew the early issues were too expensive for us. However, we kept going back and buying old back issues and before you knew it, we had amassed a lot of the Silver Age and had most of the modern comics. Now when it came time to show off your collection, these were the collections you were most proud of. I remember when X-Men got up to around issue 150, I had about 120 of them. The remaining 30 were issues I couldn't afford or couldn't find. But the collection I had, I was extremely proud of. I think my friend actually ended up with an Iron Man #1 and by time Iron Man hit #140, he had around 120 Iron Mans. The collector in us was totally turned on.

I remember meeting another would be friend in comics at the time who was a real geek. He had more comics than all of us combined at the time. His room was in an attic so it basically took up most of the top floor. In his room he had thousands of comics. He probably had 10,000 comics at the age of 15. I had about 1,000 at the time. I remember he had a run of Action Comics that spanned from about 100 - 400. He was 15 years old and he had about the last 300 issues of Action. Did he think he was ever going to have them all? I doubt it. I don't think he entertained the idea that he was going to have an Action Comics #1 too much. But I'm sure in his dream of dreams he was seeing himself with all of them. The fact remained he had about the last 300 consecutive and it was impressive especially being at this young age. The collector in him was turned on. He wanted them all.

Now with this relaunch you are basically wiping that side of it out. You're basically telling people that they don't need to think that way. You're telling them its too intimidating for them and don't worry about it. We'll start over. Here you go. Here's a bunch of comics with low issue counts that you can get start to finish. Don't worry about history. All you need to know about is now.

Funny, when I go into comic shop these days I'm usually one of the only people looking at comics. At least back issues. Instead what I see happening is lots of kids sitting around the Yu-gi-oh tables playing geek games or older readers buying trade paperbacks. The modern "reader" (not collector mind you) is keeping up to date buying trade paperbacks. The kids don't even care about the comics. The older veterans of comics like me have all quit. The back issues sit with dust on top of them. No one wants them. Every store has a ton of back issues but no one is wading through them. The trade paperback is making it to where this is all the back issue you need. The collector is outdated and dying. He is not being fed anything exciting anymore. He's not interested in collecting a single storyline. Hes no longer being rewarded for seeking out the history of the comic. Instead, he is being pushed under the rug.

I often wonder about someone like my old friend who had Action 100 - 400 complete all those years ago. When every new issue came out, he had it on top of his massive collection. It became the newest piece of his prized collection. What if he kept collecting to this very day? He would have had easily Action 100 - 900 by now and probably a lot of issues below 100. Easily this would have been a major source of pride. Anybody with any collecting sense at all would have been in awe of this collection. I think what if he was collecting today and seen DC just announce they were going to relaunch their entire comics line. Do you think he's going to love having Action Comics #100 - 900 and then suddenly when the newest one comes out he had to put Action Comics #1 volume 2 on the top? I think not. I think it will be a sad day for someone like that. And maybe the final straw. He's been pushed aside.

I remember reading when Archie got married a collector who had every issue of Archie comics decided to quit. Archie had chose Veronica 1st and I think he was a bit partial to Betty. When it was announce he would marry both he felt he had seen enough. This was someone who had EVERY issue! Thats a lot of Archies! He finally felt like he had been pushed aside. Hes seen enough.

I think for long term collectors and hobbyist the relaunch is basically a slap in the face. A pushing aside. The short term trade paperback readers (not collectors mind you) benefit from having a point one spot to jump on at. A new launching spot from 2011 is being developed. Collectors be damned. Sure, there isn't many of us left. But I think the hobby was a lot healthier when it was full of both readers AND collectors. And very often collectors were your most ardent READERS. All that is left now is fickle readers. Readers who would drop a run without a second thought because they don't have any history invested in it. Or because the currently storyline is over and the new one doesn't interest them like the last one did. To me this all speaks volumes of the health of the industry. Comic Shops are almost outdated now. Replaced with Trade Paperbacks that can be picked up at any Barnes and Nobles and current issues can be seen digitally on their computer. There isn't a need to visit the comic shop anymore. The back issues sit. The new issues have ways of being seen without visiting the shop. The health of the medium has already been compromised. The white flag for comic shops and comic collectors has been raised. We're outdated and no longer needed.

The reader wins. But at the cost of the comic collecting. I think this backfires. Not having comic collectors means less interest and dwindling sales.

You reap what you sow. I think DC just parted itself from over 70s years of history. Think of all the COLLECTORS it had along the way?! Maybe some of them were still there. Maybe some of them had quit and had thought about coming back one day. I think DC just shut the door on them. Severed its ties to collectors who had a rich history in buying and seeing only the fickle READER of today as who to cater too.

After giving this relaunch a long thinking. I think DC has made a terrible mistake. As someone who is a longer term collector AND reader. I personally have just become disenchanted and alienated. I'm no longer interested in DC.

Fuck em.

Someone came across like a shill on another board where I was insulting modern comics and DC's decision to do a reboot. The person asked everyone what they were doing on a board about comics if they didn't like modern comics.

My response was here:
defiant1.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=GeneralComics&action=display&thread=2859

It has a brief telling of my history as a collector.

df1