Infinite Crisis: The Novel

[davidelliott]

Is it me or was IC a rehash of Zero Hour?

[JulianPerez]

Gerry no write ARAK.  Roy write ARAK.

kdb

The one I'm thinking of is ARAK, SON OF THUNDER #7, which was written by Conway over a Thomas plot. Arak said - with a totally straight face here - "By Thunder, I'll ne'er understand you civilized men."

Arak was this way under Thomas, too, but under Thomas at least there was a personality about him that kept him from being a Sword & Sorcery cliche.

Ok...

You know, Johns claims that he is a big fan of the Silver Age, but all he ever does it take some odd character from the 60's and write them completely out of character the kills them or makes them into a killer.

Earth-2 Superman and Lois Lane were created as tributes to the original Golden Age versions. They were two of the characters from the greatest comic book universe ever created: The Pre-Crisis DC Universe. The big bad wolfman, saved them for a reason, just in case anyone wanted to bring them back. Johns did.. just to kill them off!

Superboy-Prime was created a tribute to the Silver Age Superboy and was one of the final characters created by Elliot S! Maggin. The wolfman saved him, just in case someone wanted to use him again, and boy did Johns ever use him, by writing him completely out of character and making him into a gore crazed serial killer!!!

Finally, there was A Luthor of Earth-3, who's father was a Superhero and Mother was Lois Lane, on Earth-3 ALL Luthors were pure good and all Earth-2 hero counterparts were evil, that's Earth-3 in a nutshell. Johns, I guess, never read a Earth-3 story in his life, and figured, hey he is a Luthor so I guess he must be a bad guy, and missed the whole point of the character and wrote him completely out of character and of course got him killed!!!

You know for a guy who is such a big pre-crisis fan he sure went out of his way to kill off all the remaining pre-crisis characters, well expect for the one he turn into a gore-craze killer. Speaking of which, Johns answer for why DC has sucked for the past 20 years was because they sucked on Purpose!!! You see it was all part of the big plan, you see Superboy-Prime was punching some invisible wall, that explains it. That has to be up there with the worst ideas ever in the history of comics.

My question wasn't really answered, was it?

Though I do agree with you that in the last two issues the series tried to do too much in too little, and the send-off for Earth-2 Superman could have been better.

[Kurt Busiek]

Gerry no write ARAK.  Roy write ARAK.

kdb

The one I'm thinking of is ARAK, SON OF THUNDER #7, which was written by Conway over a Thomas plot. Arak said - with a totally straight face here - "By Thunder, I'll ne'er understand you civilized men."

Actually, he doesn't.  But close -- what he says is "By the dead gods, I'll never understand you 'civilized' people."

I'm not sure what's wrong with the line -- he's just interceded in an assault on a Jew, and is greeted with hatred and called a "barbarian."   He's noting the irony that supposedly-civilized men brand him as uncivilized, but act savage and uncouth themselves.  The line is apt to the moment and in keeping with Arak's character and the way Roy wrote him.

And seriously -- you describe being up to your armpits in Conway-written comics, but one of the two examples you pick is a series he dialogued seven pages of over someone else's plot, to buy some time on the schedule?  Pick any writer doing that, and you're unlikely to get their most sterling work.

If you want to rake Gerry over the coals, there's way better ways to do it, from his placing Chicago in Michigan to the creation of Vibe.

But then again, if you want to praise Gerry, all you really need is the sublime CINDER & ASHE...

kdb

[TELLE]

Or the fabulous Action #521 starring Vixen!

[Continental Op]

I was just rereading CINDER & ASHE a week ago and was still really enjoying it. (Though the coloring seems a bit bland to me, and a disservice to Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez's fine artwork...)

I got to thinking how nice a sequel would be after all these years, but then I realized it would actually be a pretty bad idea... not only because a sequel story would have to be set in set in much different post-Katrina New Orleans (which would seem so weird), but because I realized Cinder is pushing fifty years of age by now!

And hey, is this becoming a really classic example of "thread drift" or what??? Parting shot: Gerry Conway was one of my LEAST favorite Superman writers, and one of my MOST favorite Batman writers... keep him with lower-powered heroes (exception to the rule: Firestorm) and he does just fine most of the time.