The Karate Kid parts....

[Zero Hunter]

This has been the biggest waste of time in the Countdown so far. I love KK and have been looking forward to what they have planned with him, but so far it has been such a waste to even have him in the book. It took them 10 damn issues to get to a point where they can actully do something with him. What was the point? I don't know who is writing his part of the book, but so far they have failed very badly. The Lightning Saga story ended a month ago, but instead of KK's story starting right after that we got another month of him standing around or getting rehashes of the JLA/JSA story. This week they finally caught up to the end of that story with KK and Una (Tirplicate Girl) heading off to do what they have to do. Why couldn't they have done this 4 weeks ago? The pacing of this book is just so far beyond bad it isn't even funny anymore.

I am really wanting to keep with this series, but damn it is getting hard.

[froinlaven]

Don't waste your time. Spend your money on something else.

[Jack Zodiac]

The problem with the Karate Kid part of the story (one I've completely forgotten was one of the main storylines) is that it had to wait for the "Lightning Saga" crossover to finish, which shot the whole "continuity spine" idea for the book in the foot.

[Zero Hunter]

Thats what I think is the worst part. The Lightning Saga has been over, and yet we still got more pointless filler for another month. The stuff that happened in Countdown 41 should have been shown weeks ago.

Just really bad planning on the creators parts. They must be noticing that a big chunk of people are not exactely loving what is going on in the book right now.

[Jack Zodiac]

Sales have been good compared to typical monthly titles, but they've been crap compared to 52. They shed over then thousand readers in the first month.

[Flash's Lightning]

They must be noticing that a big chunk of people are not exactely loving what is going on in the book right now.

I'm not reading Countdown yet, but just wondering where you got those stats from?

[jadrax]

To be fair though, 52 did phenomenally well and caught everyone off guard. I doubt DC really went into this thinking it would be replicateable, especially when they removed the all-star writing cast.

[PastePotPete]

Yeah, these little cross-overs within Countdown aren't working. If the book is the spine of the DC Universe, then its crossover scenes should be up to date and we shouldn't be seeing a scene we already read a month ago.

Also, recreating a scene in its entirety from another book, with no changes, is almost like punishing readers for buying other DC books. Oh, you read the Lightning Saga? Well, guess what? You're going to be cheated out of a couple pages of Countdown this week. Yeah, it'll be 22 pages for people who didn't read the Lightning Saga, and 20 pages for you.

If a cross-over scene takes place at the same time as a scene in another book, then the countdown cross-over scene should be like a deleted scene on a DVD. You get extra background. You get extra information that makes that story better.

But don't let those scenes lag! CD 41 should have shown us where Karate Kid is NOW, a month after the Lightning Saga. Just drop us in en media res. We're smart people. We'll figure it out. And it would be WAY more exciting than re-reading scenes.

The "Real-time" of 52 limited its writers a lot in what they could and couldn't do with structure of the story. But without it, Countdown is a mess.

[Zero Hunter]

I'm not reading Countdown yet, but just wondering where you got those stats from?

Just by the general word of mouth you get off the message boards. You just hear alot more negatives about Countdown so far than you did about 52.

[stingerman]

Just by the general word of mouth you get off the message boards. You just hear alot more negatives about Countdown so far than you did about 52.

yeah I think Im done with countdown- waste of money, nothings happening and the monitors name is Bob!? WTF!!?

[Jack Zodiac]

Hey, Bob's a very distinguished name. One of HYDRA's best agents is named Bob! And one of AIM's best is named George.

[Paul Dee]

'Bob' just makes me think of Twin Peaks. And makes me shudder.

[stingerman]

Hey, Bob's a very distinguished name. One of HYDRA's best agents is named Bob! And one of AIM's best is named George.

Yeah but those were their given names. I mean why not just call him the Monitor and thats it? Okay now your Bob. This whole crisis crap has got to stop it sucks!

[Captain Jim]

I don't really have any problem with the Karate Kid segments. You have a storyline (Lightning Saga) that runs over three months or whatever, does anybody really think three months has transpired in actual time? It's a given that the average comic does NOT take place in actual time. And that being the case, you certainly can't believe that all the books that come out in a given week all take place at the same time. So, what's the beef if Countdown is crossing over with something from a few weeks ago? This is a very strange complaint, IMO.

I'm sure they're having to make some priority calls here. As stated, not every subplot can be shown each issue. Some things *have* to appear at a certain time; others that are more flexible need to wait.

As for seeing scenes you've already read elsewhere... I think the goal is to write it so you don't *have* to read all those other stories. Some of this Karate Kid segment was repeat (very little, actually), but some of it was also new. From here we move on to new stuff.

This is actually a key to the philosophy of this book, I think. If you never read the Ligntning Saga story, you could still easily follow the Karate Kid segments in Countdown. But if you *did* read the Lightning Saga, you have a fuller appreciation for the larger storyline. The same could be said of many of the other subplots.

[Jack Zodiac]

Or, if you did read "The Lightning Saga," you could be utterly confused by when exactly the Legionnaires left for their time, and when exactly Wally comes back and Bart dies. Damn continuity puzzle pieces.

But now that they're finally past all of that, they can finally start actually telling a story.