This Week (Oct 28): Blackest Night, JSA

Blackest Night #4

Blackest Night #4Written by Geoff Johns
Art and cover by Ivan Reis & Oclair Albert
Variant cover by Ethan Van Sciver
Sketch variant cover by Ivan Reis

Summer’s hottest event explodes in this critical issue! Hold on to your power rings, because the secrets behind the Blackest Night finally stand revealed! While Earth is evacuated, Hal Jordan embarks on a brave journey to the darkest depths to uncover the truth behind the Black Lanterns! You won’t believe what he uncovers!

This issue will ship with three covers. For every 25 copies of the Standard Edition (with a cover by Ivan Reis & Oclair Albert), retailers may order one copy of the Variant Edition (with a cover by Ethan Van Sciver). For every 100 copies of the Standard Edition, retailers may order one copy of the Sketch Variant Edition (with a cover by Ivan Reis). Please see the Previews Order Form for more information.

4 of 8 · 40 pg, FC, $3.99 US

Blackest Night: Titans #3

Blackest Night: Titans #3Written by J.T. Krul
Art and cover by Ed Benes & Rob Hunter
Variant cover by George Pérez

With their backs against the walls of a battered Titans Tower, the few remaining Titans face their dead former teammates who have now become Black Lanterns! Meanwhile, one Titan discovers a secret weapon…but at what price? Don’t miss this finale from writer J.T. Krul (JSA CLASSIFIED, Fathom) and superstar artist Ed Benes (JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA)!

This issue will ship with two covers. For every 25 copies of the Standard Edition (with a cover by Ed Benes & Rob Hunter), retailers may order one copy of the Variant Edition (with a cover by George Pérez).

3 of 3 · 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Justice Society of America #32

Justice Society of America #32Written by Matthew Sturges & Bill Willingham

Art and cover by Jesus Merino

The seismic rift among the members of the Justice Society deepens due to the strange actions of several new team members as well as some long-seeded conflicts! It all leaves them dangerously weakened as their home base faces assault from an army of bounty hunters who plan on collecting the price on the head of each and every member of the Society!

32 pg, FC, $2.99 US

Update: DC has posted a 5-page preview at The Source.

GeoCities, RIP: Fandom’s Lost Pages

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Today, as quietly announced six months ago, Yahoo is shutting down Geocities.

Geocities was one of the icons of the Internet in the 1990s. It was emo before LiveJournal, boasted legendarily awful layouts before MySpace (be sure to check XKCD today), and spurred user revolts over terms-of-service changes before Facebook. As one of the major free web providers, it attracted everything from teenage poetry to fan sites to do-it-yourself social networking.

Over the last decade, people have mostly moved on. A lot of old sites have been shut down or abandoned. Spammers and phishers set up shop, using the free service to hawk pills or bootleg software, or host malware, in the hours it took for Yahoo to catch them and shut them down. No doubt it’s become more trouble to maintain than it’s worth.

To be honest, I won’t miss most of it. But there are fan websites that have never moved. Book annotations, timelines, analysis, fanfic — a huge chunk of fandom history will simply vanish today. (As of noon Pacific time, all my links still work.) Some of it will survive in public archives by the OTW and Internet Archive, or in personal archives. I contacted a few site owners, or tried to, but most of my emails bounced.

One advantage for fanzines: ink on paper doesn’t require anyone to keep a central service going.

It’s funny: the things we expect to disappear from the web often don’t, but the things we expect to be permanent often do drop out of existence. GeoCities appeared 14 years ago. Will today’s blogs, Facebook pages, forums, and wikis still be around 14 years from now?

Update: GeoCities lingered for a day, but has shuffled off this mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the choir invisible.

Poll Results: Upcoming Flash Series

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In the end, 79 people responded to the poll asking which upcoming Flash series had them most excited.

The breakdown is interesting: Nearly half (47%) are looking forward most to the upcoming Flash monthly series, which launches (in theory) sometime next March. Almost a fourth each are most interested in the Blackest Night: Flash miniseries launching in December (22%) and the Kid Flash ongoing that will launch “about a month” after Flash.

That leaves 9% who have actually been turned off of the comics by Flash: Rebirth.

Early on, one reader pointed out to me that while The Flash will have two features — a lead feature starring Barry Allen and a second feature starring Wally West — they’re not separated in the poll options. Well, I guess this poll can’t be used to gauge interest in a particular character….

Next Poll: What’s the farthest you’ve traveled for a fan or comic convention?

Edit: I wrote this up Sunday night, intending to schedule it for Monday morning. I forgot to change the date, and accidentally posted it back-dated to Sunday morning — behind two posts that had already gone up! Oops! I’ve changed the time so that they appear in the right order now.

Site Updates: Lady Flash and Silver Age Reprints

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So much for getting something done every week…Still, I made some new progress this weekend catching up on Flash: Those Who Ride the Lightning.

The most visible update is to Christina/Lady Flash. I added a scan of her “Lady Savage” outfit, rearranged the profile a bit, and updated her with her current status as shown in Flash: Rebirth.

I also tackled the Silver Age Reprints list. Aside from some reformatting, I’ve added:

  • Contents from the upcoming Flash vs. the Rogues trade paperback. The solicitations only list issue numbers, but in most cases it’s clear that if one story has a one-off villain and the other story has, say, Captain Cold, it’s going to be the Captain Cold story.
  • Notes on villains and guest stars. If the title is “Mirror Master’s Magic Bullet,” it’s obvious who’s in it. But if it’s “The Case of the Real-Gone Flash,” you might not know that it stars Abra Kadabra.
  • Solid through Flash v.1 #130. I have everything that’s been reprinted in later issues of The Flash, or in trade paperbacks, but I’m still missing a lot of items that were reprinted in some of DC’s random 1970s books like Four Star Spectacular. To find them, I’ve gone through the GCD up through #130, so that part of the list is as complete as the GCD is.

I’ve also made some smaller updates — added some appearances, listed upcoming series and recent collections on the Series, Books and Specials list, etc.

Quick Thoughts: Weekly Twitter for 2009-10-25

  • Ha! Next week’s shipping list includes “AMBUSH BUG YEAR NONE #7 (OF 6)”
  • And Ignition City concludes next week!
  • Random facts: Biggest category on Speed Force is Flash News. Smallest is Covers. Second-biggest: General.
  • Top 5 tags are Rebirth, Geoff Johns, Linkblogging, Barry Allen, and Wally West. Bottom of the list? ~200 tags used only once each.
  • Ugh. SciFiWire comment sections. It’s like someone took the worst of Slashdot, Newsarama & the DC Message Boards set them loose. (Okay, maybe not Slashdot)
  • Kid Flash vs Mirror Master story in DCU Halloween Special. (This means I have 3 Halloween specials to read: DC, Vertigo & Perhapanauts.)
  • RT @GeoffJohns0: Ethan did an amazing job on Wally West’s new uniform…Very clean, very familiar, yet unique!
  • BN:Flash variant? RT @GeoffJohns0: And for everyone dying to see @FrancisManapul‘s first official piece on THE FLASH…we’ll see it soon.
  • Didn’t notice when I skimmed the TOC yesterday: DCU Halloween Special also has a Flash/Superman race.
  • This should make a number of fans happy: Retweeting @GeoffJohns0: I cannot believe how fast Scott Kolins is. Like lightning.
  • Retweeting @KelsonV: And the award for Most Disturbing Use of an Alarm Clock in a Prime Time Show goes to… FlashForward!
  • RT @GeoffJohns0: “Society” episode of SMALLVILLE is actually an insane DCU infused two-part epic. Part 1 is “Society” & Part 2 is “Legends.”
  • Huh. Mirror Master doesn’t like Bloody Mary. Who knew?
  • Flash/Kid Flash creative team: @GeoffJohns0 @SterlingGates @FrancisManapul #FollowFriday
  • So we had Barry & Blackhawk in the Battle of the Bulge in Brave & the Bold…

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Speed Reading: B&B, JLA Monopoly, and More

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Some linkblogging for the weekend…

Fortress of Baileytude starts JSA Week by declaring that Jay Garrick is the Man.

Once Upon a Geek looks back at a Justice League Monopoly board game from 1999.

For the ladies: A Comic Blog starts off their Top 10 Sexiest Comic Guys list with Wally West.

Joey Cavalieri talks about the Battle of the Bulge and Brave and the Bold #28, this week’s J. Michael Straczynski/Jesus Saiz team-up between the Flash and the Blackhawks. IGN reviews the issue.

Billy Tucci talks about his Flash/Superman race in this week’s DC Universe Halloween Special.

Dan Didio talks about legacies and characters growing up in his latest 10 Answers column.