Anyone been following what DC are doing in September in the Comic Book world? In a nutshell a pretty major reboot of the franchise will result in 52 titles with a promised fresh take on old favourites, such as Superman who may not be sporting his trademark red undies. Shock. All titles are going back to #1. Anyway the other big thing is that they are promising same day Digital Releases in all titles, and Justice League #1's physical release will even come with a code to download the digital version (this seems like a one off thing, I think they still want a descrepancy between buying digital and physical copies). Personally I can't wait. I'm a big Comic Book fan, but find my trips to the LCS sporadic at best, I usually just wait for trades on Amazon. I hope Digitalisation will bring slightly cheaper prices too, similar to Games and the App Store. I'm hoping for some integration with iOS 5's newstand feature as well- I'd defiantly be up for having a subscription plan automatically download my comics to my iPad every Wednesday. What are your thoughts? Sound tempting to any non-Comic fans?
Yep. Not knowing the history/lore surrounding characters and their worlds is hugely off-putting for me. I've bought the odd comic book here and there, but pretty much didn't have a clue what was happening. Comics aren't very popular at all here in the UK and unless you know a specialist store (which are rare) it's almost impossible to keep up. The best thing I did was buy The Ultimate Spider-Man Collection because it was the first time I'd ever been able to start at the beginning.
I know this is a somewhat inevitable shift, but this is basically going to obliterate mom and pop comic shops that were responsible for putting DC and Marvel on the map.
I kind of agree =( I am all down for the convenience... but damn this is going to be a huge blow to comic shops.
I don't really think that's the case. The people who buy Comic Books in shops regularly aren't going to stop. These people are collectors. This may even help introduce new readers, and as Midian pointed out, may get some people confident enough to be able to visit a store. I've been reading for about 4 years now, and I'll admit I'm still somewhat daunted by visiting a Comic shop. The sweet scent of stale sweat takes on a much more menacing quality when married to a sneer of contempt, delivered when you ask some twerp to point you in the direction, of the Batman and Spider-man Comics. Remember a lot of people still place a great deal of sentiment in owning a physical product. I don't think their days are numbered just yet. Oh and Marvel haven't actually announced they are doing this yet. I guess they'll probably wait to see how DC get on, but it is probably inevitable.
As lepeos pointed out, there are always going to be people that want to physically own a comic book... the exact effect this is going to have is hard to tell, but retailers of real life paper comics aren't going to be completely out of business in my opinion.
I can't wait! I'm going to download all the issue #1 reboots and keep them in mint condition so I can resell them in 30 or so years for a huge profit! Oh, DC.. how nice of you to kill off the collectors market and shoot yourself in the collective foot. Post-reboot physical copies will no longer increase in value as they currently do, even if I'm wrong I highly doubt New Superman #1 is going to be worth a lunar bus ticket in 50 years.
I don't care if they increase in value but I'm sure the hardcore collectors will. Given the amount of time and money involved with keeping up a collection of individual issues vs buying complete anthologies or piracy there's bound to be some kind of backlash.
I like it and non comic fans like it but most people hate it and dc are losing a lot of fans. I usually just by big collections or omnibus later on rather than weekly/monthly comics as I can't get them in Ireland. But so many dc fans are annoyed with the reboot.
Yeah to be fair, the actual reboot is another thing altogether, I don't fully understand it yet. I see that Bruce Wayne is back as the only Batman, but Damian is still Robin? And I know that JLA #1 is going to be a retelling of their origins, with Cyborg instead of Martian Manhunter. It seems very up in the air.
Damian is only in one series while batman is doing like 4/5. So I think that one may follow a slightly different timeline to the rest.
Personally I like collecting, but not for the potential resale. I like enjoying them and reading them, and for me the best and most enjoyable way to do that is reading the physical comic books. I just cant get into digital stuff. And about the whole DC reboot thing, I really dislike it. They are turning back years of continuity and are reversing everything. Ex. Barbara Gordon, who used to be Batgirl, was shot in the back by the Joker in the famous "Killing Joke" story in the 80s. It's one of the best Batman tales of all time, and one of my favorites. She became the Oracle, kind of an overseer who helped out heroes and has been the Oracle for almost 30 years. Guess what? None of that ever happened now. She's back to being Batgirl. And an even worse thing is that they are keeping some things and reversing others. While Barbara becomes unparalyzed and is presumably back to being a teen/young adult, Bruce Wayne's young son Damien is being kept in his normal state.
Yeah, I could get behind a 'wipe the slate' style reboot a la Crisis on Infinite Earths, but this is going to leave DC looking like Frankenstein's monster
