March Meta-Human Madness?

Just thought I'd pass along this bit.

Colin Cowherd's ESPN radio show is doing a super-hero bracket this year. Last year, they did cereal and they were amazed by how many people they got listening to the show/podcast and participating in it. So this year, they decided to go with super-heroes.

I'm a sucker for dumb stuff like this, so I voted in it.

Superheroes - Krypton (which he keeps pronouncing as "cryp-tin") Region:

1. Superman
8. Thor

4. Green Lantern
5. Aquaman

3. Wolverine
6. Spawn

2. Spider-Man
7. Flash

Superheroes - Gotham Region:

1. Batman
8. Robin

4. The Hulk
5. Silver Surfer

3. Wonder Woman
6. Daredevil

2. Captain America
7. Iron Man

Supervillains - Metropolis Region:

1. Lex Luthor
8. Punisher

4. Red Skull
5. Catwoman

3. The Riddler
6. Sabretooth

2. Dr. Octopus
7. Bizarro

Supervillains - Marvel Region

1. The Joker
8. General Zod

4. The Penguin
5. Venom

3. Green Goblin
6. Two-Face

2. Dr. Doom
7. Brainiac

Go give it a vote and feel free to discuss it here.

Samaritan X?

Wow...JMS just seems to be mixed up in all kinds of questionable decisions lately.

I love the idea of original graphic novels. I was one of the first to buy Son of the Demon at my local comic shop back in the day. I love this sort of thing.

But one of your few forays into in-continuity OGNs is...about a Gotham hospital?

This is the kind of project with a severely limited initial audience that seems destined to have a poor sales performance and lead to corporate thinking of "well, we tried an in-continuity OGN and it failed, so no point in trying it again" while completely disregarding the fact that you picked a project with very limited initial appeal.

I get that it might be critically acclaimed and generate further printing and extended sales. But it seems silly to put out a project like this in a format that you don't regularly do a lot of business with when initial sales expectations have to be low. Putting out a project where you have to hope that word of mouth starts to grow the sales seems like something you do AFTER you become a little more comfortable producing OGNs on a regular basis.

I'd love to see more OGNs. I'm disappointed in this announcement because history tells me that this isn't going to sell in large numbers out of the gate and will likely be used to dismiss calls for more in-continuity OGN projects in the future.

Wait...What?

JMS is on Superman and Wonder Woman?

I thought when JMS got the Superman: Earth 1 project, his mission to write Superman was resolved. But now you're putting him in control of the main Superman and the alternate Superman?

That doesn't seem like a smart move. It would seem more likely that people pick one JMS Superman project over the other. There is the possibility that there seems to be less differences between the two versions, because it is likely that JMS writes the core of the character rather identically in each version. There's a reason why Marvel didn't just slap Bendis on the traditional Spider-Man title after JMS left, beyond the chance that Bendis didn't want to write two versions of the same character.

The addition of Wonder Woman to his writing schedule makes much more sense, though. With how he seemed to have brought a new level of interest to the THOR title at Marvel, slapping him on to the DC character that deals with a pantheon of gods seems to be a no-brainer.