I've never read Watchmen and have zero attachment to it, and take no offense that DC is publishing a sequel. Fine with me. However I will say that while Doomsday Clock has had a few good issues, and there's some novelty in seeing the character interactions, I hope it picks up at some point. Strictly on its own merits, it hasn't been much to read so far.

 

I am a dedicated "Watchmen" tragic, I quite enjoyed the majority of the "Before Watchmen" mini-series and I will most definitely collect the entire run of "Doomsday Clock."

Having said all that, "Doomsday Clock" #7-12 will need to be a lot more fulfilling than #1-6 have been.

The character interactions have been interesting enough and the art has been superb, but there has been an unshakable feeling that the story is just maintaining its plateau and plodding toward only one spike in the story at the very end.

It doesn't feel as though anything substantial or engaging has happened yet, despite there being four issues advancing the plot and two origin story interludes.

But all of that blanches in comparison to the head-scratcher that is how Dr. Manhattan can function in the DC Multiverse.

Dr. Manhattan perceives reality as simultaneously experiencing all quantam possibilities until an action negates all the possibilities leaving only the certain outcome.
What this means is that in the universe Dr. Manhattan comes from there cannot be parallel realities because once a decision is made the other possible outcome collapses. Parallel realities only exist theoretically and only until the events that would lead to them existing do not occur.

The DC Multiverse is made up of multiple realities all co-existing, the majority of which oweing their existence to a small variation in the past that has snowballed into a noticeably different present.

Dr. Manhattan's perception of reality is totally at odds with the nature of the DC Multiverse.

In a multiverse where any decision can cause reality to branch out in opposite directions, and where a time traveller can change the past and drastically affect the timeline, how can a being like Dr. Manhattan even make sense of the world?

The only possible explanation I can see to overcome this is that these "Watchmen" characters are from a reality in the DC Multiverse that is very similar to the reality depicted in "Watchmen," but is ever so slightly different, "Watchmen" universe B, if you will.

This means that the Dr. Manhattan Ozymandias is searching for is not necessarily the Dr. Manhattan depicted in "Watchmen," the Ozymandias who has escaped from his doomed world to Gotham is an alternate to the Ozymandias we are familiar with and that the outcome of the end of "Watchmen" #12 is still simultaneously Ozymandias' utopia and the end of all life as we know it because we witnessed the destruction of "Watchmen" universe B in "Doomsday Clock" #1, not the continuation of the end of "Watchmen."

~L~

 

I like the idea of Doomsday Clock - Watchmen crosses over with the DCU - but I was hoping it would focus more on the classic Watchmen characters. I have zero interest in Mime and Marionette, yet they’re dominating the series up until now. It feels more like Johns wrote a Watchmen vs DC fanfic where his OCs get to hog the spotlight.

I’ll see what the big reveal is in #7 but it had better be *really* good, or I’m out.

 

I find this book as unnecessary as were all takes by various writers trying their continuations or alternate takes on the Tolkien work. Sure it all can be made in an inoffensive and technically correct way... But it hardly needs being done to begin with.

 

Nightwing Finds a New Place to Display His Logo in Nightwing #50

New status quo for Nightwing, and it reminds me of Batman (2011-2016) #40 - 50.

 

I clicked the link certain that Nightwing's logo would be on his butt.

Then I remembered neither Gail Simone or Devin Grayson are currently writing "Nightwing."

~L~

 

best analogy so far.

 

As with Omegashark, I'm personally more interested in Doomsday Clock for the reveal of the DC Rebirth mystery rather than the Watchmen connection - which is really annoying because so far in 6 issues we've really gotten zilch.

I do agree that Watchmen should have really been allowed to stand on its own (I completely avoided the Before Watchment stuff), and maybe Rebirth/Doomsday Clock would've been better served to not have had that connection - I would think that being freed from the Watchment framework should have allowed Johns to do his thing through his regular pace - but Johns and DC decided to go one direction so here we are.

Personally I feel DC wasted a lot of opportunities for the build-up to this - but maybe Johns was busy and Didio wanted different things - but c'mon - a perfect example is Wally who has really been wasted the past two years in Titans - they could've built up that connection to the old universe with say Superman or even Lois. They could've even let him do something with Kyle - who was a prominent teammate of his during the 90s and early 2000s.

 

Personally, the Rebirth mystery interests me not at all. I just want good stories featuring good versions of the characters. The rebooting process to get there does not interest me. I don't need some elaborate continuity porn explanation as to how characters get fixed. You can skip all that and just start telling the good stories right now, imo.

 

Haha well I love continuity porn as long as it's good and entertaining. I do agree that good stories should not have to wait for reboots though and I am annoyed that the Legion and JSA books are being held up this long because of Doomsday Clock. I really hope they're spending all this waiting time either finding great creative teams for the books or already having them working on it.

 

EXCLUSIVE: Johns Describes Shazam Comic As 'If Roald Dahl Created Superheroes'

 

I'm a fan of Johns but man I hated his N52 reboot of Shazam, particularly his turning Billy Batson into a jerk. Hopefully this'll be better.

 

True. But maybe this run will make Billy become a bit more mature and take on a bit more responsibility, especially if Johns is comparing his work to Roald Dahl (where that is a case for some of the protagonist in his books).

 

Hope so. I feel Johns needs more hits to stay on top at DC, and as I've mentioned before, I would much prefer Johns' vision to be prevailing at DC rather than someone like Didio.

 

Or worse -- Bendis.

I enjoy Bendis. But not in a guiding position. I thought he was amazing when he was doing Daredevil and Alias. But when he moved to essentially setting the tone for the entire Marvel Universe by writing multiple Avengers books + lousy events, that hurt everything, imo. The last thing I want to see is the DC version of that.

 

Oh geez yeah, his last stints with Avengers, X-Men and the Guardians don’t really instill confidence.

 

DC Comics has place the odds for who, out of this list, will die in Heroes in Crisis:

 

Superman: The Movie Returning to Theaters For 40th Anniversary

DC COMICS & DC Films Make Diversity & Inclusion Commitment

 

I like that he tries stuff. I like that he pushes himself outside of his comfort zone in terms of leaving things he knows he can write easily, like street level heroes in crime stories, to try things he has less natural aptitude for, like cosmic stuff or whatever (results notwithstanding). I like that he experiments with convention, like when his big thing for the Mighty Avengers book was that he was going to bring back thought balloons but use them in a new way, to juxtapose what characters are saying to each other with their actual, completely contrary thoughts.

What I'm less crazy about is when he'll take a mid-level character (like Moon Knight) who it seems like he has never cared about and assumes no one else does either, and try some wild new take, that, while interesting (I read it and enjoyed it for what it was), just doesn't fit with who the character ever was. I mean, his series was followed by two more series, the first by Ellis and the second by Lemire, both of whom had completely new directions (even from each other), but both felt like the writers attempted to build their directions on the past and who the character Moench created was, rather than as a blank slate/essentially new character.

In any case, I think he works better as an outsider writer, not as a leader. I liked his first DC issue of Scarlet, I really enjoyed the first issue of Pearl, I'm looking forward to United States of Murder. But I can't stand his Superman.

 

Yeah, DC is really going to kill off Harley Quinn, one of their most popular -and more importantly, marketable - characters. That’s going to happen.