DC Comics: Death of the New Gods
July 11th, 2007 by david brothers | Tags: 4th world, DC comicsJIM STARLIN: FERRYMAN OF THE NEW GODS – NEWSARAMA
I’m just going to cherry pick a few quotes for you guys, okay? Bolds for emphasis.
JS: Dan’s the boss. Myself, I sort of think of this project as putting an ending to Jack’s New Gods’ saga. Since Kirby’s initial run on the characters others have presented them with mixed results. Looking back I’d say at least half of the past New Gods series have done more harm than good. So for me, Death of the New Gods is half honoring Jack Kirby, half mercy killing.
JS: Didn’t realize that was a Mother Box until hearing your question. You know they come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. As for the Black Racer clue—well, the Racer was easily my least favorite of the New Gods. So no one should be surprised to learn he doesn’t last long in Death of the New Gods. Never could figure out what Kirby was thinking when he created this one. He should have been gotten rid of a long time ago. Then again, that’s just my opinion.
JS: Big plans for the Source. You’ll never guest whose father he turns out to be. No, seriously: everything you think you know about the Source is wrong. This is the part that the really fanatical Kirby fans are simply going to hate.
NRAMA: Got it. Finally, then, will this project lead to a re-iteration of the New Gods in the foreseeable future? Or do you think it is time to close the final chapter on an old idea and try a new concept?
JS: DC owns the rights to the character’s names. There’s some great names there. What do you think?
Thesis: Sometimes, it’s okay to let old characters lie in limbo. You don’t have to use them, and you don’t have to break them to make them more serious or mature.
Proof: Post-IdC DC Comics
Thesis: Grant Morrison and Walt Simonson are the only people who should ever touch Kirby’s New Gods.
Proof: Countdown-era DC Comics
Thesis: Black Racer is awesome.
Proof: JLA: Rock of Ages
Here, let me end on one more quote. Dan Didio at Comic Bloc.
DD: Yeah, we are in a position right now where we have a direction in what we are trying to do for the DCU and we have an overarching story that we’re trying to tell. I’d say about 75% of the concepts that are being created are editorially driven. And realistically, at that point, we are trying to figure out bringing in the best people for the job.
Editorially-driven comics aren’t bad. Truth: Red White Black was pitched by Axel Alonso. But, when you’re up as high as 75%, you’ve got a problem.
This is Countdown-era DC. Welcome to the FUN PLACE.
art by rad mcawesome, click for big
(write me an article rad, or else thriftie gets it. we also accept articles done in 3 or 4 panel format)
In slightly better news, Martha Washington drops this week (hoorah) and I bought like three pairs of shoes yesterday.
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That picture is totally rad mcawesome, and is now my new background.
If the Source is Jimmy Olsen’s father I’m gonna have myself committed just so they can electroshock me into never touching a DC comic again. Even if they have some awesome stuff out 50 years from now, catching up on the history would just be too painful.
Hopefully, saying that will cut off their plans and the Source will be Hawk’s dad.
The source is Jimmy Olson’s father?
Of course!
That explains everything!
Simonson really should end the thing if anyone does.
But really, this ruins Chris’s proposal of Birds of Prey as “Big Barda loves Scott Free”. And that must not stand.
Here’s my new theory of DC.
Didio, and a bunch of his editor friends have a personal agenda of what they want DC to look like. They keep bringing in incompetent tv writers as hired guns because if they’re ignorant of the setting, they won’t argue about the shit they’re supposed to pull.
When I was a kid, I only read Marvel. I recently got back into comics. Marvel was on the cusp of Civil War and I was really happy to see an Avengers title with characters that new readers would already recognize. DC, however, proved almost impossible to penetrate for a newcomer. Countdown has pretty much turned me off of ever reading DC again with the exception of Green Lantern books. To me it looks like they’ve been neurotically addressing continuity problems for the last decade instead of writing real crossovers.
Since the death of Superman, DC comics have become more and more dark (to an stupid level), and less fun. Please, the dead of Ted Kord, and Max Lord transformed in a maniacal and villanous mastermind, that’s crap. Everything that follows is equally dumb (Infinity Crisis, the continuty waves, Superboy prime is a killing maniac, the Sourcewall is a wall between universes, and the shit goes on).
Simonson’s Orion was a masterpiece, while Cosmic Oddisey was a boring mini-series, where the Anti-life equation was an Anti-Monitor wanabe. But DC gace the ending of New-Gods to Starlin.