Future State, it's over

         Future's End 

                                     

                                                   

   I thought it would be a lot of fun to review all of the Future State releases, but then something happened. I was never all that interested in the event at all and for the first time in my short time of collecting I realized I was only collecting these just to have them in my collection. I don't think I've ever done that with any of my books. I pick up my pull every two weeks and the bulk of it was Future State. Some of the books were great and some, not so much. In an event like this you would want to start strong and keep people interested. With each great book there would also be some mediocre ones and as I write this, I still haven't made it through them all. While I was disappointed with the beginning of The Next Batman it ended strong and I even became a fan of this new Batman. The Wonder Woman Books didn't have the same effect on me and the Superman Wonderman title wasn't all that good either. In the end, I decided against reviewing them because I wasn't having fun. Even if there's a book I don't like I can still review it but these? Man, it was just hard to figure out where these were going and what effect they would have on the future of the DCU. 

      It was never clear what these books were leading toward and the more I read, the more confused I became. Some of these were leading toward new titles with the Future State event as the jumping off point. It was the preview of a new reset for DC. After this we were heading into New Frontier which I was excited about. New Joker? Sold, and how could I not be interested. As a Batman fan any book featuring Batman or his enemies was a book I had to have. I didn't feel that I needed any of the Future State books, but I bought them anyway becauseit was an event and sometimes these books became important key issues. Each time I picked up my pull I would set aside the issues from Future State and read something else. Mostly it was the books from Aftershock and Image that grabbed my attention. These were books that were fresh and exciting while the DC stuff simply wasn't. Maybe I'm in the minority here, but I felt the entirety of the event known as Future State was a great idea but like some ideas no matter how great, they often fall a little short. 

         If you feel compelled to read some of these the ones to read are the two issues of Harley Quinn, Swamp Thing, both Batman titles and if you're feeling patient, Catwoman. These were titles that made me feel like there were a few brighspots from this and sure, if I should also add the Nightwing and even Robin Eternal in there as well. The rest weren't all that good, and some could have been had they been given more issues. That was the thing that drove me insane. Certain titles got four issues while the bulk of these were given only two. I wanted more Harley, more Swamp thing and less Shazaam, but because it was such a limited time, great stories were too short to even get excited about. Will any of this roll into the new direction for DC? Maybe, who knows. There are a lot of jumping off points so it's possible. 

        If you couldn't afford all of these titles and they do bleed into DC Infinite Frontier hopefully there's a trade forthcoming or you could find them at your local comic shop. eBay's another option, but you're going to feel as if you missed something. All the Batman titles do kind of have a running thread throughout them. If you haven't read the Joker War, none of this is going to make sense. All the Future State Batman's tie into that which is cool but could prove frustrating for a newer fan. Some of the Joker War issues have skyrocketed due to rhe appearance of Punchline so again you're best bet is to find the trade. The Joker War was epic and I was compelled to read each and every issue, but as I delved into Future State I was often sidetracked by other things so I just kept putting off reading them. As I end this blog reading the Future State titles is entirely up to you. Do you want to spend the money on books that may or may not have some bearing on the DCU? It's your call, but I am going to read and review other stuff and who knows, maybe I'll come back to these comics and review them all. Until then, I'm tapping out and moving on to other books.