A New Dawn Awaits...The DC Relaunch

Swamp-Thing #1

This is it. It’s DC-Day in the wild, wonderful world of comics. Today is the day that DC relaunches its entire line of comics and I could not be more excited about it. There are an array of opinions out there that range from the outraged, nay-saying, fanboy, to the completely disinterested, to the lukewarm, to the ecstatic. I fall somewhere towards ecstatic. Because of my excitement for this bold change, I feel compelled to regurgitate some of my initial thoughts on the relaunch. I’ve espoused this opinion while I was working at Discount Comic Book Service, on my podcast, on other podcasts, and on message boards. I still stand by it.

To date, I have been reading comics for twenty-five years. I consider myself lucky to have spent a good portion of those twenty-five years reading DC comics. Obviously, DC has been publishing for much longer than that. So long, in fact, that the idea of a relaunch is not new for DC, and angrier fans are deluding themselves if they think otherwise. This marks at least the third relaunch in DC's history (the first being the introduction of the Silver Age with Showcase #4 and the second being Crisis on Infinite Earths). 


If this is something that excites existing fans or, far better than that, excites and welcomes new fans then I am for it. I actively want it to be a success. If the initial sales numbers are any indication, most fans and, at least, retailers are behind this new initiative. It may even be that there is a subset of people out there who have flirted with the idea of reading comics, they saw something from DC’s marketing campaign, and this will turn them on. Based on the overall sales numbers, it seems that is either A.) already true, B.) there are a lot of retailers think it will be the case, or C.) both.

All that matters here is that there is an opportunity for new and returning fans to get turned on to comics. If those kids who come into the store, the adults who come back, or the folks who buy the books digitally get to experience even a little bit of the excitement I have for comics, then this is a tremendous achievement. 

All of the years of stories I've read and the joy they gave me will never go away. Every story that was written in the twenty-five years since the last relaunch is still there and is still valid--the books don't just disappear. It's perfectly reasonable, and should be welcomed, for my kids or someone else’s kids or some teenager to have an opportunity to experience their DC Universe. I got the Crisis/Post Crisis world. That was mine, we had our ups and downs, but I cherish the memories. I'll always have those and I'm making new ones all the time with other comics and eras.

Animal Man #1

It's time to let somebody else have their own DCU and their own continuity to gripe about. If they're telling good stories and fans, even if it isn't you, are getting excited about what's happening, then DC should be applauded. 

Speaking of gripes, there also seems to be a some disdain for the new costume designs among some existing fans. Let it go. Who cares about Superman and Wonder Woman’s pants? Or costume designs, in general? In the grand scheme of things, they are completely unimportant. Costumes come and go and are tweaked all the time (even on a month-to-month basis, depending on who is drawing the book!). Sure, there have been some truly awful designs throughout the decades, and there have been plenty of great ones, too.  It's my contention, however, that there is not now, nor has there ever been, a comicbook whose quality was determined by the costume designs being used. 


Moreover, the fact is, potentially new readers do not care about the costume designs. Not even a little bit. In fact, the odds are that they won’t even notice the difference. If a costume design is stopping someone from trying a book, then they probably were not really going to buy it anyway. 


It's not about costumes. It's not about continuity. It's about characters and story. 


So get out and celebrate today! Celebrate throughout the whole month and find the comic that’s right for you—I can almost guarantee you it’s there, just waiting for you. If you’re not particularly eager about JLA, Superman, or Green Lantern, that’s fine! Consider Swamp Thing, Animal Man, OMAC, or Frankenstein, Agent of SHADE. In comics, there really is something for everyone…tights are not, and never have been, a pre-requisite.

Comics are amazing and wonderful and exciting, get to your shop and be a part of this new era. Heck, bring a friend, buy the books digitally, I don’t care. Just be proud to be a comics fan. Enthusiasm is infectious and it’s high time that we started spreading it.