Continuity

[electricwolfca]

Does DC adhere to any continuity anymore?

They currently have three continuities going that involve the major characters and none of them intersect.

You have sinestro war that involves the JLA and the green lanterns

You have the injustice League that involves the justice league

and you have countdown that involves most of the major players.

Do any of these have any tie into each other or are they all set at different times?

[jv2k]

There is still continuity in a lot of books. Not everything crosses over though.

JLA just finished a crossover a few months ago and the superman books have been referencing events from each other.

[DonC]

I think they're set at different times. Countdown right now takes place after the Sinestro Corps War.

As for the rest, I have no idea.

[Jack Zodiac]

I'd rather the writers pay attention to writing a decent story instead of adhering to continuity. Unfortunately, the former isn't always the case either, in spite of the latter.

[dreyga2000]

Does DC adhere to any continuity anymore?

They currently have three continuities going that involve the major characters and none of them intersect.

You have sinestro war that involves the JLA and the green lanterns

You have the injustice League that involves the justice league

and you have countdown that involves most of the major players.

Do any of these have any tie into each other or are they all set at different times?

Every once in a while count in Countdown Sinestro Corp War is already over... All things considered the events in Sinestro Corp probably only spands at most for a couple days..

Repair shouldn't take all that hell last version of JLA was combatting fullscale alien invasions every other week...

Injustice League all happen before Black Canary and Green Arrow got married so it most likely conclude on that same night... (On the the day of the couples Bachleor/Bachlorette Parties)

It seems highly probable that these things could occur at seperate times... Hell they could have all easily happened in the same week/month

[Shellhead]

Does DC adhere to any continuity anymore?

They currently have three continuities going that involve the major characters and none of them intersect.

You have sinestro war that involves the JLA and the green lanterns

You have the injustice League that involves the justice league

and you have countdown that involves most of the major players.

Do any of these have any tie into each other or are they all set at different times?

Are you comparing this to Marvel? Seriously? The company that botched the ending to Secret War by publishing the final issue so late? The company that lets writers like Hudlin and Bendis play fast and loose with their continuity? The company that has Wolverine appearing with multiple teams each month while going on all those solo adventures?

Except for those times when you have a writer synching things up in all the books that he's currently writing, it's very rare for the kind of tight continuity that you expect to actually work in comics. Pretty much anytime that you have a character who appears in a team book and his own monthly title, there are going to be timing problems. However, you should be able to cope with that kind of minor discrepancy, since you are already accepting more fantastic things like super-powers and alternate realities.

[electricwolfca]

[QUOTE=Shellhead;5589917]Are you comparing this to Marvel? Seriously? The company that botched the ending to Secret War by publishing the final issue so late? The company that lets writers like Hudlin and Bendis play fast and loose with their continuity? The company that has Wolverine appearing with multiple teams each month while going on all those solo adventures?

oh don't get me wrong marvel is jsut as bad.

[Bob-el]

[QUOTE=Shellhead;5589917]Are you comparing this to Marvel? Seriously? The company that botched the ending to Secret War by publishing the final issue so late? The company that lets writers like Hudlin and Bendis play fast and loose with their continuity? The company that has Wolverine appearing with multiple teams each month while going on all those solo adventures?

oh don't get me wrong marvel is jsut as bad.

Marvel has its share of problems but I wouldn't say it is just as bad.
They separated Civil War from Annihilation while they were running and meshed the timelines later in Nova.

The coordination of events in World War Hulk has been pretty decent and because it actually is crossing over into so many mags you do get a sense of it happening all across the board in Marvel at very near to the same time unlike the Sinestro War that I can't find having an impact outside the GL books.

You do get the sense that Countdown is going on across the DC Universe but then you get a scene like one with Karate Kid and Batman in the middle of Lightning War that just doesn't fit anywhere with the events of JLA and JSA.

[Paul Newell]

I think they're set at different times.
One thing I'm wondering, is that why has this become such an issue of contention recently when, ever since continuity became such a point in shared universes, titles have always run at different timespans in relation to each other.

[Citizen V]

I would think that DC still has continuity,but i can imagine that notion would be disregarded at some point.

[Paul Dee]

One thing I'm wondering, is that why has this become such an issue of contention recently when, ever since continuity became such a point in shared universes, titles have always run at different timespans in relation to each other.


Is it not just the fact that DC's editors should be making notes for the reader to inform them roughly of when a certain issue takes place if it seems to complicate another story?

I'm way behind with Countdown now but I presume the issue with Kyle joining the Challengers didn't have a note saying ("This issue takes plce after the Sinestro Corps War")? If it did then fair enough

[Lorendiac]

For what it's worth, here's something I wrote three years ago, in September 2004, well before "Infinite Crisis," regarding Dan DiDio's pronouncements about "continuity" as it relates to telling exciting new stories with the same old characters. Looking back on it, I have to say that he gave us fair warning that DC in the modern age had no intention of trying to make sure every single piece of the DCU's stories fit together perfectly, like a jigsaw puzzle . . .



***** OLD POST BEGINS *****

DC seems to be trying to cut down on the amount of complaints they get about "canon" or "continuity" violations by adopting a policy of "selective continuity."

There was a recent interview with Dan DiDio, the Vice-President-Editorial at DC, in which he said, in effect, that continuity just ain't as important as it used to be. Here's a partial quote:

"Continuity can be used as a plus or a minus, and that's one of the things that we've all become acutely aware of. The reality is, we're trying to tell the best stories rather than focusing on a given universe's continuity. We're experiencing, in some cases, what we call "selective continuity"-building upon the stories that people remember most and pushing aside-maybe even ignoring entirely- the stories that have less influence on current events, or those that can actually bog down characters."

Some of the people on DC's own message boards expressed the opinion that when DiDio talks about "selective continuity" he really means the following: "Who needs continuity anyway? Each writer will respect whatever bits and pieces of continuity from other writer's work he feels like respecting. Or change whatever he feels like changing for the purposes of the story he wants to tell. The next writer to come along after him will do the same thing. And so forth. Live with it!"

That may not be a totally fair interpretation, but that's the gist of what some people said in reaction -- and I know where they're coming from. Of course, others pointed out what I was thinking, that the above is a pretty fair statement of how "continuity" has already worked at DC for many, many years now in several cases . . .

The complete interview is here: http://www.newsarama.com/pages/DC/Dan_Bob_2004.htm

***** OLD POST ENDS *****

Of course, in that passage I quoted, I gather DiDio was mainly talking about gleefully sweeping under the rug "dusty old stories from previous years that have awkward things that, if respected, would hinder whatever we happen to feel like doing this week," but it strikes me that the same basic attitude probably carries over to the subject of "possible contradictions among different stories, by different writers, using overlapping sets of characters, that we're publishing here and now!"

Later in the same thread in which I had posted the above, I added some clarification by saying that I actually felt some real sympathy for DiDio's attitude that it wasn't necessary, nor even practical, to try to slavishly respect all that has gone before . . .

[Paul Newell]

Is it not just the fact that DC's editors should be making notes for the reader to inform them roughly of when a certain issue takes place if it seems to complicate another story?

I'm way behind with Countdown now but I presume the issue with Kyle joining the Challengers didn't have a note saying ("This issue takes plce after the Sinestro Corps War")? If it did then fair enough
Why? They've never needed to in the last 40 years. And that's how long the problem has been around. What switch has flipped that people suddenly no longer understand that comics appearing the same month, don't happen at the same time?

[Lorendiac]

Why? They've never needed to in the last 40 years. And that's how long the problem has been around. What switch has flipped that people suddenly no longer understand that comics appearing the same month, don't happen at the same time?

I know where you're coming from. I recall a time, back around 1982 when I was just staring to collect certain comics regularly, when Marv Wolfman was the regular writer on "Action Comics" and he had Superman get split into two different people by magic when two sorcerers in a past century were both trying to grab control of him for their own purposes. Each new Superman had all of the memories and heroic personality, but only half of the usual power set -- the one who escaped from the dueling sorcerers and made it back to the present day for awhile found he had flight, super-strength, and I think a super-efficient brain, but did not have heat vision or invulnerability. (I forget who got the super-speed and some of the other powers.) In other words, the Escaped Superman's flesh was no longer bulletproof. (So of course he got shot.)

I believe this lasted for something like 8 or 9 monthly issues of "Action Comics" before it finally got resolved by merging them back together. Meanwhile, as far as I can recall from what I saw then or have read later in back issues, Superman's simultaneously published appearances in the "Superman" title, in "World's Finest Comics," in "DC Comics Presents," and in "Justice League of America" all showed him as just one guy, operating at full power during that lengthy period! All of those other stories were presumably set "just before" or "just after" his period of being "magically split into two half-powered Supermen," but I doubt any of the other writers went to any great trouble to explain to the readers exactly when their stories were happening in relation to the chronology of Wolfman's story arc . . .

The only exception I can recall was in the pages of "The New Teen Titans," where a woefully half-powered Superman got to save the lives of several of the Titans with a tractor beam, and then introduce them to the Omega Men, who could help them chase Blackfire's starship and rescue their friend Starfire. But of course that series was being written by Marv Wolfman too, so it was the simplest thing in the world for him to coordinate the timing of his own scripts with himself!

("Marv, can you please make sure that when you give Superman a few pages in the Titans title, you make sure he's only at half-power, just as a special favor to me?" "Well, sure, Marv, I guess I can do it that way, if it means so much to you." "Thanks, Marv, you're a true friend! I'll do a favor for you sometime, to pay you back!" :D )

Other writers, however, apparently felt free to gleefully ignore the whole thing as a "flash in the pan" that would be here today and gone tomorrow, so why worry about it? ;)

[lawman]

Why? They've never needed to in the last 40 years. And that's how long the problem has been around. What switch has flipped that people suddenly no longer understand that comics appearing the same month, don't happen at the same time?
I think most of us understand that pretty well. But I also think just how problematic this can be tends to wax and wane. Right now DC's handling it rather worse than usual, IMHO.

As was already discussed some months back, if Countdown is supposed to be the DCU "spine" that everything else intersects, then it would probably be handy if, e.g., it actually blocked out a coherent sequence of events and didn't imply that totally incompatible stories like Amazons Attacks and the "Lightning Saga" crossover somehow overlap the same time span.

At the moment, aside from Countdown (again) spoiling any suspense about Kyle's fate from the Sinestro Corps War, there's also the fact that the JLA is having its collective ass handed to it by a group of villains on the night of GA & BC's pre-wedding parties, many of whom apparently decide to attack the exact same heroes again (with much less success) at most a couple of days later in the GA/BC Wedding Special.

Not to mention the stories (Wonder Woman, Action) that are spoiled by having the conclusion delayed for months, or where one major title's handling of key characters (Joker and Harley in Morrison's Batman) doesn't dovetail at all with their appearances in other books, or any number of other SNAFUs.

A little bit of willingness to "figure it out later" is always necessary with serialized comic book stories. When almost every title leaves your understanding incomplete until you've read something else, though (if even then!), it's a problem.