Worst Mini-Series of 2009

Fin Fang Doom: the Blackest Night tie-ins! I was incredibly excited when Blackest Night started, but these completely unnecessary $9 stories took a lot of the wind out of its sails. It turns out that the zombie Lanterns weren’t even really the people they looked like, so Superman fighting his Earth-2 counterpart or Tim Drake…



DC’s New Executive Team

DC today finally announced who would be taking over as publisher as Paul Levitz old job was split in half with Diane Nelson taking over as president and now not one but five people will handle the publishing half.  Officially Dan Didio and Jim Lee are the co publishers.  Geoff Johns is the creative chief….



Best Trend of 2009

Fin Fang Doom: back-up stories in $3.99 comics! Four dollars is a lot to pay for a comic book. It’s more than I’m willing to pay for a standard 22-page comic produced by DC or Marvel. But throw in an 8- or 12-page back-up featuring characters I like but don’t sell well enough to have…



Worst Trend of 2009

Jim Doom: The Creepy Christopher Reeve / Richard Donner Fetish! This all just seems ridiculously short-sighted to me. Maybe it’s more than “DC creators honor their childhood by reinventing Superman according to how he was when they saw movies as a kid,” but that’s how it comes off. And I didn’t grow up thinking Superman…



Best Surprise of 2009

Jim Doom: Killing half the Guardians! I actually really really disliked it when Adam Warlock killed off half the Guardians of the Galaxy, but then when I thought about why I disliked it, I really liked it! This series has been so good that I had grown to truly care about the characters in it,…



Biggest Disappointment of 2009

Jim Doom: the “real” conclusion to Batman R.I.P. The thread uniting Batman RIP to that two-part story that led into Final Crisis #6 was pathetic. At best, I’d call it weak and underwhelming. At worst, I would call it a dishonestly hyped, poorly executed rip-off. Honorable mention: Bigshot writers swinging and missing: I have tons…



Best Writer of 2009

Jim Doom: Dan Abnett and Andy Lanning! I don’t know if I should call this a tie since it’s two guys, but I don’t know where you split them. Guardians of the Galaxy has been great, and War of Kings was amazing. I hear from Doom DeLuise that Nova and some of the other Kings…



Worst Writer of 2009

Jim Doom: Tony Daniel I don’t know why DC decided one of the most important periods in Batman’s history was the right time to let someone practice writing comic books. Daniel’s plots are predictable and his dialogue is groan-inducing. My best guess is that they needed someone to tread water while Grant Morrison’s big picture…



Best Artist of 2009

Jim Doom: Ivan Reis! Blackest Night is as good as it is because of him. He makes everything as huge, horrific or heroic as it needs to be. He can handle zombies, superheroes, different faces, gorgeous superheroines, realistic or creepy landscapes, scenes on Earth or on some other planet, intimate conversations, massive battles and basically…



Worst Artist of 2009

Jim Doom says Ethan Van Sciver I do not get the excitement around this guy. He’s like a slightly more successful Tony Daniel – all post-Image muscular rigidity and no soul. The stiffness and lifelessness of his figures was made much more obvious when DC stuck him on Flash: Rebirth, a book in which people…