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Friday, January 25, 2019

DC Editor for a Day

Let's say, for some insane reason, DC Comics decided to give me editorial control over their line of comic book titles, but only to the extent that I could create a slate of comics based strictly on existing characters.  

Well, I'd create the line that I would want to read, without regard for sales viability. Here's what it would look like, imagining that each title has an incredible creative team: 
 
Superman Books
Action Comics (anthology led by Superman, just the way it started back in 1938)
DC Comics Presents (Superman team-up stories)
Lana Lang (Lana Lang, on-again off-again girlfriend of Clark Kent, goes on archeological adventures from Qurac to Skartaris to Atlantis) 
Lex Luthor (diabolical tales of Lex Luthor's infamies great and small) 
Lois Lane: Woman of Steel (Lois Lane's adventures as a brave, bold reporter) 
Man of Tomorrow (Superman's adventures with the adult Legion of Super-Heroes)
Man of Steel (Superman's adventures as a radical 
The Private Life of Clark Kent (Clark Kent's day-to-day adventures in journalism, dating, grocery shopping, etc.) 
Supergirl (stories of Kara Zor-El, Superman's cousin) 
Superman (Superman's main title, with his biggest adventures)
Young Clark Kent (Clark Kent's life in Smallville, as his powers were developing; frequently crosses over with Legion of Super-Heroes, below)

Batman Books
Batgirl (the adventures of congresswoman Barbara Gordon, AKA Batgirl, in Washington, DC)
Batman (Batman's main title, two-fisted street crime adventures) 
The Brave and the Bold (Batman team-up stories) 
Legends of the Dark Knight (Batman stories told from the perspective of his villains) 
Detective Comics (anthology led by Batman, just the way it started; detective stories) 

Team Books
Birds of Prey (Batgirl, Black Canary, Huntress, and Hawk and Dove fight street-level crime) 
Blackhawks! (a squad of pilots from around the world fly into danger wherever they can find it!) 
Doom Patrol (DP members from all incarnations of the team gather to fight the weirdest threats ever) 
Freedom Fighters (the heroes of Earth X have freed their world from tyranny, only to be stranded in ours!) 
Gorilla Soldiers (Congorilla, Detective Chimp, Beppo the Super Monkey, Angel and the Ape, and xx versus their arch-rivals the Ultra-Humanite, Gorilla Grodd, Titano the Super-Ape, and Monsieur Mallah and the Brain.)  
The Haunted Tank (ghostly adventures in World War II) 
Justice League of America (DC's greatest heroes team up to face the biggest threats) 
Justice Society of America (the greatest heroes of the 1930s and 40s fight the Nazis and other fascists and mad scientists) 
Legion of Substitute Heroes (good-hearted Legion rejects try to do the right thing despite their shortcomings) 
Legion of Super-Heroes (dozens of super-powered teenagers of the 31st century explore the galaxy and combat interstellar evil)
Secret Society of Super-Villains (super-villains work in secret, hatching sinister conspiracies to rule the world--but can they avoid killing each other?) 
Suicide Squad (super-villains and anti-heroes reluctantly work together under threat of government sanction, performing secret missions so dangerous that not everyone comes back alive)
Suicide Squad Secret Missions (Suicide Squad anthology)  
Tales of the Green Lantern Corps (anthology series about the non-Terran Green Lanterns) 
Titans (generations of sidekicks work together to prove themselves) 

The Other Heroes
Animal Man
Aquaman
The Atoms (scientists Ray Palmer and Ryan Choi explore the microverse) 
Black Canary
Black Lightning
Blue Beetle
Captain Atom
Elongated Man (back to the original concept, the Nick and Nora Charles of the superhero world; lighthearted mysteries of the jet set) 
Fury of Firestorm (Ron Raymond and Martin Stein take back the Firestorm matrix - but they're not happy about it!) 
Flash Legacy (anthology of stories of the fastest men and women alive, from World War II to the far future) 
Green Arrow
Green Lantern
Hawks (the adventures of Katar and Shayera Hol, police officers of Thanagar) 
Hellblazer
Red Tornado
Shazam! and the Marvel Family
Swamp Thing
Vixen and Bronze Tiger (solo adventures of the Suicide Squad team-mates) 
Wonder Woman
Zatanna

A pretty solid selection of titles--at least from my selfish perspective. 

3 comments:

Jeff Shyluk said...

I can't help but think there's one title you've missed... winking emoticon face goes here.

Earl J. Woods said...

That one's a surprise!

Jeff Shyluk said...

I've also been thinking on the origins of DC. Deep into pornography and financed in part by the New York mafia, Harry Donenfeld was not a wholesome choice to be Superman's first editor. Yet where evil abides, grace abounds all the more. If you had been there back then, I can only imagine how things would have been different.