This week, Blake starts to chat about what happens in Batman, Inc. #8 and instead gets sidetracked on a rant about spoilers. They’re everywhere. They cannot be avoided. So maybe it’s just time to give into the madness. WARNING: This podcast contains spoilers for… well… everything. In the picks, it’s Doctor Who: Prisoners of Time #2. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!
Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.
It’s a big week for Bruces and Blake and Erin take in Willis’s newest film, A Good Day to Die Hard, and talk about the repercussions of Wayne’s lastest battle with the Joker in the conclusion of Death of the Family. We also talk about the return of The Walking Dead, rejoice in the crapitude of Birdemic: Shock and Terror, and Blake recommends that if you’re not reading Morning Glories, you go back and start at the beginning. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!
Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.
2 in 1 Showcase Episode 283: Bruce Willis and Bruce Wayne
Blake and Erin talk about books both with and without pictures this week. New Kindle Convert Erin points you towards the “Black December” sale from the good folks at horror publisher Permuted Press, and Blake urges all writers to throw their support behind Operation eBook Drop. In comics chat, we discuss the passing of Jerry Robinson, the return of Valiant Comics and Marv Wolfman’s Night Force, and the next big thing at Marvel, Avengers Vs. X-Men. In the picks, Blake triples with Animal Man #4, Hack/Slash Annual #3, and Snowy Joey and the Christmas Dinosaurs. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!
Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.
Episode 248: Avengers Vs. X-Men and a Valiant Return
The new DC Universe is a month old now, and in an extra-sized episode Blake, Erin, and Mark sit down to talk about how that first month shaped up. Mark gives us the retailer’s perspective on how sales have changed not just for the New 52, but for other titles as well, and the gang discusses the hits and misses of the last two weeks of titles. In the picks, Erin is just getting into the Dresden Files, Mark is a fan of Annihilators: Earthfall and Herc, and Blake cheers the premieres of Ghostbusters and Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!
Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.
Episode 239: One Month of the New 52
Halfway through the first month of DC Comics’ New 52, Blake and Erin sit down to discuss the comics they’ve read so far. They dig into Batman, Suicide Squad, Lanterns (both Green and Red), Demon Knights, Frankenstein, Batwoman, Static Shock and much more! In the picks, Erin goes retro with Image’s I Hate Gallant Girl and Michael Crichton‘s novel The Lost World, and Blake stays contemporary with Resurrection Man #1 and Life With Archie #13. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!
Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.
Episode 237: The New 52 Week 2 Review
Three months after the announcement was made, on Wednesday, everything changes. DC Comics is relaunching its entire line with 52 new #1 issues. And while I certainly won’t be getting all of them, I will be getting a lot. And I’m actually very excited for most of them. Still, questions persist… the history of the Flash(es), the connection to DC’s multiverse, whether Booster Gold will ever learn the truth about Rip Hunter’s parentage, where the Marvel family fits in, whether Steel ever armored up after the death of Superman, if Stephanie Brown ever was Robin or Batgirl, how Barbara Gordon is walking again, how the Martian Manhunter came to join Stormwatch, if Superboy was ever a member of the Legion of Super-Heroes… I could go on and on, and if you understood even half of those questions, you probably can too.
But the important thing is, I’m anxious to find out the answers. This week, even more than usual, I can’t wait for Wednesday.
For years now, I’ve maintained a steadfast and unbroken tradition of not being at San Diego Comic-Con. This is not for lack of desire. So today, I take a look at the stuff happening in San Diego this year I wish I could be a part of…
Everything But Imaginary #407: What I’ll Miss in San Diego
But moving back in time, it’s January 25, 2005 and I’m taking a look at just how tight the continuity of the DC Universe has become in the last year or two. I’ll leave you guys to decide in this counts as irony or not.
I believe in credit where credit is due, so you’ve really got to give Stan Lee props for really creating our current concept of a superhero “universe.” Oh, superheroes had met before. All of the top National (later DC) Comics heroes had come together as the Justice Society of America in the 40s. Superman and Batman frequently appeared together in World’s Finest Comics. Even Atlas (later Marvel) had their collections of World War II-era characters like the Invaders and the All-Winner’s Squad.
But it was Stan the Man, writing approximately umpteen billion Marvel comics every month (this record would be held until Brian Michael Bendis broke into the business) that really started to forge a world with his creations. The adventures of the JSA didn’t impact the characters in their own titles, nor did the various team-ups that had happened. What Stan did, and did so well, was begin to mix events from various comics. If the Thing lost his powers in Fantastic Four, then he’d be powerless if the team happened to appear in Avengers that month. If Spider-Man was on the run from the law (in other words, if it was a day of the week ending in “y”), Foggy Nelson may have mentioned it in Daredevil. This was nowhere more evident than when Hawkeye, the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver — villainous foes of Iron Man and the X-Men, reformed and joined the Avengers.
These days, though, Marvel has sort of lost its cohesion as a universe. Each of Spider-Man’s three titles seem to exist in their own pocket world and barely connect. Nearly two years have passed in Daredevil during Bendis’s run, while other Marvel titles have only progressed a few months. Why, Magneto took over the entire city of New York at the end of Grant Morrison’s New X-Men, and not a single other title even made reference to it. Except for comments in various titles about the events of Avengers Disassembled and the gloriously continuity-heavy She-Hulk title, it’s hard to feel like there’s a Marvel “universe” anymore.
But man, DC is trying to make up for it.
As Marvel’s titles have grown looser and looser, DC’s are getting tighter. And I’m going to warn you right now, this column is about to get spoiler-heavy for half of the books in the DC line, so if you see a title bolded you don’t want to know about, you may wanna skip ahead.
It’s easy to point to Identity Crisis as the genesis of this transformation. Like the ending or hate it, it was a huge storyline that has had an astronomical impact on the DC Universe. Just a month after the story’s conclusion, we’ve already seen fallout everywhere: the death of Robin’s father has impacted his own series, which in turn has impacted the other Batman-family books. It’s also being dealt with in Teen Titans, and dealt with extremely well. The Titans are also dealing with Lex Luthor’s battle armor, lost during that miniseries.
The apparent death of Ronnie Raymond is the very catalyst for the new Firestorm series. As if that weren’t enough, it’s sparked a storyline in Manhunter, as DC’s newest vigilante is trying to hunt the murderous Shadow Thief.
In Flash, Wally West has to cope with the fact that his uncle, the paragon of virtue Barry Allen, was one of a subset of the Justice League that agreed to tamper with the minds of their enemies — and what’s worse, has to deal with restoring an enemy who, in turn, is threatening to turn many of his reformed colleagues like Trickster, Heat Wave and the Pied Piper back to their old dark ways. In Adventures of Superman, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman are struggling with the same revelation.
And that’s just the stuff directly from Identity Crisis.What other links are appearing among the many titles of the DC Universe lately?
• After the events of “War Games,” the Birds of Prey have recruited a new member and left Gotham City, impacting every Batman title, particularly Nightwing — because he’s still in love with Oracle. Plus, the cops of Gotham Central are even more hostile towards the caped crusader than ever.
• Speaking of Nightwing, Starfire has quit the Teen Titans to join his team, the Outsiders, to try to help him cope with all the trauma in his life as of late.
• Speaking of the Titans, they’ve linked up with two other titles. Green Arrow’s sidekick, the new Speedy, has joined the team. A few months ago, the young heroes got caught up in a time-travel adventure that wound up restarting the entire universe for the Legion of Super-Heroes, and writer Mark Waid has promised that he and Barry Kitson are doing the new Legion as the official future of the DCU — it’s up to the other writers to get them there.
• In Jeph Loeb’s Superman/Batman title, we met the all-new (yet all-classic) Supergirl, who’s about to get her own title. There’s also a rumor that she may check in with the Teen Titans herself. Plus, Loeb is currently milking DC properties as diverse as Kamandi, Cinnamon, Jonah Hex and the Freedom Fighters for the current arc in that title. He’s brought back characters that haven’t been seen in years.
• In Wonder Woman’s title, she’s gone blind after a battle with Medusa. When she guest-appeared in Adventures of Superman, not only was she still blind, but she was wearing the same blindfold. Not too hard a trick, of course, since the two books share a writer, but it’ll be more impressive in a couple of months during a promised crossover with Flash.
• Speaking of crossovers and books with the same writer, Bloodhound wound up merged with Firestorm (both books by Dan Jolley) and the Monolith lent a hand against Solomon Grundy to Hawkman and Hawkgirl (two books by Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray).
“Okay, Blake,” you’re saying, “We get your point. There are a lot of crossovers. So what?” My, you can be rude sometimes, did you know that?
Here’s the point of all this.
A few months ago a group of five writers, Brad Meltzer, Judd Winick, Greg Rucka, Geoff Johns and Jeph Loeb, conducted an interview where they promsied that they were building the future of the DC Universe. And if you look at the books I’ve mentioned, you see their names all over the place, along with other talented writers like Devin Grayson, Gail Simone, Marc Andreyko, Bill Willingham and others I will feel bad later for leaving out.
Clearly, this is going to be a monumental task, even looking ahead to promised events such as DC Countdown and the enigmatic Crisis 2.
Those stories are going to be the framework of the DC Universe of the future.
What we’re seeing now, across the entire line, is the foundation. We’re seeing the hints, the clues, the groundwork. And knowing that this is what we’re seeing, we get to have all the fun of watching as everything is put together.
Some people, I understand, don’t like continuity that tight. I know that. But for those of us who do, watching as it is created before our eyes is something really really incredible. Something amazing.
Something I once may have even called Marvelous.
FAVORITE OF THE WEEK: January 19, 2005
While we’re on the subject of those truly remarkable books, I have to give credit again to Geoff Johns for turning out the best comic book of the week, Teen Titans #20. Since the murder of his father and the death of his girlfriend in agonizingly short succession, Robin has tried to repress his emotions in an effort to prevent from becoming more like Batman (which was nice and ironic, since repressing his emotions only made him more like Batman). This issue dances around some action, but at its core is a heartfelt examination of a son’s grief and his desperate attempt to continue forging his own future, and not let it be determined for him.
Blake M. Petit is the author of the superhero comedy novel, Other People’s Heroes, the suspense novel The Beginner and the Christmas-themed eBook A Long November. He’s also the co-host, with whoever the hell is available that week, of the 2 in 1 Showcase Podcast. E-mail him at BlakeMPetit@gmail.com and visit him on the web at Evertime Realms. Read past columns at the Everything But Imaginary Archive Page.
This week, DC Comics made an announcement that rocked the world of comics. This Sunday, the Showcase boys get together to talk about it. What’s the difference between a “reboot” and a “relaunch”? Will same-day digital change our reading habits? Which new books are we looking forward to, and what are some announcements we hope get made before all is said and done? In the picks, Mike likes Jack of Fables Vol. 8: The Fulminate Blade, Kenny chooses Flashpoint: Batman-Knight of Vengeance #1 and Blake goes with 50 Girls 50 #1. Contact us with comments, suggestions, or anything else at Showcase@CXPulp.com!
Music provided by Music Alley from Mevio.
Episode 224: The New DC
The world is full of comic book nerds, especially in Hollywood… but why don’t we see a lot of original superhero characters outside of comics? Can superheroes only thrive in one medium?
Everything But Imaginary #392: Medium Defiance
And in this week’s classic EBI, let’s look back at Oct. 6, 2004, when I thought about all the spoilers that were invading the internet… and I… struck… back…
Now that we’ve all had a chance to read Detective Comics #799, wow, what a shocker, huh? I never suspected that Robin’s father, Jack Drake, would be killed by the Joker and a hermaphroditic gerbil on PCP. Talk about a shocker!
What? Oh, you mean you guys haven’t read it yet? You mean it won’t even be available to purchase for several more hours? Oh, gosh, I feel terrible now. Wow, it’s a good thing that everything I said there was complete and total rubbish, isn’t it? But now that I’ve got your attention, this would be a good time to talk about spoilers.
A “spoiler,” of course, is any piece of information regarding the plot of a story that you didn’t know yet, in essence, “spoiling” it for you. The term “spoiler” was coined because “ruiner” sounds funky. And before we go on much further, in case you didn’t get it, I was lying in the first paragraph. Being the kind, benevolent, dashing, callipygian, modest columnist-type-person that I am, I would never actually tell you what happened in Detective Comics #799 because that would spoil it for you. Also because some of you may know where I live.
For as long as there has been fiction, there have been spoilers. If you go back to the 1500s you can find scrolls written by people talking about that startling new play wherein, at the end, SPOILERS AHEAD! Romeo and Juliet both kill themselves. But since the invention of the Internet, spoilers have become a much bigger problem because now people have the ability to opine from anywhere in the world to anywhere in the world as fast as the information can be processed in their brains. Or, more frequently, their mouths, since often people on the Internet have found ways to bypass their brains altogether.
This problem, of course, is not exclusive to comic books. Websites like Ain’t It Cool News make their name by giving out juicy spoilers for movies far in advance (and conveniently forgetting about it when the spoiler turns out not to be true), but at least they have the courtesy to stamp a big warning label before the spoiler appears. This, unfortunately, will not stop idiots from e-mailing it to you or blabbing it in a chatroom, but in this day and age, that’s the price you pay for daring to get out of bed in the morning.
You can also spoil books – I’m a big fan of Stephen King’s Dark Tower series, and frequently visit a message board devoted to such. When the advance review copies of the last book in that well-loved series began to circulate a month or so ago, there was a massive storm on that board between the people who were hurling spoilers around right and left and the people who didn’t want to know. One jerk actually went so far as to post the entire plot of the book in the middle of a thread where people were congratulating the administrator for pulling the plug on spoilers. Another popped into a chatroom and spouted out the ending to people who hadn’t read it yet. And this is for the end of a series that some people have been reading for 22 years. There is a word for people who do that sort of thing. However, I will not tell you what that word is since the CXPulp.com filter would most likely block it out anyway. (HINT: it ends in “weed”.)
Now some people don’t mind spoilers. Some people are perfectly happy knowing that SPOILERS AHEAD! “Rosebud” was the name of his sled before the movie even starts. And if that’s your thing, hey, that’s fine. But there are an awful lot of us out there, myself included, who prefer not to know the ending. You’re the kids who always snuck into your parents’ closet looking for Christmas presents, whereas we’re the kids who just looked at the 18-inch box under the tree and hoped against hope that a puppy could fit in there somehow. If you want to discuss spoilers, you’ve got every right to, but you should also have the respect and courtesy to keep them amongst yourselves and not go blabbing that you find out in Amazing Spider-Man #512 that SPOILERS AHEAD! Norman Osborne is the father of Gwen Stacy’s children to anyone who hasn’t heard it yet.
Just last week a thread appeared here which started with the phrase “Well, now that we’ve all read Superman/Batman #12…” and proceeded to give away the entire plot. The trouble with this thread was, not all of us had read Superman/Batman #12 yet. This appeared on Friday. The book came out Wednesday. Not everyone gets their comic books the day of release – or even the same week – and you can’t just assume that they have. If I hadn’t finished reading the book about five minutes before, I may have had to go to the guy’s house and hit him with a frozen halibut.
Even worse was an incident a few weeks ago in the forum of our own Chris Sotomayor. Soto, one of the best colorists in the biz (and I say that out of genuine admiration, not just because he hosts a forum here), was discussing his upcoming work on the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Book of the Dead. Fans were speculating as to who would appear in that book, since the current Avengers Disassembled storyline was resulting in many casualties. Then someone appeared in the thread and asked Soto if he could post some pictures since, by now, we all knew that SPOILERS AHEAD! Hawkeye was the character who died in the much-touted Avengers #502.
The problem with this? He posted this message nearly a week before Avengers #502 even went on sale!
Oh, I was ticked.
Now to his credit, he’d tried to do something, at least. He changed the font color to white. Unfortunately, since the background text on the site is various shades of gray, that was worse than useless and the book was seriously spoiled for me. And it didn’t help that everybody else was talking about the death like it was common knowledge soon afterwards.
The obvious question to ask here is, how long is information considered a spoiler? Technically, I’d say any time before you, personally (or to be more specific, I personally) have read the comic. But that gets a little ridiculous. I mean, just because someone has never read Avengers #4 doesn’t mean they don’t already know SPOILERS AHEAD! they found Captain America frozen alive in a block of ice, thawed him out, made him a member of the team and he served proudly for at least 500 issues.
So how long is a reasonable amount of time to consider something a spoiler? When do you have to stop putting information like SPOILERS AHEAD! the boat sinks and Leo drowns in those little gray text boxes we use to shield the masses? I know some fans would prefer something remain a spoiler until the trade paperback comes out – this specifically applies to those fans who wait for the trade paperback. But I don’t think that’s always necessary. If you’re writing in a thread about Identity Crisis #3, you can reasonably assume people have read Identity Crisis #2 and know that SPOILERS AHEAD! Dr. Light raped Sue Dibney already.
Rather than cruising on a set period of time, I think it’s fair and logical to assume something is a spoiler until the next issue of that title comes out, whenever that happens to be. When Birds of Prey went biweekly, by the time #74 came out it should have been acceptable to reference how, in #73, SPOILERS AHEAD! Oracle defeated Brainiac.
And if that means you’ve got to talk about NYX #5 in spoiler blocks for the next six years or so before #6 comes out, so be it.
Some people don’t mind spoilers. Some people even like ‘em. And those people have plenty of opportunity to talk about them. But if you’ve got spoiler info, make sure you present it as such for a reasonable length of time. Otherwise, you’ll be like Homer Simpson walking out of The Empire Strikes Back and saying, SPOILERS AHEAD! “Wow, who would have thought Darth Vader was Luke Skywalker’s father?”. This would, by extension, make the rest of us the people standing in line outside the theatre who wanted to kill him for saying it, and since very few of us have yellow skin, four fingers and an overbite, it’s not a fair analogy.
Like so many problems in the world of comics (and the rest of the world too, when you get right down to it), you can solve this one if you just apply a little common sense. Try it sometime. You might even like it.
Favorite of the Week: September 29, 2004
It’s a darn good thing that I had read Superman/Batman #12 before I read the spoiler, because this was a fantastic issue. (And considering how long it took to come out, it better have been.) Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Barda have stormed Apokalips, hoping to rescue Kara from the clutches of Darkseid… but what if she doesn’t want to be rescued? There’s plenty of action this issue, and then just when things seem to have settled down, Jeph Loeb hits you in the gut with a knockout punch, a real shocker. Granted, it’s the sort of shocker that you’re certain will be resolved in one of two ways, but it’s a shocker nonetheless. Now let’s all just hope Michael Turner manages to turn out issue #13 before Kara is old enough to have grandchildren.
Blake M. Petit is the author of the superhero comedy novel, Other People’s Heroes, the suspense novel The Beginner and the Christmas-themed eBook A Long November. He’s also the co-host, with whoever the hell is available that week, of the 2 in 1 Showcase Podcast and the weekly audio fiction podcast Blake M. Petit’s Evercast. E-mail him at BlakeMPetit@gmail.com and visit him on the web at Evertime Realms. Read past columns at the Everything But Imaginary Archive Page, and check out his new experiment in serial fiction at Tales of the Curtain.
For the long version of what Comic Cover Roulette is, read the first post. (Actually, read it anyway. It’s cool.) But here’s the short version: back in the Silver Age, comic book writers would often be given cover art and assigned the job of writing a story to fit. Now, I’m picking out some classic covers and doing the same thing. This time I’m tackling World’s Finest Comics #136, with a cover by Dick Dillin and Jim Mooney. I’ve never read this issue.
Batman has been on the trail of one of his most frequent foes, the mad scientist Dr. Hugo Strange. Having barely escaped a deathtrap that involved placing him in a vibratory chamber that almost shook him apart, Batman captured Strange and turned him over to the Gotham City Police Department. He is still shaken up from the trap, though, and is feeling ill when he returns to the Batcave. He collapses in the cave, alone. When he wakes up, he looks around to see that the cave has changed mysteriously. While most of his familiar equipment is still there, much of it has been altered in subtle ways, with the Bat design altered just slightly to look more like a bird. He is interrupted by Robin, who comes down into the cave and acts with surprise. “Who are you?” he asks. “How did you get into the Ravencave?”
Startled by Robin’s reaction, Batman is momentarily overcome when his young partner attacks. Robin manages to activate the cave’s automatic defense systems, and Batman is forced to slip past his own traps to escape the cave. Robin is startled that this man has escaped from systems he believed were impregnable, and loses Batman in the woods outside of Gotham City.
Batman is startled to find that his communication systems do not work. The cellular system linked to his cowl is unable to link to any satellites, and he cannot contact anybody for help. Finding some clothing and using money hidden in his utility belt to buy a bus ticket, Bruce Wayne makes the trip from Gotham City to Metropolis to turn to one man he believes can help him – Superman. As he arrives in Metropolis, he changes back to his uniform and heads to the roof of the Daily Planet building, waiting for Superman to make an appearance. When the man of steel arrives, Batman is surprised to find himself, again, attacked by an old friend. He’s fast and agile, and has trained himself to evade Superman if the two of them ever were to find themselves on opposite sides of the law, but between surprise, fatigue, and a lingering tremble from Strange’s trap, Batman is finally captured by Superman, who brings him to the newsroom of the Planet.
Waiting for him there are Robin and James Gordon, Commissioner of Gotham City. Robin contacted the Justice League and told him about this strange “Batman” who was running through the “Ravencave.” With his appearance in Metropolis, Robin and Gordon have come to place him under arrest… but first, the unmasking. Superman pulls off Batman’s mask just as Lois Lane snaps a photograph of his real identity, shocking everyone. Robin in particular is distraught to see the man he has been chasing is, in fact, Bruce Wayne. Bruce is confused as well, a confusion made only worse moments later when Robin’s partner – who had been overseas on a mission – makes his belated appearance. Wearing a costume similar to Batman’s, but with the bat motif exchanged for that of a blackbird, the hero introduces himself as Ravenman. Lois Lane, ecstatic, rushes off to print the story, exposing Bruce Wayne as a costumed villain called “Batman.” Superman, however, doesn’t think things are so simple.
Superman takes Batman to his Fortress of Solitude, determined to get to the bottom of this mystery. Ravenman, he says, has been his friend for years, and he has long known that Ravenman is really Bruce Wayne. Who, then, is this “Batman?” As Batman begins to question his own sanity, Superman says he has a theory. He places Batman into a device similar to an MRI machine. The device hums and whirrs, studying Batman, and finally displaying a bizarre readout – coordinates for Batman’s location in four-dimensional space. Superman explains that when he captured Batman, he felt strange vibrations inside his body. The device has confirmed his suspicion – Batman has been vibrated into an alternate reality. Strange’s trap shook his body at just the right frequency to cause a shift from his own world to another one where Bruce Wayne’s crimefighting alter ego took the form not of a bat, but a raven. Superman promises to help Ravenman and Robin construct a cover story for the strange appearance of Bruce Wayne in a “Batman” costume, then summons another member of the Justice League. The Flash, who has often been able to travel from one dimension to another by altering his own vibrations, manages to help Batman make his way home. As he settles in to the Batcave, he feels bad for causing the potential trouble for that Bruce Wayne of another world, but is extremely happy to be home.
If you’d like to suggest a cover, go right ahead. Find it online (I suggest using the marvelous database at www.comics.org) and post the link — any cover that has Superman on it is fair game. These characters are, of course, ™ and © DC Comics. I don’t own ‘em, I don’t claim to own ‘em, and I have no intention to use any of these stories for any monetary gain. This is just for funsies. Please don’t sue me.
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