Recently, TwoMorrows released The Crisis Companion by Kevin Miller. This is an in-depth look at Crisis on Infinite Earths, its antecedents, its concept, how it plays out issue by issue, and its legacy. Given my ongoing reread of the period of Crisis's publication on my other blog, I was very interested in getting this as soon as I could.
I haven't had a chance to read it in depth yet, but overall, I'd say it looks quite good. At 250 pages there is a lot of detail, and just from browsing it, I've already learned interesting details like how the decision to kill Supergirl was made.
I enjoyed Miller's speculation on how elements of the Crisis story may be metatextual commentary on Wolfman's feelings about writing it. This sort of literary theorizing I liked a lot. I was less pleased with his swipe at the "overly long" "Trial of the Flash" arc wherein he suggests it is the cause "in no small part" of Flash's decline in sales since its inception in 1959. I share his opinion that "Trial" is overly long, but Miller provides absolutely no evidence that sales of Flash declined more precipitously in the years between April of 1983 and June of 1985. A cursory search online suggests that in fact its sales declined by a greater amount between 1980 and 1982 than 1983 to 1984. Regardless, absent evidence I'm forced to conclude that either Miller was making a joke that just appears as a statement of fact or he's just being slack about providing the evidence for his claims.
This issue aside and even with a limited read, I think it's a fascinating work and worth adding to your collection if you are a DC or 80s comics history fan.
No comments:
Post a Comment