Where were you?
Now that today’s shipment brings Infinite Crisis to a close, and since the big fun arguably got started with a bullet born of a government conspiracy that left half a head splattered about, let’s take a moment to reflect where we were when we experienced the big moments of Infinite Crisis.
Sure, Maxwell Lord was standing in the Checkmate headquarters, and not on a grassy knoll or a book depository, but the absence of Ted sure led to one heck of a quagmire.
I remember reading the demise of Ted Kord while sitting at my computer. It was the only chair I had in my apartment at the time. Normally, I read my comics lying on the bed or sitting on the toilet. But I knew that Countdown was going to be something worth sitting upright for. When I got to that page, I felt like I needed to sit down even further.
I read the fantastic exposition of IC #3, tying together the various miniseries events that led up to the Crisis, sitting in the back corner booth at the McDonald’s on 48th & R. I read it and re-read it, neglecting the other books in my bag.
Last week, I read Dan Didio’s page-by-page set-the-stage column hyping the last issue while sitting at Lefler Middle School. The middle schoolers do their homework, and I read my comics. In hindsight, I think the column may have given me expectations that were hard to live up to, but it did get me excited for today.
And today, I picked up IC #7 on my way to work. Normally, I wait until afterwards to stop at the comic book store. But rather than scouring the paper for cartoon ideas, I got my Big N Tasty value meal (this time at the McDonald’s on 11th & Cornhusker), sat down in my favorite booth, and read the finale before I even touched my work. I felt like I couldn’t turn the pages fast enough.
All in all, I was pleased. I’ve read some pretty harsh criticism of the series – not enough big action, no meaningful deaths, etc – but I thought it was an amazingly executed storyline that served fictional and editorial needs very well. I have a few nit-picky things to address, but this is not the time.
“Normally, I read my comics lying on the bed or sitting on the toilet. But I knew that Countdown ws going to be something worth sitting upright for.”
Dude, you don’t sit upright on the toilet?
I credit my good buddy Billy DeFrain as the reason I love DC Comics today. He loaned me his copy of Countdown the week it came out, then I made a mad dash to find the last copy of it in Lincoln so I could have one for myself.
I read OMAC Project #4 (or was it #5?) that opens with Wonder Woman holding Max Lord’s fresh corpse at a Country Kitchen along I-80 on the Iowa/Illinois border. It would be another day or so before I found a copy of Wonder Woman #219 at Wizard World Chicago and read why she did it.
I read IC #7 today in the Valentino’s parking lot at 33rd & A. It’s very rare when I get a chance to read my comics before work on Wednesday, but there was no way this comic was going to go unread for longer than it took me to drive somewhere where I could read it.
“I read OMAC Project #4 (or was it #5?) that opens with Wonder Woman holding Max Lord’s fresh corpse at a Country Kitchen along I-80 on the Iowa/Illinois border.”
I read this as saying that Wonder Woman was at Country Kitchen on I-80 holding Max Lord’s fresh corpse. I was like “No way, I would remember THAT!!”
For the record, when I read on the toilet, I place the comics on the floor and lean forward to read them.
Cool idea. Let me throw my two cents in on this one. I read Countdown at about 3 in the morning some day last summer in my old apartment. The window was open, I was smoking a cigarette, and it was very emotional. I was also fairly drunk.
I read IC #1 on a bench just east of the Chatterbox, around the corner from Trade-A-Tape. I read the last issue of Villains United there, too.
I read IC #3 during the middle of a Christmas party, drunk off my ass. I re-read it a few days after that.
Most of my other comics, I read while sitting on the unused couch in the corner of the apartment. It’s amazingly comfortable.