Comic Book Resources

It does seem excessive, but at least this way, ‘Supergirl’ is bound to become more popular. It’s going to be incorporated into the big story Johns is planning for the Super-books, which it might not have been if Johns hadn’t been able to get his apprentice the gig.

Just OUT of curiousity, can anyone tell me how many creative teams did the Uncanny X-men have?

How about Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, etc.?

Sorry but continuously giving in to cronyism doesn’t equate with long-term success. That’s what’s already getting Dan DiDio into controversy with most of the mainstream DC universe books right now.

SUPERGIRL as a series and a character DOESN’T need more obvious glad-handing attached to it.

I almost believe that this book is only continuing out of sheer bloody-mindedness on the part of DC editorial. I can’t understand why it would continue with such a revolving door of creators. What are sales like?

Off the top of my head I’m not sure Uncanny X-Men matched eight writers until probably quite recently. Stan Lee, Arnold Drake, Roy Thomas, Len Wein, Chris Claremont, Fabian Nicieza and Scott Lobdell will probably get you up to about issue 300ish. More writers in 90% less comics!

They should just cancel the book already and devote the effort they put into it into actually good books, like Blue Beetle, the now-cancelled Catwoman, Checkmate (well, when Rucka was on it), Shadowpact, etc. DC’s biggest problem is they only seem to care about, from a marketing standpoint, about Batman titles, Superman titles, whatever weekly they have going and the next big crisis event. Everything else gets swept under the rug in favour of the next Bat/Super family title or other event driven book.

Tom, I don’t think you can compare since the X-titles, or any other title that comes to mind, eever had that many new writers in such a short period of time. That translates to 4.25 issues per writer…pretty sad, if you ask me.

Remember when peter david wrote 80 straight issues (maybe he took a break now and then but you know) of a title called “Supergirl”? Good times man, good times.

Well, I always find it amusing how this series always seems to pander to PAD’s SG audience in a back-handed way, without giving them what they REALLY want. First Resurrection Man, then Young Justice, and now dragging in Silver Banshee, as if this villainous has-been is even still relevant to Superman right now.

Cronyism is pretty common when it comes to hiring writers in almost every field I have any experience in. I’ve always thought it had something to do with editors wanting extra emotional leverage over writers, to help make sure they don’t hire someone who disappears into the night instead of finishing assignments. The latter is surprisingly common among would-be (and even established) freelancers, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was a comics industry problem, too.

That’s a funny side-effect of the “star” writer syndrome, where shame is pretty much the only threat editors can use to get a writer like, say, Damon Lindeloff, to write the comic he agreed to write.

That is pretty unstable. But I don’t think it’s the record quite yet. Skull the Slayer only managed three issues in a row with the same writer during the course of its run of eight issues. Of course, it was crap. And canceled about when it should have been, I suspect, unlike Supergirl.

That’s a good point about Peter David, and certainly I loved that run, it’s the only Supergirl I own. But it helps to remember that David himself once remarked that his steady tenure may have actually hurt the book, since consistency is rarely rewarded in comics any more. People sample a NEW creative team or a NEW direction.

Which is a shame, really, when you think about it, because that very professionalism makes it hard to market. “Here’s this guy that’s been doing reliably good stuff here for month after month” isn’t nearly as exciting as “New team! New direction!” But those reliable professionals are the guys that have done the bulk of the comics I own here.

At least this title looks like it will have some sort of direction. And if Geoff Johns is going to be the main driver of all the Superman books then I’m okay with having his padawan on Supergirl. I don’t want to see Rucka or Bedard on this book if Johns is going to be the main driver.

Also if Johns think this guy is a good writer, I believe him.

Let’s see… over the past 34 issues, Uncanny X-Men has had 3 writers. Chris Claremont, Ed Brubaker, and Tony Bedard (who was technically just helping out Claremont while he was sick).

The big problem with Supergirl is that since Loeb left DC after putting out so few issues (of course, given what he was going through at the time it’s a testament to his work ethic that he got anything done at all), the new Supergirl was left as little more than a cipher. The first five issues of her series, after all, was her going around the DCU beating the snot out of other superheroes and/or full teams.

After that we’ve had the rotating cast of writers, all trying to nail down a character with no definitive voice. We’ve seen Kara as an angsty and conflicted rebel; we’ve seen her as a party girl who finds fighting monsters to be a total drag; we’ve seen her as an upbeat and helpful heroine; we’ve seen her be tough, vulnerable, bitchy, sweet, friendly, mean, a loner, a team player, aggressive, defensive, happy, angry, smart, foolish, controlled, reckless, and all sorts of other contradictory emotions and personalities. No one has written her the same way as anyone else – hell, even Mark Waid has written her in multiple ways between the Legion book and Brave & the Bold.

Really, there’s no reason for a book with this much creative turmoil to still be surviving (especially not when far better and more consistent titles like Catwoman are getting the axe). It seems like the only reason it’s still around is because editorial really likes the idea of having Superman’s cousin back with her own comic again. I don’t know how the sales on the book are, but I can’t remember ever seeing much positive acclaim for the title (nor for the character herself, for that matter). The Supergirl book has a bit of an air of desperation to it, as DC continually tries to find a direction for the character that works. That’s not a bad thing, of course, but it seems like a waste to devote an ongoing series to a character that’s still quite clearly in the development phase.

It would be nice if Gates and Igle could really turn this book around and make Supergirl into a clearly defined and viable character, but I just don’t see it happening. I really think that DC should just cut their losses with Supergirl already and cancel the book. Let Robinson work with her in Justice League or Johns in Action Comics, but give up on the solo title until we have a stable version of the character.

IIRC, Supergirl is actually one of DC’s better-selling books despite the creative turmoil associated with her. Probably why they shoved her into Legion to goose sales.

Also, I believe this particular version of Supergirl was mandated to DC by a Time-Warner higher-up. If so, then DC would have plenty of reason to keep her around even if she wasn’t selling.

Supergirl is actually one of DC’s better-selling books despite the creative turmoil associated with her.

Try “was.” Supergirl used to be a top seller; in the last year it’s shed more than half its readers and dropped to the bottom of DC’s second tier of sales, and shows no signs of slowing the loss.

It is dropping fast, I neglected to mention that. This said, Supergirl still sells a lot better than a lot of titles the Internet likes quite a bit more. It’s not a book in cancellation territory, and probably wouldn’t be unless the bleeding continued for about another year.

DC doesn’t seem to realize that you can’t polish a turd…and yet they keep trying…

Since John Seavey is looking for material to cover, I’d love to see his take on this series. I haven’t read a single issue of it, but from the sidelines, it certainly does seem like they’ve managed to create a book that almost completely lacks a storytelling engine.

And I can’t help but think that’s a big part of what’s hurting it creatively. As Bloom pointed out above, each new writer keeps giving Kara a new direction, and they’re pretty much forced into that position because the character doesn’t naturally have one. The old Superboy series was initially confronted with a similar problem, but added the elements of a storytelling engine early on. Superboy got a unique setting (Hawaii), a regular supporting cast, and a halfway-decent rogues gallery. PAD gave his Supergirl the first two elements, and a secret identity. This Supergirl has no useful secret identity, no supporting cast to speak of, no individualized setting (where does she sleep, anyway?), and no rogues to fight. It’s just the random monthly adventures of Superman’s cousin.

Personally, I thought they hit on a decent direction for the character when they established that Zor-El’s plan for Kara was for her to harm Kal. At least that defines a relationship and provides an emotional struggle for the main character. It’d be hard to make much of that over the long-term, but at least it provides a short-term direction that would be unique and tailored to Supergirl herself.

Not counting a fill in or two, that’s more writers than the Flash had in 230 issues. It ties the number of regular writers Hellblazer has had in it’s 20 year run. That’s 2 more writers than Swamp Thing managed in 171 issues.

Something’s not right there.

Dc also seems to be looking for that instant turn around for this book..Instead of letting a writer spend some time on the character and actually develope some things. DC seems to go okay writer X hasnt increased sales lets move to writer Y constantly hoping the next guy will be the cure. It may be time to let this character cool off for a year and relaunch her later

You know, I’ll be curious to see how the sales change when people who really want to read about Superman’s cousin Kara have a viable alternative in the Power Girl book.

Sterling Gates?
C’mon…
I mean…really…c’mon…
If that’s the guy’s real name, then I apologize sincerely and profusely.
But…c’mon…
At least come up with something good…like Frank Quitely.

“over the past 34 issues, Uncanny X-Men has had 3 writers. ”

Maybe, but Claremont did about 29 issues or so, and Brubaker has done about 24. Two writers in 53 issues isn’t bad (Bedard doesn’t count, as Claremont had health problems at the time, so he needed some help), and a bit more accurate…

I have to wonder, what will happen if sales don’t pick up? I can see DC keeping the book if it becomes a critical success that most people don’t read, like Manhunter…but if the book fails commercially and critically, is there any point in keeping it around? If it’s true that this is an edict from the higher-ups at Warner, I guess they have no choice but to keep the title going.

Man, it’s worse than Wolverine. Of course, are all these writers building off the previous writer’s plots? Because I have no problem with constantly rotating creative teams if the book still feels like an ongoing instead of a series of minis.

“Not counting a fill in or two, that’s more writers than the Flash had in 230 issues.”

That was then, when the title did fairly well. But since Flash: The Fastest Man Alive launched, the Flash books have had almost as many writers as Supergirl has had. And look how sales have gone on those titles…

I just wrote a few pieces on blog about how revolving door creators ended up killing sales on The Flash. Supergirl is obviously in the same boat.

It’s really strange how much things have changed at DC – when I was growing up, writers NEVER moved. Dixon was on Nightwing and Robin for long runs, Waid was running Flash, Marz was GL, David was YJ and Aquaman, etc. Part of me thinks it’s the new TPB focus of comics, as the longer arc-oriented format makes it easy to bring in a name for a quick arc and then bring in someone else, then reap the sales of two TPBs that don’t have much connection other than the star. Consistent writers are a good thing if you’re telling serial stories, but if you’re focusing on plot arcs… they don’t really matter as much, I suspect. Except that people who are USED to serial stories get turned off.

The only time I thought Supergirl was decent in the current run – with apologies to Loeb who, as noted, was remarkable in that he got ANYTHING done – was when they had her hanging out with Boomerang in New York. That’s a decent hook – have her out trying to find herself, getting used to living in a city that ISN’T Metropolis, and with an interesting character as support. Add a couple of civilian supporting characters, maybe have her get a job (instead of the “living off a trust fund set up by Batman” weirdness), build up a couple of villains… you know, basic superhero stuff.

Of course, that was quickly thrown away, but there was something there that could’ve been built on.

Clearly that makes this the most important #34 ever. You can cross that off your Top 50 countdown.

Welcome to Supergirl, Sterling Gates and artist Jamal Igle — hope you survive the experience!