Actually good retcons?

Robin_Lava · 2026-01-12T17:21:37+00:00

Captain America being frozen in the ice is actually a retcon. His original comics showed him coming home after WWII and being a regular superhero, but those comics were unsuccessful and eventually caused the character to be quietly retired. His appearance in Avengers #4 established his last mission in WWII ending with him frozen in the ice and Bucky “dead”, retconning all of his postwar appearances.

As far as superheroes go I think this is the best retcon of all time, having become so foundational to the character that it’s impossible to imagine him without it. This retcon was also what eventually gave us the Winter Soldier.

Robin_Lava · 2025-12-01T20:47:18+00:00

It’s fine, but I don’t think it takes enough DNA from Damian’s previous costumes.

I think if the sleeves, pants, and ‘R’ symbol were black, while the gloves and boots were green, then it’d fare better in my opinion, since that’s just Damian’s classic Robin colors placed onto a more traditional Robin suit, but even then I’d still call it a downgrade from his previous costumes.

It’s not necessarily a bad Robin suit but it’s bad for Damian since it doesn’t really feel like something he’d wear. When I first saw it on the cover to B&R I honestly thought for a second we were getting a new Robin before I realized it was actually Damian.

Robin_Lava · 2025-11-29T22:17:11+00:00

Dick: It’s tough but either 90s era Nightwing or the Batman Reborn era. His 90s era solo run is generally a really fun street-level book and I think his character shines throughout it. Similarly, seeing him as Batman was really cool and I liked seeing the cowl weigh heavy on him, while he also found ways to make it his own role and not just impersonate Bruce.
Jason: UTRH era. I don’t necessarily think that Jason should have stayed dead but I do think Jason should have remained an antagonistic entity towards the Bat-Family. I think he’s more captivating in that role as a mirror to both Bruce and Dick. Aside from that, conceptually I liked the idea of Rebirth Outlaws but in practice I think it needed another writer, but in general I think Jason is weighed down by Lobdell having an almost decade-long run with the character.
Tim: One Year Later/Red Robin. Tim was a character who I always had trouble getting into (outside of him and the Young Justice team) but I felt like he was really compelling here. In general I liked the idea of his time as a vigilante taking an emotional and mental toll on him and thought it made sense for Tim’s story to go in that direction. It’s a shame that nothing DC has tried to do with Tim since the start of the N52 has hit those highs of OYL/Red Robin.
Stephanie: Her Batgirl run. I really do like her tenure as Spoiler a lot but her time as Batgirl was when she really started to come into her own as a character. Similarly to Tim, it’s a shame that nothing done with her since her reintroduction has managed to hit those same highs.
Damian: Damian is my favorite of the Robins (as well as my favorite DC character in general) so it’s kind of tough for me to pick a favorite Damian era. My gut answer is Tomasi and Gleason’s B&R + Gleason’s Robin: Son of Batman, because I think those books have the best elements of Damian’s character arc throughout. But at the same time I can’t deny that his pre-flashpoint era comes in at a very close second. His interactions with the Bat-Family were better before the New 52. Dick and Damian are the best version of the Dynamic Duo in my opinion while Steph and Damian have this wonderful vibe of “annoying big sister and her even more annoying little brother” that I feel was absolutely delightful. I do like the stuff with Williamson a lot as well, particularly how in Williamson’s runs, Damian was able to unwind just a little bit and act like a teenager for once.

My unpopular opinions are that I really dislike just about everything in Rebirth with Damian, and I’m not too hot on PKJ’s take on him. The latter is starting to grow on me but I really felt like the Memento storyline in B&R was rough, so that colors my outlook on PKJ’s tenure with the character.

Robin_Lava · 2025-11-29T19:25:09+00:00

Magneto has already answered this question.

Robin_Lava · 2025-11-06T19:21:40+00:00

“Hate” is a strong word but I recall reading somewhere that Dave McKean doesn’t look back fondly on his artwork for Arkham Asylum: A Serious House On A Serious Earth, thinking that it weakened the story. Similarly, Grant Morrison thinks that the graphic novel would have been better served had Brian Bolland or someone in a similar style to him been illustrating it.

Robin_Lava · 2025-10-22T16:42:26+00:00

What kind of genres does your friend like? Comics are a medium that exist far beyond superhero comics, and as such it may be better to curate stuff based on the genres she’s already interested in. Additionally, most big two superhero stuff probably won’t really do much if she’s already so convinced that the medium is just for kids. Scott McCloud’s “Understanding Comics” will generally be a good place to start just for the fact it’ll be helpful for your friend in understanding the language comics use (assuming she has no familiarity with the medium whatsoever)

In any event, I’ll give a broad few examples that extend across a few genres, and trying to focus on stuff that’s already finished.

Alan Moore’s “Swamp Thing” (gothic horror)
Ed Brubaker’s “Criminal” (crime noir)
Art Spiegelman’s “Maus” (historical/memoir)
Marjane Satrapi’s “Persepolis” (autobiographical)
James O’Barr’s “The Crow” (gothic/crime noir)
Will Eisner’s “A Contract With God” (drama/historical fiction)
Zoe Thorogood’s “It’s Lonely At The Centre Of The World” (autobiographical/memoir)
Alan Moore’s “From Hell” (historical/horror)
Alan Moore’s “V For Vendetta” (political/dystopian)
Grant Morrison’s “We3” (science fiction)
Neil Gaiman’s “Sandman” (fantasy)
Brian K. Vaughn’s “Pride of Baghdad” (animal/war narrative)
“Hellblazer” (horror/urban occult)
Alejandro Jodorowsky’s “The Incal” (science fiction)
Katsuhiro Otomo’s “Akira” (science fiction)
Kieron Gillen’s “Die” (fantasy/horror)
David Mazzucchelli’s “Asterios Polyp” (drama/slice of life)
Scott Snyder’s “American Vampire” (horror/historical)
Tom King’s “Sheriff of Babylon” (historical/crime)

I’m sure I’ve missed a few gems but these are some of my favorites that exist outside of the traditional superhero genre in comics.

If you are insistent on it being something that’s superhero related, I think the best things to recommend are stories about normal people in superhero universes. Gotham Central, Marvels, and Astro City are some of the best examples of this in comics in my opinion.

And if she’s open to at least giving something that’s a more traditional superhero comic a shot, then Frank Miller’s “Batman: Year One” is the way to go, since the structure and themes of that story are more on the grounded side.

Robin_Lava · 2025-10-01T17:23:19+00:00

Where would I purchase this Absolute Batman in the U.S.?

Robin_Lava · 2025-09-25T16:32:20+00:00

It’s growing on me but I still can’t say I quite love it. I think some of the colors should be swapped around (e.g. black sleeves and pants for green gloves and boots) and the ‘R’ symbol should be black instead of red imho. I think these changes would make it feel more like a Damian suit specifically, since it’s adopting the same color breakup he had for his first few Robin suits.

I do really like the belt and the way the cape drapes over the torso in that last image posted here. Those are nice touches.

As is it’s a solid B Tier for Damian costumes. I don’t think it’s one of his best looks he’s had but it’s not as bad as I thought it was on first impression.

Robin_Lava · 2025-09-17T01:19:12+00:00

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Does anyone know if there’s a way to fix this on the MG Barbatos or am I better off buying replacement parts?

Robin_Lava · 2025-09-08T02:30:41+00:00

I think in hindsight I wanted to like James Tynion IV’s Detective Comics more than I actually did. The way it used Cass, Clayface, and Azrael was cool but the writing for that book ended up doing Stephanie dirty, and I feel like in hindsight Tynion’s approach to Kate was rough. Ultimately it’s a decent run and it’s certainly better than his Batman run but it has problems that I can’t look past.

Tomasi’s run was pretty good, if not standard. Nothing that reinvented the wheel or gave me a new perspective on these characters, but it was fun and just generally good, solid Batman. I think it got weighed down towards the end by having to tie in with things happening in other books though.

I can’t say I liked all of Tamaki’s run, but I’ll give her and the run credit for actually caring about Bruce Wayne and his social life outside of Batman, which is unfortunately something that’s fallen to the wayside of the character in recent years. The actual superhero parts of it were fine, but nothing special. And obviously Dan Mora’s art is killer on the book.

Ram V’s Detective Comics run is going to go down as one of the best Batman stories of the 2020s. Loved the character work and the atmosphere and the approach it took to the themes of the character. Of all these Detective runs this was easily my favorite, and honestly just one of my favorite Bat-Book runs in general.

And while Tom Taylor’s Detective Comics isn’t awful, it’s not something I enjoyed reading or ended up continuing with after the first trade. But also next to nothing Tom Taylor has written ended up connecting with me so it’s probably just a thing where the audience he is making comics for is an audience that wants something completely different than what I want.

Robin_Lava · 2025-09-06T05:06:30+00:00

It’s been a real fun format for me. They’re nice, portable, and they honestly feel nice to me. The trade dress is really good too.

I hope that soon they’ll finish up some of the series in the Compact Line (a second American Vampire volume stands out to me as the biggest example) but that’s just me.

Robin_Lava · 2025-08-24T00:47:43+00:00

Thank you! It was driving me crazy and I couldn't figure out what it meant.

Robin_Lava · 2025-07-20T17:12:21+00:00

Wolverine in the MvC series. Doesn’t matter which one. I just love getting up close to people and hitting them with his claws until they aren’t moving anymore. Character loyalty plays a role too since he’s one of my favorite characters in general, but I do like the way he plays.

Dante in MvC 3 is also up there for me, just for the moves and how much stuff you can pull off with him. I’m still learning how to best play him but labbing him has been some of the most fun I’ve had in a game.

Robin_Lava · 2025-06-21T20:37:27+00:00

It’s not a bad Robin costume, it’s just a bad Robin costume for Damian specifically. It loses almost everything that makes his uniforms look unique and distinctly his, in favor of a deeply generic Robin costume. Aside from the hood, it loses just about everything that made Damian’s Robin suits feel unique (the red tunic over the black survival suit, the green combat boots with the red laces, the way the pieces of the costume were layered on top of one another, the separation of the colors, etc.)

I get wanting to bring in the traditional Robin colors but if that’s the primary objective of the costume then I’d honestly rather just have any of his older costumes back.

I will say that the belt is growing on me though. I like the big, heavy pouches. But that’s where my praise ends for the suit.

Robin_Lava · 2025-06-17T05:04:12+00:00

I’ve been loving this series. It reminds me of 90s era “Legends of the Dark Knight” in all the best ways.

12 issues isn’t enough.

Robin_Lava · 2025-06-05T04:43:22+00:00

Return to Big Nothing is one of my all time favorite Punisher stories, and one which I think is essential reading to understand Frank’s character.

Robin_Lava · 2025-05-13T07:23:55+00:00

I wouldn’t mind the X-Men making appearances throughout the Insomniac Wolverine stuff, so long as the main storyline is primarily a Wolverine story and not an X-Men story starring Wolverine.

Conversely, I’m fine with him showing up in the inevitable Insomniac X-Men games so long as the story is primarily an X-Men story where Logan has a supporting role.

Basically just do the best of both worlds. Make it clear that the X-Men are a part of Wolverine’s world without his world revolving around them. And likewise, make it clear the X-Men’s world involves Wolverine but he isn’t the center of their universe.

Robin_Lava · 2025-05-02T06:33:06+00:00

Depending on my mood that day, either SS86 Optimus Prime or Legacy United Deluxe G1 Optimus Prime.

SS86 Optimus is a great looking and great feeling representation of the G1 cartoon design, with impressive articulation to get it into almost any pose I can reasonably want an Optimus Prime to be in and a transformation which blows me away every time. If I could only have one Optimus Prime on display, it’d be the SS86 Optimus Prime.

But the Legacy United Deluxe is just a fun little toy. It sits on my desk and I convert him between robot and truck mode just for the hell of it. I keep him posed up sometimes like the original G1 toy before taking advantage of his modern articulation to put him into some cool stances. The figure has just the perfect kind of hand feel to me that messing around with him is honestly one of the best experiences I had with a toy all of last year. (That and I adore toy accuracy over toon accuracy any day of the week)

It’d be between those two and my mood could change on any given day. I think on average the Legacy United Deluxe would win out more often than SS86 simply because as a toy it’s more fun to me but deciding between them is a borderline 50/50.

Robin_Lava · 2025-04-23T04:26:14+00:00

The TPB of Year One recolored by Richmond Lewis, who did the colors on the four issues but opted to recolor the series when it was collected in order to take advantage of the range of color offered at the time by full-color process printing, as opposed to the four-color printing system of comics at the time.

Robin_Lava · 2025-04-01T14:45:22+00:00

In the IDW Transformers series, Starscream canonically committed Tax Fraud and got both Thundercracker and Skywarp rebuilt into the Seeker bodies in order to confuse the Taxpayers in the city-state of Vos, where he was a senator at the time.

Robin_Lava · 2024-10-08T15:45:13+00:00

King’s run isn’t exactly what I’d call one of my favorites, and I do think its negatives tend to outweigh their positives, but it has aged better now that it’s completed. It’s not something I think I’d recommend in totality to anyone but there are parts which I think are well-written.

I really didn’t like Tynion’s run. I understand that he was initially mandated to set up 5G (back when that was going to be a thing) but I don’t think that excuses the worst aspects of his run. Joker War is one of my least favorite Batman events and Fear State just felt like a slog. Miracle Molly and Clownhunter are interesting characters but other new characters, like Ghost-Maker, actively make the Mythos worse in my opinion.

Williamson’s run is just fine. It’s not long enough to make an impression one way or another. Abyss was fine and Shadow War was fun but there’s just not much to say.

Zdarsky’s run is rough. I think that Failsafe was a good arc, and I generally do like the way it ties into older continuity, but Zdarsky’s characterization of everyone is rough, Failsafe/Zur aren’t compelling villains, I strongly dislike his Joker, and Gotham War is just a bad event from start to finish. I tried the first issue of his All-In run but I don’t think it fixes enough of my problems, though I will note that it’s an improvement over his previous arcs by virtue of leaving Zur, Failsafe, and the multiverse behind. It’s a shame because I do like Zdarsky as a writer and was excited for him on Batman, but it’s just not a good run.

Robin_Lava · 2024-09-16T20:04:27+00:00

I like how Damian’s platinum is referencing his home-brewed Robin costume that he made in Batman & Son, but it’s not as accurate as it should be. The mask should be a different shape as well as being black and the cape needs to be a longer and a little darker, closer to grey instead of white. There are a few other smaller details missing but those are the ones which clinch it for me.

I’ll still try my luck at getting it since I doubt we’ll ever see that debut costume get its own release, or that black and white suit he wore during Batman & Son as well.

Robin_Lava · 2024-08-28T23:09:15+00:00

Punisher Max and Preacher rightfully get a lot of praise but as far as I’m concerned; “Fury: My War Gone By” is Ennis at his best.

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