Reboot the Comics Continuity

There are rumors circulating that DC Comics is rebooting their continuity again. Not 5G which has been cancelled with creators receiving kill fees and all, but something else. Whether true or not I thought it’d be fun to see how you guys would reboot the comics. What would you wanna see happen?

Personally, I wouldn’t mind seeing DC start from scratch and work it’s way back up. It’d take awhile to get my favorite characters (Nightwing & Titans) back, but I think it’d be worth it cuz the universe has something to work towards. And it’s the perfect opportunity to add new stories to the lore like they tried to do with Court of Owls (loved that story but never understood how or why they’re just now showing up in Batman’s career; always thought they should show up in his early career). I think it might also be good to bring in new titles and grow the universe in phases with a big event or milestone ending each phase, for example phase one leading to the formation of the JL. It’d also be cool to see titles not set within the current line of comics and I think Detective, Action Comics, and Batman Beyond are great candidates for that. Beyond could start back at 1 in it’s own Bruce Timm universe, while Detective and Action comics continue their legacy numbering (since people seem to like that sorta thing) and maybe set together in an old universe or something starting up where they left off?

How would you do it?

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I’d do it several years from now. :stuck_out_tongue:

They could always do what I thought they should do with the New 52: pick a certain number of titles that exist in that new universe (e.g. Batman and Superman) while keeping plenty of titles going strong in the previous universe (e.g. Detective Comics and Action Comics). I think that’s what you might have been suggesting, too, but I’d probably place less than 50% of the line in the new universe. New readers aren’t going to be picking up 20 titles a month.

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Yeah I agree!

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Don’t think this is a popular opinion, but I wouldn’t reboot, relaunch, soft reboot, or re-whatever.

I would make the beginning of every arc a jumping on point for new readers. If the writer wants to tie into stuff from older issues, be it recent, old or old old, just dedicate a page or two (or 10) to catch the reader up, and give reference to the source material if the reader wants to explore said material. If the writer wants the story to stand on its own, so be it.

I like big epic stories with sprawling events; my preferred story type actually. They just don’t all have to to change the DC universe as we know it.

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I agree not all events have to changes continuity. I honestly wish they’d do more events that weren’t that scale.
However, I do think building timelines is a must and honestly that’s something that really lacks in DC right now. Also don’t like all these imprint like wonder and stuff. I don’t understand the purpose. Like why can’t it all be one print one universe, etc.? If you need more teen heroes then put out more teen here titles. They don’t need a whole other imprint to themselves.

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I get that a good segment of the fanbase is into continuity/canon/timelines. Can’t say I’m not intrigued by it to some degree myself. I don’t dig into it too much though. In the past 6 months, I went from Kirby’s New Gods & Jimmy Olsen, to John Byrne’s Superman, to Loeb’s Superman Batman, to Miller’s Dark Knight stuff (out of universe, I know). Even dabbled a bit with Grant Morrison Batman (I did it wrong; started at the end :joy:). That’s in addition to the current series I’m following. Honestly, I find that how the stories are interconnected or related (if at all) affects my enjoyment much less than the actual events of said stories. I may be in a minority here, but it’s how I honestly feel.

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That’s cool. I mean, for I just like to establish some sort of history with characters. Like when New 52 started writers just seemed to choose where each character was in their career and eventually started contradicting each other and I hated that. That’s as far as I’m worried about a timeline. Just lmk what really happened and how this connects to whatever it connects to. And then when they tried to fix all of it with those big events it was never really said what was really the truth. Like an official timeline was never set. Yknow what I mean?

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I personally think the imprints is a good idea. It helps consumers find titles that suit them. Also to be honest, they are better imo. Wonder Comics, Zoom, Ink and Black Label have all delivered better books than the mainline the last years.

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While that may be true (honestly I wouldn’t know) I just don’t understand the point. You say it helps consumers find titles that suit them but I mean if you’re looking for teen heroes then look for titles with teens front and center. Why does it need an imprint and why does it need to be different than the main line?

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They have different curators. Teen in main line continuity gets brainwashed by Bdsm fetishist and put in leather and made to hurt children when Snyder wants an edgelord.

Teen books curated by Zoom/Ink management think more about what they do because they explicitly target younger readers.

Wonder Comics is spearheaded by Bendis and does good work at improving diversity. Main line is bats and friends.

Different imprints are managed differently.

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I think part of the issue that fans are all over the place on what they want. All of our opinions, outside of loving DC, are going to be different. What I would love to see is an understanding by the fans that these are just stories and acting like they need to fit into continuity stifles creativity. I don’t need a Batman story to acknowledge Knightfall. I need it to be an entertaining read, since this is for entertainment. Rebooting takes away some of the awe of DC though. Legacy was what they were known for and they were respected for that. Now they aren’t. I would say they need to figure out what they want to currently be first. I wish they had leaned into infinite earths and told stories that they said were on different earths so they didn’t have to connect every single story. If they wanted something to be main continuity, they could just say hey this is sticking with the character. It isnt like they couldn’t make this publicly known in the social media world we live in. Telling the most entertaining stories though is by far more important to me. This is my leisure time and rebooting every few years makes me unsure what to buy. It is disorienting, but it can also keep things fresh if that is what they are wanting. If they were to reboot, I would want them to go back to classic versions being represented

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At this point, I think I would want it to mostly stay the same but find ways to retcon Jon/Superboy, Wally, Alfred, and the newest sociopathic Damian. Those are just my personal problems with writing rather than continuity.
And reintroduce a bwahahahaha JLI.
I think they botched New 52 by picking and choosing who rebooted and who was a soft reboot and who wasn’t really a reboot at all. By his 5th year, Bruce had a teenage son with an archenemy and at least 3 other grownup Robins?
I wouldn’t want to go back to pre New 52 though because then you would lose things like Court of Owls.

I really really really want a new Who’s Who and a new History of the DC Universe.

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Then somebody need to add Nightwing and Titans to a damn imprint. I’m tired of DC doin my ppl dirty!

Damian was 12 for years and just for rebirth was given a birthday to be 13 so they could add him to Teen Titans

I would love them to actually write Nightwing correctly and manage him right!!! That’s what I want.

I meant his most recent sociopathic turn in Teen Titans not to get rid of him altogether.

That’d be interesting! I’d like to see it. I mean, I like Seeley’s version of Bludhaven better than Dixon’s “asbestosis town USA” version. A city lit up with neon lights meant to distract from the filth underneath feels more like Dick rather than a rip-off of Gotham and Batman. Seeley just needed a little corruption, and maybe even a part of town similar to Dixon’s that was decrepit and dirty. Also didn’t like the Run-Offs, a waste of cool characters that could’ve helped round out a rogues gallery which is something they really need to build for him.
Sorry, I rant. What I’m trying to say is if Dixon did come back I hope he takes the things other writers did better while incorporating some of his old stuff.

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I think if anything, the continuity is going to revert to pre New 52. There are going to be so many spoilers in my theory that have to do with current issues on the racks, I’d have to blot out almost this whole post, so be warned if you are keeping up with the comics on here that are a year old.

As several titles have been canceled or discontinued for stories reaching their natural conclusions, I now officially pull every DC title with the “Universe” tab on the cover, i.e. every title in continuity. I say this because having all of these books is largely what I base my theory on. In my head I’ve basically been making a thread of events with yarn connecting them.

So let’s start with the Flash. Of course Wally has been back since Rebirth and slowly, everyone began remembering him, but recently he’s been imbued with some of Dr. Manhattan’s ability and currently sits on the Mobius chair. His wife Linda Park doesn’t remember him, and his kids are still lost to the state of “life” in current continuity. More on that in a bit. Barry just managed to pull Max Mercury and Jesse Quick from the Speed force. Jay Garrick and Bart Allen are back, and some people remember them from the past.

Staying with Bart, the Young Justice crew, and touching on Teen Titans, in Young Justice, Bart explained why no one initially remembers Connor or their time previous in YJ. Connor of course is back, Jon Kent got aged up to around 16-18, and is 1,000 years in the future with The Legion, leaving a void on present day earth for a Superboy, I’m looking at you Connor. Tim is no longer going by Drake, went back to HIS classic Robin uniform, and is going by Robin again. In Teen Titans, Damian has quit being Robin, so connecting these two events, it seems Tim May be gearing up to be THE Robin again.

There seems to be a connection between Joker War tie ins, and Batman and the Outsiders. Barbara had to rip out her implant to keep the Joker from being able to control her body, and when Luke Fox put it back, he warned her if she ever took it out again, it would not work again. Foreshadowing perhaps? So that leads to Outsiders. With that book ending, it seems as though Batman is stepping aside due to trusting Black Lightning, and Shiva had told him it was time to let Cass be what she was meant to be. So what if Babs has to yank out the spine implant again, during the course of Joker War, and resumes her role as Oracle, and Cass becomes Batgirl again? Babs’ BG title
Is ending after all with the forthcoming issue 50.

Hawkman is coming to an end, but not before he and Shiara were granted one last life together where they were happiest. They were transported to the 1940’s and they were with the JSA in the current issue. What if the end of Hawkman leads to a new ongoing JSA?

So here’s my theory: given the fact Wonder Woman is currently trying to save all universes in Death Metal, and Wally has the power of Manhattan and the Mobius chair, and is heavily involved in Death Metal, I believe he is going to reset the Mulitverse to pre New 52. His motivations would be clear as it would restore his relationship with Linda and the kids, he clearly has the power boost to go along with the Speed Force, and for the most part the DC Universe would be at the very least, no worse off from where it is now, speaking of where the characters are at now, in their fictional lives. And some of the events, were they to happen, have been somewhat “organically” resetting, or have been eluded to happening. Tim Drake/Robin, Batgirl, Oracle, Hawks/JSA.

If this happens, it would be having our cake and eating it too. For those of us “old heads”, we would get the continuity we loved most. Silver and Bronze Age were not AS connected, so I would argue as far as tightly connected events affecting the whole of the line, from around Crisis, to right before Flashpoint is the most beloved connected continuity. It’s been nine years since we had this continuity, so it falls to what’s old becomes new again. This would also serve as a “reboot” and a way to try and spike sales as younger readers who may have jumped on DC with New 52, or Rebirth would not be as familiar with this cannon, and it would be completely fresh for them. That’s my mindset reading the current line​:four_leaf_clover:

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If this turns out to be true that’d be really cool! I do hope that in doing that though, they bring over some of the better things from this timeline like Court of Owls, Grayson, Azzarelo and Chiang’s Wonder Woman run, Abnett’s Titans (though I do feel it was missing characters like Starfire, Raven, and Beast Boy but it was really good), Seeley’s version of Bludhaven (though IK Bludhaven was destroyed by Chemo in DCnU but still), and they weren’t really part of this timeline much but I would love to see them bring in Kaldur and Artemis from Young Justice (there is a similar character to Kaldur but it’s not exactly him). Personally, I like Stephanie better as Batgirl than Cass but since Steph has Spoiler which people seem to like Cass is the only one left without a fleshed out hero identity so it makes sense.

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I think starting over fresh is not a great idea; we’ve seen the problems that causes. Maybe just do a better fleshing out of what from pre52 happened, if any of that is still murky.
However, where Cassandra Cain is concerned–yeah, this’ll be no surprise to anyone: If I had the reigns, I’d basically toss out all of Tynion’s awful reinventions (not just Cass, of course). I don’t need or want her to be Batgirl again, just give her the good origin, the history and growth from better writers, and none of the infantilization or hackneyed poetry from 2016 on. Steph, I think, could still go by Spoiler, but acknowledge her history, and specifically her struggles to be accepted by Batman and the crew. Sure, she could go back to be being Batgirl if they wanted Babs back in the wheelchair–but you could keep Steph, Babs, and Cass, but get the role of Oracle filled by another character (someone from before the Flashpoint mistake).

The prospective “revised” timeline DC showed off last year gave me some hope they were heading in a direction much like I described above. But with the recent shake-ups, it’s fairly indistinct what their intentions are.