If the internet bugs you so badly, Geoff, stay off it. The fanboy bashing is stupid, petty and not worth three dollars.

I dropped Booster Gold because he brought back Ted Kord in a cheap and stupid way as fan service.

I dropped JSA because he brought in Kingdom Come Superman in a cheap and stupid way as fan service.

I dropped Green Lantern during Secret Origin because he retconned Atrocitus into Hal’s origin in a cheap and stupid way to set up Blackest Night, which hasn’t even been very good.

I don’t get the same thrill seeing Ted Kord, or a reunion of the JLI characters, or Kingdom Come folks showing up in the main DC universe. If people love that, good on ‘em. But when you don’t care, it feels like he’s just going back to old stories and characters not because it fits the story or makes it better, but because he wants to shoehorn them in for his own purposes. And I’m sick of it.

And I’m always going to believe that as far as an abrupt switch in storytelling style and character focus, Infinite Crisis 7 is always going to be just as bad as, if not worse than, Secret Invasion 8. IC 7 was an abomination of an ending to an event, and Superboy Prime might be the worst character I’ve ever read in the history of comics. I can’t stand him, and not in a good way.

So yeah, that’s why I don’t like Geoff Johns.

Infinite Crisis was a big disappointment. But I kind of gave him a pass on that one because it felt like the rug got pulled out from under him. At the very least, there were last minute switches. I just chalked that up as a fluke. And I enjoyed his contributions to 52, but I loved every bit of 52. Next to 7 Soldiers, I think 52 is the greatest comic book event in recent years.

Now, it’s hard for me to read most Geoff Johns books without rolling my eyes. I don’t know if he is indulging himself more than ever or if just bothers me more than ever. But I suspect it is a combination of the two.

I haven’t read a lot of Bendis. But what I have read turns me off. I’ve liked some individual issues. But his events keep pushing me right out of the Marvel Universe. The ending of Secret Invasion was criminal.

But I’ll give Siege a try. This life-long DC fan is getting sick of DC these days. Maybe it’t time to make mine Marvel?

So, I don’t know. That’s where I’m coming from. The positive out of this is if Bendis can prove he can do a four issue book that flows well without issue, we’ll probably see those a little more in the future compared to the 8 issue line-wides. Which is better for everyone.

The best case would be to take the Marvel cosmic model. You need to make sure that the characters and books tied in are tied in for a reason. Secret Invasion had a serious problem with this. So did Infinite Crisis. And Blackest Night is more of the same. Hell, DC is trying to bribe us with cheap plastic rings to inflate sales of lagging books that have nothing to do with the event. As much as I enjoyed the tie ins for Secret Invasion when I read them, I doubt I’m going to pick them up again. From now on, I’m sticking to the books that I read that tie in, unless something (a solicitation, a creative team, preview art, etc.) forces me to pay attention. My hope is that Siege is a sign for the future Marvel events being smaller like the way they’ve been handling Marvel cosmic.

One can only hope.

Bendis, meanwhile, is responsible for Avengers: Disassembled, House of M and Secret Invasion, all of which were absolutely atrocious, and Secret War, which I haven’t read. Johns has played around in (and in some ways, tarnished) the mythologies of the JSA, GL and Flash, but his Events haven’t (yet) had the ramifications of Bendis’.

You could dislike “Infinite Crisis” and still read most DC comics without worry. But if you thought that the ending to “Secret Invasion” was preposterous bordering on insulting… well, you’re stuck. Their ENTIRE LINE OF COMICS is based around those events.

So I don’t necessarily trust Johns much further than I can throw him (and sometimes, I would like to throw him). And I think that Bendis generally has a better support structure around him writer-wise, which allows the tie-ins to his events to generally be better. And I think that subconsciously makes me think I enjoy the main event more than I do.

Welcome back!

I was turned off by Secret Invasion. I hated the ending. And since it led directly into Dark Reign, I was “meh” on that. I eventually caught up with Dark Reign. I liked a lot of individual issues, but not enough to maintain my interest. So, I appreciate getting caught up on what I’ve missed.

I’ll probably give the Siege a look-see.

Hope you keep coming back for more. read/RANT is better for your involvement.

It’s very obvious from the article that this death won’t last. I suspect he’ll be back (or something) next issue.

I haven’t read the article yet, but I will when I boss isn’t looking…

Anyway, welcome back!

also, welcome back.

NO emotional impact. I like Kyle, and I think GLC is demonstrably better than what Johns is doing. But I don’t care. And it seems obvious that Tomasi’s hand was forced. This is why I hate DC.

also, BC, your research sucks. The Cell is horror. people that say it’s not, don’t actually remember that movie.