Karen Berger leaves DC

Editor Karen Berger, who many (if not most) credit with the success of the Vertigo imprint, is parting company with DC. She had already been effectively demoted from the position she'd held as Executive Editor at Vertigo for twenty years. So, given how much the line has already shrunk and the unfavourable changes reportedly made to creator contracts, does Vertigo still have a future?

tony ingram wrote: does Vertigo still have a future?

I would think not, although I might be wrong. I don't know, it seems as if DC is consolidating control and is less and less allowing for creators (and I am including Ms. Berger, as she IS credited with creating Vertigo as an imprint) any leeway. I hope this bites them in the ass, but I doubt it.
At one point, I had it in my head to try to collect all the Vertigo titles, because I thought it was just that good, across the board. It did a lot for DC. I know that things change, and it could be just that it's no longer economically viable, but it seems that may be less so than just the desire for tighter control. (At least, from the little I've read).

I gather there was a series of meetings scheduled at DC yesterday to discuss their future plans. These wlill still be ongoing now, I think. All DC have confirmed is that there will be "no redundancies"...

Gail Simone just got sacked, too. Some people are crying sexism. I don't know enough about it to cry anything, though.

Gail Simone?! Not good

What are DC playing at? Simone was one of their more popular creators.

I don't know. It's starting to look a lot like suicide over there.

Superman and Uncle Sam would be weeping, if they still existed.
The new Superman, of course, will be hurling the out of favour creators off the roof, while the new Uncle Sam sits polishing his shiny silver badge and honing his Nick Fury impersonation.

Sam_Vimes wrote:Gail Simone just got sacked, too. Some people are crying sexism. I don't know enough about it to cry anything, though.

According to her Twitter feed, it was done by email. Well, that's about as good as it gets.

Sam_Vimes wrote:Some people are crying sexism. I don't know enough about it to cry anything, though.

I don't either, but they started out with fairly few females, and now have fewer. Not the brightest way to expand your readership, I think.

By E-MAIL they fired her? Hasn't she been working for them for, like, 10 years or something? It kind of seems like a phone call would have been in order.

Sam_Vimes wrote:It kind of seems like a phone call would have been in order.

I'd think that too.

Mbast1 wrote:

Sam_Vimes wrote:It kind of seems like a phone call would have been in order.

I'd think that too.

Would Perry White or Bruce Wayne fire someone by email? Sounds more like the sort of thing Lex Luthor would do.

Sounds like it's time for a new company slogan.

Back in the eighties it was "The New DC. Where Legends Live2.
Now, it's "The New DC: Where Ethics Die"...

tony ingram wrote:Now, it's "The New DC: Where Ethics Die"...

DC "Basic Human Dignity? Meh"...

Dire Crap works for me. But that's more a critique of their current content.

tony ingram wrote:Dire Crap works for me. But that's more a critique of their current content.

I don't mind DC's content, to some extent. However, I think the problem in content AND character has to do with the kind of in-breeding comics has. The same stories are told, but people (writers and readers) think they're new either because they've never seen them before or they seem "cool" because of some twist; and it's ok to treat creators badly because it's "always been that way". And so many fans want to write and/or draw that they think they'd take anything they could get to do the work. (Mind you, with some writers you DO think they've never read anything but comics)
Comics are either going to die off, or we're going to have to embrace the actually new.

The problem is, as you say, a generation of comics creators influenced solely by the previous generation of comics creators and nothing else. I don't see many new ideas in American comics these days.

tony ingram wrote:The problem is, as you say, a generation of comics creators influenced solely by the previous generation of comics creators and nothing else. I don't see many new ideas in American comics these days.

That's my thinking. But, then, it seems that few companies are willing to fund anything new (think movies, television...) but then, most fans don't buy new things either.

Television? No new ideas? Oh, come on! Look at Elementary...er, no, wait, the BBC's Sherlock...no, hang on, er-Battlestar Galacti...

Damn.

So...uh. Hey-have you heard about the new Star Trek movie?

tony ingram wrote:Hey-have you heard about the new Star Trek movie?

I was in the bookstore last night, and picked up a novel which is a "Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes" book. I will probably enjoy it. But, there were plenty of others that were continuations of earlier series, and lots of more-of-the-same. I am guilty, obviously, of buying those at times, but I so rarely see anything that's actually new. I saw a number of comics I want, but those will wait until I can get them through my local shop.
We live in the age of recycling.