A (small)Rant on the state of the DCU, and then some WIP Fic!: “Men of Steel"
So, the genesis of this fic may require a little explanation… (so y’all don’t think I’m completely batshit crazy or nuthin’, ahem).
I am a reader-of-comics, majority DC-fangirl. Lately there’s been a lot of noise about the upcoming huge DC reboot, or relaunch, or whatever, in September (which some people are calling the DC New Universe or DCnU). I’ve been following the info on-and-off. -Don’t get me wrong, I have my reservations about the whole thing (I could rant for ages and pages on it!), but basically it boils down to me feeling a little wary at DC’s “new vision” and a hopeful (but probably highly unfounded, thus tentative) trust that the writers will (be allowed to) focus on creating good stories above all else, as well as wondering if (read: how long) the reboot will last before they go back to the status quo. (More on that: I read this post recently and I totally agree with him; I figure that this is how DC will be handling it (if they’ve got any brains at all) and that the “Retrospective” comics will be the alt-Earth visitations of the pre-Flashpoint DCU for the fans once that “cooling off period” is past.)
Ok, that said, I read this post and went “holy shit” and “god I hope not.” Some points I agreed with, others… not so much. It was pretty depressing at the time and took a while (~2-3 days) to sink in. I especially took exception to this bit:
“Superman will have to nearly-die at Doomsday's hands: again.
The great city of Kandor will go back into the bottle: again.
Luthor must discover and threaten Clark Kent's secret identity and those he loves: again.
All the past sparring and arguments between Lois and Clark will have to be repeated: again.
Supergirl would have to die at the Crisis: again.
Once these characters are introduced and old conflicts are revisited, everything else will be cheap imitations of things we have seen already.”
Here’s the thing: I don’t see “redoing” something like this as bad if they actually handle it properly. My main argument for this is the DCAU (the DC Animated Universe that aired on the WB and CN channels - Superman, Batman ,Batman/Superman Adventures, Justice League, and Justice League Unlimited, and Static Shock, Batman Beyond, and The Zeta Project as, well, let’s call these two main groupings “Earth X”, and the majority non-associated Teen Titans Go!, Legion of Super Heroes, and Young Justice series as “close to Earth X”). The DCAU tackled many of the same or similar storylines as visited in the (comic!)DCU verse, sometimes to very different results and along completely different angles, but almost always to an extremely interesting effect. I enjoyed it greatly. Granted, this was a different medium, but given the straight-to-home-DVD animated movies that they’ve put out that are alternate-DCAU that also work just fine, I don’t see this as being completely infeasible in the comic book world either... provided they care more about producing good storywriting (and character development, and consistent character handling) than making money via gimmicks or merely churning out pretty action-bang-sequence pictures with gratuitous crotchshots and other miscellaneous fanservice. (C’mon DC: forget giving us what you think we want - just give us good engaging interesting stories and I guarantee you we’ll read!)
Whew.
Ok, that all said, now I come to the thing that occurred to me this morning, totally randomly I swear :-D
If we’re really saying “screw continuity!” with this reboot/relaunch thing, then what if we went all the way? Forget this “again” bullshit running through the same old stories in the same manner. What if we change something really “basic”? And I’m not talking about just messing with the character’s core personalities for the hell of it, to a possible and worrisome tainted/”tarnished” end - what if we altered something with the unfolding of the history itself? Something that was sort-of-almost touched upon in the Smallville ’Verse? Something that they’ve tentatively played with conceptually using alternate characters in the most recent Superboy comic book line?
What if Lex Luthor knew that Clark Kent was Metropolis’ Superman, right from the start?
…Personally, I doubt that DC would have the balls to ever do something this “drastic” (outside an Elseworlds), but boy do I think it would be fun! *eg*
(...yeah, I don't count the whole Supergirl-Lex dynamic pre-Crisis, in that Lex was already established as a villain -- I'm talking a Luthor-Kryptonian scenario that actually is a good bit more grey, and lends itself to Lex not going totally To The Dark Side For Ever And Ever, Amen ...y'know, one that is a little more 3D than "must kill Kryptonian" all-day in every way.)
(Also, holy crap -- I am posting a WIP?! Be warned, I have decided that my policy on WIP’s is that such posts may change in ungodly ways at a whim, with only a basic author’s note at the bottom to suggest such occurrence. I may “show my work” (strikeouts, {offsets}, etc.), but I may not. Large edits/rewrites will most likely end up as a new posting with a link to the new version from the old WIP story post(s).)
First part of the story starts here!: “Men of Steel: Hello, Metropolis! My Name Is ____”
(Also, I should probably note -- I wrote this rant and part 1 of the fic last weekend, but procrastinated in posting my WIP because I felt it wasn't long enough. ...Yes, I am that bad ^_^;; )