Well, it's here. The DCnU has finally arrived. I'll get into the details (read: review/thoughts/rants) of Flashpoint later this week. Going to need to let that digest and then re-read, otherwise this will be a book-length rant about how bad they fumbled it. Don't get me wrong, the initial idea is sound; retool the entire DC universe to better pull in new readers, especially those that are getting into the stories via the new movies and want to read something accessible. Whether this idea will work or not will take time, I'm hopeful that it will though.
Anywho, Superman's new reveal has been shown for a few months now. What is really interesting is that it looks very similar to the upcoming movie by Zack Snyder.
Here's a good look of the costume from the latest set.
And here's a good look of his new costume in the comics. They look pretty similar, although the comic one looks more like armor and has brighter colors.
What's the most noticeable difference? No red shorts/outer-underwear. Although if you look at the lines from the art they are still there, just blue instead of red. Personally, they should have just taken the whole underwear thing away and made them pants.
So, what's the current reception to this change? If you look upon the internet, you see a lot of vitriol for this look. Really, the majority of those posts are from the vociferous bunch of comic-fans, and while there are a lot of complaints they don't necesarily reflect all of us.
First off, I would like to address the opinions my wife had. She is most assuredly a non-comic book fan (although she does enjoy most of the movies), and wasn't really impressed with the Superman movies. Well, the first one anyway. What did she think of the costume? She wasn't thrilled, actually, with the live action version. Her main problem was the suit looked way too tight (which I'd figure would be a plus since he is very muscle-y), and it shows off his bulge. She felt uncomfortable and thought that it pull you away from everything else, and makes you want to just turn your head.
Next, I had her take a look at the new costume (along with looking at the older one for comparison) and her comments were very insightful. She admitted to him looking much younger, for starters. Her main problem was the way the costume looks too sci-fi, it looks like he is wearing armor. About the only positive thing she liked about the costume was that they took away his outside-underwear. In total, though, the look just didn't seem like Superman.
Now, for my opinion (you knew it was coming). I actually agree with a lot my wife says. He looks younger (in the old DC I'd say he was late twenties to early thirties, in the DCnU he is no older than twenty-two), and his suit looks like futuristic armor. Like my wife, I understand that its meant to look more alien, but it just doesn't feel like Superman. On top of that, that dog-collar like setup around his neck is just retarded. Also, what the heck is up with the Superman symbol outline on his shoulders? While it is definitely different, it still has a few similarities so you can't mistake this guy for someone else. Regardless, he just doesn't have that timeless look to him anymore.
Now, I'll discuss my thoughts on the new set of stories DC has created with this universe later, right now I just wanted to post some thoughts on my all-time favorite superhero. My final stance on this costume is this; I can see Superman underneath all of the futuristic armor, and while it may be interesting where DC is going with this, I'm just not thrilled with this costume change.
So, for all of my non-comic book readers, let's have a primer on the stance of Superman comics. Before this current reboot, there were a good ten years worth of books to read to get all of the great stories that affected the current Superman. While most of the books were fairly accessible (unlike, admittedly, a bunch of other DC books which strangely aren't getting as heavy a reboot as Superman here), the current run of books did reference stuff from the 90's often. This included the marriage between Lois and Clark, Superman's death, the rise of other Supermen (like Steel, and Superboy), Superman's cousin (Supergirl), and the various mega-events that he has dealt with for the past two decades. That is a LOT for new readers to catch up on, although to be honest it is doable without rebooting it all, (A la Superman: Secret Origin by Geoff Johns and Gary Frank) but this does seem like a viable idea to insure new readers stay. No longer will you have little asterisks besides every other pages' captions stating to read some TPB from something years ago.
Anyway, this was the basic stance of the pre-DCnU Superman:
-Placed in a rocket by his birth-parents on a dying Krypton.
-Lands on Earth, where he is cared for by John and Martha Kent.
-Both adoptive parents were alive well through his career as Superman.
-After establishing himself as Superman, and having various adventures, he comes across mega-villain Doomsday, and after an all-out brawl, both die (don't worry, both get better...)
-Four Supermen come to take his place, one of them turns out to be a villain, the real Supes returns and now you have Superman, Steel, and Superboy (A clone of Superman and Lex Luthor. Oh yes, Conner Kent has two daddies.).
-Fast forward a few years, and now he has found his true cousin, Kara via a large piece of Kryptonite crashing to Earth, reiterate the whole idea of fish-out-of-water stories and there you have it.
-A few crises hit (read: mega-events like Infinite Crisis and Final Crisis and Blackest Night).
-Superman discovers the real Braniac, and with that finds the bottled city of Kandor, which recreates itself on Earth before launching into space and creating a New Krypton in opposite orbit of Earth, oh and Johnathan Kent dies.
-Lots of silly stuff happens and ends with New Krypton blowing up, and Clark and Kara being the only Kryptonians again, so you should just ignore the whole New Krypton thing other than the story kills off his adoptive father.
-Goes on a year-long walkabout around the USA, and finds out (via being an idiotic and depressive fellow) the qualities that make Superman timeless.
Too much stuff, even I'll admit that is a LOT of story for a new reader to go through.
So what has the reboot done?
What we know so far:
-The standard origin still applies, boy from Krypton has great adoptive parents, what's the twist? Before he becomes Superman, both of his adoptive parents die.
-That whole marriage thing? Gone. Right now Clark is a single man and Lois is dating some other guy.
-The costume, of course.
-Everything else has been taken off the board, but Kara is about to reappear for the first time (oh yes, another fish out of water story), and Superboy is still around (as a soulless weapon for the time being).
Not as much to deal with. Should be easier to read for new fans. While I'm not too happy about the changes (I loved that his Earth-parents were still around, and the marriage was one of my favorite things about him. Made him very down-to-earth and relatable), I'll try to give it a shot. If the stories are incredibly good, then it won't matter what the changes are (for the most part), and with both Grant Morrison and George Perez doing writing duties on Superman books, there is a good chance the stories will be decent.
Guess we'll find out.
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