Unvarnished Countdown Review...

[awe4one]

Part of a review on AICN concerning the ongoing DC weekly maxi-series...

 

Have you ever been out drinking all night and found yourself famished at the end of the night? So you get the bright idea of buying a huge burrito and stuffing it into your drunken mouth at 4:30 AM only to wake up around noon the next day and find yourself parked, legs asleep, toilet paper in hand, dropping logs for the entirety of the next day?

 

Well, folks, that’s what this is.

 

COUNTDOWN is a long, drawn-out, late-night burrito morning mess. (thumbs u

 

Jim

[blutobc]

Ouch!!!

 

I've been waiting to pick it up in TPB, but this doesn't sound good.

 

But then again.....if your favorite reading spot is the ol' "Man Throne"....

maybe reading it there might help facilitate that, uh, relaxing feeling.

 

[jordanscott]

[seank]

I stopped reading Countdown about five issues in. *Whew*

 

The plethora of spin-offs and one shots is troubling.

[Zonker]

It's the "DC Challenge" of the 21st century!

[blutobc]

It's the "DC Challenge" of the 21st century!

 

That was a stinker from the past. - DC Challenge

I never did finish that series and solve the mystery.

[followtheleader]

This book is really bad. A joke in comparison to 52. Don't know why I'm still buying it. About time to dump it (like the burrito).

 

Pat

[Zonker]

It is a shame really, since I've enjoyed almost everything else head writer Paul Dini has done-- Batman Animated, Lost, the big books painted by Alex Ross a few years ago, and most recently his run on Detective Comics.

 

I think where this went wrong was in DC's attempt to fix a weekly series production problem they had with the much more successful 52. The production problem with that series was it practically took out of commission for a year 4 of their top writers: Johns, Morrison, Waid and Rucka. So, to fix that problem they tried to adopt the TV writers room model-- Dini as head writer/ show runner, and a rotating cast of lesser-knowns doing the actual scripting every week. But perhaps the reason 52 worked so much better was also the reason it monopolized the top talent: their names were on each issue for a year-- if 52 sucked, it was their reputation on the line, so they did what they could to make it work, to the detriment sometimes of their other assignments. With Countdown, Dini's rep will perhaps be hurt a bit, but the accountability is more spread out among the larger committee of no-name writers. It is also possible that in order for Dini to relinquish total control over the scripting of the series, it had to be a story he wasn't particularly invested in on a personal level.

 

Either that, or Countdown was an editorially-driven cash grab from the start.

[jordanscott]

well going counter to the general feelings in this thread, I actually am liking it.

 

prefer it to 52 actually which really did feel liked it could have been done in 42, esp at the end.

 

i look forward to this every week and even if i'm not wowed every week i still enjoy it. the stories seem to be moving at a better pace than 52 and I'm really liking Jimmy Olsen and Black Mary.

 

not going to drop it any time soon.

 

it would have to get truly horrible for me to drop it with only 25 or so weeks left to go.

[followtheleader]

Personally, I liked the way that 52 focused on a story each week (felt like different books). Now, it feel's more like a bit of all 4 every week. And those four stories are so repetitive. The villians running from a new villian or hero every week is so bad. Or having a new 52 Earth is too predictable.

 

Pat

 

[blutobc]

I took the plunge and picked up the current "Countdown" books in the VCC for about $1/book. Hopefully it will be worth it at that price.

[Ivanko]

It is a shame really, since I've enjoyed almost everything else head writer Paul Dini has done-- Batman Animated, Lost, the big books painted by Alex Ross a few years ago, and most recently his run on Detective Comics.

 

I think where this went wrong was in DC's attempt to fix a weekly series production problem they had with the much more successful 52. The production problem with that series was it practically took out of commission for a year 4 of their top writers: Johns, Morrison, Waid and Rucka. So, to fix that problem they tried to adopt the TV writers room model-- Dini as head writer/ show runner, and a rotating cast of lesser-knowns doing the actual scripting every week. But perhaps the reason 52 worked so much better was also the reason it monopolized the top talent: their names were on each issue for a year-- if 52 sucked, it was their reputation on the line, so they did what they could to make it work, to the detriment sometimes of their other assignments. With Countdown, Dini's rep will perhaps be hurt a bit, but the accountability is more spread out among the larger committee of no-name writers. It is also possible that in order for Dini to relinquish total control over the scripting of the series, it had to be a story he wasn't particularly invested in on a personal level.

 

Either that, or Countdown was an editorially-driven cash grab from the start.

 

Something else to ponder:

 

The outline for 52 was IMMENSE, whereas Countdown's was in a composition notebook.

[BadDeacon]

What I liked about 52, the great stories about different characters, is completely missing from Countdown. Countdown seems to be about nothing but events, and I could care less about the characters in the story.

 

Poor, poor writing, imo.