I also enjoy 52 largely as a fun way to explore a superhero universe. You get to keep track of tons of characters without having to buy scads of different titles, which is convenient for someone like me who doesn’t have time or interest in digging through Previews. Flaws are easily forgiven because there’ll be a new one next week, and stunts like the ending of week 43– which would’ve been extremely offputting in a monthly book– instead actually make me curious about how the cliffhanger will be resolved. It is disposable and ephemeral without being uninteresting, which is the sort of superhero read I enjoy when I’m waiting between masterpieces.

It helps to know that 52 is also finite, and therefore, there is more likely to be some sort of resolution to the title’s various plot threads. It’s a good format, one that frankly makes a lot of DC’s monthly superhero output obsolete, and I look forward to seeing Countdown (which will hopefully remain similarly self-contained and finite, as for me these are key points of appeal for the format).

And it’s not just Geoff Johns. Every DC writer they’re currently employing has a man-crush on ‘Kingdom Come’. I think it’s in the employment application.

And also Johns’ weird crush on Kingdom Come. That’s been driving me nuts for a while now.

Bloggers have decided Geoff Johns as of late is responsible for it. While it may be unfair, he certainly has enough obvious influence over the DCU editorial style at the moment that it’s not a ridiculous opinion. Perhaps one that irritates a longtime Johns fan, but this sort of broad criticism becomes more inevitable the more prominent a writer in virtually any medium becomes.

Put another way, Johns has always had a taste for the bloody and visceral. (It doesn’t hurt that the JSA pencillers from the start of the 1999 series to the present day tend toward realistic styles instead of cartoony ones.) Why is it that people are suddenly singling out the bloody-minded takedown of utterly obscure heroes or child extras for condemnation?

(I should note that I have no problem with negative responses to the issue. For example, Evan Waters has done an excellent job of expressing his distaste in measured fashion. I just wonder why Greg needs to drag down an otherwise nice post with unnecessary Johns bashing–the comment in the Stars and STRIPES paragraph was justifiable, but the reference in the Catwoman paragraph seemed bizarre, given that Pfeiffer is the author in question there, not Johns. I’ll also admit that I’m partially responding here to a trend that I saw at work in the JSA post that vanished from the blog last week.)

It started to meander a little bit in the middle of the current series (approximately issues in the mid-30′s to mid-50′s range) and I dropped it. But I picked up some of the ‘pocket’ collections that collected huge chunks of issues and after reading volumes 1-5, I found myself with a whole new appreciation of the series. It may not come through clearly when reading SiP in (semi)monthly installments, but when you read it all at once, you really get a feel for the cohesiveness of Moore’s story, and where he was going with it all along. The more recent issues have been some of the best of the series’ whole run because he’s finally tying up alot of plot threads and throwing in a few last second surprises too. SiP may not be everybody’s cup of tea, as it doesn’t feature any spandex-clad throwdowns, but it’s been one of the best indies out there for years now. I’ll miss it when it’s gone, but it will also be nice to see an American comic series get some sort of closure…

Yeah, Apathy Boy, maybe it is unnecessarily negative. I’m certainly glad DC is trying the Minx line, and I honestly don’t care if the new weekly event does well or not, but I basing it on their business practices over the past 20 years or so, where it seems like they learn nothing about beating something into the ground. We’ll see.

His stuff can be overwritten and definitely wont be to everyone’s taste, but he’s got talent and mad ideas dripping out of his ears like hot wax so I’d recommend giving it a go.

That’s unnecessarily negative, isn’t it? It actually makes a lot of business sense to keep your biggest seller going until it’s no longer profitable.

And it’s not like you can’t do the same old thing AND try something different as well. The Minx line is certainly a huge gamble (and let’s not forget, so was 52).

Now, though, I’ve had to listen to the blogosphere drone on and on about the buzzsaw of death. I’m not sure how issue #3 is all that different from the Vol. 1 stories I just mentioned. Dead children? Well, Degaton’s goons get all Travis Bickle on Courtney’s kid brothers and sister in the earlier sequence. It’s guns instead of Nazi superspeed, but it’s still bloody as all get-out.

So what’s the difference now? I have my suspicions (namely, payback for the bloodshed in Infinite Crisis), but I’d like to hear just how the current storyline is really that much worse than those in the previous volume.

As for The Chinatown Death Cloud Peril, the risk of an exploding head is well worth it, it really is that awesome. Previews is probably offering the paperback version, though, and the chances are good that Amazon probably has some nice remaindered hardcovers left for the same price or lower. That’s where mine came from.

No. It’s meandering, pandering, blander-than-blandering stuff. Nothing new, nothing exciting, nothing special.