The only issue I have with Superman's new look is that it looks a bit too much like Earth-3's Ultraman (their Superman equivalent). I will agree that when Jim Lee draws him it looks great and something I can get very used to as long as he's drawing it; and it's DC Direct figure that was shown off at SDCC looks really good.

Geoff Johns did an interview with ign where he said that he does have a surprise addition to the team. Here's the quote


I agree that some of the continuity really needs some clarification, and soon. Maybe it doesn't have to be in a story, I'd settle for a 1 shot book that breaks down a timeline for what carried over and when it fits in. Because while I enjoyed Batgirl and all three Green Lantern books when you step back its kind of hard to understand what happened and when. Particularly how if Batman has only been around for the past 10 years (at most) how does that explain Damian? He's like 10 himself and if Talia is still his mom then that would mean that Batman, Talia and presumably Ra's al Ghul all met when he first hit the scene. That's kind of a stretch.

Now I don't know if you guys plan on talking about this week's books next week; but here are some quick thoughts:

I don't think I'll be following a Superman solo book. Action comics is what it is, but Superman #1 in a word was boring. I will say Beeslo gets his wish in Clark Kent writing an article, and just as I said it would be it was boring. All it did was add redundant information to what we were already reading and seeing in the panels. I've got nothing against George Perez, but this book felt dated. While the whole Daily Planet stuff was interesting, Superman ends up fighting what felt like a monster of the week. Maybe its a precursor to something but I doubt it.

Tony Bedard is back on track in GL New Guardians. While I hated his handling of Kyle post War of the Green Lanterns and Blue Beetle being the weakest of the relaunch books I've picked up, this one was pretty good. It summed up what it needed to about Kyle's origin and mentality and left on a good enough mystery that made me really want to get issue #2.

Aquaman was awesome; but I'm not really surprised given the pairing of Johns and Reis. Johns did what I've wanted someone to do for a long time now and establish how badass Aquaman can be without just saying it. Not going to give out any spoilers, but it was my favorite book of this week.

Batman The Dark Knight didn't need to get a relaunch. It should have just died with the old series. There's just no need for 4 books following Bruce Wayne; not to mention the fact that he or other Bat related characters take part in 10 of the new 52. I love David Finch's art, but if there's a Batbook on the chopping block its probably this one. I would like to see Finch doing the pencils for another book.

Being a bigger fan of DC I will say its weird seeing them get so much more attention that Marvel this past month. I've always felt they've had better characters than Marvel, but they just never knew how to attract new readers; so I'm actually happy about the relaunch for the most part. I don't mind being in the dark about the new universe's history as much as I thought I would. As long as the books are good I can't really fault them for starting over. I finally have a Justice League book with a team that makes sense written by one of my favorite writers and drawn by one of my favorite artists. I finally get a Kyle Rayner book again. Grant Morrison is off Batman, and Scott Snyder is taking the reigns. And while I lost a Superman solo book to follow and Wally West is no where to be found; I'm actually cool with it all.

On a final note, and I forget if you guys mentioned it previously, but The new Daredevil is awesome. It's one of the few Marvel books I still pick up, and the best of the bunch. Punisher is off to a slow start, Deadpool got a bit lame in England and Thunderbolts just started a new arc; away from the current timeline it seems. Oh and Amazing Spider-man has been a good read even with Ramos on art duty.

My only thought about this whole "New 52" thing is, what was the point?

They built it up as a total reboot starting from scratch but half of these "new" number 1's contain pre-established continuity from the old universe (blackest night, killing joke, etc). Why? It makes absolutely no sense to me.

If they were going to do that than why not just put everything on hold for a month or two and release a series of "number 1's" that are basically history lessons for their respective books/characters and then pick everything back up from where it left off but with the start of a new story arc.

Or just go for the full on reboot and actually start from nothing and go from there.

Honestly this all seems totally counter productive with the way it was handled. If you're a new reader you are just as fucked as you were a few months ago before this all happened.

I dunno, I feel like I have a million different arguments against the way this was/is being done but they all lead to the same point. That being that this was a complete waste. Period.

Now in order to not sound like a complete whiner, in spite of how stupid I think this new 52 crap is...A couple of the books do seem worth checking out to me. Once I get caught up on my backlog of stuff to read I may check out Justice League and Detective Comics...I guess .

To be fair, from the get-go they said it wasn't a reboot, but rather a new universe where some characters were going to get tweeked, while others got complete overhauls. It's more of a soft reset. The term reboot was being thrown around by those reporting and speculating on it. they let it be known before Flashpoint even ended that Green Lantern was going to continue right from where it left off, Batman Inc. is carrying over and the Killing joke still happened. They more or less took a page out of Marvel's book by building hype around new #1 issues. and in the sort term it paid off huge seeing as how 11 of the books have sold more that 100K copies and 3 selling 200K; which is unheard of these days. Most, if not all the #1's have sold out and a merchant level, with Justice League already scheduled for a 4 printing in a month.

In short: They figured out an easy way to lure new readers and make serious bank.

Well from someone who doesn't really follow DC that was how it came across to me. Knowing that they said it wasn't actually a reboot helps a bit...it's still a big ole mess though with the all over the place continuity and what not. They could have done #1s and brought in all those readers and built up all that hype without having to change anything I'm sure.

The real telling thing anyway will be how all these sell and are received as they continue on. I mean, how many of those #1s sold just because they were #1s and people bought them thinking they'd be worth a million bucks some day just like the original Action Comics #1? I'd be willing to bet a decent number of them...and I think DC knew that.

Not to take anything away from their success. Good for them, I hope they keep selling. More importantly I hope this gives the industry as a whole a little boost. If any percentage of those sales came from people who weren't readers at all and they keep with it hopefully they branch out beyond DC and comic books as a whole can get more sales going.

No you're on point about them selling about #1's; and I'm sure by January we'll have a better picture of how it will play out and see what books will continue to carry over new readers. The collector and scalper markets will probably drop off significantly by then as well.

Honestly I'm more curious about the numbers for the digital downloads once the books start getting discounted. I plan on getting an iPad and cut down on my weekly comic purchases down the line, leaving all of my on the fence purchases for a digital copy.

The Justice League issue cover made me laugh, looks like Green Lantern is sporting a minigun strap-on.
That Joker finale panel was brutal, damn.
Frankenstein in DC, whaa? Always thought Solomon Grundy was their universe's Franken monster.

Iron Man partying down with dwarves? Fuck, I gotta get back to reading comics again soon.

Btw, the title card is damn classy. Steam-Punk-Mecha-Hitler for the win.

I can understand that point but I am a new reader (read: really old reader who has been out of the loop for well over a decade). I have been able to pick up nine or ten different N52's and have been able to understand what is going on from the get go. Yeah, there are some(many) references to previous story lines but nothing that break the enjoyment factor for me because it's not so much old stuff that I have no idea but enough allusion that I understand there are back stories to characters and what they are about.

Plus, I'm not sure how many "new" readers DC was trying to pick up. I think it may be more of a marketing thing to get readers of other comic labels to become "new" DC readers rather than trying to get people who have never read comics before to pick one up and subscribe.

Considering I've been seeing commercials advertising the new 52 on television channels that aren't G4 (Comedy Central for example) I'd say they're definitely making an attempt to grab brand new comic book readers.

I'm sure pulling in non-DC readers is part of it as well, but when was the last time you saw comic books advertised on TV? That's gotta be a grab for the non-comic book readers.