This is indeed an historic time for us as, come this September, we are relaunching the entire DC Universe line of comic books with all new first issues. 52 of them to be exact.So it's a complete reboot, but it's not. For some it is, for some it isn't. Green Lantern, for example (according to another article), will still reflect the events of past storylines, while others will not (Superman certainly looks a bit younger now, though I love the high-cut collar and the apparent lack of red underwear, that looks sharp).
In addition, the new #1s will introduce readers to a more modern, diverse DC Universe, with some character variations in appearance, origin and age. All stories will be grounded in each character's legend - but will relate to real world situations, interactions, tragedy and triumph.
This epic event will kick off on Wednesday, August 31st with the debut of a brand new JUSTICE LEAGUE #1, which pairs Geoff Johns and Jim Lee, together for the first time.
Some of the characters will have new origins, while others will undergo minor changes. Our characters are always being updated; however, this is the first time all of our characters will be presented in a new way all at once. Over 50 new costumes will debut in September, many updated and designed by artist Jim Lee, ensuring that the updated images appeal to the current generation of readers.
It's a lot like Crisis on Infinite Earths from 1986. Superman was completely rebooted as if he'd never existed, and so was Wonder Woman. Batman got a new origin story, and some past details were rewritten but then continued. Green Lantern and Flash kept on keepin' on. Hawkman wasn't rebooted at all, and then he was, and then he kind of wasn't, and then they just went ahead and did it, and then he died. It's an attempt to get a bunch of new readers with your new ideas, while not alienating your old readers who have dedicated their lives to following the exploits of the characters (who were already rebooted by Crisis on Infinite Earths... and Zero Hour... and Infinite Crisis...). So you grab the new readers with your #1 issue, and then you ask them to be familiar with past storylines, but not too familiar, and please don't go out and buy the past storylines of this other hero because we're not using those now.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
It's a bold idea to relaunch the ENTIRE line with new first issues, but then to step back at the same time and try to hold onto your convoluted history at the same time is an idea that's already been tried (on the other hand, the post-Crisis early 90s did see a sales boom; on the other other hand, the mid 90s saw a giant gaping chasm in sales). But it's not only bold, let's not forget that it's also an admission of defeat, an acknowledgment that the current publishing line is simply not working. The whole event is an idea to pull in those mythical new readers, and the question that everyone's asking is, will it work?
Let us have no doubts about one thing: some of these new first issues will be huge for sales. Justice League #1 will sell like holy mother fucking shitcakes. Power Girl #1 will probably sell a few copies more than the previous issue of Power Girl. DC is going to make a lot of money off this relaunch boost as curious fans come in to see what's changed, who's younger, who's dead, and who's suddenly become Asian. Some people will plunk down the $150-200 dollars required to buy every single first issue. It'll make them a ton of money among the established readers, no matter what happens (you can always depend on a relaunch boost from existing readers: Justice League was relaunched with a new first issue in 1987, then again in 1995, then again in 2006). BUT, will it bring in those new readers that they're so hoping for?
You'll need mainstream media attention for that, and I really wonder how much renumbering even matters in terms of mainstream attention. Superman #75 did well because it was the death of Superman, and when I picked up Action Comics #687 to see the beginning of the Reign of the Supermen, it didn't matter to me what the number was. And when Superman came back from the dead in Superman #82, I stopped buying, because I didn't care about the old Superman. The Human Torch recently died in Fantastic Four #5somethingsomething (587?), and a lot of people who didn't buy comics bought that, because it got some attention and it was interesting. One of the best-selling Batman storylines of recent memory started with Batman #608. I'm really not sure of the conventional wisdom that high numbers bother people. I think it's story accessibility that matters, but more than that what matters is story QUALITY. If it's crap, it doesn't matter how accessible it is.
And some of these comic books will be crap. I think we could easily say that out of the 52, a good 20 will be barely readable. It would probably be smarter to scale back and really focus in on a few books to raise the quality, but there's not a corporation on this earth that would say "we have a line of 56 products right now, should we repackage 52 of them and cut the other 4, or should we repackage 4 and cut the other 52?" It would be suicide, and they're certainly not going to do that.
So you'll have a good quantity of crap, and for those books a relaunch won't help. But does it even matter if you have 52 good books? Red Robin #1 could be written by a donkey, it doesn't matter as long as you've got a good Batman #1 on the shelves. That's what a "mainstream" person is going to pick up, after all, if they were to pick it up. DC's plan should be to market the holy living hell out of that Batman #1, really get it out there on the internet and the airwaves and in print. If past activity is any indication, they will not do that. They did issue a press release today (which I don't see on CNN, MSNBC, or CBS... maybe tomorrow?), but there's a long time between June and September. Customers aren't likely to mark their calendars in anticipation. If you want that impulse-buy curiosity, you need to keep up your presence, which means not only advertising but also having the damn books where people can see them. People don't buy Cosmopolitan at specialty magazine stores.
And it's a good question whether "people" want comics anyway. I'd probably buy a copy of Justice League #1, just to see. If I really liked it, I'd buy #2. I might buy Batman, sure. It is, however, incredibly unlikely that I would buy a copy of Booster Gold #1 just because it's suddenly hipper and younger. Because I do not give a flying shit about Booster Gold. Who might get interested, though, is kids. In all the decades that have passed since the forties, we've forgotten that the primary audience has always really been children. We adults who nostalgically enjoy a good piece of tights-clad action adventure should be a secondary audience. If DC is going to pull this off, they need to get Booster Gold and Red Robin and Power Girl and all the rest into the grubby, sticky, short-fingered hands of children. Don't just sit back and expect adults to read your press release, mark their calendars, and storm your stores come September 1st.
All in all, there are a lot of issues with this, a lot of potential pitfalls, a lot of places where DC can (and probably will) fail, unless they get their acts together and start acting like the corporate-owned branch of Warner Brothers Pictures that they are. The myth that DC and comic book people in general are operating under is that new readers WANT to read comics, but for some reason they don't, and you just have to give them an entry point and they'll be there. That's not only a myth, it's idiotic.
Comic books were invented during a time that movies were primitive, television didn't exist, and radio could only provide so much adventure. An Oxford University study in the late 50s showed that in houses with televisions, comic book reading had declined by more than 50%. They served a purpose and provided a type of entertainment which could not be found elsewhere... and now it can. Especially today, with incredible video games, beautiful animated shows, and movies with special effects that can literally, truly do anything. Comic books are less relevant than ever before. If you're really going to hook new readers, you need to give them something that they truly can't get from anywhere else. I, for example, read Ultimate Comics because they have the kind of insane yet intelligent stories that I like, but that you'll never find on a superhero cartoon. Persepolis gave readers a rare glimpse at revolutionary Iran through a normal person's eyes. Superman #75 had Superman getting beaten to death by a giant monster. Watchmen, for much of its existence, was a story that could never have been told in any other medium (I once checked Watchmen out of the library and let one of my friends read it; he liked it so much he bought me a copy of it for Christmas). The most successful comic books have something unique to offer, just like the most successful films, and the most successful books, and the most successful video games. I don't know that DC understands that. If they did, we wouldn't have 52 first issues being thrown at the wall, with a vain hope that they might succeed where their previous incarnations failed.
UPDATE: Details on the first ten relaunches were released today, and I do have to give DC credit for one thing, they are hanging on less to previous continuity than I thought. A fair amount of new origins here, and some plotlines established that go beyond "supervillains show up, and they punch them." So they do seem to be breaking from tradition more than it initially sounded like. It looks like the major characters are coming through basically unchanged, but the second and third tier characters are getting a pretty major shakeup. They're also being wise by not simply relaunching existing series, and instead cancelling some and creating others (no Booster Gold #1, for example, though Booster shows up in Justice League International).
So they're being a little smarter than I gave them credit for, and I have to admit that. They are actually trying to reinvent their line and make them approachable. Now if they can just 1) avoid the incessant urge to crossover the books every other month, 2) stay away from classic continuity and never go back to it, and 3) actually fucking market the things, they might have something.
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