As I post this in mid-February, none of the promised SPs for 2012 has shown up yet, but Amazon is listing more for the rest of the year. I've already covered January through August in other threads, so I'll use this to list anticipated releases for the end of the year.
Showcase Presents: Amethyst, Princess of Gemworld Vol. 1
Gary Cohn (Author), Various (Illustrator)
648 pages
$19.99
This title will be released on September 25, 2012.
Showcase Presents: The Flash Vol. 4
Various (Author, Illustrator)
520 pages
$19.99
This title will be released on October 30, 2012.
Showcase Presents: World's Finest Vol. 4
520 pages
$19.99
November 27, 2012
Showcase Presents: Weird War Tales Vol. 1
Summary: In this value-priced collection, war stories turn creepy as soldiers face ghostly foes, haunted weapons and much more.
Replies
I'll buy the Flash, if only because I think this volume has the legendary Mopee story I've never read.
I'm of two minds about Amethyst. I loved the series when it came out, and when I gave it to my daughter when she got old enough to be interested in comics, she loved it too. She even made a trip to Mid-Ohio Con with me one year to meet co-creator Dan Mishkin. It's long overdue for reprinting in collected format. However, the characters rely heavily on being different colors, and being in black and white format is probably going to make this a confusing read. DC should have published this in the color "omnibus" format it's been using for other titles. DC really missed the boat by not reprinting this about 10 years ago when Sailor Moon, Cardcaptor Sakura and other magical girls were popular with young manga readers.
Hoy
If we all go ahead and buy the Amethyst Showcase, they're sure to reprint it in color a year or so later.
If SP: THE FLASH maintains the pace of the last couple volumes, not only will we get the legendary Mopee story, but we'll also lurch completely past the classic Infantino years into the not-so-classic Andru & Esposito years. In fact, by my calculations, SP:TF vol. 4 would conclude with the so-bad-it-makes-Mopee-look-good story best known as the "Barry-san Saga."
I agree completely with the problems with reprinting AMETHYST in black and white. The original 12 issues were probably the peak of Ernie Colon's career (in my opinion, at least), and the color was very much a huge part of the storyline. It'll still look cool in b&w, but it won't be the same. It's like watching "The Wizard of Oz" in black and white, where the big change when Dorothy comes out of the farmhouse loses most of its impact.
...So these covers pictured are definitely the ones that will be rejiggered into the book's covers ???
Will the Flash one include the word balloons ???
IT would be rather less attention-getting minus it - R. C. Harvey/others' dictum about the importance of woids and those pretty little pickies working TOGETHER in comics , ideally , at its best !!!!!!!!! So Say We All .
Or , did Gardner Fox?? just happen to leave his TV on one of those damn kids' rock'n'roll shows , Shindig or Hullabaloo , say , one nite after the news was over up in Yonkers , and see a certain Miz Ross...and Flo and Mary - performing a song of theirs ???????
...I . Want . The . BATMAN . 60s-70s . Newspaper . Strip (probably needs to have an expensiver-er volume . Sigh . Mebbe the short Bridwell-Plastino run could come out first in a Prestige Format publication ? ) .
I have to admit that I have always been curious about Amethyst Princess of Gemworld. I remember seeing her in one of those loose-leaf Who's Who issues in the early 90's. The next I heard of her was just a mention in a Books of Magic Annual issue. But they didn't even show her, they just mentioned her realm.
It's undecided whether or not I will buy it, but I must admit...I've always wondered about that series.
The initial Amethyst series was a 12 issue limited series, preceded by an insert in Legion of Super-Heroes #298 (DC introduced several new series using insert stories in the period.) At this point it was a girl-friendly fantasy series with wish-fulfillment elements but also, at times, a dark streak, involving a well-detailed fantasy world. The writers were Dan Mishkin and Gary Cohn. The art was by Ernie Colon, and was stylised and impressive; I think it was this series that made him a name to non-Harvey fans. It was ostensibly set in the DCU - while it was running Amethyst met Superman in DC Comics Presents #63, by the same writers - but really self-contained. The storyline moved towards a resolution in the final issue.
The feature was continued by an annual and an ongoing. At first Ric Estrada was the new regular artist. Cohn did a brief run with Colon after Mishkin left, then left himself. Subsequently, with Keith Giffen plotting, the series was tied more closely to the rest of the DCU. Amethyst was blinded (in her Amethyst identity) in Crisis, and revealed to be a Lord of Order. I've only seen the last issue of the ongoing from this period. Colon's art on the issue was very impressive, but the tone had become (to me) depressingly dark.(1) This phase was continued by a special, and a four-issue mini drawn by Esteban Maroto which the GCD tells me involved the origin of Mordru.
(1) Amethyst's stepfather had left her stepmother for another woman, and her stepmother was either enchanted or insane.
That bothered me at the time, too. Why connect an independent woman with a rich backstory to Doctor Fate and the Legion? Answer: because Giffen was writing/drawing/plotting Doctor Fate and the Legion and thought it would be more profitable to link Amethyst to established DC characters and, in hindsight, rob her of what made her unique.
I think the background was poor sales. Tying a series closely to the shared universe is a standad approach at Marvel and DC so I can see why DC should have thought it could be the solution for the Amethyst franchise, but as it turned out, it wasn't (or wasn't the way DC did it).
I think the takeaway from all of this is: Just stick with the first 12 issues of AMETHYST. In fact, you could probably track down those 12 issues in the original format, in color, for less than the $20 this volume will cost. Plus, you won't have to endure all the painful wrenches into continuity inflicted upon us in the post-Mishkin-Cohn-Colon years.
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