Update Lowdown 20180117

The crossover special event for Young Animal and the DCU is still due to go forward next month and the trade paperback collecting them has shown up on Amazon for pre-orders anticipating a June release. Pencil that date in reeeally lightly, however, because the DOOM PATROL issues completing the second arc (and taking place before the crossover) have started drifting again. All reports are that issue #10 will ship next week (Jan. 24th) as I've mentioned previously, but #11 has been moved from February (alongside the crossover) to March 14th, a week before the most recent date for #12. That strongly implies that #12 will eventually be pushed back as well and the subsequent trade to collect the second arc will be shipping very close to the "Milk War" crossover trade. None of that will matter a year later for people picking up the trades, but comic book stores near college campuses (as in, every major city in the U.S.) are going to be mighty steamed if the target audience for a pile of new trades goes home for the summer (or graduates) the week before it arrives.

It's Been That Kind Of Year, Alright

Earlier this week, between the Christmas and New Year's holidays here in the U.S., Diamond Distributors has finally given an official announcement of the cancellation "by the publisher" of the first ever trade collection of Rachel Pollack's DOOM PATROL stories. The announcement came nearly a month after it was reported by Newsarama on November 30th, shortly after Diamond posted their monthly cancellation announcements for December. That made this week's January 2018 Cancellations the earliest outlet to make it a matter of record.

Given a provisional title of "Book 4" when it was solicited last spring, it would have included #'s 64-74, plus ANNUAL #2 and the Doom Patrol story from VERTIGO JAM (1993). It would have had ISBN# [978] 14012-7451-X [or 1], but also would have had nearly 400 pages for $39.95. The page count of the Annual and the short story averages out to about two normal issues, so the remaining uncompiled issues (#75-87) would fill a hypothetical second volume (provisionally called "Book 5"?) roughly the same size and price. According to the Newsarama account, the title will not be resolicited. It's just my own speculation that the price might be intimidating. Whatever the actual reason, DC likely wasn't committed to the project since the Amazon page for the book still has the cover of Pollack's first issue (#64) complete with March 1993 cover date and $1.75 price clearly visible in the upper left hand corner standing in the place of whatever cover art the book would have had. It wouldn't have been a bad idea for the trade paperback to use the same Brian Bolland art used for the cover of #64, but DC never bothered to use a reproduction without the comic's now 25-year old trade dress.

I'm hoping that the reason it "won't be resolicited" is that the followed the reasoning I suggested eight years ago in this blog, recommending a three-volume configuration, which would likely mean each costing $29.95. Three books for $90 versus two books for $80 might, counterintuitively, get higher orders. People always pay more in installments. Call it a mortgage. See the break down here:
DP05-AA Pollack Period synopsis

History Is An Angel Being Blown Backwards Into The Future

(...with apologies to Laurie Anderson.)

There were two pieces of good news today. On the Diamond Comics Distributors website, the New Arrivals for November 22nd, 2017 included DOOM PATROL #9 and there were no Doom Patrol issues noted in the Shipping Updates. The other piece of good news is that the Young Animal/Justice League crossover annuals were included in the February 2018 solicitations. You can get the details where I got them, from the excellent My Greatest Adventure 80 blog .

In the previous post I was concerned that the current arc of DOOM PATROL wouldn't end in time for the crossover, which had earlier been announced to run in January and contain events that would introduce new conditions for both the Young Animal titles and mainstream DCU. As things stood, the last issue (#12) would be released in the middle of the crossover, raising the possibility that the crossover would reveal spoilers on the main series. I say "stood" because, having waited since April for the first three issues of the arc, I was skeptical about getting the last three issues in the remaining three months. So, ignoring their absence on the Shipping Updates, I checked their individual pages. Every item confirmed to ship has one, with the cover art (if available), capsule description, rudimentary credits and a few other specs, including the slated arrival date. Well, they all had new dates.

• #10 is now expected to ship on January 24th
• #11 is now expected to ship on February 21st
• #12 is now expected to ship on March 21st

For the record, the last issue of BUG! is still due next month.

Silver Threads Among The Gold

Casual readers could be forgiven for assuming that the current DOOM PATROL series written by Gerard Way had been cancelled. It hasn't, just to be clear on that. There are four solicited issues which have been delayed several times. Since the first story arc ended in issue #6 (in direct market locations Apr. 26th earlier this year), the trade collecting it appeared May 31st, and the next two issues followed on Jul. 26th (#7) and Sep. 6th (#8). Those two issues were in the shadow of an announcement from the San Diego Comic-Con on July 21st that once the second arcs of the various Young Animal titles end, there would be a mini event in which each of the four core titles would release an annual in January 2018, forming a four part crossover that would establish that the characters under the Young Animal imprint will interact with mainstream DC heroes. DOOM PATROL's Annual would have the Justice League co-star, for instance. This would be the opposite of the policy for characters removed from the DCU to form Vertigo, 25 years earlier. Needless to say, they're not going to make the Silver Anniversary of the Vertigo launch, which will be the first week of January.

The last issue of SHADE THE CHANGING GIRL (#12) arrived with DOOM PATROL #8 and the last issue of CAVE CARSON HAS A CYBERNETIC EYE (#12) followed two weeks later along with the most recent issue of the mini-series BUG! THE ADVENTURES OF FORAGER (#4) on Sep. 20th. Next came the final two issues of MOTHER PANIC on Sep. 27th (#11) and Oct. 25th (#12). Aside from the two remaining issues of BUG! and four of DOOM PATROL, there have been no other comics solicited under the imprint. Trades collecting those books that have been published, yes, but no new comics. Diamond Comics Distributors has announced all of the January titles and not only do the annuals not get a mention, but the JLA titles each ship twice for that month. That means that whatever the ramifications of combining the imprints were intended to be, the larger DCU isn't waiting around to see what they were.

The larger, unintended problem is that we not only have three other creative teams standing around, resentfully tapping their feet waiting for who knows how long to continue on to their third arcs, but when those issues of BUG! and DP do come out, they will be the only ones on the racks under that imprint. The whole point of having an imprint is that readers who enjoyed one title are implicitly referred to the other titles. It's a short-hand way of communicating the feel and outlook of a narrative style and other subtle and nuanced kinds of information that are difficult to convey in a blurb. This worked beautifully for Vertigo, mostly because the line was created with six existing titles that had each been published for 30+ issues and had cultivated reputations that distinguished them from most other DCU titles, but also because they added one or two titles (including ongoing, minis and one-shots) every month for a year. Facing a market that is smaller generally, Young Animal chose, wisely I think, to start with a sharper focus. It became feasible for more people to follow the entire imprint every month than it had been for Vertigo. But you don't get cross-recommendations from other titles if you've put the other titles on hiatus.

Ultimately, five years from now when these stories are only available as trades or downloads, it may seem like a moot point when the individual issues did or didn't ship. My point is, by the time the current DP arc ends and proceeds to the annual crossover, the three other titles could have completed a third arc apiece. If the point of the crossover is to bring these other titles into your own title's continuity, then these delays mean that there were three trades that could have been part of your continuity but now do not exist. More importantly, there could have been eighteen individual comics out there, any one of which could have led readers to the others and/or DP. It would have meant quadrupling the imprint's share of rack space for a six-month period. As a fan, I'm just jonesing for my DOOM PATROL. But in cold, hard business terms, it means that in comics specialty stores, which are usually small, operator owned businesses that rent their retail space and get their comics on a direct market basis (meaning unsold copies aren't returnable for credit), provide you with a little sliver of their rack/wall/floor space for each of your publications. They pay for both the space and the comic occupying it. The cover of the comic serves as an advertisement for itself, of course, but the more comics that appear under the same logo and the stronger their sense of collective identity, the more so that the cover serves as an ad for other publications under that imprint/logo. It means the retailer is not only advertising the rest of the line beyond that comic, but doing it every minute of every day they're open and paying you (at least in part) to do it. And every title on the rack at the same time doesn't just increase the visibility geometrically, but exponentially. Consequently, when you reduce the number of titles the effect diminishes logarithmically.

Anyway, the new dates for DOOM PATROL were announced this week:

• DOOMPATROL #9, originally solicited for June 28 then cancelled and resolicited for September 27, should now be arriving on November 22.
• BUG! #5, originally solicited for September 13 then cancelled and resolicited for November 8, should now be arriving November 15.
• BUG! #6, originally solicited for October 11 then cancelled and resolicited for December 13, has not yet been rescheduled further.
• DOOM PATROL #10, originally solicited for October 25, should now be arriving on December 20.
• DOOM PATROL #11, originally solicited for November 22, should now be arriving on January 17.
• DOOM PATROL #12, originally solicited for December 27, should now be arriving on February 24.

And let's not forget that while the first week of January is the Silver Anniversary of the Vertigo launch, the end of next summer is the Golden Anniversary of the death of the original Doom Patrol. Let's hope there's something out there by which to commemorate that.

News on new series delays (and a sad note)

Earlier this week Diamond Comics Distributors announced on their website, yet again, that the forthcoming solicited issues of the current DOOM PATROL series have been delayed slightly further.

• Issue #9 (originally solicited for June 28th, cancelled and resolicited for September 27th) has now been rescheduled for November 8th. Of this year, for the record.
• Issue #10 (originally solicited for October 25th) has now been rescheduled for November 29th.
• Issue #11 (originally solicited for November 22nd) has now been rescheduled for December 20th.
• Issue #12 has recently been solicited for December 27th, but obviously that will probably be addressed next week if it hasn't been already.

Before that announcement, though, was another news item that only had a tangential relationship to DOOM PATROL. On Wednesday 27th, 2017, an actress named Anne Jeffreys passed away. American audiences today might know her best, if at all, for the 20 years she spent on the soap opera "General Hospital" and its spin-off, "Port Charles". Hard core comics fans might remember her as Tess Trueheart in the first two post-WWII "Dick Tracy" feature films (which replaced the pre-war "Dick Tracy" serials). But during the 1950's she played Marion Kerby opposite her real life husband Robert Sterling playing Marion's husband George Kerby on the television series "Topper". 

The original novel "Topper" was written by Thorne Smith and published in 1926. It was followed by a sequel in 1932 ("Topper Takes A Trip"). After Smith's death in 1934, the books were adapted into feature films in 1937 and 1938 respectively. A third movie, "Topper Returns" (1941), introduced a new ghost to bedevil Topper, and a radio series followed in 1945. The TV series returned to the original concept of George and Marion and lasted two seasons (which, back then, translated to 78 episodes, or about three or three and a half seasons on broadcast network television today).

It would be a heck of a coincidence if the George and Marion of the Topper franchise weren't the inspiration for the Bandage People George and Marion who lived in a house full of SRS (Sexually Remaindered Spirits) in the Rachel Pollack run of the DOOM PATROL from 1993-1994. Although their origin would eventually reveal that they weren't technically ghosts themselves, they were after all frequently teasing the bodiless head of The Chief-- a literal 'topper'-- who moved into their house.

It's also worth mentioning that right before publishing the second "Topper" book, Thorne Smith released "Turnabout" (1931), a book in which an ancient Egyptian god causes a bickering modern American couple to switch bodies and live as each other's genders. Given that gender identity and fluidity were recurrent themes during her tenure on the book, it's reasonable to expect that she was aware of popular earlier novels such as "Turnabout" and Virginia Woolf's "Orlando" long before she began writing comics.

Happy 100th to "Waiting For Doom"!

If you haven't been listening, you should. The podcast "Waiting For Doom" has reached 100 episodes and they celebrate with an extra-long episode including special guest Richard Case, most frequent artist of the 1987-1995 version of DOOM PATROL and primary artist during the Morrison Period. All 100 episodes are available in their archive and highly recommended.

You can start with their 100th here: "Keeping the Love Alive"

Link Sausage 2016

With the new DOOM PATROL series and Young Animal imprint there's probably going to be more traffic here, so before I shake out the cobwebs I want to acknowledge some blogs who post more then once a year.

Today there was a DP appearance in the cover mash-up blog, Super-Team Family (whose previous incarnations were wish-list covers for Marvel Two-In-One and Brave And The Bold). You could spend days going through its enormous back catalog of posts featuring imagined meetings between characters often separated by publishers. A page with all the posts tagged for the Doom Patrol is here:

Super-Team Family

I've been enjoying the podcast Waiting for Doom, which had been created to have something extant while DP fans were waiting for a new series. Now that there is a new series, there was some anxiety that the podcast would founder without a purpose but it's been insightful and funny as always with the bonus of being situated better than anyone else to assess the new series. It's here (check out their archive):

Waiting For Doom

Providing graphic counterpart to Waiting For Doom is the simply called "Doom Patrol" but which is better known by its URL, "MyGreatestAdventure80":

My Greatest Adventure 80

Hosted by Doug, MGA80 was up and running before this blog started. It never really went away, but its posts became few and far between during the DP-deficient New52 period. There were some other fan sites still out there that have been inert even linger than this one. "Doompedia" hasn't posted since 2011 and the podcast "Doom Podtrol" hasn't posted since 2013. It's too early yet to know if the new series will renew the interests of their respective hosts, so I'm going to leave up any existing links on this blog to theirs but I'm unlikely to specifically refer to them in new posts.

Five Years (Stuck On My Eyes)

Pushing through the market square...

.....It's just a few weeks until this blog's fifth anniversary, at which point I had thought I'd be wrapping it up. Not only is life "what happens when you're making other plans", apparently it happens even after you've made them. Every time I get a notion to add something I hold off, thinking that with just a little more research I could make it more whole, more complete, closer to perfect (what the hell, let's just say "closer to fine" and make every sentence paraphrase a rock song).

.....Any of you who've bumped into me commenting elsewhere in the comics 'blogosphere' (is it a sphere or a cube? Ooh, ooh-- let's make it a dodecahedron! I think it's the largest regular polygon solid and-- bonus-- it's yet another perfectly legitimate word that triggers a Spellcheck warning. Why does that feature even exist...?) will know that I have followed many other comics besides Doom Patrol.
.....And that I go off on tangents. (I realize that I unfairly ignored it in the above digression, so my apologies to tetrahedron fans-- sonnuvabitch, I could have sworn Spellcheck would flag "tetrahedron". Huh.)

.....I've been able to find cheap reading copies that have filled holes in my collection due to a shift in the secondary market that puts a much greater distance between high and low grade copies than I've seen in my lifetime. Mint condition books go for sky high prices; low grade books go for so little that they wouldn't recoup the cost of pre-grading. 20-, 30-, even 40-year-old comics might sell for less than current comics. You sacrifice resale value, of course, but being able to finish reading story arcs I put aside decades ago has a certain gratification to it. It also has been eating up much of my spare time. It will continue to, be assured, but I am also going to recommit myself to this and, eventually, my other blogs by rationing my time, cutting back on television and being more willing to share what I've learned/found as it comes to me, perfect or not. And if I can get a handle on some basic technology I've been ignoring, oh boy, will it be imperfect.

Doom Podtrol M.I.A.?

Among the blog and website links in the left column of this blog you may have noticed the link to the podcast "The Doom Podtrol", which has offered fan commentary on DP stories for years now on an irregular schedule (not as bad as mine, but irregular). The last post was in November 2013 and I assumed it was just another lapse (the end of the year can get busy for all of us) but that link now leads to a page with their header, but no content. It can still be found through iTunes, but of course that's without the listener comments. I'm hoping that this is a temporary glitch and I won't have to modify the link to send readers to iTunes just yet. If the hosts are reading this, drop me a quick comment below. Thanks, I've always enjoyed the show.

Airing out the summer house

.....So, the moral of the story is "don't use the new Blogger interface"? Assuming that this post indeed posts then it will the first one readers have seen in a while but not the first one I've done in that time. A few here and on my other blogs (the music ones) were typed up and, when I hit 'publish', apparently evaporated. At first, when I tried to read them (to make sure I was controlling the font properly in the new set-up) and they weren't on the home page I wondered if I had posted to the wrong blog by mistake. No such luck. I've been trying to reconstruct them from memory but have scrapped that idea and decided to return to my original concept of documenting and reviewing the Doom Patrol's history. Until I know for certain that the glitches are ironed out I'll be writing from organized notes only, which means things should be informative, albeit drier than usual.

.....As of August 7th the above paragraph still appears as it was saved and this font I am now typing has not been enlarged (something that used to be a common problem when I had to save a post midway through and return to it later-- the continuation would appear in edit mode as a larger and frequently different font, requiring time consuming methods to change it). For the foreseeable future, we might be good to go.

Technical Failure

.....NOTICE: THE POST MENTIONED BELOW HAS BEEN RESTORED. It was eventually posted June 21st, 2011 and has a byline of June 12th, on the page prior to this one. You can access it by clicking on "Older Post" below or by using the archives on the left. Sorry for the delay.

.....I'm publishing this purely as a test. The post I intended to publish was only partially saved. I've just tried to restore several paragraphs of missing text and noticed that it was not saving what I was writing. If it publishes this short post, then I will know if, tomorrow, it will be worth my time to recreate the entire post in a single extended writing session and publish it without first saving it.

Retro Denouement Interlude

.....To paraphrase Oprah, "YOU get a link, and YOU get a link, and YOU get a..."

.....After the previous two posts I had to get some much needed sunlight. The timing was right; here in the northeast U.S. it's been a bright, humid, summery first week of June, during which I cleared out several barrels of yard clippings, filled several (non-DP) holes in my comics collection and took a belated look at the solicitations for August. I still don't see any indication of Doom Patrol's future. Flashpoint will apparently be carrying on into September, unless absolutely everything ships on time, with the last day for all titles being August 31. With next month's Comic-Con there will undoubtedly be tons of news available about DC's direction while Flashpoint is still on the stands. In the meantime, we mere mortals have the blog "Too Dangerous For A Girl", whose recent posts as of this writing have been sifting through what look like press releases. The home page should be here:

http://dangermart.blogspot.com/

.....I checked in earlier today to monitor any possible comments (none today) and post one last 'retro' entry before devoting the next few days to editing a massive music entry for my other blog. I checked the stats, mostly to see if publishing the previous post had gotten any better reaction than the first few days. When you publish infrequently as I have in the previous year, people just don't bother to check you out every day. A new post can result in a spike in activity, either several people looking for something new or else a few people flipping backwards. In the past month I've been getting closer to a weekly schedule and was curious to see if the rate of pageviews would continue to spike and drop or begin to level off. Wellll... neither. The total pageviews for Wednesday were more than ten times the average for LGC: Doom Patrol. All day. The lion's share of referring URL's (i.e., the last page someone was on before coming here) were from tamaraorbust's blog, "Histories Of Things To Come" with the rest coming from the Doom Patrol-related blogs to whom I always link on the left side of this page. I wasn't at all surprised to see the "Histories..." URL's, given that we are mutual followers and have on more than one occasion referred to and endorsed each other's blogs. The curious thing is that "Histories..." is dramatically more prolific than this blog and deals with every topic under the sun (and behind it and probably in it, too). Many of its posts are not about comics, let alone Doom Patrol specifically. Otherwise it would have a permanent link with the others instead the occasional one, like this:

http://historiesofthingstocome.blogspot.com/

.....The readers for all those (or these, as those numbers are still coming in) views come from several countries, so I can't just dismiss this as one guy on a meth binge going back and forth between the two blogs for 24 hours straight. (For the record, the management does not endorse nonprescription amphetamine use. Try it with a pot of coffee, though.) If there are new readers out there, be advised that after the next retro post I'll be picking another theme for Doom Patrol stories to examine. I'm leaning towards the post-Crisis appearances that led to the Kupperberg series in 1987 and then the mini-series that tied into it, mostly because they've not been compiled into trades to my knowledge. If there are any other pieces of Doom Patrol-related knowledge or insight which you're having trouble locating on the web I could probably give you an answer, a helpful link or possibly a post detailing my reasons for an educated guess on the matter. Just leave any questions in the comments area and I'll be notified of them.

.....One last item: they technically aren't whole stories, but I've been enjoying the mash-up covers of the blog "The Brave And The Bold: The Lost Issues" (currently retitled "Marvel Two-In-One: The Lost Issues") for a long time now. Check out Ben Grimm's imagined adventure with the Original Period DP here:

http://braveandboldlost.blogspot.com/2011/05/thing-and-doom-patrol.html

.....And this earlier Batman excursion into Gypsy Period 1 here:

http://braveandboldlost.blogspot.com/2010/08/this-is-one-of-very-first-covers-i-did.html

.....Or Ben with Danny's roommate:

http://braveandboldlost.blogspot.com/2010/11/thing-and-ambush-bug.html

.....In a few days I'll have the post intended for this slot and try the following week to maintain a weekly pace.

DP09-AB Giffen Period update

.....[Both this post and the previous one were saved for editing and needed to be altered prior to posting. That explains, if not necessarily excuses, the gap between their stated dates and their eventual publication. Since this blog usually deals with the past and is meant to be a record to be referenced for some time to come I don't generally worry about those gaps. In this case the prior post was delayed because three weeks ago I came close to losing an eye. Don't panic; the damage has nearly reversed and I will have stopped needing medication soon. But until recently it meant that I would have to limit my time in front of the screen to reading (and briefly commenting) e-mails, other blogs et al to keep myself current. If you've seen the previous post, I don't have to explain why proof-reading and fact-checking it was out of the question. Until I've fully recovered (very soon now) I'll be keeping myself to conversational essays like the one below which really only require a read-though for grammar and spelling, or recording existing playlists such as the recent Hüsker Dü post on one of my music blogs.]

.....Yesterday the last issue of Keith Giffen's run on the Doom Patrol shipped on schedule. That doesn't necessarily mean that the Giffen period is over, per se. While it is true that this had been the third series in ten years, each failing to exceed the two year mark, this blog has already identified extraneous guest appearances in other periods published immediately before or after the nominal series proper. I'm holding off identifying a specific cut-off for this period just yet, but need to acknowledge the cut-off of the series.

.....An excellent statement about the use and significance of death in the Doom Patrol franchise can be found at the Histories Of Things To Come blog. The post is part of a larger, open-ended series on the permanence (or impermanence) of death in comics. Here's a shortcut:

http://historiesofthingstocome.blogspot.com/2011/05/reflections-on-revolving-door-of-death.html

.....Now, as to the future of the group? There's no word yet that I've heard, but it may turn out that their last ten years has been a dress rehearsal of sorts for a larger trend at DC. We're nearly a year and a half from the twentieth anniversary of the Vertigo imprint, which launched by converting six mature readers' titles from DC continuity to a separate, parallel continuity. Each month during that first year they would be joined by new ongoing titles and mini-series, often based on other DC characters excised from super-hero continuity. Doom Patrol was one of those Cardinal Six, all of which but Hellblazer were cancelled before the end of 1996. In a previous post, "DP05-AB The Wilderness Years" (intended as an appendix to the Pollack Period), I listed the appearances of the group (or more often, merely Cliff) between the Pollack and Arcudi tenures. The cumulative effect is the distinct sense that writers and editors alike missed having quirky and fringe characters to contrast their mainstream heroes. When those characters were already engaged in their own titles in another imprint, not being allowed to use them must have been easier to accept. But to see them sitting in the cancelled pile while you've got two dozen Bloodlines characters to work with (or not, as was the case with nearly every one but Hitman) must have been unbearably galling. After 2000's Totems the efforts at reintegration became more overt than the period pieces and cameos of The Wilderness Years. There was the Arcudi Period, of course, but also Animal Man's appearance in Hawkman and his much higher profile roles in the Rann/Thanagar War and 52, both spun off from Infinite Crisis. But it was during the Giffen period that the gate started opening in both directions.

.....Not long before the (until recently) current series began in the DCU, Madame Xanadu began under the Vertigo imprint. She debuted in the seventies as a DC horror host, eventually stepping forward as a character in her own one-shot. She was one of the few hosts who did not become characters in Sandman. [Side note: considering how many did become Gaiman's cast (Cain, Abel, Eve, Destiny, Lucien and the Three Witches, at least) I've often wondered if there's an old DC, Charlton, Fawcett or Quality horror comic out there hosted by Mad Hattie.] Since 1996 the Vertigo imprint has predominantly introduced original characters and features. It is commonly assumed that the explanation for Vertigo's early success was some combination of three factors: it retained older readers who had become disenchanted with the conventions of adventure fantasy; it brought in new, previously non-comics-reading audiences who had never been enchanted by super-heroes in the first place; and it freed creators from obligations to continuity, an incentive that would attract the most creative contributors. Whatever cache an established character might have, to remove them from the DCU in order to publish them under Vertigo might not impede any of those factors, but that cache also ceases to be the advantage it might have been in the DCU. There have been occasional attempts at re-imagining existing characters, some successful (Human Target), some not (The Creeper) and some forgotten (Vertigo Visions:Tomahawk). But the greatest volume of Vertigo's publishing since 2000 has been legacy titles (Hellblazer, Fables, House of Mystery, House of Secrets) and original properties (100 Bullets, Y the Last Man, Transmetroplitan- originally Helix, DMZ). The last that I had noticed Madame Xanadu in the DCU, she had been blinded by the unanchored Spectre during Infinite Crisis. The Vertigo title takes place in the past, moving forward from the days of King Arthur in the first issue and ending the first arc with the 1930's (and the start of DC Comics) in issue #10. Along the way she meets Jason Blood, the Phantom Stranger, Zatara and a few other surprises from DC's supernatural history. For the second arc, Exodus Noir, she meets the Golden Age Sandman (Wesley Dodds) and Dian Belmont in 1940. Wes and Dian had their own long-running Vertigo title without ever really being removed from the DCU, but Wes became inactive for health reasons in the Justice Society Of America series that was cancelled just as his Vertigo title Sandman Mystery Theatre began in 1993. Right after it was cancelled in 1999 the Justice Society returned in a series of one-shots (fighting Steve Ditko's 1975 Stalker character of all people). While his Vertigo series went on his old teammates appeared individually (Jay in Flash, Alan in Green Lantern Quarterly, Nabu in Fate, and Spectre in his own title-- more on that later) but outside of Zero Hour the Justice Society rarely appeared as a group. It would almost appear as though Wes was complying with the continuity quarantine, give or take a Starman arc. But the next Madame Xanadu story really raised an eyebrow when it used the Martian Manhunter as a guest star (and given J'onn's eyebrows, that's saying something). Set in the 1950's, Broken House Of Cards may have been a nod to Gerard Jones' American Secrets prestige mini-series, but there's no precedent for the JLA stalwart being anything other than squarely in the DCU, Final Crisis or not. Now the last six issues of Madame Xanadu are scheduled to be collected on August 10th as Extra Sensory. They are six stand-alone issues each by a different artist with the only unifying themes being the 1960's and the senses of perception. There are no DCU guests until the last issue, the sixth sense, when the Phantom Stranger reappears. Their exchange, on pages 19-20, is a pretty explicit acknowledgement of the DCU:

• PS: "A new age dawns. A return to the time of heroes...Such an era will see dramatic changes, a procession of nearly infinite crises...You have, I assume, foreseen such a confluence of grandeur?
• MX: "I-- yes...I have seen their coming. A new speedster and a green guardian. A micronaut and a sea king. An archer and his siren. Even... a Martian. And this pantheon shall spawn a trinity of epic scale-- three champions who shall fight for and inspire the entire nation... but that doesn't explain why you are here..."
• PS: "I merely seek to understand your position in these upcoming events-- and to react accordingly... Do you still plan to...what is the saying? 'Sit this one out'?"

.....Well, that's what we all want to know. All 29 issues were written by Matt Wagner with #13 on edited by Shelly Bond. While the two of them aren't going to be dictating companywide editorial policy, the Stranger is asking of Madame Xanadu what we the audience would like to ask Vertigo as a whole. As you might guess from the gaps in the quotes above, I've heavily edited the exchange for brevity's sake. Xanadu's response is, in essence, "if it happens, it happens". Well, it's been happening more and more. Last year Death had a major part in Action Comics #894 (12/10). Shade (the Changing Man, or Rac Shade) featured in two Hellblazer arcs; "Sectioned" in #267 (07/10)- #270 (10/10) and "Bloody Carnations" in #271 (11/10)- #275 (03/11). He was last seen on the planet Meta on a single page in #272, but will appear again this year as one of at least three DCU mini-series featuring ex-Vertigo stars:

• Flashpoint: Secret Seven - A three part series written by Peter Milligan, who wrote the Hellblazer arcs, and drawn by George Pérez. It will include, at least, Shade, Amethyst and Enchantress.
• Flashpoint: Legion Of Doom - A three part series written by Adam Glass and including Animal Man among others.
• Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search for Swamp Thing - The title sort of explains itself. It's another three part series, this one written by one-time Hellblazer editor Jonathan Vankin. This one will most likely be in for the greatest amount of preemptory bile owing to the fact that there had been plans for a China Miéville-scripted Vertigo Swamp Thing series due to begin publishing in 2010 that was cancelled in the scripting stage. After considering the series, DC had made a decision about returning the established characters who had migrated to Vertigo back to their native DCU soil and no one's soil is richer than Swamp Thing's. While the publisher didn't have misgivings about Miéville's work to my knowledge, an age-restricted script with no connection to any other publications in their roster would be inconsistent with their plans beyond 2010. To Swamp Thing fans this translated to knowingly shelving a good script in favor of one that had not been plotted yet. It's difficult to rail against a blank spot on a rack but when the BDA series arrives it will provide a locus for the resentment over a lost year of Swamp Thing stories.

.....So what does all this mean for the Doom Patrol? With the series cancelled it means less than it could. At best the greater the number of characters with similar marketing histories and, by implication, audiences makes it more likely that DC can cultivate a group identity functionally like the shared identity that the Cardinal Six had as mature readers titles before they were formally rebranded as 'Vertigo'. It's commonly understood that the Vertigo name was created so that the identity that those titles already shared could be extended to new titles and projects. There was no need to build a brand; it already existed, it just didn't have a name. This year it seems DC has decided to remove the stone from the stone soup. Frankly, Vertigo no longer needs Shade or Kid Eternity to sell Fables or American Vampire. At worst, DC could create a pointless, bureaucratic imprint-for-its-own-sake like Marvel's Marvel Knights or Midnight Sons. At best it could trust their audiences to make those associations among repatriated titles and perhaps create a group editorial page unique to them in place of On The Ledge or DC Nation. Doom Patrol and other characters not currently under their own titles could move amongst titles in the group during the year but still participate in annual Crisis events, providing those events are once a year and last 6 or 7 weeks instead of 6 or 7 months. A quarterly anthology wouldn't be a bad idea, but a proper Doom Patrol story needs a few issues to, first, lay out the weirdness and, then, make sense of it, or at least sense enough to wrangle it. Ultimately, it may go direct-to-trade.

.....I mentioned earlier that there would be more on the Spectre. There will be, but not in this post. And Mento is involved.

Petition For Grievance... and Grieving

.....I've been catching up on reading other blogs and in my absence here I've forgotten to note that the current series of Doom Patrol is scheduled for cancellation after the publication of issue #22 this spring. It is one of several titles selling below expectations that will be cancelled before a far-reaching summer 'event' storyline. It's true that shortly after this series started it was drawn into the Blackest Night storyline and that it had two noticeable effects: an enormous jump in sales for those two issues (#'s 4 and 5) and the derailment of the planned storyline, requiring a few months to get back on track, during which the sales slid below where they had been before hand. That's bad news for any title, but critical to this one because it was widely promoted as being an attempt to reconcile conflicting histories and failed attempts over the past seven years to radically rewrite continuity. While the group's history has always been strange, with some periods seeming irrelevant to the events of others, for nearly forty years it was never technically in gross contradiction as it has been this past decade. In interviews, Keith Giffen seemed to view it as a professional challenge and personal mission to be able to relate the group's history both accurately and coherently while somehow also telling an interesting story in the present time. Putting all that aside to participate in a thousand-character crossover, as he was required to do, has chased short-term sales at the expense of the brand itself. The book has been back on track for almost a year now, but since few people have been reading it, they don't know that. Hopefully, once the summer event is over, the team will appear in some other vehicle, with the best-case scenario being an opportunity for Giffen to return with them in their own feature. When he started, the Doom Patrol had disambiguation problems that were probably only second to the Legion Of Super-heroes in the DC Universe. In just a year and a half he has already made enormous progress.

.....Of course, since the purpose of this blog has always been to recount that history and add the reader's perspective, the blog will continue, however far apart I have allowed the posts to come. I would also recommend that you add your voice to an existing petition at:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/savethedp/

and follow the petition's progress at Doompedia (the link is on the left).

Stalling for Time, But

.....I noticed that I recently had an increase in pageviews. Because I hadn't realized until a few months ago that Google gave me the means to eliminate myself from the counts, I hadn't placed too much significance on the numbers. Still, almost a third of the views are from other countries, and I know I can't possibly be re-reading myself that much, even for editing purposes. I should acknowledge that there's been an enormous influx of views from Poland, Denmark and Europe generally. Maybe they're just now getting the "Batman:Brave and the Bold" animated episodes and want a crash course in chronology. Or maybe they've enjoyed the paperbacks and have just caught on that there are hu-u-uge gaps between the Drake and Morrison, or Morrison and Giffen periods. In any event, I've just finished the Gar-continuity post (previous post), so I need to offer an incentive to wait for the list of all Mal's appearances. I found this today:

http://www.comicartfans.com/gallerypiece.asp?piece=654371&gsub=88312

.....Hope you like it as much as I did. Hell, I just hope the link works. Do zobaczenia.

Girl Genius Day and Update

.....First, if you haven't stopped by in a few weeks, I should direct your attention to the previous post. With Bumblebee taking a more active role in the current Doom Patrol series, I've been taking a closer look at the Teen Titans' history as it pertains to Gar Logan and Mal Duncan. The previous post explains why Mal's position as DC's first black hero may come 'with an asterisk', as they say.

.....Next, I have to temporarily turn away from all things Doom Patrol to inform you that today, January 12th, 2011, is Girl Genius Day. I've followed Girl Genius since the Secret Blueprints shipped ten years ago this month. Husband and wife creators Phil and Kaja Foglio have now released the Girl Genius novel to coincide with Kaja's birthday and asked fans to buy their copy today. The comic book takes place in a world as it would be today if 19th century Europe had been controlled by feuding mad scientists instead of the Habsburgs. But you don't have to take my word for it. You can read the comic from the beginning at their website: www.girlgeniusonline.com where they have nearly 1000 pages of the main series plus a creative plethora of extras free to view. If you follow the link, click on 'the comic' and when the current page comes up, click on 'start'. If you think you'd prefer the comic to the novel you can order print editions directly.

.....Because they've been flying the steampunk flag for so long now they've accumulated a fan base that includes talented craftspeople. Every convention is followed by some pretty interesting cosplay photos. Even if you don't plan to buy anything, you'd be advised to check it out. There aren't that many comics creators who've won Hugos.

.....Thanks for your patience while I wandered off-topic for a moment. Back to the vaults, now.

The Lost July Post Surfaces

.....The post reviewing Showcase #96(12/77-01/78) underwent re-editing (believe it or not, it's the shortened version; sections that strayed off topic were surgically excised to make separate posts). You can find it quickly by clicking on the July, 2010 link on the left side of this page.

Halloween Music Suggestions

.....One down, one to go. My other blog, "So, What Kind Of Music Do You Listen To?" has just posted part one of a two part Halloween special and should be doing daily posts this week. New DP posts are en route. (I got another hat, so to speak.)

.....In the meantime, it's not much of a stretch to suspect that comics fans, especially fans of a group of walking wounded like the Doom Patrol, might enjoy the suggested Halloween playlist on the other blog. If you have pre-teen kids, you know how hard it is to find background music for parties that isn't too babyish or too adult. I made this tape for my nephews when they were at that age and am listing the songs as two recommended 45-minute programs. Just click on "LGC: So, What Kind..." to the left of this post. The music posts will be found at October 10th and 11th, 2010. If you need help finding a compilation, some of the artists have websites linked on the right hand side of that page. Enjoy

Link maintenance and you

.....At the risk of sounding like a military training film about hygiene, I've decided that before I return to regular posting that I take a serious look at the few regular features of the blog. The template is fine, and in fact I am reluctant to fiddle with it because my absences here that have resulted in long gaps during the summer have been enough of an interruption to continuity. So, the template stays.
.....My icon stays as well. I spent a great deal of time here as well as commenting on other blogs and sites using generic blank icons before adding the Sandman illustration by P. Craig Russell. If I could figure out how to make a more DP-specific icon for this blog alone and use the Sandman elsewhere I would. The DP's connection to the Sandman is tenuous at best (it would be easier to connect them to Kevin Bacon) and I am reasonably certain Russell has never drawn any of the Patrol characters, even as a pin-up or trading card, ever. (My Russell collection is about as extensive and complete as my DP collection and almost as well documented. I'm pretty confident that he never drew them.) My reason for using this is because the art comes from a commission by the American Library Association for a poster to promote reading in schools and is not generally available commercially. It's one of a handful of Russell works I haven't managed to acquire. Having found a virtual copy online and pasted it here, I can look at it everyday. I am able to use a different icon on npr.org and may rotate through other things in the future, but for now the picture stays in the kid.
.....I have just finished checking all of the links on the left under the heading "If You Don't Follow History..." and as of today they all successfully lead to pages that are up and running. Some may not have been updated in a while but that's a glass house at which I'm not prepared to throw stones. This blog should have marked its first birthday earlier this month with something more festive than silence but it seemed a little hypocritical given its (my) recent inactivity. If you're feeling nostalgic/masochistic you can click on the first link to read this blog's Mission Statement. After that you can wake yourself up by clicking on the link to D-D-D-D-Doom Podtrol!, the audio blog (podcasts) of fans' direct reactions to reading Doom Patrol stories. Unlike here, they jump around in chronology, reviewing both current and original series. In one podcast they eschew the format to do an overview of Cliff's career. They also offer a choice of formats for listening. Along with mygreatestadventure80 (aka Doom Patrol), Doompedia and this LGC: Doom Patrol blog, there is now a pretty well founded community for DP fans that didn't exist just two years ago. As long as we don't all get blown up simultaneously, things ought to be pretty good for the foreseeable future.

Technical difficulties, please stand by

.....I'd like to apologize to any regular readers about the delay in posting, although this (unlike some previous delays) can't be attributed to my personal lethargy or shifting priorities. My hard drive blew and I'm only able to write this due to public library access. It may be the end of August before repairs or replacement are possible. On the plus side I am hand writing a back log of material and re-editing it before I transcribe to the blog. I am also updating unconfirmed appearances for the period overview entries. Confirmed appearances will be listed in the comments section for now until there are sufficient revisions to warrant a revised entry.
.....Our library (wisely) limits computer time to meet the considerable demand. I have also been spending some of the allocated time to maintain personal correspondance. For now, if you're new to the blog, enjoy the backlog and take advantage of the links. I'll update when possible.