@JohnAAustin79 please. Alan did notvwant to give them inferiority issues.
I am batsiiting for a 61 year who looks like he is 29, and he fought crime in 1939. Twilight years are relative.
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Please donāt make me bring up Alan Scottās weakness 
! Because, if youād like, Iāll go get a sliver of wood out of my hardwood floor and flick it at Alan Scottās ring and watch him drop like a leaf 
! I love ALL of the Green Lanterns but Hal Jordan is my favorite along with Jessica Cruz.
Hal Jordanās only weakness is Parallax and the color yellow.Thatās a much better weakness to have than being felled by a mighty oak tree in your backyard. As for babysitting for a 61 year old whoās 29, you missed my point obviously. The whole point to Sandman Mystery Theatre was to experience the pain Wesley Doddsā aging body gave him and his love for Dian Belmont.
Despite his infirmities, he continued fighting evil because there was no one else to fight the good fight. Wesley Dodds was looking forward to his golden years because he couldnāt wait to spend them with Dian. He had to reset his own broken bones and suture his own wounds. Thereās no guarantee when you set your own bones that youāre setting them right.
I remember reading one of the Sandman Mystery Theatre comics and it had a scene in it where Wesley was in bed and he passed it off to Dian as just having a cold but actually one of his ribs was broken and he had some internal bleeding going on. The point of Sandman Mystery Theatre besides telling great noir stories was to show us what the cumulative effects are from going out and playing hero. Because thereās always a price to be paid and thatās what Sandman Mystery Theatre showed us - the toll. Because, in reality, if we dressed up and played hero, itās not gonna be like Batman.
Itāll be more like Sandman. Because youāre gonna wind up with broken bones, a busted open face, scars zig zagging all over your body. Always feeling like youāve gotta get up for one more dance, even though your body is telling you to stay down. But heroes donāt stay down, do they?
Thereās always another villain, always another battle. And thereās a cost. When youāre alone, itās okay to be a hero. But when you find someone to share your life with, then youāre putting your loved ones in danger and then you have to start thinking āIs it worth it to keep playing heroā?
And thatās what I love about Wesley Dodds because he knew there was an ending in sight after he met Dian. He didnāt need to save the world 24/7 anymore because now the world had the JSA. Thatās why he wound up retiring. In reality, a body can only put up with so much pain before it just gives out and then you canāt get up.
Trust me, I know. I deal with multiple medical conditions so I deal with pain consistently and this is not of my own making and now Iām in my twilight years at the age of 43. Thatās why I said Sandman Mystery Theatre is unlike any other comic out there by DC because the main character can be hurt. He doesnāt fall off of a six story building, get up, dust himself off, and act like nothing happens.
If Wesley Dodds falls off the side of a building, he hopes to land in a garbage can. But, if he doesnāt, he lays on the ground and then slowly picks himself up and shambles his way home. Or, if heās able to, heāll drive a car. To me, the Sandman represented a toughness that I had not seen in comics before at that time in the '90s and I absolutely loved it and I still do 
!
Sandman Mystery Theatre is a timeless comic 
!
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Villains prefer metal to wood, and he can dodge.
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I told the bats not to play with matches, but they always play innocent.
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Iām going to say first that I refuse to read anything from Bleeding Cool on principle - I think theyāre a hugely unethical website, and so I have no clue nor will I ever have a clue what is said on their site. And if their main writer/editor decides to pop in here and try to start a debate about it, as he always seems to do when someone mentions his name, I will completely refuse to engage with his dishonesty.
That being said, Iām going from my memory of this article: The New Golden Age Adds Three New Series | DC - I always prefer to try to take from DCās website when possible, and from the creatorās interviews when not. In this article, Geoff Johns says: āRob will present a mystery tale of The Golden Age Sandmanās earliest days through the lens of Oppenheimer.ā
That sounds to me like the past.
That article also has the solicitation for the first issue: āWesley Dodds: The Sandman by Rob Venditti (Superman ā78) with art from Riley Rossmo (Harley Quinn) shows the titular character as a pacifist. He has given up on the hope of a peaceful world, but he hasnāt stopped believing that people can be better to each other, if theyāre only given the right tools. Possessing a scientistās optimism and romanticism, he is convinced that humanity can invent cures for its own ills. Having learned about the battlefield horrors of World War I from his father, he sought to create a sleep gas that would allow for āhumaneā warfare. During his research, he recorded all of his attempts in his science journal - even those with horribly deadly consequences - swearing to never show them to the world. Now his journal has been stolen, and he must find the culprit and stop them before his deadly mis-inventions fall into the arsenals of the belligerent nations threatening to pull the United States into the next world war.ā
None of that indicates to me that itās set primarily in the present.
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A part of me is telling me to stay out of this, but @JohnAAustin79 and @MatthewHecht are having such an interesting conversation about Wes that I canāt resist. To start, Iām kind of confused about something:
Iām not sure where youāre getting this. In the Golden Age stories, Wes was always portrayed as a young man. This is from Worldās Fair Comics #2 from Jan., 1940:
So, his early Golden Age stories characterized him as a āwealthy young athleteā and not a grizzled, aging veteran. Everywhere I looked said it was Wesleyās father who served in WWI and not Wesley. I thought that maybe Sandman Mystery Theatre could have retconned it to be Wesley who served in WWI, butā¦ nope in Sandman Mystery Theatre #1, it does state that it was Wesleyās father:
So Iām not sure where youāre getting that Wesley served in WWI. I only have vague memories about Sandman Mystery Theatre, so Wagner could have chose to portray him as a bit older. However, that was a Vertigo series and Vertigo had an on and off relationship with actual DCU continuity in order to give its creators more control over the stories they wanted to tell. From what I know, though, in main continuity Wesley began his career as a young man in 1939.
Also, not entirely relevant but for the sake of accuracy, the JSAās last āGolden Ageā adventure happened in All-Star Comics #57 from Feb.-March, 1951. In continuity, the team was forced into a temporary retirement by the Combined Congressional Un-American Activities Committee on Oct. 31st, 1951. Wesleyās last Golden Age adventure with the JSA happened in All-Star Comics #21 from June of 1944. He just disappeared from the team after that. Sandmanās solo Golden Age adventures ran until Adventure Comics #102 from February of 1946. All that is just for clarity on dates.
So, unless you have something that firmly puts Wesley as having served in WWI and starting his career in the 1920ās, then the dates Iād go by are Sandman debuting in 1939 (or 1938 if you wanted to go by Sandman Mystery Theatre #1) and either quietly retiring in 1946 or retiring with the rest of the JSA in 1951. If Wesley was in his early 20ās when he started his career then heād only be in his mid-30ās by 1951. For athletes that is a bit older, but in the world of comics, where Batman keeps going despite all the stress he put his body through, thatās still a prime vigilante age. I think you just may be taking a cue from Wagnerās choice to portray things a bit more realistically.
Next:
Well, Wesley was not a pacifist in WWII. In All-Star Comics #11, in response to the attack on Pearl Harbor, Wesley joined the military along with the rest of the JSA. He served on an aircraft carrier near Wake Island and did some very un-pacifist things:
A few things, though. First, that story was retconned by Roy Thomas in All-Star Squadron #19-20. Even though Thomas still had Wesley joining the military, the more violent aspects of Sandmanās service were reinterpreted as violent fever dreams forced onto the JSA by Brain Wave. That is a retcon but it serves as an established way out of the JSAās more blood-thirsty history during WWII.
Second, the above panel always felt really bizarre to me and out of character for Wesley. Sandman is a hero who chose a non-violent weapon to subdue his enemies. Unlike Hawkman who flew around with swords, spears, and maces, or other Golden Age heroes who would casually kill on a whim (sometimes en masse), Wes chose to knock out his villains with sleep gas. Thatās why I can definitely see how you could or why you would want to portray him as a pacifist. Being a pacifist doesnāt necessarily mean you sit around doing nothing about bullies and evil men. It just means you choose to deal with them in a non-violent manner. You could certainly have a Wesley Dodds that only uses his sleep gas to fight crime. So, youāre correct that itās not accurate, but I could see how/why this could be done.
As for the rest, I donāt know enough about the mini-series yet to comment on if theyāll bring Wesley to the present or modernize him. I donāt think thereās enough info on the mini-series yet to be able to make an accurate assumption about what it will be. What I will say is that I doubt it will be like Sandman Mystery Theatre. Like you, I have fond (if vague) memories of that series and would wager that itās the best run on the Wesley Dodds character. However, that Vertigo material from the early to mid 90ās has never been truly replicated. It was a very specific time where DC was willing to take risks and hand over a lot of creative control to their writers and artists. That is not the same environment as today. That doesnāt mean that current stories are terrible, they arenāt. However, if you try to judge this new Sandman mini off of Sandman Mystery Theatre, you will definitely find it to be wanting. Iām going to try to judge it based off its own merits.
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Dc needs plenty of more powerful heroes like alan scott, jade, obsidian, dr fate, salem, spectre, secret, jakeem thunder, jack knight, stargirl, hourman, tick tock, atom smasher, damage, fury lyta trevor, silver scarab, ray, tnt, dynamite, so that kryptonians like power girl will not try to do everything in team titles. Wesley Dodds could become more powerful if he gets some kind of dream power. In Knight Terrors, maybe Wesley Dodds will gain some dream power to beat Insomnia, instead of relying on the powerful son of fury lyta trevor and the silver scarab. For flashes, I prefer flying flashes but dc has gone the opposite direction and changed johnny quick and jesse quick into non flying heroes, weakening them.
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Thanks for the dates, @TheCosmicMoth 
! Iām not familiar with the JSAās Golden Age adventures. Iām basing my info off of the Sandman Mystery Theatre series in the '90s. In that series heās definitely more grizzled because heās nearly 40, I believe.
As for serving in WW1, I may be wrong on that. But, like I said before, Iāve only read a few of the stories because Sandman Mystery Theatre was never reprinted or collected in full by DC. They do have two omnibusā coming out now for it. I think the first one just released in March.
Iāve read a lot of the earlier issues of Sandman Mystery Theatre but not the later ones and I do recall seeing Wesley Dodds have a nightmare about finding a dead body in a trench and it was wearing a soldierās uniform. I thought he served in the war. Sorry for making a mistake. As for the Vertigo series not being canon, I forgot about that.
Youāre right, Vertigo is not canon. But, wait, Swamp Thingās Vertigo stories are considered canon so why not Sandmanās? How can one characterās stories matter but the other characterās stories donāt? Does that make sense?
I was just trying to share my love of Sandman Mystery Theatre with everyone and for Wesley Dodds in particular. My version of Sandman that I grew up with in the DCU was Sandy āSandā Hawkinsā version that was in the JSA comic (the 1999 series) by Geoff Johns and James Robinson. I havenāt really read the JSAās Golden Age adventures yet. Thereās only a small amount available on DCUI, right?
I will definitely check them out because I do love the JSA and the All-Star Squadron. Iām sorry for offending anybody with my love for Sandman Mystery Theatre. I still think that series is a timeless classic and Matt Wagner a phenomenal artist and writer. Also, my mentioning about Wesley Dodds being a pacifist comes from an article that I read on Bleeding Cool.
It said that Wesley Dodds is going to be a pacifist in his new mini. I will wait to read the mini before deciding whether or not I like a pacifist Wesley Dodds. Iām still reading these comics irregardless of what I may read on other websites about them because I love these characters. Plus, Bleeding Cool is heavily biased towards DC and I know that so I take their info with a grain of salt.
I was just relaying what I read on there. Sorry for upsetting anybody.
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I did not say that the series was set āprimarily in the presentā, @millernumber1. Please 
re-read my replies. I said that the story will start in the past and then probably end in the present with Sandman coming to our time. The Alan Scott mini and the Jay Garrick mini are gonna start off in the past and end with them in the present so why wouldnāt the Sandman mini do the same thing?
Especially since Wesley Dodds is set to play such a key role in the Knight Terrors event. Now is the perfect time to reintroduce him to a whole new generation and update him along with the other members of the JSA. Iām sorry that youāve had bad experiences with the guy who runs Bleeding Cool. I did not know that.
I have only been coming on here since March 2023. I wonāt mention that site again when talking to you, okay? I know that Bleeding Cool is biased towards DC and I keep that in mind when I read articles on there about DC. I get my comic from other sites as well, more reliable sites like CBR, Comic Book, Newsarama etc etc.
I wonāt mention Bleeding Cool to you ever again. I am going to read the Sandman mini before deciding whether I like it or not. Iām gonna read all these minis because I love the JSA all together. Iām sorry again if I offended you by mentioning Bleeding Cool.
Talk to you around the boards .
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I figured, and that may have been the case in Mystery Theatre. I honestly donāt remember it well enough to say. I should revisit it fully now that itās on Ultra. Even so, that would be a retcon if Wagner played it that way.
This issue is really, really foggy. To start, Alan Mooreās Swamp Thing more or less set the tone for what Vertigo would be in the 90ās. However, Alan Moore wrote Swamp Thing long before Vertigo existed. When Moore was writing Swamp Thing, it was definitely set in the mainstream DCU and had crossover issues to the major events and everything. Years after Moore left Swamp Thing, in 1993, Vertigo was created as an imprint for the more mature comics and Swamp Thing was brought into the fold. I think both because it was initially set in the DCU and because itās generally pretty influential, most of Swamp Thingās continuity from this period has remained intact (Iām not sure if all, but most).
Thatās not the case for every Vertigo book, though. Take Animal Man. Similar to Swamp Thing, Animal Man started in the mainstream DCU and then got shuffled into Vertigo. While a part of Vertigo, things got really, really weird for Buddy Baker and family. So weird that most of that stuff has not survived or at least is not mentioned in modern continuity.
So, I wouldnāt say that the Vertigo material is strictly not canon. However, I would say that most of it existed in this limbo state where it may or may not be canon. A lot of it operated in its own, little world without acknowledging the wider DCU. A lot of it got really weird (which I liked, but still). In the end, thatās why I caution about taking Vertigo stories as canon. In the case of Sandman Mystery Theatre, it could be canon or it may not be depending on which way the wind blows.
For the record, I totally agree with you on a lot of this. I also mentioned my love of Sandman Mystery Theatre. Iām really into Johnsā JSA and I liked the fact that Wesley passed the torch to Sand, so no arguments on any of that. You can read most (not all, but most) of the JSAās Golden Age adventures on DCUI through All-Star Comics.
No need to apologize! You were just expressing concern for the direction of a character you enjoy. Thereās nothing wrong with that. To clarify my motives, I read your arguments and saw some potential truths and inaccuracies and wanted to share what I know and clear some things up. It wasnāt my intention to chastise and I apologize if it came off that way.
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I think thereās a whole lot of stuff being assumed here that we just donāt know. Based on what the article I posted and the quotes I excerpted said, it feels like at least the first issue is much more focused on the past.
Well, I personally recommend getting most news about upcoming comics directly from the horsesās mouth, so to speak, by hitting the DC News tab! Thatās most reliable for me. News | DC
This is the way. I think these minis are extremely exciting, and I hope we have some great convos about them when they come out in 5 months! (Oof, that seems so far away!)
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Thatās very nice of you. You didnāt come off as chastising to me. I donāt know a lot about DCās earlier history so if Iām wrong, then it should be pointed out to me. The point of life is to keep learning and once we stop learning, then we stop living.
Thank you for filling me in about Vertigo as well because I was only 14 when that line started so I donāt know much about it. I remember that I was told to stay away from it by my Mom because it was for adults only. I just read Grant Morrison 's Animal Man a couple of years ago. I came across the complete series at my local library in graphic novel format.
This was before I had DCUI, of course. And I read them because I do love Grant Morrison. But Animal Man was very strange and not really my cup of tea. In fact, I got so turned off by that series that itās put me off the character of Buddy Baker altogether.
That series left a bad taste in my mouth. But a lot of people cherish it and love Animal Man and I donāt knock him or them for loving him. Heās just not for me. I love Swamp Thing though .
With all my heart ! Alan Moore was a great writer and he created one of my top three favorite Green Lanterns, Mogo . And, oh, yeah, I know DCUI doesnāt have all of the JSAās adventures on it but I will definitely read what they do have. I wish they had more of the older stuff on there but I understand why they donāt.
The printing process was really bad back in the days and a lot of comics need to be remastered and that takes time. Iād read somewhere that the printing process was at itās worst in the late-'70s. The paper was cheap. The ink bled through the pages.
Thatās why a lot of stuff from the '70s isnāt on DCUI yet. They have to be repaired and remastered and thatās gonna take time. So I read whatās available to me and Iām happy with something other than having nothing.Thanks again, @TheCosmicMoth, for helping me out with some clarifications and for filling me in on some of DCās history.
I would love to find out someday if you know about what happened to DC in the late-'70s - the big implosion. I donāt know what happened. I was born in '79 so that was just a little bit before my time . Iāve heard it hinted at on certain comic archive websites but I donāt really know the whole story.
I would love to hear it someday, if you know it that is. I love comic books and I love learning new things about them because then it shows me that thereās still so much I donāt know about comics that remains a mystery and I love a good mystery. Thatās one of the reasons why I love Sandman Mystery Theatre and also why I love Batman so much as well because he is the Worldās Greatest Detective and heās always involved in a mystery . So, if you know about what happened to DC back then, @TheCosmicMoth, Iād be willing to listen 
.
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Hey, no problem!
Honestly, I donāt know much about the 70ās either. I know a bit, but itās my weakest decade (I was born in '85). I have more interest in the Gold and Silver Ages than I do the Bronze. When it comes to the DC Implosion, I probably wouldnāt do it justice. I know the basics: DC Explosion was a planned expansion of both comic sizes and the number of titles quickly turned into the DC Implosion or mass cancellations due to lagging sales and an ice storm that caused shipping issues. Bob Rozakis did a good blog post on it, though:
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Thanks so much ! Iām just beginning to explore DCās Golden and Silver Ageās right now thanks in large part to DCUI. Both those eras are largely unexplored to me outside of reading a couple Green Lantern: The Silver Age graphic novels and the first comic which was a Brave and the Bold I believe to feature the Justice League in it. Itās the one where they fought Starro. And Iāve read a couple of Silver Age Flash comic books that featured Eobard Thawneās first appearance (because heās my favorite Flash villain) and the story where Jay Garrick made his return.
Want to hear a funny story? I actually almost got that Flash comic, physically, the one with Reverse Flashās first appearance in it a couple of years back. I was waiting to get my refund during the pandemic and I was going to use part of it to purchase that comic. The comic book store I was going to a few years back managed to acquire a copy and he was selling it for like $300 and I figured that was a fantastic price for it because itās so old and itās also Reverse Flash so his first appearance to me is priceless.
The only thing that derailed my purchase was not receiving the refund on time. So somebody else came in and bought it before I could. I was disappointed because that wouldāve been the first Silver Age comic I owned outside of reprints, of course. Right now I just finished Supergirl and Metalloās first appearance and I loved it 
! I had no idea that Metallo debuted back in the '50s!
That was pretty cool discovering that. I always thought that Metallo was created in the '80s because I remember seeing the cover of a Superman comic with Superman hunkering down in some rubble and Metallo is above him and is atttacking him with Kryptonite rays from back in the mid-'80s. Of course, that was my first time seeing Metallo and I was only 7 because that was the cover to Superman #1 post-Crisis. Hey, learn something new every day, rightā? I guess I got a lot to look forward to because my primary eras of DC havs been everything after 1985.
I have been exploring more issues prior to Crisis and really enjoying them. I just really love DC ! I have so much fun reading them. In fact, Iām going to read the new releases this week and get caught up with those after I read the article that you sent me.
Thanks again for the link, @TheCosmicMoth .
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Woof! Thatās a bummer! That would have been a pretty great addition to the collection. Summerās coming up and itās almost convention time, though, and those are great places to find old issues like that.
Glad that youāre enjoying the classics! Keep it up! The Silver Age is my favorite.
Youāre very welcome 
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Yep. My introduction to the JSA was in the 70ās and they were not tied to WW2 then, and were portrayed as being about 10-15 years older than the JLAerās. Nor were they tied to WW2 in the 50ās or 60ās. In fact they didnāt get tied to WW2 until the 1980ās with the generation who were teens at that time and were reading āAll-Star Squadronā. A comic that appeared 40 years after the start of WW2. The excuses for the JSAers still being around was ridiculous in the early 90ās, itās exponentially more ridiculous in 2023, 82 years after the start of WW2.
We donāt tie Hal, Barry and other Silver Agers to the 60ās, we donāt tie the FF, Iron Man or The Hulk to the Cold War despite their obvious Cold War origins and itās ridiculous to tie the JSA to WW2 because us Gen Xerās enjoyed a comic put out 40 years ago. Time to stick the classic JSA back on Earth-Two and let them have their origins in the 80ās or 90ās if you want to keep their legacy versions, or have them 10 - 15 years younger than the JLA if you donāt.
The JSA is my favorite team, I want the same rules that apply for keeping other heroes young in play for them.
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Welcome to the community.
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Welcome to the community @thelensman.948! 
Please feel free to let the moderator team know if you need anything!
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