Free Imagine Blogs

Remember a few days ago when I posted the glorious cover to Final Crisis Aftermath: Run which I described as "a one-shot starring the Human Flame"?

I was wrong. So very, very wrong. Yes, Run stars the Human Flame. And yes, Run has a cover. But Run is not a one-shot.

It's a six issue mini-series.

Which means that Final Crisis Aftermath: Run is a Human Flame mini-series. Let me repeat that for those who are slightly slow: a Human Flame mini-series. Final Crisis Aftermath: Run is a mini-series starring the Human Flame. I cannot believe I typed those words. Thrice, even.

Some times the gods of comics answer our prayers. Even prayers for things we didn't even know we needed. Truly they are wise and benevolent.

I said a little bit about Final Crisis #7, but I wanted to go a little more in depth on my thoughts about the series as a whole. There were some questions about my declaration that I "liked" issue number seven. Well I did like issue seven. But I also didn't like it.

The final issue had a lot to like. It had President Superman, Wacky Japanese Guy, Aquaman, the Zoo Crew, Flash Facts, and 50 Supermen. Those were the panels that made me smile. But those were just a few pieces of one part of the series. As a whole? Final Crisis was a bit of a mess.

It seemed to have a lot of those Grant Morrison "let's throw crazy shit in and see how people flip out" moments. But by and large, it didn't make a lot of sense. Or it makes sense, but only to the fevered brain of one deranged Scotsman. And that's okay. Those are the kind of stories he wants to write and there is a place for them.

But are those the sorts of stories we need in our big blockbuster crossovers? (if we need big blockbuster crossovers at all!) As much as I am loathe to compare my beloved DC to their competition I'm afraid must. Because sometimes you have to give some tough love.

Let's compare some of Marvel and DC's recent crossovers. Now we're not going to compare the minutiae because for these purposes those things aren't important. Civil War may have been a mess as well, but the point I want to make here is about ease of transmission. To the casual reader (if he or she exists), to the lapsed fan, and to the outside world. Consider these sentences:

Civil War tells the story of two factions who fight over the right of the government to regulate super-heroes.

Infinite Crisis tells the story of a number of refugees from a twenty year-old series, two of whom are alternate universe Supermen who along with an alternate universe Lex Luthor decide that our world's heroes are corrupt because they let magic get out of control, chaos erupt on a distant planet, villains unite, and Batman builds a crazy satellite.

You see how complicated that is? I haven't even scratched the surface of Infinite Crisis there. You cannot describe it in one sentence. The title doesn't really mean anything. Civil War -- much to my chagrin -- does a better job of telling you exactly what it is in once sentence. And in a single two word title.

Next up:

Secret Invasion tells the story of a secret invasion of Earth by shapeshifting aliens.

Final Crisis tells the story of a war among the gods which leads to the universe falling apart and... I got nothing. I can't do it. Maybe if I threw in the word "metatextual" it would make sense...

This is the problem with what DC has been doing with its crossovers. They are far to insular. They cannot be understood without being steeped in years of DC history. I won't pretend that I don't like that stuff sometimes. I'm one of a select number (probably including all you reading this) who do know that DC history. But a casual reader couldn't pick up Final Crisis and keep his head on straight. He or she could pick up Secret Invasion and know what it's about simply by reading the cover.

Now, this whole thing has very little bearing on the actual quality of the stories. Final Crisis wasn't my cup of tea, but I thought Infinite Crisis was a rollicking good yarn. And I understand that Civil War was as much of a mess in the eyes of some as Final Crisis turned out to be. But again, you can pick it up and know what it's about by reading the cover.

If DC wants to recover some of that market share that Marvel dominates they need to reevaluate the way they do big crossovers. Maybe Blackest Night is a step in the right direction. After all, "Blackest Night tells the story of dead super-heroes rising from their graves to take revenge upon the living" is both concise and kickass.

...

....

What?

Seriously, what?

I have no idea what just happened there.

But I liked it.

Sometimes Grant Morrison gets it right.

Huh. It looks like Checkmate did get canceled without me noticing. Oh well. That last story was awful anyway. They probably should have ended the series as soon as Rucka left anyway. Checkmate was his baby.

Luckily, he's coming back for some more Checkmate next week with Final Crisis: Resist. Goody. I really liked what Rucka did with Checkmate (even if I still hate the Great Ten). It looks like we're going to get a lot of the same fun stuff we got in "classic" Checkmate, too. Plus, Snapper Carr.

But here's the particularly fun bit to me: the Resist solicit says that Checkmate must "awaken an evil from a Crisis past." Assuming that it's not from the original Crisis, I take it that means Infinite Crisis. And since this is Greg Rucka I take it that means Brother Eye!

At least, that's my guess. So the question becomes: what happens when you've got a populace enslaved to Anti-Life, half of them are infected with the OMAC virus, and then Brother Eye turns it on?

Boom.

Okay, I'm going to try to keep this spoiler free... As some of you probably haven't read this yet. But what the hell happened in Final Crisis #3? Holy crap, that was insane.

There were about a billion things in that comic that I'm not sure I understood. That is, I understood them. But not necessarily their significance. Do y'all know what I mean? There's clearly more going on than there seems to be on the surface.

And despite that cover, I wasn't really expecting that last page. I mean, sure, they told us this was going to happen. But it still seems unreal when you're staring it in the face. The big question is: where do we go from here?

Oh, and also: Aquaman! That is all.

Still pretty busy... Lot's of stuff to do. But I just wanted to say real quick my thoughts about Final Crisis #2 I was a little leery about the first one, but the second one has really gotten things going. And the Japanese characters?

Well done, Mr. Morrison. Well done.

"So says Most Excellent... Superbat..."

All right, friends. I'm back in the game. Let's talk about Final Crisis.

Specifically, an aspect of Final Crisis that I feel well qualified to discuss: Grant Morrison's wacky Japanese superheroes.

I'll admit that at first glance characters like the members of the "Super Young Team" appear to be ridiculously over the time. They appear on the surface to be quintessentially Grant Morrison. You would be forgiven in thinking that there is no way the real Japan could be that wacky.

You would be forgiven, but you'd be wrong. I don't know if Grant Morrison has spent any time in Japan. But on the surface, I'd imagine that he has. And even if he hasn't, he's probably studied some of the pop culture. Because characters like Most Excellent Superbat and Shiny Happy Aquazon aren't that far off from the characters you see in the comics here.

The key, of course, is to combine things that shouldn't go together with bright colors and a dash of poor English. The result is not far from what we've seen in the Final Crisis Sketchbook.

Of course, even though he gets some of it right (Only some... "Shy Crazy Lolita Canary" wouldn't wear a schoolgirl outfit; she'd wear a lolita outfit) the real test will come in how they are played on the page. If Morrison can play them straight while still keeping the wacky elements, they'll be perfect.

(Oh, and for the record... Japanese shopgirls don't usually shout "SUMIMASEN!"... They shout "IRASHAIMASE!")

Still in vacation mode here, friends. But I just wanted to let you all know that I yet live -- and still I think of comics.

Oh, how my mind considers the consequences of the Human Flame. Oh, how my mind wanders on the return of characters said (but not believed) to be unreturnable. And oh my God how my mind wanders on the fact that I'm tired of waiting for Final Crisis to arrive.

I will admit that I am a sucker for the big events. I love them. This is one of the (many) reasons why DC has always had more of an allure for me than Marvel. The big events in DC are big. Really BIG. This is not to say that Marvel doesn't do Big Events (I hear this "Secretive Invasion" has some scope to it).

But DC's events (usually) span multiple worlds, involve dozens of heroes, bring about death and destruction on an awesome scale, and end civilizations. And call me crazy, but I find that fun.

In a few short weeks Final Crisis will arrive. And I am... Uneasy.

Why, you ask, is the Man Who Mastered Magnetism uneasy about the arrival of Grant Morrison's superhero magnum opus? I will tell you.

Recall just a few short years ago. At that time we found ourselves faced with another crisis. A crisis of infinite proportions. As I do enjoy wanton destruction and property damage, I was well pleased to join the Society so that I might engage in some magnetism-related mayhem.

It was when we decided to ambush my pathetic nephew Damage and his friends the Freedom Fighters when everything went horribly wrong. Yes, we killed Phantom Lady. And yes Black Condor was skewered by Sinestro. But then the Human Bomb decided to blow himself up. I suppose I should have been expecting that from someone with such an appellation, but well... I was enjoying myself too much to pay attention.

You know the rest of the story. I was blown up and removed from active duty in comics. As such, I have been forced to watch from afar and comment here. Through the Internet.

But all hope was not lost! Not long ago a Doctor Polaris returned to the pages of DC comics in Justice League of America. He is not conclusively me, but I wouldn't be surprised if her were. I wouldn't necessarily know it, seeing as I accumulate new personalities the way Hal Jordan accumulates knocks on the head.

So you can see why I may be uneasy about Infinite Crisis. I was killed, and now I live. But there is always the chance that I may be slain again for cheap shock value. Know this: if Grant Morrison kills me again he will have made a powerful enemy. I allowed it once; I will not let it happen a second time.

I had planned to write a scathing postmortem of DC's Countdown series tonight.

But I decided I didn't want to do that. There are a lot of things in comics that I don't like. Generally, I don't bother complaining about them (unless they involve Cassandra Cain). Doctor Polaris and Azrael do more than enough complaining (and whining in the latter's case) for the three of us.

By most objective metrics Countdown was a failure. But I'm not going to talk about that. As with all missteps, the only thing that can be done is to reflect, and then look to the future.

And so! To me the future of DC looks bright. I believe that they have learned from their recent failures (Countdown) as well as recent successes (Sinestro Corps War).

The two big coming things are of course Final Crisis and Trinity. With Final Crisis, DC has taken a cue from the successes of Sinestro Corps. They've made clear again and again that though there are tie-in miniseries, readers can pick and choose which ones they want to read. They won't be like the myriad of Infinite Crisis or Countdown tie-ins. Whatever else there is, Final Crisis can stand alone.

With Trinity, DC is taking a step back and looking at what worked and didn't work in 52 and Countdown. One problem with Countdown was that the stories seemed to jump all over with no clear goal in sight. Trinity will not suffer from that. Rather than different writers working on different issues, everything will be done by one core team.

Still, it's hard to say to what degree Trinity will tie-in to other projects. I have a feeling that like Sinestro Corps and Final Crisis, Trinity will be largely self-contained. I hope so.

For my part, I'm more excited right now about DC than I have been in a long time. The countdown is nearly ended. The next number is zero. Than all hell breaks loose.

It's going to be a grand time...

Final Crisis is only a few scant months away. But will it live up the hype? It's difficult to say. We know that Grant Morrison is writing it. And this guy -- The Human Flame -- plays a big role:

You know, I'm not completely certain that this whole "multiverse" thing isn't a complete fakeout. In fact, I'm starting to believe that that's exactly what it is.

When they brought the stupid thing back they talked a lot about the infinite possibilities inherent in the concept. That may be so. But what have we really seen happen with the multiverse?

Well, we've got Monarch scouring worlds and slaying dopplegangers left and right. He's conscripting all the rest into his wacky army. And on the other side of things you got Superboy -- excuse me, Superman Prime -- destroying Earths wholesale.

So here's the question I've got... How exactly can you have a multiverse if everybody who lives there has been killed or drafted into a conquering army? How can you have a multiverse if the fifty-two Earths are being destroyed by a maniac one at a time?

No, my friends. I fear that this multiverse we have been granted is merely a stopgap. It is a temporary measure. When the last page turns on Final Crisis there will be one Earth again.