I’ve been out of comics since just after DC’s “Final Crisis” series.
The cost of physical copies by 2009 had become so beyond their value proposition, that it was just not worth it anymore.
Many of the comics we’d read in about 5 minutes and then be like “Oh. That was a waste for that.” and throw them in a pile to never be touched again.
I had already purged my 15000 or so collection, and it just seemed like I had finally moved on.
Of course, the interwebs allowed me to still keep tabs on DC, but as rebrands such as the New 52 literally shit all over my favorite characters and teams, there was definitely no interest in really going back.
Earlier this year, I decided to temporarily subscribe to the online service for a few months to see if I had missed anything.
All I did was find myself going back to very old series and/or issues that I’d loved (and all sold off) since nothing new I would look at kept my interest at all.
DC decided to do a “New History of the DC Universe” and all I can say is THANK FUCKING GOD I did not pay $5.99 per issue for this. It would have cost $23.96 + tax for these 4 issues and there’s just nothing here whatsoever.
Now I know I’ve been out of this for a long time, so there’s a lot of new art talent working in the field, but this all just feels like Mark Waid is just calling this in. There’s nothing that feels remotely consequential to this non-story.
And the art is all over the place.
At least with the original Post-Crisis “History of the DC Universe” you had Marv Wolfman and George Pérez produce something that felt like a cohesive whole with gorgeous art.
This? It reads and looks like bad fan fiction to me.
And obviously, it does ZERO for a new reader to understand what the DC universe is.
Are you telling me now that after all these major reboots, revisions, and rebrands that all these stories are somehow in continuity with one another? It makes no sense to me and honestly, I have zero wish to even go through them again to see if there is something I missed. Though there really was barely any text.
On even looking online for what the cover prices would be made me see that it appears to have been another bullshit thing with tons of variant covers in an effort to get more money from those few superhero comics buying people there are out there.
I swear, how do printed comics even still make any kind of profit?
I don’t get it.
The industry as a whole has been shrinking for decades with manga more or less taking over. Manga that is far less costly for what is often far more substance.
I didn’t feel ripped off by what I’ve been paying for each “The Summer that Hikaru Died’ release at all. In fact I’ve reread them multiple times now.
But maybe is is me.
I’ve just outgrown what current era super hero comics can offer me in terms of story and especially art.
(Or Warner Brothers Discovery keeps churning this out as a loss leader to maintain trademark and copyright. That makes more sense to me.)
What was the point of this?
Oh yeah. This was all very disappointing and I am glad I did not pay for paper versions of this.
The online subscription is far cheaper and I’ve gotten to enjoy all the old stuff again.
Somebody give Jerry Ordway complete control of the original Earth-Two, The JSA, and Infinity Inc. on that world and mandate no company-wide cross-over involvements and I might consider buying something physical again and reading something produced after 2009!