Countdown to Infinite Crisis (No Spoilers)

[Augie De Blieck Jr.]

Johns, Rucka, and Winick can be great writers when they really really want to be. Look at what they did in this issue - they fully fleshed out a character and reminded us all of why we loved him so much. They did this, of course, so they could kill him. What a sad, sad waste.

On the bright side, the ending didn't play out like your typical superhero comic where the hero is given all the unbelievable outs he needs to survive. The villain actually fulfilled his promise. Go fig.

The overall affect is actually pretty cool, but there's a certain level of cynicism underneath it all that I just can't get behind. I think I can skip this summer at DC.

-Augie

[Chad Anderson]

As you point out, they always make the character 10 times more interesting than they've been in years, and then they kill them off. Why not remind us why we like them and then keep your big-name talent on their relaunched books for a change, instead of ramping them up for an issue before knocking them off permanently (or at least as permanently as comics allows)?

[Augie De Blieck Jr.]

It would have been a much more interesting story to see how the character battled back from these personal demons and external situations to become a winning hero again.

-Augie

[PatrickG]

When was the last time ANYBODY wrote a typical super-hero comic?

I think with Alan Moore's retirement, Grant Morrison is the last guy left doing them and I'm not sure it's fair to call his work typical. Okay, I guess John Byrne gets the no prize here.

Everybody else keeps trying to give bad guys bigger and bigger victories of different sorts or is trying to distort the genre in weird ways.

[torippu]

Johns, Rucka, and Winick can be great writers when they really really want to be. Look at what they did in this issue - they fully fleshed out a character and reminded us all of why we loved him so much. They did this, of course, so they could kill him. What a sad, sad waste.
-Augie
I completely agree. I had a bad feeling about the outcome of Countdown ever since reading JLA: Classified #5 last week.