"And they all lived happily ever after": (Re-) Reading the Pre-Flashpoint DCU

[chastmastr]

"And they all lived happily ever after": (Re-) Reading the Pre-Flashpoint DCU

I've been pondering some ideas (again, along the lines of the stuff in my sig) for how to read--or re-read--the pre-Flashpoint DCU in the most satisfying way, with a sense of proper closure--not leading into Flashpoint and the reboot, but simply treating it as the "last chapter" of that world. Some series really did give that sense, but others did not--and others, I think, need to be separated into a sort of pre-Flashpoint prelude and put into the "new 52" box as part of what leads up to it.

Originally, I was going to write all of these (again, see essays in sig) in rough chronological order, which would mean that the most recent reboots of the DCU would be nearly the last thing to be written--but since so many of us here on these boards seem to feel bereft of the most recent iterations of our beloved characters, I am thinking that perhaps it would be nice to do this sooner rather than later.

This is not--please, please, we already have seventy-two billion threads all about what people don't like about the new 52--a thread remotely about disliking the new continuity, or talking about what we miss from the last one (which has its own quite nice thread already). Or, for that matter, how we might like the new continuity. It's just a "how one could read or re-read the books in the last continuity to give a satisfying sense of closure to that batch of books" thread. I'm thinking more or less of the material from Infinite Crisis (which soft-rebooted the DCU, sort of) up till just before Flashpoint.

(I do the same thing with my other comics, by the by. It's all in the essays linked in my sig. You think I'm long-winded here? HA!)

Thoughts?

[Ghostbuster]

Well the ending of Brightest Day was a cliffhanger where Firestorm finds out he's going to go supernova and wipe everything out. So even if the reboot didn't happen the old DCU was going to blow up anyway.

[chastmastr]

Um, yeah, I think we could see that as a plot-point that didn't go anywhere because of the reboot rather than the best possible ending for years of stories and characterization.

[chastmastr]

Oh, here's what was going to happen with Firestorm. Dang, that could have been a good series, but one could (for example) take this as the resolution of that particular plot-point.

[Theozilla]

Oh, here's what was going to happen with Firestorm. Dang, that could have been a good series, but one could (for example) take this as the resolution of that particular plot-point.

That really does sound good, while I don't think the current series is terrible, it simple is "not bad" and/or "okay". But not nearly as great as it could have been.

As for closure, I don't really see how that would work for characters like Batman, Green Lantern, and Swamp Thing who all are basically still continuing from pre-Flashpoint plots.

[chastmastr]

Oh, it's not perfect, but it could still make for an enjoyable read.

[Ghostbuster]

How is green lantern continuing from pre flashpoint? In blackest night it showed Hal was friends with martian manhunter for years and in the one year later story a different version of the justice league shows up. However in the new universe there was only 1 JL (the big 6 + cyborg) and Hal only knew j'onn j'onzz briefly and it ended in a battle. So unless the green lantern title is taking place in the future or in an alternate reality it's not continuing from pre flashpoint.

[Buried Alien]

Nearly all of the old DCU ended on dangling plotlines. Superman's GROUNDED was done, but everything else seemed to be cut short in the middle.

Ahead of COIE in 1985, DC rushed to bring all ongoing storylines to an end.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)