52 x 1 = 0
In the world of comics, the apparently biggest news of the year so far is that DC are cancelling their entire line in a few months, then relaunching fifty two new series with issue one the following month. The entire DC Universe is being recreated with a new history and everything. Excuse me while I yawn widely.
It has to be said that I lost pretty much all interest in DC Universe titles a while ago, even in the last hold-out, Gail Simone's Secret Six. Admittedly of the big two I was always way more a Marvel boy than a DC fan, but the last few years, DC seem actively to have been working to create a universe designed to exclude people who haven't read every single title for years, so self-referential and governed by a weird mix of nostalgia and externally-imposed (ie at the company-wide level) has it been.
So it's not surprising that I'm not the most excited person in the world by this announcement, but honestly, it's a little surprising to realise that the last few years' worth of creative decisions have killed off my interest in the entire DCU so totally that I can't dredge up enough interest, even in characters that I like when done well, to be considering buying even a single one of these new series. Not one.
And actually, in a way, it's just another such piece of pointless editorial/corporate imposition that really finally determined me not to be part of it. Fifty-two new series. Fifty-two? Seriously, fifty-two exactly? A number that has taken on a truly monumental (though pointless) importance in the world of DC the last few years, from the name of its year-long weekly series to the recreation of the DC multiverse with 52 universes in it. And that just happens to be the number of new series that were worthy of being born out of the ashes of the old DC? Seriously? So how many not-so-great pitches did you have to accept, or good ones got rejected, to make that exact number of relaunches? I'd be far more tempted to try a few of 35 or 61 new titles. As it is, birthing a new universe under the obvious auspices of the mandates that rendered the old one unreadable? Not touching that with a bargepole.