Aldo reads DC's New 52 (So you don't have to)

Now that some time has passed, I'm considering checking out the books that seem like a good use of my reading time. Please, aldo, if you would, tell me if this seems a sensible back-issue reading list (based on what would seem to be reasonably good reviews in your awesome recaps):

Batman
The Flash
Wonder Woman
Teen Titans
Suicide Squad
O.M.A.C.

Also, if I read Batman, will I also need to catch up on Nightwing (or read the other crossovers) to make heads or tails of this Owls stuff? Also also, is reading Superboy at all essential to following Teen Titans (which I only ask since they share a writer)?

If I go down this road, I will absolutely be reading Action Comics and all of the horror stuff whether it's advisable or not, so no advice needed there, thanks.

Teen Titans might be take it or leave it for some people. I enjoy the hell out of it every month but after about #4 it is COMPLETELY tied into Superboy and at the moment neither make much sense if you're not reading Legion Lost and (I suspect) The Ravagers. All the #9s can't be read in isolation.

OMAC should be compiled in a single trade. Wait for the price to drop then knock yourself out, it's definitely for fans of Savage Dragon, Godland and all the other Kirby rips - but this seems more authentic because it uses ACTUAL KIRBY PROPERTY.

You can easily make sense of Owls without reading anything other than Batman. I'm not sure I'd advise jumping into any commitment for the others - maybe Detective.

I, Vampire #9: The best issue in some considerable time. All the vampires are hiding in the desert in Utah, so some blokes go to Europe to get a secret army of vampire killers to bomb the shit out of them. In the mean time, after last month Andrew became the MOST POWERFUL VAMPIRE OF ALL TIME ALL TIEM EVER and Mary decided to go with him she is now bored and offers to fight him for the vampire army on the last page. Man, does she have a short memory. Still good stuff though.

Justice League Dark #9: New writer, new team members, same old crap. It's a dull old fetch quest, which leads into OH NOES WE KNOW WHERE THE BOOKS OF MAGIC MIGHT BE BUT WE HAVE PROMISED TO BRING THE MAP BACK. At one point Steve Trevor leaves Constantine's London flat (where his wife isn't, because he's only married in the Vertigo Universe) through the window. How is that 100 foot fall working out for you then Steve?

Superman #9: Pretty awful stuff all round. SEKRET SOVIETZ EXPERIMENTZ. Mistaken identity as someone else gets outed as the real secret identity of Superman! Lois books an expensive restaurant and expects Clark to pay! Hmm.

Teen Titans #9: Thankfully, this is the end of The Culling. Red Robin explains everything that's happened to date for people not reading all the books, and then a whole pile of stuff happens that means nothing to people not reading all the books. It's still the best of all these titles, and next month we get "the mystery of Mystery Island". Which seems to involve dinosaurs. Ace.

Flash #9: EFFORTLESSLY SUPERB. From the ultra-stylish splash page to throwaway pop culture references ("Maybe we're all dead and don't know it. Like in that old TV show where they all got lost..." "You mean Lost?" "I don't know, I don't watch much TV...") every page exudes joy. If Grodd is dealt with too quickly - and there's a reasonable argument he is, I could have easily read another couple of issues of him - next month we get Weather Wizard, and Pied Piper has been introduced (see my next post, once I've done the next three reviews). The Turtle can't be far away. NOT JUST FOR FANBOYS (ALTHOUGH IT HELPS).

Firestorm #9: The world of Firestorms is getting wearying, especially Captain Britain Firestorm. Oh look, they can merge together and form a TransformerStorm. The high point of this is when OMAC pulls the head off a Firestorm. Talk about damning with faint praise.

Hawkman #9: Swords on the cover can only mean one thing: The Liefeldening. While I think DiDio's Plan B is barking mad, you have to admire his faith in Rob. He gets to do plot and co-scripts here, two of his four worst skills (the other two being pencils and inks). To his credit, this is the best book he's produced this month, but it still isn't any good. I think we should start a book on how long he lasts.

Voodoo #9: One of the best issues in some time, although the writer hasn't been reading the core Superman books as Lord Helspont seems now to be in 19th century Mexico. It's obviously not Peru, because that's where Justice League Dark are at the moment. It's building to something, definitely. I'm betting it's cancellation.

OK, I said I was coming back, and it's to ask this question. Who do we think DC's gay character is going to be? They said last week it was somebody who hadn't appeared yet - then Flash 9 came out so Pied Piper is a candidate. But because he was gay before that wouldn't really be a thing. So...

is it Wally West? I remember a story from somebody saying they wanted to use him but weren't allowed to by the editors. That's some weird choices if so.

I think it's going to be an Earth 2 JSA character - I figure either Flash or Green Lantern. Because no one would care because no one buys or reads James Robinson books and it wouldn't be one of their core licenses.

Maybe I'm too cynical, but then again, maybe not.

Stray observation, looking through Suicide Squad: I'm glad someone finally had the good sense to make Amanda Waller skinny and hot. I'd like to think that was the real reason for the reboot.

Well I agree it's going to be a non-Silver Age character so you could be right. Is there going to be an Alan Scott though? xpost

Alan Scott is the one narrating that documentary that tells the backstory in the beginning of the first issue of Earth 2. They show him looking it over on the plane. He looks like a big blonde douche.

Oh, that seems like a lock then.

Looking through these and peeking at DC's solicitations for the coming months, I'm a little baffled to see (as I'm sure someone has mentioned in this thread) a slew of writers who I wrote off 15+ years ago as Marvel hacks (e.g. Mackie, DeFalco, effing Liefeld) holding a pretty sizable share of the reins. Like, I don't in any way feel that this is going to end well for DC unless they do some massive restructuring (probably wrt their current managerial practices, so top-drawer creators feel like they'd be at all valued for their creative input).

this entire "we're going to make an old character newly gay for pay" press-grubbing is just disgusting prima facie, and such an insult to every writer who's non-ostentatiously included gay characters in their DC superbooks over the last 25 years

Somehow Batwoman is exempt from Owls

It's probably exempt from Owls because it was written before the Owls were invented, and thank fuck because despite reading your reviews I have no idea what the Owls are or an Owl is or whoo Owls are all about, so it would make me drop the book. And the enormous improvement this issue with Bloke McManly's JHW-impersonation art has just convinced me to hang in through real JHW's return.

but then nobody has noticed the link between the utterly white skinned Kate Kane and the utterly white skinned Batwoman either so it's clearly set in Stupidtown and not Gotham.

a) we only know of one character who's ever set eyes on both Batwoman's chin (the only exposed part of her skin), and Kate Kane.
b) no-one in Gotham seems to notice all the weird 19th Century filigrees around the edges of their field of vision either, so both could perhaps be read as artistic licence with purpose by Williams.

Batman Incorporated #9: GMoz gives us a new title, which is effectively one he gave us before but Johnsiverse rebranded. If you liked it before, you'll like it now. But it thinks it's better than it is.

Being a joyful display of actual drawn storytelling, and genuine communication between writer and artist, automatically makes it better than every single other New 52 book, except maybe the Western one, which I've not seen. And isn't this #12 or so, not #9?

Wonder Woman really is excellent. Never thought I'd be reading a WW book each month.

Batwoman looks great again this issue, but is still actually boring and confused in the storytelling. I think only Greg Rucka could actually write her well as a main character, though I enjoyed her appearances in GMoz issues.

The Batman owl thing is great! Do not judge before a read.

p.s. Batwoman sucks without Rucka writing. There, I said it.

#0 and JHW3 issues were still dope enuf. new dude shows that Reeder and/or inker were not bringing the necessary visual stylisation to keep the ....six? separate story strands, taking place at different times, clearly delineated

Yeah, the art in this is an improvement and helps but the separate strands and delineated by being BRIGHT and DARK and so forth. It just feels jarring to me.

I made a mistake through tiredness and repetition - this is Batman Incorporated #1, not #9.

(btw sic, I understand artistic licence, I kind of use it myself when I write these to pull things out when they occur to me...)

sure sure. but we don't have another thraed where we're discussing the book so might as well throw all of it in here!

Come on Aldo, that Batman Inc was all kinds of good.

Yeah, you're right but I had a grump on by then probably. And part of it is certainly that GMoz has been completely treading water on Action.

I sent the BAT-COW panel to several friends

Yeah, part of my enjoyment just stemmed from relief that GMoz was back on form after Action Comics.

Confession: I have no real motivation to read Action

Action 9 was really good after some very wobbly issues

Not confident that the series is actually very well conceived, though.

I am highly confident that it is very poorly conceived.

Editorial shenanigans or just Grant running out of time/inspiration? (Or all three?)

The scripts have been pretty pedestrian so don’t think we can blame the artist(s) this time.

I wonder that myself. I've heard that the new system has not worked like the old one, even for someone as rarefied as Morrison. Perhaps the bloom is off the rose. And perhaps he really said what he wanted to about Superman with ALL-STAR. Compared to that, ACTION is really the dog's breakfast.

Have the new INC, but haven't yet read it (though someone spoiled BATCOW and it made me laugh really, really hard.)

Like I said, I still haven't read Action, but even if it's as poor as y'all suggest, I'm hardly gonna think less of Morrison for suffering a misstep after his amazing Seven Soldiers/52/Batman/Final Crisis/Batman & Robin/Batman Inc. run. Particularly within this New 52 world, wherein the concept of the writer seems to have become severely devalued by editorial.

still think We3 and Seaguy are still my favorite Morrison projects

Don't get me wrong. I don't think Morrison's lost it. But ACTION just ain't that great.

And perhaps he really said what he wanted to about Superman with ALL-STAR. Compared to that, ACTION is really the dog's breakfast.

I think this is very otm.

well yeah, he didn't have any interest of his own in doing more Superman or this Superman - DC came to him a few months before issue 1 came out and asked him if he'd do it.

Oh, the sad capriciousness of timing (15 years and the roles reverse)...

Yeah, ain't it, though? He's come a long way from writing JLA so that DC would finish publishing THE INVISIBLES.

I still marvel at that particular piece of magick. INVISIBLES is a book that shouldn't exist, coming from one of the major comics publication companies in America, and yet it happened (warts and all.)

Oh, as for the new 52, I've dropped all but ACTION and WONDER WOMAN and am a hair's breadth from dropping those, Cliff Chiang or no Cliff Chiang. But DC has proved that they don't want my money, 'cept for reprints.

And perhaps he really said what he wanted to about Superman with ALL-STAR. Compared to that, ACTION is really the dog's breakfast.

otm, and sadly. when AC started out, i was excited by the prospect of this young, angry, 99%-er superman with very limited powers going up against fat cat plutocrats and their uniformed stooges in a world largely devoid of super-stuff. seemed brave & timely, with lots of potential for character-building and slow expansion into the more familiar continuity. but morrison seemed to drop that angle as quickly as he presented it, rushing to incorporate lex luthor, kandor, a tiresome origin story and so on.

like, i was hoping for a neoteny recapitulates phylogeny superman, where we'd get to spend some time with a relatively small-scale man of steel.

Matt, look at Dial H. It is shockingly entertaining.

I actually have it in one of my scattered piles of singles to read. Should clean house one of these days.

I'd also argue that DIAL H isn't really NEW 52 territory, but that's probably just splitting hairs, huh?

eh I'm a Marvel Fanboy, AFAIC anything remotely DC-related is New 52

So turns out Alan Scott is the gay man why because Obsidian doesn't exist anymore which means the gay that was in Alan never had a chance to escape through his son I guess? This feels really perfunctory, but whatever.

I guessed right. 'Bout time I got something right.

Tom Spurgeon ‏@comicsreporter

like any progressive human being, my first thought on hearing DC's announcement was "Oh, God: 10,000 stupid 'weakness is wood' jokes."

Hahaha. I will take back every bad thing I've said about the New 52 initiative if they're able to work in a new Alan Scott villain with a magic cockring.

Green LAntern's new arch-nemesis:

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/images/comic_tot14.gif

Hey, snap, you on the twitter? hit me @highway_62

As for this? Ah, well, you'll get your chance one day, Bruce Wayne.

now following! I'm @EZSnappin if anyone wants to follow along.

Man, you work fast.

just happened to check ILX seconds after you posted. I'm no Ned, where a mere mention of his name summons him from the ether.

Ravagers #1: Seriously, this is every bit as bad as you think it is. One character unzips her suit in the middle of an icefield where they'll freeze to death if they don't keep moving to expose her cleavage, presumably because she needs BEWBS to fly (which is what she does next). All against an angsty Fairchild dialogue of inner thoughts. Technically none of it is awful, but it's one of the most unreable Johnsiverse books.

Animal Man Annual #1: I have to say, as much as I enjoyed this it's an utterly, utterly pointless book. The talking cat tells Maxine a story while it has a piss, a tale of a previous Animal Man and a previous Swamp Thing, fighting a previous version of the Rot in a small town and not winning. Buddy turns up from the future in the story the cat's telling at one point to let them know they're going to fail. Then at the end they go back to a house and prepare for the next issue of Animal Man. It's nicely written and, after a very shakey start, the art's passable. But really, save your money.

Batman Annual #1: Taking place (in effect) during an OWLS crossover, Mr Freeze gets a Johnsiverse origin in this thoroughly decent 40 pager. He's clearly going to be important in Batbooks to come, as he's possibly the only villain that's had this kind of analysis thus far. It turns out the reason the OWLS were after him in the other book is that some of the surgery that's made their regenerative powers stable enough is based on his work, presumably making him the man who knew too much. I'm trying hard not to descend into hyperbole, but I genuinely can't think of a Batwriter that excites me as much as Scott Snyder. Yes, even BatMoz.

That said, I enjoyed Superman Family Adventures even more. Reminded me most of the two Bizarro hardcovers.

Did Lemire write the annual? That sound pretty dire and unnecessary.

Have I mentioned I've given up on the official new 52? 'Cause I have.