DC ABCs Part 1 (A-G)

So I've been doing these ABCs of the DC universe here lately. Mainly to keep myself busy while I'm script writing. (Which is going a LOT slower than I had thought it would.) Also it's allowing me to play around with some drawing and coloring techniques so I can produce more work faster. (Like I mentioned before, when I'm ready to release the new comic, I want the entire story completed before even putting the first page out.) So I've been doing these things for the past few weeks. (Not to mention since the comic I'm doing is a more superhero type comic, it's good practice.)

The idea was the focus on the lesser known and outright obscure characters in the DC universe, just because I feel that's one of DC's strongest elements is just the sheer amount of weird concepts it's some up with over the last eight decades. Many of these were chosen by others. And I normally post these on my DeviantArt gallery, but I figured I've post them too in groups. So let's start.

A is for ATLEE: First we have Atlee, the most recent Terra. Power Girl's sidekick and all around adorable subterranean girl. She stayed home to hang around her parents after the Ultra-Humanite tried to take over her body, and we hadn't heard from her since. (And with the new universe re-boot, we probably never will.)

B is for BZZD: Next up is the Green Lantern Bzzd, who's essentially a space hornet. Not the strangest Green Lantern ever made.

C is for CIR-EL: Cir-El here is from a period in time where due to various reasons I had stopped reading a lot of mainstream comics for a bit, so I'm not as familiar with her as I honestly should be. From like late 2002 to late 2005, I had gravitated away from comics by the big two. (I felt they were getting a little too dark and taking themselves waaaaay too seriously. And let's face it, superheroes are by default, silly four color fun. It wasn't until Power Girl's miniseries in 2005 that I came back to the DC universe... But it's still a problem that is really prominent in comics these days.) I'm only a bit familiar with her from her brief appearance in the Public Enemies story. (And her character was taken out of the animated movie as well.) It got even more baffling when around this time, as I was just starting to catch back up, they re-introduced Kara Zor-El as Supergirl in the comics (like in the very next storyarc) and they never mentioned Cir-El again, so I was left scratching my head for a while thinking "Here's this dark haired girl with a kinda bland costume... Who the hell WAS that?" Of course with the miracle of the internet, I was able to catch back up and get answers.

D is for DELIRIUM: We have the youngest member of the enigmatic family of godlike beings known as the Endless, Delirium! (And her big brother Dream too.) I have a warm spot in my heart for Delirium, and for the entire Sandman comic series too. Back in late high school in the early 90s (Gawd, does that age me or what?) when everyone else was drooling over the latest issues of Spawn and WildC.A.T.s., I had discovered this quirky little book called Sandman. It was very different, and it was very intriguing. I think we all remember that first comic where when we realize that comics can be much MUCH more than superheroes and fighting, where we realized it was a form of art that could be taken seriously, and not just as popcorn Michael Bay-ish entertainment. Sandman issue #44 was that book for me, later followed by Matt Wagner's Grendel. (Issue #44 was part four of the Brief Lives storyarc, for those curious.)

E is for EMPRESS: A supporting character from Peter David's run on the comic book Young Justice. (Related but not the same as the current cartoon show.) Now I got to be honest, as much as I like the current cartoon show, I really did not like the old Peter David scribed book. It was about that time I started to feel that whatever magic he used to bring to his comics, he was losing it. (Seriously, the first issue had the trio of Impulse, Superboy and Robin fight a villainess named "Mighty Endowed" who possessed large gravity-handicapped breasts. Now, I appreciate a good pun for a name as well... But the entire time while reading the first bunch of issues from that series, I felt like I did watching 'Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back', where I know these are supposed to be jokes... But I'm just not laughing. And I couldn't help but to think that I wasn't the target audience. Anyway, Empress here came from after I had dropped the book from my old comic shop's pull list. (This was about that time I stopped reading a lot of DC and Marvel books, as I mentioned with C for Cir-El.)

I know nothing about her, other than her real name is "Anita Fite", which another one of those pun names, that I SHOULD appreciate... I wouldn't mind catching up and reading up on her, but I'm sorry... She only appeared in a book I DON'T want to read. So I literally have no opinion or knowledge about her. I was thinking maybe she'd show up on the new Young Justice show, and fill me in with some information, but it looks like they passed on her for Artemis, who I've grown to rather like.

F is for FLAMEBIRD: Flamebird recently made her appearance in the recent pages of Batwoman. I've always had a love for Flamebird, because of the sheer history of the character. If y'all haven't figured it by now, I'm a huge comic book history buff, to the point I even gave serious thought to writing a text book or novel on comic book history, from the Platinum Age all the way up to the current age. (Which I like to refer to the Titanium Age.) Bette Kane here has a really interesting history, especially when you factor in all the politics behind her creation. (I touched upon a little of it here: [link] ) So whenever Flamebird pops up, I'm always happy about it.

Having said all that... *sigh*

...I don't like Batwoman. (The comic, not the character.)

Oh, I think as a character design, it's really dynamic and fun looking, and as a character she's okay in her various guest appearances and I liked her well enough. But in her own book?

For years, I was told by everyone and their grandmother that Batwoman was an amazingly well written comic book with fantastic writing and awesome art. So after years of hearing this and wondering, I finally got the trade paperback collecting Elegy and Go... And after reading, all I could wonder is just why am I supposed to care about this character? She comes across as this socially deficient emo control freak, bordering on 'Mary Sue' territories. (Which may ironically make her a perfect fit in the DC Nu52.) I heard so many people praising the comics, but I just don't understand why. The book is kinda... Pretentious, I'm sorry to say. The writing isn't Greg Rucka's best. The art, while pretty, is so stylistic that there's sometimes I have no idea what the hell is going on. That changed with Amy Reeder's art... But she's pretty damn good, so that goes without saying. (But... She's leaving soon.)

And then there's how the other characters react to her. Batman pretty much treats her like an equal, and I'm like “Uh, NO! No. No. Nonononono no nononono nooooooo. NO.” Batman gives Superman crap. SUPERMAN! The godlike farmboy who's been at this crimefighting business as long as he has. Every member of the Batfamily he has given some serious grief to, trying to force them out of this lifestyle. Dick, Tim, Jason, Babs, Stephanie, Helena, Selina... Hell, even Dinah and Ollie. The only exception being Cassandra, and that poor girl is a whole messy drama on her own. But Batwoman? Totally treats her like an equal. Now, someone told me that it wasn't Bruce in those stories, but Dick... So that makes more sense then. (Because he always was a lot more easy going than Bruce, and he seems to have a weakness for redheads.) But that doesn't excuse how Kate Kane treated Bette.

If we're to accept history as it is now, Elizabeth Kane has been doing this crimefighting thing longer than any member of the Batfamily except for Bruce and Dick. So when Kate Kane was getting kicked out of West Point, Bette was running around with the Titans, or at the very least fighting with her Aunt Kathy, the original Batwoman. And of course, the writing of the comic has to go out of their way to make Bette seem like an incompetent twit, getting put into intensive care on her first outing, after a fight with Kate.

The thing is, I know there's an awesome lot of potential with Kate Kane, and they could easily build her up to be an amazing character in her own right... I just wish they didn't have to drag down a perfectly good character to do so. Ahhh, I babbled too long on that. Let's finish off with...

G is for GLEEK: Hehe... monkey!


More to come in time. :)