What do GA collector's think of DCs New 52 Universe?

[Sqeggs]

As usual the Batman books are the good reads,but that`s been the story the last 25 years. I think Batman has carried DC this last decade,and now it`s time for Superman to step to the plate to help,as the rest of the DC characters would have a hard time beating Ghost Rider at the movie box office.

 

And he's dead!

[batman_fan]

Whats a "New 52 universe"?

 

Sums it up for me. I read very little Marvel/DC mainstream superhero fare. I do read moderns in TPB form but am usually going for independent and international fare.

 

Are people saying comics are still being made ?

[G.A.tor]

Entertaining

[conditionfreak]

The 52 universe sucks big time. It appears as if DC just wants to put out the most improbable and impossible story they can. Just for the sake of making it "busy".

 

It sucks.

 

Are "we" just out of stories? Has everything already been done, except for the really really complicated stuff?

[vaillant]

I have also to mention that, not being affectioned to the characters, I should have been barely touched in seeing these "reinventions".

Instead, when I browsed the new Shazam/Captain Marvel, I was doubly depressed: both because this Billy Batson is thoroughly pointless and because the artwork is great, and thus totally wasted here.

 

From what I have read most Otto Binder stories are so constantly ahead that they make each one of those New 52 titles pale in comparision.

[Comicopolis]

DC's New 52 is mainly a set of terrible books.

 

I found it somewhat funny that the initial premise was supposedly to start afresh with continuity and then they just went and used the exact same characters and the old continuity was still there.

[zosocane]

Actually, I think the Geoff Johns/Gary Frank incarnation (re-incarnation) of Shazam (DC officially dropped the name Captain Marvel) is well done -- story and art. Keep in mind that we are only getting appetizer-size stories each month as a back-up story to the JLA, so it's hard to build any real momentum with the character and story.

 

But I look at the JLA book (technically, "Justice League," not to be confused with their upcoming and different title, "Justice League of America") and the artwork scares me off.

 

And that's my biggest problem reading -- or, more correctly, attempting to read -- modern DC or Marvel: the artwork is generally disappointing. The artists are more focused on the post-publication sale value of their original pages, leading to a lot of splash or semi-splash pages that destroy story-telling and continuity.

 

I can pick up a 1972-ish House of Mystery be transported mentally into the book -- art and story are just outstanding. I pick up almost any book from 2012 and it's hard to get excited.

[vaillant]

@zosocane: I’m by no means a knowledgeable reader when we talk of DC, but I have discovered Captain Marvel a year ago, as in Italy almost nothing has been published of the Golden Age, and the direct comparision came as inevitable, also for the reasons you say: in some ways the "reinvented" Shazam pays homage to the original in an amusing way, and the artwork is really good.

But at the same time, the premises are deliberately unsettling, the mage Shazam seems inadequate as he gives Billy his powers, and all those unneded mystery and complication reveal superficiality rather than a literary quality in storytelling.

 

You are right about the artists: a good 80% of them does not even know how to draw the most ordinary things. There are a few exceptions, like Frank Quitely or some artist I don’t recall which drew some episodes of "The Gauntlet" on Spider-Man, but most new artists would fail without all that computer coloring covering the inconsistency of their drawings. But again this is always related to the quality of storytelling: how can you make a good introspection of the characters through drawing, how can you dramatize or move, when there is nothing to dramatize about?

[zosocane]

Vaillant, you are right on about computer-generated coloring masking much of the slop we see in modern comics.

 

Not sure if you have seen this, but check out www.comicbookplus.com. You will need to register (free) before you can access the content, but it has available downloads of many non-DC and non-Timely golden age comics. Check out the Mac Raboy stuff under Fawcett (e.g., Master Comics). Even if the scripts are somewhat juvenile, the quality of the art and story-telling is unreal.

[vaillant]

Hi zosocane,

thanks, I know and owe much to the DCM, which has similar content.

I have started collecting some Golden Age slightly before discovering (and joining) the CGC boards, a little more than a year ago.

 

I am not sure what has been the key factor in making me decide to purchase a GA book. It was either Charles Biro’s Daredevil or a research I started some years ago about italian comics of the same period (I am focusing on "Il Vittorioso", the very first italian publication, by catholic publisher A.V.E.) which focused in offering stories written and drawn by italian artists alone – and this proved to be a good move when comics were largely banned in Italy due to restrictions of the fascist regime.

Last year, as I was browsing eBay I realized I could buy a Daredevil Comics #12 for slightly more than $100, and I said to myself: «Why not?». This has been my "ruin", as I have spent in a year more than what I have spent in comics in the last ten years…

 

Mac Raboy Captain Marvel Jr. stories seems to be occasionally more "juvenile" as you say, but maybe it was a choice? After all, Jr. was a groundbreaking concept, as it showed that a paraplegic boy, with the complexion of a 14-year old, could be a super-hero, as much as Superman.

But the Marvel Family is my favorite: now when a current writer will be able to come up with a storyline like "The menace of old age" or "The well of evil", well… we’ll start speaking about what makes a comic story "mature" or "adult"…