Bends is awful

I agree with wiseman.827: today’s writer’s seem almost phobic to the idea of marriage, Since the mid sixties, Barry and Iris Allen married; no big deal. The Fantastic Four’s big appeal (to me) was all about the marriage of Sue and Reed Richards, and then their children (Jonathan Hickman had comment in the last Fantastic Four title he wrote that the main theme of his whole time writing FF was family). Spider-Man operated fine with the Mary Jane Watson marriage and put to rest the “woe is me” Peter Parker syndrome.
As far as Superman, some of the best series in recent years is the Peter J. Tomasi reboot with Clark, Lois and son Jonathan. I’m not sure where Bendis is going with his version, although it appears Lois and Jonathan are in the series; what those characters will be doing - well - I’ll have to keep reading.

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My problem is how Bendis seems to be obsessed with Poop. Also he makes Lois and Clark has parents. Who in there right mind let a crazy man whom Superman fought, his only son to on a space adventures. It is nonsense. And Lois 's excuse for leaving Jon with Jor El is ridiculous. Can anyone give me a better perspective cause I am holding out for better Superman.

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As bad parents. Sorry stupid auto correct.

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Bend is on Superman has been great. King on Batman has been phenomenal storytelling. Both are the best things going on in DC right now.

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Read something else?

Bends is awful. Thankfully I’ve never had to experience it, but I have a family member who is a diver and he told me it can get pretty scary.

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😉😉😉

I can definitely understand the frustration of having a creative team not connect with you on a character. I haven’t read any of his Superman, but I went through that with a character who I really loved prior to her getting a new creative team. In the end, there’s nothing really that you can do except move on and find a character/creative team combo that does resonate. Superman won’t always have the same creative team, so you can even come back to those books someday if they bring on a writer who you feel captures the characters a bit better. That’s what I think part of the beauty of comics is, there will always be a fresh set of eyes handling a character, so you can see so many different settings and interpretations for the same character.
TLDR; It really stinks when a creative team doesn’t resonate with you on a character you love, and I hope you find a creative team/character combination that does resonate with you.

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Since this has become a Tom King thread, I would say his work is uneven, but that may be because he is writing for the six issue trade edition, not for the reader following the single issues. This month we learned what happened last month, and the story now has a direction.

Bendis monthly issues totals are much less than the previous creative teams.

See

https://boundingintocomics.com/2019/01/24/brian-michael-bendis-dc-comics-numbers-dont-look-good-at-all/

Reading that link with critical eyes. It is not referring to the most recent sales of the previous creative team. The sales of comic book declines at the issue number increases, for most titles

It is saying that the first issues until now, by Bendis, were much lower in sales and review rating see than the corresponding issue by the previous creative team, like sixth issue versus sixth issue published.

Bendis, with a number one issue, should have had great sales, and then slowly declined.

It appears, instead, that he is barely selling as much issues as the previous team would have. He did not bring in new readers.

DC had a big name to bring to over and gave him whatever he wanted as part of the deal. Looking at Superman and Action alone also won’t tell the whole story. (The link didn’t work so I don’t know the details of the story). If they are getting increased sales on all the rest of what Bendis is writing/influencing they consider it a success and not be bothered by stagnant or dropped sales on Superman/Action. The other side to all of this is the only sales data I’ve seen in recent years is in physical comics, they don’t release digital data. My guess is digital sales is much larger than anyone will admit and since there isn’t a middle-man they have zero incentive to release that information. Companies do not want anyone to know who their customers are or how much they are making/selling to said customers because that helps competition. My point is while you can infer information from the released sales data, it doesn’t tell the whole story.

Regardless, kicking Tomasi off one of the best Superman runs in years was very disappointing. And that’s from someone enjoying Bendis’ run even with his flaws.

The link works for me, as an Android user.

I have heard members who use Apple have trouble with links and even copy paste in this app.

You are right about digital sales. When the memo about restructuring DC came out yesterday, it said the main focus would be the Direct Market, that is the Local Comic Book Stores.

You would think DC makes more money on the sale of a digital copy, then a physical copy, but we are never told about these sales.

I read where they are not selling. Bendis Superman and I believe Action Comics he is writing now, they are shipping out far fewer issues from his run. He doesn’t have the demand

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Superman #7 was awful, Bendis writes an ok Superman but a terrible Lois Lane. And yeah aging Jon up was a bad idea.

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The most frustrating thing is that Bendis can write a good book and it seems like he is purposely not doing so. The actual storyline in Action comics about the red cloud is actually quite good and I believe he would do well if someone else was in charge of the Kent family and was just doing metropolis crime stories.

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Often times, good writers need good editors.

My theory is that Bendis is a good, proven writer with years of experience. With his stellar resume, DC’s simply letting him do whatever he wants. I don’t think he’s demanding a ton. I think they’ve just stepped back.

Hey, I could be wrong. But if you look at the triangle years on the Superman books, it’s obvious there was some strong editorial leadership. Four books with four separate creative teams don’t move as one for a decade without a team effort and a captain at the wheel.

And if you look at those same creators at they left the triangle titles, their work wasn’t as good.

So Bendis, as a young writer at Marvel, did some great work. And as a young writer, he probably had an editor watching over him.

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Probably. My beef stems from poor execution in thr long run. He has DC Comics top artists drawing his books, but his repeated dialogue is not great. I have all the issues of his run so far and just rode it out hoping it would get better. Sadly it hasn’t. He needs one book or 2 he can just focus on. ATM he has 5. I mean it’s great he can multitask, but at the detriment of the dialogue. Naomi was a book I picked up hoping it would get better. I mean the man is swamped so much he just uses one word sentences.
I had dropped it in October and then after listening to him talk his run up on Word Balloon. I put it back on my pull.I got duped. And don’t get me started on the cluster mess that was Scarlett. That issue 5 was a huge waste of money. That didn’t go anywhere.

The best books DC is putting out atm is Batgirl and the Sandman Universe line. Batgirl’s book has greatly Improved since it had the new team. The art is probably the best art in DC aside from the Fiumara brothers Lucifer art.

The superman books are what I got duped on to clarify.

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I completely agree I hate that he is on both Superman books. I miss Tomasi and Jurgens.

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Bendis on Legion scares me. His Guardians was bad. He should just stick to writing street level solo heroes. He would be great on a Question revamp or Red Hood. There is a reason why Daredevil, Alias, and Ultimate Spider man are his most acclaimed works.

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As someone who is fairly new to comics i feel like DC is pushing Bendis down our throats. With that said none of the books he is currently writing interest me so I can’t really give a proper opinion on the guy, but i am saddened that because of him super sons has been ruined from what I’ve heard :pensive:

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