On The Unexpected #1

*I didn't read this one. I've felt somewhere between leery and queasy with some of writer Steve Orlando's DC scripts since the short-lived Midnighter series, as his over-reliance on the characters, concepts and stories of other writers, some of which were very specific to that writer and of rather recent vintage, seemed to stand on--if not outright cross--the line between homage and appropriation.

Additionally, the most recent work of his I had read--about half of the second volume of his Justice League of America series--was just not very good. I think I made it up to the introduction of a character that was part-Tarzan, part-Iron Fist before I gave up on the trade collection. When I heard he was re-introducing the Mark Waid and Bryan Hitch-created Queen of Fables and the Grant Morrison and Mark Millar-created Aztek, I groaned. When I saw he was integrating Alan Moore and J.H. Williams III's Promethea into the DC Universe in the pages of JLoA, I swore his work off.

I know cases can and have been made as to why it's "okay" for one writer to integrate the work of another writer who has specifically expressed his desire that people not do that into his own work, about how DC's within its legal rights to use the character, and Moore and Williams' creation wasn't that unique anyway and blah blah blah. But the bottom line remains that it is just a shitty thing to do, and while mainstream comics can be a pretty shitty industry, no one is forced to be shitty. I can't imagine DC, like, held a gun to Orlando's head, or kidnapped his family and would only release them on the condition that he write Promethea into a Justice League story.

I didn't read The Terrifics for similar reasons; that integrated another Moore co-creation into the story. And I didn't read Sideways because it was a Dan DiDio-written comic, and those are generally terrible...in addition to it just being kind of gross to go around hiring yourself for plum writing assignments at the publishing company you run.

So that's...let's see here...three of the eight "New Age of Heroes" line of comics I couldn't bring myself to read.

And with the release of The Unexpected, the entire "New Age" line of comics has had their first issues debut, and we can start placing bets on which will be the first to be canceled. I'm going to ahead and bet on Sideways, although I think Damage is a real contender.



Previously...

On New Challengers #1

On The Immortal Men #1

On The Curse of Brimstone #1

On The Terrifics #1

On Sideways #1

On The Silencer #1

On Damage #1