The New 52 Makes Me Blue

DC comics suck. I read Detective Comics, Batgirl and Red Robin this week. Detective was just amazing and possibly the best Batman story told in the last 20 plus years. Batgirl and Red Robin were well done comics and enjoyable stories about characters that I have come to love and enjoy.

The Batman franchise was given a huge push forward by Grant Morrison. Outside of the JSA it was the only comic in the DCU that was going forwarding and building on a great history instead of doing soft re-sets, hard resets, or just plain wipe the earth clean type of stuff. 

I know DC had problems and their mid-list books were horrendous, but the new DCU is too much of throwing out the baby with the bath water. I’m prejudging all this stuff, but reading these endings made me said for what could have been. 

From what I can see Dick is back to being Nightwing, Barbara Gordon is back as Batgirl, Red Robin is only with the Titans and Damian is still Robin. It all sucks.

Dick has grown past being Nightwing and this is a horrible step back. Next he will have regressed and being wearing short pants again. Where is the young trapeze artist who is slowly growing into being a different Batman then Bruce. A strong tactician, a good detective, a compassionate friend, a brother to Red Robin and a true mentor who is the ying to Damian’s yang. Now he appears like he will be a solo crime fighter again.

Barbara as Batgirl, please much has been written that she is better as Oracle. If what I read is to be believed she is being made younger as I guess Dick and Babs were being portrayed as almost 30 and that is too old in DC’s mind for these characters.

Red Robin is now looking like a poor man’s Hawkman with a winged suit. Please where is the grace and strength of character that Tim has come to represent. A master tactician and more cold and calculating then Dick, yet lacking in self confidence a bit when it comes to women and his overall physical traits. Not that he is unsure of himself, just not as sure as Dick is of his command of his physical body. 

Damian paired with his father Bruce? Are you kidding? If characterization stays true Damian is just a harsher and darker version then Bruce. Bruce would not tolerate his antics, where Dick was trying with an easy guiding hand; Bruce will replace the velvet glove with an iron hand. Damian will not tolerate that type of handling. The team doesn’t work.

I have gone through the “Oh no don’t change” stage to the “this sounds cool stage” to “you did not go far enough” to the “at least this is a good jumping off point after one issue try outs” to “the bottom line is to tell good stories”.

Legion under Levitz has been very weak; continuing with him is not a winning move. Liefeld is a joke, JT Krul and Scott Lobdell are not exciting creators as writers and restarting Ollie and Carter as Green Arrow and Hawkman is a bust. Add into that dropping the JSA and the whole thing sounds very convoluted and very lame.

If you want a continuity based DCU they should have just pressed the reset button or moved over to Earth One or whatever. Start from scratch and move forward. If you want to try and do this half assed re-set plan it out for a lot longer and don’t jump into the fire feet first. One size does not fit all and that is what they are trying to do with too many comics. 

I happy with what their idea is but if they have good stories to tell we would come back and buy them anyway. It just seems like one strength of the DCU was its history and now that is being played with and has been made uncertain the entire structure has been unraveled. 

I hope my fears our unjustified and I hope I fall back in love with all the characters, but my love for the DCU is being tested and trust once broken is hard to rebuild. Goodbye Stephanie, farewell this Red Robin, adios Dick (Batman) Grayson I hope we may meet again.

One last note, all of what the DCU wanted to accomplish could have been done without changing history. All of these books could still be new number ones, but have Wally as the Flash, Connor as Green Arrow, Dick as Batman, Barbara become Nightwing, Blackqlad as Aquaman and many of the rest just as they are being solicited. Heck reset Superman and Wonder Woman as they both need it; you have a new 52 that doesn’t have to disavow the entire history of the DCU. 

The new DCU sucks because they are taking away some of my favorites.