How would you rate the Blackest Night tie ins so far?

[Will.S]

Just wanted to get a round up here of people's thoughts on the tie ins so far.

Blackest Night Batman: This one has been the strongest. Great transition from the Blackest Night mini into this mini series, Tomasi's Dick and Damien sound as good as Morrison's. Deadman, Red Robin, and Barbara Gordon are also depicted very well, plus the art is pretty darn good.

So I'll give that a 9/10

Blackest Night Titans: Has been surprisingly decent to good for me, hell it's better than both Titans books out now but that's possible because I dig seeing all the Titans under one roof and Ed Benes's art is very decent here since it's not as in your face T & A and is inked nicely. I also like the way it came off of Blackest Night proper by furthering the Hawk and Dove sub-plot which still has it's own set of mysteries.

7/10

Blackest Night Superman: This started out strong but the 2nd issue did nothing for me and some of the black lanterns used seem a little on the random side since they seemed like they couldn't find some more better ones. Hopefully the last issue will end it on a strong note.

6-6.5/10

[CYOTI]

Ranked In Order of Preference
GL
GLC
Superman
Titans
Batman

[Will.S]

Ranked In Order of Preference
GL
GLC
Superman
Titans
Batman
I'd certainly put GL and GLC alongside Batman although strangely enough it doesn't feel like a normal tie in story since everything in them seem so relevant.

[Doc Goblin]

Sounds fun. Here's my takes.

Blackest Night: Batman: The art is excellent and my favorite thing about this book. The character voices also feel pretty spot on. But for a Blackest Night tale it reads very, very shallow. Hey, I love shallow zombie stories, but that's not what Blackest Night is. Everywhere else we've been getting pretty cool stories about Black Lanterns tormenting the living. Here we get ton of obscure Batman villains as Black Lanterns who may as well be faceless zombies in a big action story. Blockbuster comes back as a Black Lantern and his confrontation with Dick lasts a whole three panels? Weak.

7/10

Blackest Night: Superman: Here's something a little more like it. Good art and good story. Black Lantern Kal-L coming to Smallville to torment Superman and his family. This book has actually managed to redeem Robinson a little for the junk he's been writing over in Cry for Justice. However... Psycho Pirate. What an unwelcome inclusion to the story. He just feels out of place and draws into question why the Black Lanterns need to play any of these games when he can just make people feel the necessary pure emotions for feeding.

8/10

Blackest Night: Titans: Ed Benes art has never bothered me. I'm a fan, so no harm done here at all. The writing on this has been surprisingly good too. So far it's been a nice collection of character-centric confrontations with Black Lanterns, and I think that was the best possible route to take with this tie-in. I normally don't even care about this cast of Titans characters, but it has me interested. The only thing I dislike is the death of Hawk/Holly Granger. Breaking up this incarnation of Hawk & Dove when little has yet to even be done with it is a lame move.

7.5/10

[Hawk_fan]

I like all three Blackest Night tie-ins.

I can't believe BK: Titans is better than both current Tiitan books.....but it is.

[Desaad]

I think they all make some pretty heavy missteps, but I think Blackest Night: Superman is the strongest of the bunch.

Batman really isn't getting the full emotional juice it could out out of this story nor is it as wild or filled with big ideas as it could be. I'd be fine if it was one or the other, but it's not really either. On the emotional side, I'd really like to see him confronting what all this means. "If there can be Rebirth for them -- Does it mean that there can be rebirth for Bruce?" I think is a logical question to ask. Even assuming that all of these characters are zombies and Dick immediately accepts that, there would have to be real rage that someone is desecrating the bodies of his family and his friends. On the big ideas side, how great would it have been to see Dick raiding all the stored gimmick weapons or stolen alien technology they've had access to over the years? Flying Saucers, Boom Tube gloves, Thangarian/Kryptonian weaponry, Mr. Freeze guns, Riddler traps, etc. Instead they go to....the Gotham Police Department for the heavy equipment? Again, it just doesn't track. It's not a particularly grounded, personal tale dealing with how Dick/Tim/Damian are feeling, it's not a particularly crazy, out of this world science action fest...it's just kind of there.

That said, it has some bang up artwork, as this Syaf character is reminding me more of Olivier Coipel every time I see new pieces of his work.

Blackest Night: Superman has some astoundingly awkward dialog, as a lot of Robinson's work does these days, but also some really strong character moments and some really strong 'oh poop!' scenes. I'm digging it, and despite the dialog problems, I can't complain too much about it. The artwork here is, again, brilliant.

Blackest Night: Titans, writing wise, isn't so bad. All of the characters are in character, which is nice (and getting rare for this franchise). But there is nothing really special about it, either. Krul isn't saying anything profound of different about these characters, or about the lives that they live (with the exception of a single line from the resurrected Omen "You kill us, and bury us in the backyard. Like dogs). Where as Batman and Superman are maybe a little tapped out for character work, I feel like if any group is ripe for it it's the Teen Titans. There are a lot of adolescents on that team, which means a lot of conflicted and, sometimes immature, issues. With the exception of Donna, everyone is just too okay with this, especially Bart and Cassie. I've heard people call for Krul to be given the ongoing "Teen Titans" book as a result of his work here, and I am just heavily opposed to that -- he's doing the bare minimum of creative work here, staying comfortably within the box. That isn't what the franchise needs. They needs someone who really has something to say about these characters, about this world, about life growing up, maybe even about growing up as a child soldier (which is essentially what they are here, and I think some really good parallels can be drawn between the psychologies of the two groups).

The art by Ed Benes is...inappropriate. I don't mind him so much (though I preferred pre-JLA benes), but it's just too pretty, slick and sexually exploitative to do a zombie story justice. It's creepy in all the wrong ways, really.

Anyway, GL and GLC are definitely the strongest of the two tie ins. I have really really high hopes for the Doom Patrol one, because Giffen can basically do no wrong.

[Melfice]

I have really really high hopes for the Doom Patrol one, because Giffen can basically do no wrong

Yeah! Me too I can't wait for the Doom Patrol Blackest Night tie in issues! I love the series and have high hopes as well.

[Plex]

The only one I was a little bit disappointed with was the Solomon Grundy one which was a prelude. The rest have been really good and I am looking forward to seeing the rest.

[Desaad]

I'll say this -- the final issue of the Batman redeemed the entire thing for me. Really really strong emotional work, awesome guest appearance, wonderful and ingenious resolution that 'solved the problem' in a totally unexpected and unique way.

And the art, somehow, got better. Syaf's character work was just more consistent, his composition and attention to detail explosive.

Probably the best of the non GL/GLC Blackest Night tie in issues I've read.

[Psavell2]

Batman's been my favorite character since about late '97, maybe early '98, so I'm a little biased when I say that the Batman tie-in has been my favorite of the first round, just as I'm biased in saying that I'm most looking forward to the Flash tie-in in the second round.

Superman comes in second, mainly by default since I've never been a fan of the Titans and haven't even read them regularly since Dick led them as Robin. Still, I liked the 80's slasher movie feel of that first issue, and the last page of the second was worth the cover price: "How would Conner put it? Oh, yes... it's on!" What's not to love?

Despite my indifference to the Titans, again I revel in the horror movie atmosphere they're using. The stuff with that zombie baby was awesome.

Originally I was planning to skip Wonder Woman and JSA in round two and just go for The Flash, but I've enjoyed all of these so much that I'm already sold on the next three.

[neverman]

Just wanted to get a round up here of people's thoughts on the tie ins so far.

Blackest Night Batman: This one has been the strongest. Great transition from the Blackest Night mini into this mini series, Tomasi's Dick and Damien sound as good as Morrison's. Deadman, Red Robin, and Barbara Gordon are also depicted very well, plus the art is pretty darn good.

So I'll give that a 9/10

Blackest Night Titans: Has been surprisingly decent to good for me, hell it's better than both Titans books out now but that's possible because I dig seeing all the Titans under one roof and Ed Benes's art is very decent here since it's not as in your face T & A and is inked nicely. I also like the way it came off of Blackest Night proper by furthering the Hawk and Dove sub-plot which still has it's own set of mysteries.

7/10

Blackest Night Superman: This started out strong but the 2nd issue did nothing for me and some of the black lanterns used seem a little on the random side since they seemed like they couldn't find some more better ones. Hopefully the last issue will end it on a strong note.

6-6.5/10

I am liking Titans best, followed by Batman. I am not Superman fan so I won't buy that. I didn't like the way Barbara was treated in Batman (she did not do anything really, Dead man did all the work) but I don't like anything DC is doing with her these days. I had not read any Red Robin before this series, and I like him ok here, not enough to pick up that book of his tho.

[Anxy]

I'm following and enjoying the Titans one the most, but that's probably because I get more excited about Titans stories than I do Batman or Superman, so it's more of a bias on my part than anything.

I did like the first issue of BN: Batman, and I might pick up subsequent issues if I'm feeling bored some weekend and wanna grab some back-issues for funsies.

BN: Superman was good pulpy schlock-value fun, but it felt a little unnecessary to me. If all these were in one collected volume, I'm sure I'd have fun reading this mini-series. I don't think I'll make a special effort to read it on its own.

[Karl O'Neill]

Blackest night: Batman is by the far the best of the bunch for me so far.

Superman and Titans are both really really good. Which to me is a big suprize because I was expecting two turds.

They both have great art and are really well written and the action is well paced and keeps me interested enough to finish them.

I bet the second batch of mini's will blow these out of the water. JSA, FLASH and WONDER WOMAN!

[DeTroyes]

I can't believe BK: Titans is better than both current Tiitan books.....but it is.

Sad, but true.

I'm hoping JT Krul takes over Teen Titans come next year.

******

My ratings:

Blackest Night: Titans - 8/10
Blackest Night: Batman - 7/10
Blackest Night: Superman - 5/10 (sorry, not really a big Supes fan)

[Jarath]

Until reading Batman #3 today I would have said TItans, Superman, Batman would be the tie-in order.

But the batman finale was fantastic and has set the bar for the finales of superman and titans. I hope they can do it in as much style.

[Personamanx]

GLC.

It's the only Book Im reading that's tieing into BN at the moment. Though a few series I read will be having Tie in Issues so I'll have to wait.

[Doc Goblin]

Sounds fun. Here's my takes.

Blackest Night: Batman: The art is excellent and my favorite thing about this book. The character voices also feel pretty spot on. But for a Blackest Night tale it reads very, very shallow. Hey, I love shallow zombie stories, but that's not what Blackest Night is. Everywhere else we've been getting pretty cool stories about Black Lanterns tormenting the living. Here we get ton of obscure Batman villains as Black Lanterns who may as well be faceless zombies in a big action story. Blockbuster comes back as a Black Lantern and his confrontation with Dick lasts a whole three panels? Weak.

7/10

Now that I've read the final issue, I think I should tweak my rating on this one. The third issue did pack more of an emotional impact, but it did come a little too late. The whole series should have been something like this. Pulling some of it off in the final issue doesn't really make up for the lackluster first and second issues. But the way this concluded was inventive with how Dick and Damian got out of their situation with the Black Lanterns.

New rating: 7.5/10

[another_version]

GLC.

It's the only Book Im reading that's tieing into BN at the moment. Though a few series I read will be having Tie in Issues so I'll have to wait.

That just seems hard to do, to only read GLC... but it must be working somehow.

[Psavell2]

That just seems hard to do, to only read GLC... but it must be working somehow.

Originally I was only going to read the Batman tie-in. I'm glad I changed my mind.

But yeah, I think both Green Lantern books share equal significance, as there are a couple of threads that have run through both. In fact since half of the tie-in issues of Green Lantern so far haven't featured Hal, I sometimes confuse which book I read which events in.

[Jarath]

GLC doesn't seem quite as central to the overall story. That might change with Indigo 2 turning up and obviously there is going to be an important corps death and a red lantern Guy.

But if you look at the latest GL I get the feeling you'd be able to not read that and go straight from BN #3 to BN #4. The Mongul thing isn't really important for the Nekron story, but it is very important for the War of Light and the GL stories that are running through Blackest Night.

Despite this though it really does feel like it's important. Particularly with GL and GLC. They feel neccessary to me, even though I know all of the important story reveals will come in the main series.

I think the most impressive thing is that none of the tie-in books have been stood out as being rubbish. Personally I didn't like BN: Batman #2 all that much (although I think it might read better if read with the other 2 in one sitting.) but the overall quality of both the main series and the tie-ins has been fantastic. And looking at the creative teams on the next set of minis there is no reason to think they're going to go down hill.