Ranking DC's New 52

We're now about halfway into the second month of DC Comics' The New 52, and I'm now at the point where I have to pick and choose which books I really want to follow and plunk down my own money for. So I made a list and found it quite interesting.

The good news is that I am buying more DC Comics than I was before the relaunch, when I was pretty much just getting the core Batman books. 

Starting with the books I liked enough to stick with, these are the titles I have bought the second issue for already:

• Action Comics
• Animal Man
• Batgirl
• Detective Comics
• O.M.A.C.
• Batman and Robin
• Batwoman
• Batman

These books I definitely plan to buy the second issue of:

• Justice League
• Wonder Woman
• Superman 
• I, Vampire

That's 12 so far, just one title less than a quarter of the New 52 offerings. 

These books I am very likely to pick up, availability and funds allowing: 

• Supergirl
• Aquaman
• Batman: The Dark Knight
• Superboy
• Green Lantern Corps
• The Flash

So if I pick up those books, that means DC got me back for 18 of the 52 books. Again, that's not too bad — it's a lot more than I was getting. 

These books just missed the mark for me, and I could reconsider:

• Green Arrow
• Swamp Thing
• Deathstroke
• Green Lantern
• Blackhawks
• Teen Titans

I admit that I had picked up Green Lantern #2 at the store last week, but changed my mind and put it back once I saw Love and Rockets: New Stories, Vol. 4 was out. 

These titles were the mediocre group of the bunch — not bad, but also neither interesting enough or good enough to make me want to come back. And I'll admit, some of these surprised me.

• Batwing
• Hawk and Dove
• Justice League International
• Men of War
• Static Shock
• Stormwatch
• Demon Knights
• Frankenstein, Agent of S.H.A.D.E.
• Grifter
• Legion Lost
• Mister Terrific
• Resurrection Man
• Birds of Prey
• Blue Beetle
• Captain Atom
• DC Universe Presents
• Legion of Super-Heroes
• Nightwing
• All-Star Western
• The Fury of Firestorm
• Green Lantern: New Guardians
• The Savage Hawkman
• Voodoo

That's a full 23 our of 52 books that fall into that category, nearly half of the line.

And then, there's the titles I actively disliked or thought were flat-out terrible.

• Red Lanterns
• Suicide Squad
• Catwoman
• Red Hood and the Outlaws
• Justice League Dark

Again, not bad, but the relaunch hasn't really improved the quality of DC Comics, despite all the hype. I wish that the publisher had taken the time to dig deeper in terms of talent and offered up more surprises. They only get one shot at this — at least for the time being — so I would have liked there to be more comics that I could wholeheartedly recommend to both lapsed fans and new readers.

FF Re-read: The Fantastic Four #11 (Feb. 1963)

“A Visit with the Fantastic Four” and "The Impossible Man"

Script by Stan Lee

Pencils by Jack Kirby

Inks by Dick Ayers

Letters by Art Simek

Another, much more successful experiment than the previous issue, this is a rare issue with two FF stories that is refreshing, fun and entertaining. Interestingly enough, Stan Lee writes in the intro to the second Marvel Masterworks volume of Fantastic Four stories that this issue was extremely unpopular at the time. Fans in particular disliked the Impossible Man as being too "silly" for so "serious" a comic book as The Fantastic Four.

'Captain America,' 'Punisher' and 'Daredevil' relaunched with unexpected style, substance

Before I delve back into DC waters, it's been interesting to notice that Marvel has been relaunching a lot of titles lately as well, though without anything like the fanfare that DC has been getting.

In addition to next month's relaunch of Uncanny X-Men — the very last long-running title from Marvel or DC to get a new first issue — Marvel recently relaunched Captain America, Daredevil and The Punisher. I had started thinking about this piece a while back when only one or two issues of each was out, but now there's four issues of DD out and three each of Cap and Punisher.

Let's start with Captain America, which seems to have gotten a new first issue to coincide with the release a few months back of the movie. That's not a bad move on Marvel's part, and it's one I'm surprised they haven't used to greater effect in the past.

This isn't much of an introductory first issue, but it really doesn't need to be. Comics fans know who the characters are and the basic setup, while readers new to the character who saw the movie will be in pretty much the same place. There's a nice connection to the movie with the first issue opening on the funeral of 91-year-old Peggy Carter that also introduces Sharon Carter, a.k.a. Agent 13.

Unlike most of last month's DC debuts, Captain America has a very distinct tone and feel to it that is tailored quite well to the character. My original thoughts were that it was a bit decompressed, but on a second read I think it's far from being the worst offender in that category. The second issue does drag a bit, however, with much of the first half of it devoted to back story before stuff starts happening. The third is another good issue, and writer Ed Brubaker has surprised me by writing comics arcs that are structured like they used to be, with enough going on in each issue to keep me interested.