(no subject)

[greenygal]

Finishing up my SUICIDE SQUAD collection (almost--still missing two issues and one of them has Batman and Oracle, dammit!), and it hit me really hard when one of the characters died. Yeah, yeah, the book's called SUICIDE SQUAD, what was I expecting? But every other time, either I knew it was coming (perils of reading fifteen years late and out of order) or I could see it coming, or for various reasons I didn't care so much. Not this time. This was a character who'd been part of the book for a good while, who didn't want--or deserve--to die, and who I was growing very fond of. It wasn't a heroic self-sacrifice, it wasn't a fight to the finish--they never even saw it coming. Just. Bang.

And in almost any other book, that wouldn't have been it. It would have been a con, or an impostor, or a setup for a resurrection. Anything. And I wanted it to be, I really did. I didn't want it to end like that! But in SUICIDE SQUAD the only guarantees you get are that the writing is great, that something will always go wrong--and that when someone goes down, they tend to stay there.

This is what it's like to hate a book because it's too well-written. I forget what that feels like sometimes...

Comments

[kerithwyn.livejournal.com]

I've got a couple of the Oracle issues, and some random ones I picked up during the Ivy!obsession, but it sounds like I need the whole run. *sigh, grin* Making me read good comics? Not a hardship, really. ;)

[greenygal.livejournal.com]

Yay! Convert! I think you really do need the whole run, but if you want to do a trial I recommend the Flight of the Firebird arc, #5-#7, which I adore and which features the Penguin. (Then again, it's not like there's anything wrong with #1-#4, so you might just want to start at the beginning...) I also recommend SECRET ORIGINS #14 for a lot of useful backstory, and the DEADSHOT miniseries, which eventually ties into the main book, and is just a really good read besides. (Very, very dark. But good.)

[kerithwyn.livejournal.com]

Making a list, checking twice. ;)

[greenygal.livejournal.com]

Oooh, the power. *g* I've got to the point of wanting anything they appeared in, but I think I'll wait to see if you like it before I start recommending dubious properties like the Doom Patrol crossover...

I have read all the Suicide Squad books including the new one

[illmantrim.livejournal.com]

And I like em alllll!


grins

And... I heard a rumor from a small lil birdy in D.C. who said that over ten years late and a lot of changes later three entertwined and sometimes crossingover series will be relaunched-- Suicide Squad, Checkmate, and Captain Atom...

Re: I have read all the Suicide Squad books including the new one

[greenygal.livejournal.com]

I didn't read the relaunched Suicide Squad, at the time because I hadn't gotten into the book (and I gather it wouldn't have done me much good going into it cold, anyway) and now because, well, I've heard bad things. Though given that Deadshot's in it I suppose I should at least take a look. (Yes, I am obsessed. Why do you ask?) I confess to being very, very surprised that DC would give the book another shot when the last try was only a couple years ago and it didn't get past #12.

Re: I have read all the Suicide Squad books including the new one

[illmantrim.livejournal.com]

ahh but their idea is a relaunch returning the book to the core which lasted over five years of publishing-- hence the true suicide squad

Re: I have read all the Suicide Squad books including the new one

[greenygal.livejournal.com]

Which is well and good creatively, assuming the writing is of a level to make it work. (Well...probably. There's a good argument to be made that the initial concept of the Squad has become cliche by now. But I'd be happy to make the trial.) But what makes them think it'll sell? The first book was cancelled for low sales. (A five-year run isn't bad, of course, but still, that's why it was cancelled, and I've heard comments to the effect that it never did all that well commercially.) The second lasted twelve issues, and has very likely turned a lot of people off of buying anything labelled SUICIDE SQUAD--the new readers because it's all they know, the old ones because they've been burned. (Now, again, I didn't read v.2. If it was a work of magnificent creative genius, I apologize. I just haven't heard much that was good about it--and commercially it obviously had problems.) A third relaunch, only two years later, had better have either truly magnificent writing or some sort of surefire hook, else it seems certain to be a dead loss.

Don't get me wrong: I fell deeply in love with the Ostrander/Yale SUICIDE SQUAD. I am very sad that there are only a couple issues left for me to read. If that book, with all its excitement, complexity, and depth of character, could be published again, I would be thrilled. I am just very skeptical that it could happen, that it would sell if it did, or that DC would make the experiment. I'd be delighted to be wrong on all three counts.

Re: I have read all the Suicide Squad books including the new one

[illmantrim.livejournal.com]

I dunno exactly when its gonna be launched so it could be delayed but it is supposed to try to incorporate siome beter storytelling-- and the rumors are flying so i dont know which ones might be true about writers

[shadowlongknife.livejournal.com]

My God.

You're a Suicide Squad fan?

*bows in shock*

By the by, I followed a link on the __nightwing journal's info page to get here. He (meaning the part of my brain that writes him) says hi.

[greenygal.livejournal.com]

I am, I very seriously am. I mean, the characters and the writing and the art and people died, and you cared about them when they died, and they had personalities and religions and backstory, and the heart of the book was a nonpowered black woman, and and and... Well, I like Suicide Squad an awful lot, yes I do. Even when it broke my heart.

I'm keeping an eye on a number of RPG journals, mostly at theatrical_muse, but when oracle_watching showed up I noticed you guys, and well, hey, I like a Grayson...or two... ;)

*investigates* And you do Daredevil, too? Oooh. Cool.