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Underground > Comic Books >

COUNTDOWN!

  
  

Page: 12(3)456

 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
22:22 / 17.05.07
Second issue - I'm sorry, fiftieth issue - was my getting-over-the-opening-jitters allowance, and it seems to have failed to hold my interest. Tragically, they've just written a fairly dull Jimmy Olsen comic.

Thoughts--

1. The ball hasn't just been dropped, but thrown with that opening scene. Clark wouldn't be disrespectful enough to reveal secret identities to Jimmy, Jason Todd (who was adopted by Bruce, wasn't he?) probably shouldn't be publically known, and the only possible way I can think to make the first scene make sense with regard to those logistics is that the Crises have rebooted those old World's Finest team-ups involving Jimmy playing Robin to Clark's Batman during adventures, and getting to know young Dick (which would make him Dick's age...) enough that Dick might reveal his identity, which seems really odd...

2. Mary Marvel - wow, what a lame second part to her storyline. Meeting up with Madame Xanadu to, ah, have a few generic vague magical statements thrown around.

3. Batman versus Karate Kid. Honestly, I could have skipped having *any* of the big guns show up in favour of just our gang of disparate also-rans, and I'm not sure what the point of including stuff from another series' storylines (JLA/JSA team-up) is doing for COUNTDOWN. Sure, I'm happy to see a Legion connection but meh.

4. The Rogues - I'm sorry, I totally miss the Rogues who weren't trying to be "hardcore" criminals, although the through-the-looking-glass coke snorting was cute, I suppose, if the thing didn't read as lame pseudo-gang behaviours reduced to their dullest movie cliche varient.

5. This Jimmy Olsen is almost as ugly as Tim Sale's. The only thing cool about this last scene is the list of contraband for Arkham. And what a terribly drab faux Lector scene with Mistah J, I have to say.
 
 
Mark Parsons
23:24 / 19.05.07
I'm underwhelmed at this point, but am recalling that it took awhile for 52 to grwo on me too...

And all this business about Jimmy knowing Todd's and greyson's identities is, according to editor Mike Marts' Newsarama interview, intentionally wonky. All will be reevaled, etc, etc.

IMO, the series will pick up soon enough once the threads kick into gear, but WOW what a ropey first two issues!
 
 
John Octave
04:12 / 20.05.07
4. The Rogues - I'm sorry, I totally miss the Rogues who weren't trying to be "hardcore" criminals

Geoff Johns started this, didn't he? The Rogues aren't hardcore criminals, but they're not total losers, either. They're competent, but unambitious. They adhere to a stict theme but lack the fetish-obsessive quality of Batman villains; they're rather benign criminals just out for a good time and easy money, really.

Most of the stuff in the last issue of Countdown was kind of middling, blah stuff, but the Rogues scene was the only scene I thought was actively bad. Guys called Mirror Master and the Trickster snortin' coke and patronizing prostitutes? Does that really mesh?

And who's Mirror Master to be calling anyone out on changing sides? He sold Luthor out to Batman in Rock of Ages and teamed up with Animal Man! "We'll hunt yeh down and kill yeh." Poser.
 
 
Elijah, Freelance Rabbi
00:03 / 21.05.07
The last time we saw the Joker he was brain damaged to the point of carving a smile onto his own face

Was this in the non Grant issues of the current Batman run? I ask because I didn't read them. I assume the brain damage is due to being shot in the face?

Also, could someone who's patient enough to read the current JLA please fill me in on the Karate Kid stuff?

Over in JLA 2 members of the Legion have been found with their memories messed up so they think they are second string villains. Batman had a guy named (I think) Trident who he captured and found out was Karate Kid, then they had a big fight because Batman was mad that Superman ranked KK as a better fighter then him.
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
03:03 / 21.05.07
It's also fairly important to note that the Legion stuff's a little all over the map at the moment; "The Lightning War" seems to involve the pre-ZH Legion rather than the current, threeboot model. But that's just what I'm getting from flipping through in the store.

GEOFF!!JOHNS!! did indeed, I believe, engineer the "Rogues as hardcore arrr-ing criminals." I really do like the earlier model better, when they were highly intelligent people with poor social skills and a lack of long-term thinking. They lacked the killer edge of the Batvillains and mirrored Barry's concerns. I liked that by the time Barry was gone they had a complex, respectful relationship with Wally...

...actually, if pushed to think about it, I might trace the revisioning of the Rogues back to Underworld Unleashed, from what I can remember. Bargaining their souls away for street credibility, becoming complete caricatures in the process.
 
 
Evil Scientist
11:45 / 21.05.07
WARNING! WARNING! THREADROT FROM EARTH 50 BREACHING CONTINUITY!

I'm guessing at some point Monarch will step up through the bleed and I'm curious if this will eventually carry cover into Wildstorm's STORMWATCH P.H.D. A Monitor already stopped by a few issues ago.

This would be the shadowy figure that brought Stormwatch Prime back from the dead yes? Hinted at being Jackson King's supposedly dead Father?

EARTH 50 THREADROT DANGER ENDED.
 
 
FinderWolf
13:39 / 21.05.07
I know it's just a comic book and all, but you're telling me Jimmy Olsen wouldn't hear the commotion, crashing, screams, tearing flesh, etc. from Killer Croc mauling a guard right behind him, as Croc then comes up behind Jimmy himself in the final panel? It's not like Croc has ninja-like skills to move silently like the whispering wind in battle or anything...
 
 
FinderWolf
13:43 / 21.05.07
and when I say 'you're telling me,' I mean the writers of Countdown. No one in this thread said 'yeah, Jimmy can be snuck up on by Killer Croc as Croc attacks a guard 20 feet away and not notice it.'
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
15:18 / 21.05.07
I'm sure, Finder, that the editor of Countdown would hasten to assure us that "Yez, the ending of the second issue with Jimmy apparently unaware of Killer Croc was intentionally wonky," and that more will be revealed in the future. Possibly this is going to turn out to be Jimmy Olsen from Earth-46, who is unfortunately quite deaf as a result of a run-in with Sonar and now has added "master lip-reader" to his repetoire. Only, you say, how did he successfully have a conversation with Red Hood? Why, he takes X-Ray Vision pills supplied by his world's drug-dealing Superman, allowing him to see straight through that awful, awful red helmet.

Personally, I'd question the administration of Arkham regarding their prisoner movement procedures - should they be taking Killer Croc out into the hallway with an unarmed, non-powered civilian standing right there? Were they just really, really, really hoping he'd taken his Elastic Lad serum that morning?
 
 
slagar
13:13 / 24.05.07

so in Countdown Jimmy Olsen has managed to say "Superman's Pal" to everyone he has talked, yet in the past two years, since New Earth's inception - it has been two years, right? one year of 52 and one year of One Year Later - he never said it once?

the Monitors are supposed to insure the purity of each individual universe in the multiverse but wouldn't they have a huge problem with New Earth to begin with. What are they basing their idea of who should be on New Earth? after the Crisis isn't everyone who inhabits New Earth supposed to be there? i can see where Duella might have been tranfered over after the second Crisis would be a problem but Jason Todd was there after the Crisis so he belongs there.

my guess is theCountdown is that New Earth is just an amalgam of all the multiverse and will have to be depopulated into their repsective realms.
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
16:19 / 24.05.07
my guess is theCountdown is that New Earth is just an amalgam of all the multiverse and will have to be depopulated into their repsective realms.

I thought the point was that New Earth had duplicates of characters from other Earths on it, but the respective other Earths had their own versions intact. New Earth is a "Best Of" patchwork world. I thought that the deal with Duella was that she was brought over to the New Earth at some specific point, rather than being the local, native version -- and hence needed "correctly." I vaguely remember someone saying Darkseid brought her over, but that could have merely been rumour.
 
 
SiliconDream
17:48 / 24.05.07
It's not like Croc has ninja-like skills to move silently like the whispering wind in battle or anything...

Ah, but he has the crocodile's natural talent for camouflage. Whenever Jimmy turned around, Croc threw himself to the floor with lightning speed and pretended to be a harmless log.
 
 
Spyder Todd 2008
02:25 / 25.05.07
SPOILERS



So, uh, Black Adam's powers are back? Or something?

Maybe?
 
 
Evil Scientist
08:05 / 25.05.07
So, uh, Black Adam's powers are back? Or something?

Maybe?

There is apparently a mini-series coming out that will detail BA's search for his new magic word and will link into Countdown. But yes, essentially, he'll be back up to speed sooner rather than later.

But, presumably, won't be embarking on another world-wide killing spree straight away.

[+] [-] Spoiler
 
 
Dan Fish - @Fish1k
10:00 / 25.05.07
on a techie note, I've put how to do this in the wiki:

Spoiler
[+][-]
  
 
Dan Fish - @Fish1k
10:01 / 25.05.07
which I've obviously messed up, so ignore that!
 
 
Grady Hendrix
14:10 / 25.05.07
You know what would have been nice at the end of 52? If DC had six or seven Multiverse titles ready to go with three issues in the can and a creative team signed on to each for a minimum of 12 issues.

It would have been so nice to see a Western comic from DC, a WWII comic, a space/sci fi comic, a Captain Marvel comic with the full Marvel family, and so on and so forth. Comics from Earth X, Earth Y and Earth ZYX.

Instead what we get is a chronic masturbator who's vainly trying to hide what they regard as their dirty little secret by tying it off in a prudish, punitive pretzel twist. DC wants to whip out its Multiverse and spray a century's worth of story seed all over the faces of its readers and its writers keep trying to make it go in that direction like angry, typing sperm that just want to be free like salmon to spawn. But DC knows that its habit is dirty so it keeps trying to tie knots in its unstoppable Multiverse. It tried to castrate itself (CRISIS ON INFINITE EARTHS) but it still had the urge. It tried to rub its face in downmarket filth to eradicate the Multiverse urge entirely with the dire IDENTITY CRISIS. It tried to punch itself in the testicles with INFINITE CRISIS and then it developed a split personality and secretly rebuilt its ruined Multiverse with 52. Now it's angry at itself for dirty, dirty rubbing of its Multiverse and it wants to take the hammer of COUNTDOWN and smash itself in the Multiverses again and again and again.

Why won't DC just embrace its true nature as a soft, generative womb for a million colorful characters, a million continuities, a million different earths? DC needs to stop trying to hold the baby in, and it needs to breathe, and relax and puuuuuush and let the chips fall where they may. Worrying about continuity is like gay people supposedly "cured" of their condition by some weird religious cult worrying about sex all the time. It's a way of still being obsessed with something that you're secretly ashamed of by pretending to hate it and wanting to constantly "do something" about it.

Why does DC hate its Multiverse? Because it thinks it's childish. And DC wants everyone to know they wear the big boy pants now. See what they did to Sue Dibney? That's what big boys do.

Oh, DC. Stop issuing your cramped little repressed miniseries, let your juices flow, let your writers write, and get a therapist already.
 
 
Spyder Todd 2008
15:27 / 25.05.07
There is apparently a mini-series coming out that will detail BA's search for his new magic word and will link into Countdown.

Right, we all knew that would happen. But why hasn't that miniseries been completed before he returns as the world class super powered wanker that all the kids love (I guess)? Shouldn't that be the way of things?
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
18:22 / 25.05.07
DC's new motto seems to be "Jump ahead, and then sort out the details later." Which is the thinking that brought us "World War 3," and I don't mean the wicked Mozzer JLA super-fest.
 
 
Spyder Todd 2008
19:31 / 25.05.07
Gah! But that's a ridiculous way to make stories! I mean, what was even the point of taking away Black Adam's powers when they're giving them back less then a month later!?!?!

I know. I should really stop expecting logical decisions from these people. Still, it erks me to no end.
 
 
FinderWolf
04:14 / 26.05.07
As much as 52 had its many off-weeks, this series so far has failed to grab me, aside from my interest in the overall plot idea of 'the Monitors as border agents between the various earths.' And most of the preview art for upcoming issues posted in a recent Newsrama interview looks weak and kind of amateurish at points.... hm. We shall see.... maybe this will hit its stride eventually.

And yeah, very dumb to bring Black Adam back so quickly. He loses any sense of menace at all if he's not allowed to go away for a while and be 'the ticking time bomb that returns after a long absence.'
 
 
rabideyemovement
14:42 / 26.05.07
I'm pretty sure the addition of Black Adam here will tie into his new mini-series. Like Mary Marvel, he's powerless, but he plans to search the earth til he finds a new magic word. It makes sense to have Mary meeting with the darker spectrum of the Marvel family if they're really going to plumb the depths of her character.
 
 
Mark Parsons
22:08 / 26.05.07
I wonder if we are really even on nu Earth. Could this be an alt-erth Black Adam?

Not sure if I am repeating info here, but DC states that the Olson-knowing-Nightwing's-ID scene was an "intentional" mistake, intended to clue us in that something is amiss. of course, it seems to have had the opposite effect: many have criticised it as sloppy editing/writing.

Overall, the series has improved in three issues, but it is still quite aways from really grabbing me. It's a shame, but that's the difference between solo Dini and the four-headed star-beast that wrote 52.
 
 
rabideyemovement
06:04 / 27.05.07
I was riding the fence til I saw Olsen rubberneck...
I'm all in for this one.

especially interested in the Ray Palmer bits!
 
 
LDones
07:54 / 29.05.07
I think this was all I might need as far as evidence that I Am Definitely Not The Target Market for DC's (apparently) editorially written Countdown.


From a Countdown-related CBR interview with Paul Dini:

CBR: Okay. How do you relate to Darkseid?

Dini: I think he's cool! I look at him as like the head of a mob family. He's the ultimate cosmic godfather, basically...


I kind of find the whole meaninglessness incarnate / 'hateful bodiless machine-god-spirit who solved the Anti-Life Equation and uses suicidal depression as a weapon' portrayal of Darkseid a tad more effective and terrifying, but alright.


And I guess the DCU nail in the coffin for 7S (outside of any possible future Morrison minis):

CBR: Will there be an explanation in "Countdown" for the New Gods' activities in "Seven Soldiers" and how that metaseries relates to their post-"Seven Soldiers" appearances in the DCU?

Dini: I think it may touch on that tangentially, but basically we're going in a different direction with the New Gods. You will see Scott Free and you will see some of the other characters showing up in "Countdown," but the interpretation of some of those characters in "Seven Soldiers" is pretty much the "Seven Soldiers" version or "universe," if you will, and when we deal with a character who had a prominent role in that series, it's going to be more along the lines of what we've already seen established in the DCU.

===

7S being ignored (or even shunned) by DC isn't too much of a surprise, and I suppose it's wonderful if characters like Morrison's Frankenstein never have to answer to continuity outside of that shiny bald head; but I do find it sad that the level of thought, consideration, craft, and even respect-for-DC-ness put into 7S is being shunted off to languish in "Alternate Universe Closet X" - particularly since it tells me that DC editorial have only marginal interest in publishing further 7S stories (though I hope I'm wrong on that).

DC seem to have plunged headlong into the editorially driven mindset that the Sheeda were partially a parody of: stripmining the desperate nostalgia of an increasingly aging set of buyers - with alternate-universe Legion crossovers, huge events surrounding half-baked characters like Egyptian Shadowhawk Black Adam, and massive fanwanks all present in place of care in plotting or craft or any of the things comics like 7 Soldiers did well.
 
 
The Natural Way
10:47 / 29.05.07
I can only agree with all of the above. I mean, what the fuck? Why's it so hard to find good bloody writers out there who can run with this stuff? Cosmic Godfather, my arse. Godfather, maybe, but by 'cosmic' you mean 'firing lasers, proclaiming oneself a God and living on an alien planet' don't you, Mr Dini? And there's actually nothing cosmic about that stuff on its own at all, is there? No, that takes imagination.

Bollocks.
 
 
Phex: Dorset Doom
11:02 / 29.05.07
7S being ignored (or even shunned) by DC isn't too much of a surprise

True that, but wasn't the whole thing of the Mister Miracle book that, to over-simplify a tad, it was all a dream? That is, Metron made a horrible replica reality in the Black Hole so Shiloh would get beyond the whole celebrity thing and perform a (super)heroic act in SS#1. So there's no 'ramifications': The New Gods aren't living as bums, Darkseid hasn't solved the anti-life equation (because then he would kinda rule the universes) and isn't living on Earth as the bastard offspring of Ving Rhames and Satan. The status quo is as it has been since Jack Kirby's day.
Until tomorrow of course...
 
 
Hallo, Paper Spaceboy
14:14 / 29.05.07
The New Gods aren't living as bums, Darkseid hasn't solved the anti-life equation (because then he would kinda rule the universes) and isn't living on Earth as the bastard offspring of Ving Rhames and Satan. The status quo is as it has been since Jack Kirby's day.

The dream explanation is wonderful in theory except that when Shilo escapes the black hole...Darkseid still appears to be possessing the big black mafioso body, though Shilo now comes with "god-sight" and can consequently kick his evil arse. In my mind, the only explanation that works is that Metron makes the Black Hole Life Trap simulation, Shilo passes with flying colours, and can go off and actually deal with the real thing - that Darkseid is on Earth with possibly some corrupted understanding of the Equation. And maybe Shilo defeating him and dying results in the return to status quo?

The only way the Miracle strand works for me is if Metron's preparing Shilo to face a specific, real situation (the fallen gods) with the proper skills (god-sight) to stop him from falling into Darkseid's trap so that the status quo can be restored. And even then it's a bit dicey.

But "cosmic godfather" seems like a bit of an exploding duck as portrayals go -- even Thanos doesn't get stuck with "cosmic godfather."
 
 
slagar
14:51 / 30.05.07

my point about Jimmy Olsen saying he was "Superman's Pal" all the time is that i think they are hitting us over the head with the fact that this is not the Jimmy Olsen of pre-Countdown stories in a bad way. they have 52 issues to work with their story, they could have spent some time showing those who work with Jimmy on a daily basis wondering what his odd behavior was about. instead he recycles a phrase. it's very lazy. it's the laziness the brought about the WWIII comics.
 
 
Mario
15:20 / 30.05.07
No, Thanos gets stuck with "Emo purple Skrull"

There's also the problem that Nu-Shilo shows up in Firestorm along with Darkseid Classic, and there's a reference to Darkseid having the Equation.

It's a mess, really.
 
 
Our Lady Has Left the Building
17:45 / 30.05.07
Grant Morrison must be comics biggest masochist. His runs on Animal Man and Doom Patrol get redacted from continuity afterwards, he invents/first expresses Hypertime, a year or so later DC say they don't like it, it smells of wee and they aren't ever going to use it, he kills off Magneto who is brought back a month or two after Grant's last issue of X-Men and his Magneto is called 'an imposter' and never explained, he updates seven characters who haven't had much done with them for decades and the changes he makes are ignored by other writers and then he's writing Batman and the changes he makes to the Joker are also apparently ignored. Still, he's getting paid so maybe he doesn't mind the rest.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
23:19 / 30.05.07
Well, some would say he shouldn't mind because his stories are still there to pick up and read. I suspect - and he may have said this somewhere, can't remember - that he just knows that he in turn gets to into these 'universes' and put things the way he wants them, and sees it all as part of the crazy fun. To bring this back to Countdown - am I imagining that people seem more surprised that the follow-up to 52 and the comics that should in theory overlap with Morrison's Batman a) are quite poor and b) seem to contradict his stuff, than they were in the case of New X-Men? Is it just because we were promised that Morrison had had a hand in redesigning key bits of the DCU as part of the Crisis-That-Never-Ends, is it that Chuck Austen is considered a worse writer than Geoff Johns (I actually agree with this - Johns at least seems like he can probably hold a pen), or something else?
 
 
The Falcon
00:06 / 31.05.07
Yeah, hmm - I would have suggested anyone who wanted to bridge the gap from Mister Miracle to Countdown should pick up the last three issues of Firestorm, as I did, thinking "Dwayne McDuffie wrote some neat cartoons for JLU and Milestone is well-spoken of, Beyond! was alright, eh?" but they're really not very good and don't really bridge any gap. Shiloh Norman is in them, though. Likewise the two issues where Klarion appears in Robin don't appear to acknowledge in any way his future space empire, but you can make up a story in your head why, probably. They have nice Frazer Irving art.

To be honest, if you really want a coherent continuity you have to engage yourself to the task a bit - as I've mentioned I keep my superhero comics of the last few years, since intra-continuity became more of a thing again in some semblance of a continuity order (this is utterly tragic, and the latest Captain America has yet again ruined my efforts by having Ronin-era New Avengers pootering around. Where does that leave Iron Fist?! And Thunderbolts?1!!11! No consideration, Broob.) I mean, do people honestly expect that the continuity should parallel release order? It seems a big ask; I've stolen the first three issues of Countdown off filesharing, they were really boring, but the Joker moment vs. 'The Clown at Midnight' gives no pause - if you're unhappy with the differing depictions (Joker remains in Arkham in Batman after all) than simply antedate Countdown #49 to before Batman #663. Otherwise it's just an artist's choice, really.

Incidentally, hypertime was mentioned by Waverider, is it(?), in 52, so that's not out the window; unsurprising given its two architects formed half the script team; the whole 'the Garden' multiverse thing seems a complexification and deepening of the concept to me, really. Animal Man is redacted to precisely the point he was at at either the end of Morrison or Milligan's (all too short, in the case of the latter) runs. So it's not really as people seem to want to describe it. The Xorn thing is a mess certainly, but House of M offers an out for anyone who really wants New X-Men to have continuity primacy.
 
 
Mario
10:56 / 31.05.07
I think you have to assume that when Shilo resurrected at the end of Seven Soldiers #1, Darkseid didn't see much point in keeping the Pimp-Daddy flesh-suit (Either that, or Granny's new look started squicking him out ).

Really, the only thing we need to explain is how Shilo went from warden of the Slab to celebrity escape artist, and that could simply be a lifestyle change.
 
 
John Octave
13:51 / 31.05.07
New Gods stuff is totally easy to fanwank away because they're, well, gods.

Theory One: Dark Side is a separate aspect of Darkseid (similar to how Mercury and Hermes are, I believe) two different entities in the DCU), one which Darkseid may not even be aware of.

Theory Two: The New Gods have mastered Hypertime where humanity denies it, so so Dark Side is from a separate Hypertimeline that has come to ours for whatever reason. Also from a separate Hypertimeline is any appearance of Darkseid that Jeph Loeb writes where his weak ass gets knocked around by Superman and in which the Omega Beam's nothing more than glorified heat vision.

Theory Three: Do the New Gods even necessarily obey linear time? Dark Side (and all the New Gods in MM) could be from a "future" in which Darkseid already knows the Anti-Life Equation (or has traveled back to a time where his "younger" self missed the opportunity to learn it in the first place).

Theory Four: Superboy punched it away.

Anyway, it's hard to get too worked up about something like this since Morrison himself plays pretty loose with continuity himself ever since trying to coordinate everyone in JLA made him insane ("Superman has new powers and Wonder Woman is dead? EEEEEEE"). New X-Men was full of inconsistencies with prior stories, continuity mistakes, and huge whopping retcons, but it's lovely just the same. At least quietly ignoring Morrison's changes is a little more dignified than that continuity-patching that went down on X-Men as soon as he left.
 
  

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