Holy ####!

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2009/09...-30th-century/

best...news...ever!

This is equivalent to hearing that Walt Simonsen is returning to Thor, though it's probably bad news for karate Kid.

Holy cow... That's awesome news!

Someone please tell me I'm not dreaming this.

If you think that was the big takeaway from today's news, you're really missing out:

Warner Bros. Restructures DC Comics

-J

Ah-ha!

Yeah, I should have figured something like this was in the works, as DC watched Marvel have more success with translating comics to film in recent years. This isn't to denigrate the generally excellent recent Batman films, but that's been their only really big "hit" property, contrasted with the success of X-Men and Spider-man films, and of course Iron Man's success, not to mention the reasonably good profitability of the Fantastic Four films. Superman Returns was largely bungled, and both legal/business baggage and blunders dragged down the considerable bottom line for both Superman Returns and Watchmen -- though I really enjoyed the latter.

While I'm sure the general intent has been there for the past couple years, I'm finding it difficult to see this as not being something suddenly given clearer direction and energy by the seemingly imminent Disney/Marvel deal. My impression for the past year has been that there's been a lot of finger-pointing over not turning DC characters into successful tv and film properties, but no real leadership.

So who's taking Levitz' place & how's this affect Dan Didio? BTW, 2 years to change Levitz' boss who botched a # of deals is too slow a response time if you ask me.

At first I was excited but then I remember I was excited when Shooter took over the Legion, and look how that turned out.

But maybe he'll explain the whole Fredric Vaux thing.

If anyone thinks this is a good thing, you might want to reconsider. Now that DC is fully under the thumb of Time/Warner, expect to see poor/slow performing titles to get axed rather quickly. Also expect to see a powering down of the DC line, to only the titles that make any cash.

Think I'm wrong? I submit a single example. Topps taking over Wizkids.

Levitz might not be writing Legion for long...

Diane Nelson, who helmed Warner's Harry Potter Division, making the company a tonne of cash while keeping Rowling happy. Pressure's on for her to do it again. I expect Didio's safe for now (though there may be some downward pressure on him to get Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent back in their respective titles PDQ if Warners is serious about maintaining their brands).

Here is another link. My apologies if this was already linked.

I shudder for DC comics. Paul Levitz had class and dignity, and I have often wondered why he let so many of the more vile aspects of the "Didio" era occur...but I never doubted that he cared about DC Comics (the creations, the creators, and the fans).

As far as return to the LSH...I'm not as excited as some. The LSH has always struck me as the type of book that the writers really cannot go back to. Of the great Legion Scribes, Levitz probably ranks behind Jim Shooter...where Shooter introduced (what seems like) 75% of almost everything used in a typical year of LSH stories, Levitz showed that there could be a (more) grown-up Legion...but that being said, I hope he can overcome the curse of nostalgia.

One positive potential I see: Since Geoff Johns has essentially undid the "Five Year Later/Mordruverse/Zero-Hour/Reboot/Threeboot" stories, it would be interesting to see the "actual" post-Magic Wars storylines. Supposedly they were sketched out. If you want to see one fans "best guess", follow this link.

In the statement linked by Tidge, they've specifically come out and said they would stick with the status quo for volume of titles. Yeah, they could backtrack on that, but I'll give them benefit of the doubt since the first thing they've said about DC publishing was so direct and that they backed it up with numbers (90 monthlies, 30 trades a month).

I wouldn't think WB would want to reduce the line significantly since DC is already a distant second to Marvel in market share. Even having several low selling titles gives you some opportunities to close that gap, such as tying REBELS and Booster Gold to the Lantern Corps ring promotion in a month or two.

Plus, DC has very few monthlies that are over issue 50. WB coming in and canceling (or more likely, ordering a relaunch/revamp) several titles wouldn't be that much of a change in status quo. We've already had the long running Bat-supporting titles scrapped in the last year, Flash and Legion are being retooled, etc. and DC is doing a lot more mini-series for characters who clearly couldn't support a monthly.

What may be useful to remind ourselves of is that the expenses and profits for Marvel and DC's publishing will be/are little more than footnotes in the ledgers of Disney and Warner. Each is primarily interested in the mine of properties they can draw on for other merchandising and exploitation in mass media. As much as we'd like to think otherwise, monthly comics aren't really mass media. They're a specialty item with a fairly small market.

This is no guarantee that someone higher up won't decide to meddle -- some big wheel who decides he or she's a Real Businessperson coming in to raise the level of the game, but if so I hope that there's someone there to talk sense to them when they start talking about getting back to early '90s sales levels or those of the 1940s. The latter was a different world and when comics were extremely casual spending, and the former was ony due to a heavily-manipulated investor market that eventually stood revealed as a pyramid scheme -- an ultimately highly corrosive bit of short term thinking that almost destroyed the players.

DC has *always* been "under the thumb" of their parent company, dating back to the forties.

I am cautiously optimistic re: Levitz returning to the Legion. I enjoyed his run from way back when and I think he can do a pretty good job providing, as Tidge pointed out, he can avoid reverting to his previous work.

Frankly, I am thrilled he's stepped down, but not because of his writing return to Legion. Rather, this move has the potential to be the best thing to happen to DC art & story-wise in long while.

Preferring to lock folk into DC-exclusive contracts, Levitz would only offer freelancers wages well below the industry standard. He is the grudge holder that prevented further Marvel/DC team ups and not letting guys like Mark Millar run free with Superman.

He is an old guy with old school tactics, and would allegedly tell anyone from Frank Miller to Alex Ross to Alan Moore during their heydays that "They weren't bigger than Batman" always reminding people that the characters were more important than creators.

Levitz's resignation is not making folk weep all that much.