Yea, so I still haven’t bothered with HEROES IN CRISIS issue number four.
As far as this series goes, well, actually, probably any mainline DC COMICS series, torture porn and super-heroics really just don’t go together. Wow, too strong you say? But no, it’s not strong enough. But maybe HEROES IN CRISIS, so far, isn’t like torture porn. No, it’s more like a mocumentary snuff film paced like a 1950’s soap opera. That’s just strong enough.
Seriously, after four issues out of nine, do the readers even have the slightest idea how many characters, big and small, have actually been lambed to the slaughter?
I know this started out a good idea, and I know I’m going to sound like a broken record, here-- I know this started out as something else, sort of a reversal on the WATCHMAN motif. “No, no,” exclaimed someone high-up at DC COMICS, “We won’t use original characters!! We’ll use the existing DC pantheon!”
Original characters would works so much better for this drama. That way, no one could ever cry you killed off their favorite, and future and current comic creators could not plot out in their heads the triumphant return of said favorite character until such time as somebody actually pulls it off. Welcome to comics.
“But this time it’s permanent!” someone high up at DC comics yells. “This time we’re going to give you closure!!”
Don’t be silly. Again, this is comics. More specifically, this is super-hero. Nobody WANTS closure on their favorite costumed icon.
And yea, I know. Controversy makes money, and this could all be a long-range plan to go Rebirth, and then really, really dark, and then more like Rebirth, and then really really dark every few years to build interest in the comics industry.
Controversy doesn’t always make art, though. Just sayin’.
Worst of all, though, is the most likely outcome of HEROES IN CRISIS. The killer will turn out to be one of the heroes, iconic or otherwise. He/she snapped under the pressure and stress of being a defender of humanity, and lost their own. “It happens in real life,” someone at DC COMICS says, to heroes both in and out of uniform. It’s happened in comics, too-- both to the heroes, and their supporting cast. The HAL JORDAN GREEN LANTERN snapped. Yea, that didn’t last. The ATOM’s wife, JEAN LORING, snapped. I don’t think that story is part of NEW 52 or REBIRTH continuity. "This time, " that higher-up at DC COMICS exclaims, “it’s going to stand!!”
Please see the sentence above about future and current comics creators.
If super-heroes are a form of modern mythology, and arguably, that’s exactly what they are-- they can’t die. Not permanently. Myths can only change for the times, sometimes into something quite new, sometimes back into something surprisingly like their original form.
But snuff films aren’t drama. You can try to sell me on otherwise.
But I ain’t buying it.