After Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths end, DC will be undergoing Dawn of DC -- a new linewide publishing initiative that will pivot certain ongoing series -- I've heard about the Superman books, Nightwing, and Harley Quinn -- and launch a bunch of new ones starring old favorites. There'll be 20 new ongoings* launched in 2023 as part of Dawn of DC, and the first 10 have been announced. They are (list lifted from Popverse):
- Unstoppable Doom Patrol by Dennis Culver and Chris Burnham, spinning out of events in Lazarus Planet (March)
- Superboy, Man of Tomorrow by Kenny Porter and Jahnoy Lindsay, the DC Round Robin 2022 winning title following Conner Kent on a journey of self-discovery in a reality that isn’t his own (April)
- Green Lantern: Hal Jordan by Mariko Tamaki and an artist to be named at a later date (April)
- Green Lantern: John Stewart by Phillip Kennedy Johnson and and an as-yet-unnamed artist (Launch TBA)
- Green Arrow by Joshua Williamson and Sean Izaakse, following the search for the missing Oliver Queen as the result of events in Dark Crisis (April)
- Batman: The Brave and the Bold by Tom King, Mitch Gerads, Guillem March, Gabriel Hardman, Dan Mora, Rob Williams, and more, in what promises to tell “core stories building out Dawn of DC,” according to the publisher (May)
- Cyborg by a creative team to be announced, as the character’s role in defining the future of Earth is explored (May)
- Shazam! By Mark Waid and Dan Mora, featuring the return of Billy Batson (June)
- The Penguin (working title) by Tom King and Stefano Gaudiano sees Oswald Cobblepot forced back into organized crime by… the U.S. Government…? (June)
- Steelworks by a creative team to be announced, featuring both John Henry Irons and his niece Natasha (June)
Then, come July, presumably 10 more books will have a staggered launch. There's more detail about direction of the new books in the DC link at the top of this post.
Replies
I've gotta say, I'm looking at this Dawn of the DCU announcement as a good sign. There's not a lot of books there that I was specifically clamoring for, but it's more variety in the output than DC has had in a while. Doom Patrol, two GL books, Shazam, Green Arrow, and Cyborg, plus two extensions of the Bat universe (and one of them is a crime book starring Penguin!) and two Superman family books (one of which starts John and Natasha Irons!). This feels like a reversal of the constant Bat-launches of the last year or two.
Of the set, I'm most interested in Doom Patrol (the oddest of the bunch), GL John Stewart (thanks to PKJ's involvement), Shazam (thanks to the Waid/Mora creative team), and Steelworks (since I like those characters a lot), and Penguin (due to King's involvement).
These titles are also going to test my resolve; my hope is to read most of them on the DCUI Ultra ap a month after release, rather than bringing more paper into my house. I'll definitely be experiencing most of these books that way, but there are a couple -- Shazam, almost certainly, and maybe one or two more -- that I decide I want in physical form, and to support with money out of the gate.
In all, though, it seems like a first step in a promising direction.
The only one I would say I am definitely interested in would be Shazam.
The Tom King series' are a hard pass from me.
The rest, I guess I will see what I read in the solicitations. None of them blow my doors off, but there is so little information right now.
I like King, but totally get why people don't. But what seems like the premise of the Penguin -- he starts operating as a gangland mole for the Feds -- sounds like exactly the sort of entertainment I go for. Even though if you otherwise said "Penguin ongoing series" to me, I'd pass on it without a thought.
Since I haven't read Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths (and won't until there's an omnibus), is there information I'm going to be missing walking into Dawn?
Not that I will walk very far. I've given up on monthlies (I know, shock and surprise) and just buy collections, and often new series don't make it to the HC stage because they're canceled so fast. Or I choose not to get them because, by the time there's an HC, the critical consensus is "no bueno" or "no necessito."
The likeliest candidate for me is the Tom King series. As Rob says, I can understand those who read something bad he's done, like Heroes in Crisis, and swear "Never again!" I agree, that stunk. But his Mister Miracle was very good. So good, that I'm willing to roll the dice on any new project he's got. (I've got his Adam Strange in the to-read pile, and I'm really looking forward to Human Target.) Besides, the description of "core series" sounds like he's being positioned as the main staff guy, now that James Tynion IV has gone self-owned. So these stories may "count" more than others.
I like Doom Patrol, but I'm at least two big writers behind on that series. Besides, it's a tough one to do well, so waiting for a critical consensus on that one seems logical.
The Penguin book sounds weirdly interesting, especially since he's getting a TV show on HBO Max (for now). Maybe.
Tom King is one of three current writers whose work I will almost certainly buy. (The other two are Mark Russell and Al Ewing.) Of the titles listed above, I will commit to Shazam! by Mark Waid, but I'm not particularly interested in "Dawn of DC." All of the new titles will rise or fall on their own merits AFAIAC.
"Since I haven't read Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths, is there information I'm going to be missing walking into Dawn?"
Ooh, I can answer that! No.
It is exactly like every other DC event series you have ever read only more so.
It is exactly like every other DC event series you have ever read only more so.
I made the mistake of committing to "Infinite Frontier" -- I read all the IF miniseries and one-shots -- so I could write about them in my column. Well, I read almost all of them -- I found a numbing, depressing sameness to the Bat-books, so I didn't read many of those. There were a few others I started to read and hit "Nope" pretty fast. Naturally, it turned out they had absolutely no more impact on the succeeding reboot than the Convergence/Future's End books did on ... well, anything.
So I asked that question knowing the answer, but hoping for different.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm behind on the Crisis books. What the hell... has DC been rebooting THAT often? Is Superman still Kal-El from Krypton? Is Bruce Wayne still an orphan who is out to protect Gotham City? Is Hal Jordan still a fearless gladiator?
Too many events. Then too many changes to keep up with. I can't feel anyone is surprised that I don't want to get involved in new comics... too expensive an investment for too little continuity. I can't afford to restart every series every year, year and a half for a new start.
I felt comfortable when I read the Justice League and knew who was in it and their history. Now I don't know anybody's history. I appreciate new elements, but in context. Not a full restart with all new elements.
So it's not too likely I'll be in on this one. Maybe Shazam... I kinda trust Mark Waid. But I'd have to read a LOT of support to chance anything else.
"I can't feel anyone is surprised that I don't want to get involved in new comics... "
Eric, I'm going to recommend a book to you that hasn't even been released yet: Avengers: War Across Time, five issues by Paul Levitz (in his first ever Marvel series) and Alan Davis. (Cap posted about it to the "Avengers Reassembled!" discussion.) It features Kang the Conqueror and is set during the early days of the Avengers (post-Captain America but pre-Kooky Quartet). It starts in January.
Rob Staeger (Grodd Mod) said:
Oh yeah, Tom King has some great ideas, I just don't think he has ever been able to create a good series out of those ideas. For Heroes in Crisis alone I would avoid everything he does, I read this for free and still felt like I had been ripped-off.
Have you tried Mister Miracle, Travis? It was not only a good idea, it was really well executed. It is as good as Heroes in Crisis was bad. (And Heroes in Crisis was every kind of bad.)
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