Should I Read The First Crisis Trade

[Tobias March]

Was Crisis on Infinite Earths a good story? Received wisdom has it DC dropped the ball on re-establishing continuity after the storyline finished - that the Crisis was well-intentioned, but ultimately didn't deliver. So we had Zero Hour and the latest Crisis. And in the Monitoring the Monitors thread here there's speculation as to whether Infinite Crisis has actually finished rolling itself out.

Is it worth shelling out the cash? Is it a trade worth owning? Was the story in itself complete and coherent or just a mish-mash of deux exes? Lemme know..

[Mike Marino]

I wouldn't reccomend it. In terms of continutity fixes, unless you read a good deal of pre-crises stuff, you probably won't care about them, since the post crisis world is all you know. At least that's the way I felt. I had never read any golden age comics up until that point, so the fates of those characters, or many of the other characters that appeared in the book that I knew nothing about meant little to me.

It's interesting because it's one of the first (if not the first, I'm not sure) crossover of that size and that nature, but as a story, it's just not very engaging. A mish-mash of deus-exes is an excellent way to put it.

[justcrash]

Was Crisis on Infinite Earths a good story? Received wisdom has it DC dropped the ball on re-establishing continuity after the storyline finished - that the Crisis was well-intentioned, but ultimately didn't deliver. So we had Zero Hour and the latest Crisis. And in the Monitoring the Monitors thread here there's speculation as to whether Infinite Crisis has actually finished rolling itself out.

Is it worth shelling out the cash? Is it a trade worth owning? Was the story in itself complete and coherent or just a mish-mash of deux exes? Lemme know..


yes, great story line from a great creative team. It didn't do much in the way of fixing things (well, ok, for like the first 6 months things were smoothed over... lol) but nonetheless, it is at LEAST worth the cost of the trade. :)

[DDM]

I like Crisis On Infinite Earths because it has every single character in the DC Universe; likewise, it is a very good, dynamic story with important deaths of Supergirl, Barry Allen Flash, the Huntress II & Robin I of Earth-2, the last appearance of the Crime Syndicate of America from Earth-3. Crisis also explains the Oans & Krona's role in the creation of the Monitor, Anti-Monitor, & the rift which sets in the motion the Oan's split to become Zamorans (female Oans) & Controllers.

Crisis On Infinite Earths is the last appearance of all the heroes & villains before DC revamped most of them for the single universe. After Crisis, Batman never talked about Earth-2's Huntress; likewise, Earth-1 Superman became post-Crisis Superman at some point not remembering the Earth-2 Superman nor the pre-Crisis JSA. The Earth-1 Wonder Woman "died" to be reborn as the new Wonder Woman who first appears in Wonder Woman #1 (volume 2).

Crisis On Infinite Earths is a landmark storyline which literally changed DC forever. This is a promise DC kept.

George Perez's art is another reason to buy it.

[shaxper]

The first Crisis was a great storyline, but it relied upon so much knowledge of characters and histories in the DCU at that time period. I still get confused when I read it. Honestly, I don't think that either it nor Infinite Crisis are required reading for any but the most devoted of DCU fans. You can get by without it. It's a good story, but it's also pretty confusing from a "who the hell was that guy?" perspective.

[Buried Alien]

It still has the biggest superhero fight scenes *ever*. Nothing matches COIE for sheer size and scope.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Paul Newell]

It's a fun little read.

Did I say little? I mean't huge. :)

[rerun]

It's pretty cool. A little confusing at first (especially if you weren't reading comics back then), but better as you progress.

[Fenix]

YES!

Forget about the who´s who. I started my comic collection with it. I knew nothing of pre-crisis dc, it was harsh to understand, I won´t deny that, but I´m still thinking that it was the best "crossover company event" ever. :).

[Kara Zor El]

I'd say yes. It's worth it just to look at the pictures. However it is in the old style of strory telling and therefor very dated. So if you can handle old fashioned dialogue etc then you will enjoy it. but it's no Watchmen.

[Rutsah]

If you go to the dc site and read the history of the dc universe it has the salient points. I bought it and it kindled an interest in infinite crisis but if I'd done my research I could've easily learned enough to follow along. The Perez art makes it worth it for me.

[shyguy]

I'd say buy it if you like George Perez' art; avoid it otherwise.

I don't even think of it so much as a story as a tool to get from one way of publishing superhero comics to another. As such, I think that the story is, at times, both a mess and just plain stupid. I also think that it's really boring at times.

But, again, it's George Perez at the top of his game, drawing just about every character ever to be published in a DC comic.

[marshal99]

COIE was an event they planned 2 years in advance , they actually set up the monitor appearances in silhouette for one year in various comics before the crisis actually happened.

COIE was a historic event never to be repeated ever again , on a scale that nobody else will ever top. For those who do not know the pre-crisis DCU , it will be confusing and the story itself will hold no emotional attachment since you do not know these characters as they are not the same ones in the current DCU.

[comicstar100]

Great story, my favorite trade along with kingdom come. Its really cool to go back and read the first crisis after you read IC.:cool:

[DDM]

COIE was an event they planned 2 years in advance , they actually set up the monitor appearances in silhouette for one year in various comics before the crisis actually happened.

COIE was a historic event never to be repeated ever again , on a scale that nobody else will ever top. For those who do not know the pre-crisis DCU , it will be confusing and the story itself will hold no emotional attachment since you do not know these characters as they are not the same ones in the current DCU.

While the Monitor & Lyla appeared 2 years before the Crisis begun, Marv Wolfman has said Crisis On Infinite Earths: History of the DC Universe (the book's original title) started 5 years earlier. Research took about 5 years for Len Wein, Peter Sanderson, Marv Wolfman, George Perez, Paul Levitz, & numerous other editors & writers before the story begun...

[Shellhead]

While the Monitor & Lyla appeared 2 years before the Crisis begun, Marv Wolfman has said Crisis On Infinite Earths: History of the DC Universe (the book's original title) started 5 years earlier. Research took about 5 years for Len Wein, Peter Sanderson, Marv Wolfman, George Perez, Paul Levitz, & numerous other editors & writers before the story begun...

Wow. Marv may have just finished reading The Courts of Chaos when he thought up Crisis on Infinite Earths.

[stealthwise]

I wouldn't recommend it really. I think that so much time has passed that the book itself has become outdated, and it follows the standard cartoon storyline in terms of anti-climax after anti-climax after anti-climax. The dialogue is very 80s as well, and loaded with tons of exposition.

[Buried Alien]

I wouldn't recommend it really. I think that so much time has passed that the book itself has become outdated, and it follows the standard cartoon storyline in terms of anti-climax after anti-climax after anti-climax. The dialogue is very 80s as well, and loaded with tons of exposition.

Tobias should check it out and judge for himself. Just because something is old doesn't automatically mean that it's bad. Quite often, I find it's the opposite of that.


Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[TommyV]

Say what you will, but my feeling is that anyone who collects DC comics should have this in their collection. It's certainly not something to just "pick up and read" whenever you feel like (it's a committment), but it's just something you have to have. Otherwise, it would be like having a bunch of Michael Jackson albums and not having "Thriller." Or something.

[Lorendiac]

I would say it's definitely worth owning and worth reading, if you are already reasonably familiar with the old Pre-Crisis continuity regarding the differences between Earth-1 and Earth-2 and Earth-3 and so forth.

(I was already familiar with that stuff from when I started reading some DC titles regularly in the early 1980s, before COIE ever came along. So when I eventually got around to reading the full COIE story, I was impressed and I actually understood and appreciated who all these weird people (different versions of Superman and Wonder Woman, for instance) were supposed to be!)

On the other hand! If you don't really know or care which version of which character concept was from which parallel world in the Pre-Crisis, Silver Age/Bronze Age continuity, then you can probably live a perfectly happy life without ever seeing all the nitpicking details of how Marv Wolfman did his best to respect the old continuity throughout most of the COIE series, before tearing it apart by destroying most of those Earths and merging the last handful into one "new and improved" Post-Crisis Earth.