Small Fat & Mighty

So this was an ask sent to Miss Nicki aka flatbear, but she’s passed it along to me because I’ve got A LOT OF BOOSTER/BEETLE FEELS OKAY. Hope you don’t mind, anon. :)

Okay, here’s the thing: I’m not going to tell you to pick up any ongoing books with Booster Gold in them. There are two reasons for that. First reason is that DC is actually the devil and they actively shit on all of the characters that I love. Admittedly, that’s more of a personal problem, but whereas Marvel will make you sob and pull out your hair over the hell your favorites get put through, DC will just straight up retcon your favorites out of existence! Which is reason number two that I won’t tell you to buy any DC ongoing titles; not only has Ted Kord not been in a book in forever (seriously, I think he might be the only comic book character ever to not get resurrected) in New 52 he was never the Blue Beetle to begin with. Which is disappointing on so many levels, but my issues with New 52 DC are a totally separate post.

If you want to read Booster and Beetle together, JLA: Justice League International is a good, solid start. There is a lot of shit that comes before it, but that’s unavoidable and honestly, it mostly deals with the other characters in the series. If you’re not sure who someone is, Wikipedia will be your best friend. And hey, by reading JLI you get some bonus Guy Gardner, Dinah Lance, and J’onn J’onzz! There are four volumes, only one of which you can get on Comixology, but here they are on Amazon for not a lot of money (Two, Three, Four), or if you have a LCS they will likely either stock the volumes or be able to order them for you.

Formerly Known As The Justice League is also amazing and worth checking out, if only for Beetle getting super pissed at Booster because Booster sucks and is a total moron and Sue Dibney assuming that they’re together.

Now, Ted Kord dies. If you want to read it, it’s in Countdown To Infinite Crisis, but I’m gonna be honest with you, it’s not a great series and they recap it so damned much that you don’t really need to go there. Just skip straight to 52, which is an excellent series and HEY LOOK AT THAT, THE FIRST ISSUE IS FREE! :D Then you wanna hit up Booster Gold, which is his solo series and deals with the aftermath of 52, Booster’s sorrow over Ted’s death, and how he becomes the guardian of the timestream. Even though Ted is dead, he’s still a hugely important part of this series because from his death on, basically everything in Booster’s life is informed by how much he misses Ted. It’s really wonderful to watch him grow as a character from a guy who just wanted fame and fortune to someone who saves the universe on a daily basis but can’t tell anyone about it.

HE BREAKS MY FUCKING HEART, OKAY.

I’d read that up until issue #43. After that it gets into some Flashpoint bullshit, which was set-up for the New 52, which like I said is not really worth reading. You might wanna pick up Justice League: Generation Lost which started out awesome (Max Lord is one of the greatest villains of all time) but kind of petered out cause it just went on way too long. Still, the beginning is absolutely worth reading, particularly if you enjoy megalomaniacal hot guys who get nosebleeds when they try to control the world.

That about wraps it up! It seems like a lot of reading, I know, but it’s absolutely worth it and it goes really fast because a lot of it is light-hearted, at least to start with. And if you like it, I’d also highly, highly recommend picking up Blue Beetle, which is about Jaime Reyes, who took over as Blue Beetle after Ted died. His sister is Tumblr’s spirit animal.

God, longest answer ever. Nicki is never ever going to give me another ask to answer again. XD

DC Conducts a Second Nielsen Survey on the New 52

As they promised DC Comics is once again having Nielsen survey readers about the new 52.

If you remember the first survey showed the DC failed at its stated goal at bringing in new readers with the survey showing just 5% of the reboot readers were new readers. In fact the survey basically showed that the same people were buying comics that were buying them before;

The launch of DC COMICS-THE NEW 52 galvanized the traditional fan base for superhero comic books: male readers, who were already—or have at one time been—comic book fans.

Women were shown to be either 7% or 23% depending on which survey you paid attention too — the self-selected online or the in-store ones done in select cities and select days. You can guess to which number marketing pays attention.

You can fill out the survey here. I’m not sure it will do anything — I suspect DC will once again scratch their heads at the number of women who choose to participate as they did here in an interview with Publishers’ Weekly:

The in-store and the online exclusively —group 1 and group 3—those were both 93-7 in male/female skew. The middle survey, online only which was open to any self-identified shopper, was 77-23 male/female. So was there a glut of activity specific to wanting to register certain feedback? I can’t say whether females found their voice in that survey or whether they had specific female related issues to report on, but this is something that stood out.

So go fill it out and don’t forget DC has no monthlies with Orange in the title.

via

But seriously there are a lot of problems with Alan Scott.

And you’re going to have to forgive the rant, because this means a lot to me. Things like this are what Mary and I spend the majority of our radio air-time talking about. Gay characters in comics.

So, right off the bat, the good things.

- First, DC is aware that gay characters are important to a new generation of comic readers. All of the noise we, as a community, have been making has not fallen on deaf ears.

- Second…well. Yeah okay, that’s all I’ve got.

Here’s what’s wrong with Alan Scott being ‘re-made’ as a gay man, and how DC handled it.

- HOW DC HANDLED IT. Exploitative-much? Look, I know that this is a big deal for a handful of people, mostly those who have been getting shit for a distinct lack of LGBTQ characters in the New 52.

Look, one of the major problems that I have with a lot of LGBTQ characters is that their sexuality defines them. That’s the only draw for the character, and that is humiliating and insulting to those of us that actually are LGBTQ. Tell us something ELSE about Alan Scott! He’s a young man again! What happens to his children? Is he still close with Jay and Ted? PEOPLE ARE MORE THAN THEIR SEXUAL IDENTITIES. I know DC can do better than this. Look at Scandal Savage, look at Batwoman. Look at, although he never got this in a printed run, CATMAN for god’s sake. If DC is trying to get more interest in the Earth 2 section of the new 52, that’s fine, but I don’t appreciate my sexuality being used as an advertising trope. It is not something to be exploited for sales.

(I would call Marvel out for the same thing with Northstar’s Big Gay Wedding, but Northstar is an established gay character and has been for, well, forever. Other LBGTQ characters that marvel didn’t make a big deal out of? Teddy and Billy, Richter and Shatterstar.)

- While we’re on the subject…yes, DC, more gay characters are a good thing. Glad you’re onboard. What would have been awesome is if we had gotten a gay character from the regular DC universe. You know, the one with Batman, and Superman, and Wonder Woman, and Black Canary…the universe that your fringe readers know about. You have to be a pretty dedicated DC fan to even know that the parallell Gay Alan Scott-having Earth 2 universe even exists. I’m sure this wasn’t your intention, but the whole thing smacks of ‘Well, we just can’t have gay dudes in the regular universe…’

- And another thing. I like Alan Scott. My girlfriend, a HUGE JSA fan, likes Alan Scott. That’s because we know who he is. Because we have read comics outside of the shit that gets turned into movies, and put in cartoons. Through this whole press debacle, DC has been touting their new move as a ‘Iconic Character being remade as gay.’ I like the guy, but Alan Scott is far from iconic. Golden Age does not equal iconic. Iconic would have been someone that DC actually has money riding on - a BIG title character, someone with their own book, someone with instant fan recognition. Sorry Alan Scott, but I guess you were the safest option.

(From my girlfriend - Why not bring Ted Kord back? DC is WELL AWARE of how big a fan favorite he is, and more than that, I have heard even the most die-hard, old-school, heterosexual-loving comic fans talk about how Ted and Booster should have been a canon couple. Ted coming back does not, in any way, invalidate Jamie as a Blue Beetle. And can you imagine, Ted and Michael as an established couple, adopting Rip from the timestream? LOOK AT THAT DC. NOT ONLY DO YOU HAVE TWO ESTABLISHED POPULAR GAY CHARACTERS BUT NOW YOU HAVE AN ALTERNATIVE FAMILY! Way to win our hearts!)

While one of the things I would like to see MOST from the big comic companies is established, popular characters coming out (Like, to a smaller extent, Richter and Shatterstar) as opposed to making shiny new safe characters. But honestly, this is not the way to do it. I would rather take a new character than someone with little to no instant recognition. On a list of Five Earth Green Lanterns…ALAN SCOTT ISN’T EVEN REALLY A GREEN LANTERN. What about Guy Gardner? THAT would have been a bold move! What about Kyle Rayner or Jon Stewart?

(Get out of here, Hal Jordan. Not even the neglected minority wants you.)

It’s not good enough, guys. I appreciate the effort, but it’s just not good enough. Instead of throwing your support behind one of the most overlooked groups in comics, you’ve managed to marginalize and trivialize us even further.

A year ago, my pull list consisted of 80% DC comics. Now I don’t buy a single DC book. Because of shit like this.

(FOR FUCK’S SAKE EVEN KILOWOG WOULD HAVE BEEN A BETTER OPTION)

DC Comics Hires Homophobic Sci-Fi Author Orson Scott Card to Pen New Superman Series

DC Conducts a Second Nielsen Survey on the New 52

But seriously there are a lot of problems with Alan Scott.