Clark Kent Quits the Daily Planet - Just as I Quit Reading "Superman"

I'll be honest with you.

I wasn't going to pick up issue #13 of DC's recently relaunched Superman title, anyway.  I really didn't believe DC could flail about any worse with the character than it seemed they were doing during periods of the Eddie Berganza editorship of the Superman Family of books in the 00's - back when continuity changed with every writer - or when DC seemed to be forcing year-long, family-wide, editorial directed stories upon the Superman books prior to the New 52.

A few months back I read Scott Lobdell was coming on Superman, and at the time I decided that would mark the end of my readership on the title.  I'm not even worried about having a hole in my collection as comics from this era depreciate in value by 75% the minute you walk out the door, anyway, so it doesn't really matter for my collection.  If I want to eventually read the comics or just fill the gap, I'll buy them in a bin at Half Price Books where someone will dump them a few months from now and it'll still be cheaper than buying them digitally.

In case you can't tell, I'm not just not a fan of Mr. Lobdell's work, but DC's direction - particularly around Superman - the character - which has been reflected largely in Superman - the comic.

Today it became news for some reason that Superman was going to quit working at The Daily Planet and start his own website or something.  I guess.  Something social media-y that the kids will relate to.  Apparently he makes some speech about how the news business isn't just about sensationalism, its supposed to be about Truth, Justice and The American Way and then runs out the door crying.

Thinking out loud about a few things around DC Entertainment

Huh.

So, for the first time since probably 2003, I didn't look at the solicitations for DC Comics' coming books the day they were released.  I just forgot to do so.  But that's sort of where I'm at with DC these days.

It's time, once again, for my:  "Something is Up at DC" Amazing Criswell Psychic Predictions.

Cartoons:

DC is part of WB, which also owns The Cartoon Network.  About a year and a half ago, we first heard of the coming "DC Nation" block of cartoons, which never turned into a full block.  It was an hour with some small cartoons tucked in, lasting about 80 seconds or so apiece.  They were pretty great.

Season 2 of Cartoon Network started about three weeks ago, and then last Saturday - it just wasn't on.  They showed a different program in that time slot.  The same day we got an announcement that (a) they were pushing the show back to January and (b) DC Animation was releasing a few films, not the least of which was DC's Flashpoint story which led into the New 52.

I'm wondering - and this is just me talking out loud - if DC has decided that they don't want to do the New 52 in their new animated shows, but that was a last minute decision.  DC had already released one Justice League movie based in the world of Young Justice, and I assume that Flashpoint would be the same sort of thing - spinning the New 52 Universe into the Young Justice world - or eliminating it so they could do a New 52 Justice League cartoon.

Maybe that isn't happening.  Or maybe its a far greater problem to introduce the New 52 to a casual audience than devoted comic shop geeks and its causing all sorts of issues.

Or maybe they're finding that DC comics characters can't draw in an audience for a television program.  Honestly, both the Green Lantern cartoon and Young Justice are really, really dark shows.  Avengers may be dopey and badly voice-acted, but the characters don't all seem perpetually miserable, and that's the Marvel cartoon, about heroes with real-life problems.  Go figure.

But DC and CN pulled the plug on Batman: Brave and the Bold, which was a terrific program, so what do I know?

Or, DC is holding off until the new Batman and other cartoons are in the can and they can have a true programming block of 2 hours or so.  Which would be keen.

The bottom line is - WB's investment in DC as a multimedia IP farm just went kaput very publicly on DVR's all across the country.

Meanwhile over in comics - The Supersuit

I have to think someone noticed Superman's new costume is more trouble than its worth.

In the January solicits, Superboy seems to have inherited the current costume, and Superman is back to jeans and t-shirt.

My guess is he winds up with something more movie-centric without the collar, or we get something much closer to the original suit.

I don't think anyone liked that supersuit.  And it would have been nice to see two artists draw it the same way.  Ie:  Do not let Jim Lee design your supersuits anymore.

Meanwhile, Steel's new look is spoiled on the cover for Animal Man.  I like John Henry Irons, but have no fixed idea regarding his look except:  it's gray or shiny metal.  So, this is fine.

At the end of the day, no matter how many jokes you make about the red trunks, etc...  Superman is an icon first and a character second.  It's a bit like trying to hip up the Coca-Cola label or a Campbell's Soup can.  It's a nice design exercise, but on the shelf, its not what people are looking for.

The Wonder Woman pants/ no pants debate was surely of some use to DC.  At least they understood that when she's in pants, nobody has any idea what they're looking at and they're trying to mess with 70 years of brand recognition.  Its just a bad idea (surely as bad as the current DC logo, by the way).

We'll see what happens, but I suspect we'll get something much more familiar in our supersuit before all is said and done, whether it's the George Reeves look or the Henry Cavill speed suit.  I will not miss the Lee design.

Animated Watch: Dark Knight Returns (Part 1)

When I was in 6th grade, I walked into Austin Books and Comics and had some birthday or Christmas money to spend.  I don't remember much about my early days of comics collecting, or chronological order of events, but I most certainly remember standing in ABC, flipping through the pages of a collection of Dark Knight Returns and not buying it.  I've always regretted the decision.

Because it was a whole 3-6 months later that I bought a trade paperback of the comic that changed everything for me.  And I could have read that comic much, much earlier.

Today that copy of Dark Knight Returns is in a sealed bag with a board.  It's worn from wear from the literally dozens of times its been read cover to cover, not counting the hundreds of times it was simply picked up and leafed through, nor the times it was handed off to friends (even as they were told: do not lose this, do not tear the pages, do not read it while eating, do not in any way harm this book) and, when I was making some early decisions about Jamie, she took it with her as assigned reading.

Flat out, I have most of the book memorized.  Like some people spent their middle-school years memorizing baseball stats or all the words to their favorite sci-fi movie, I (and a lot of you, I'd guess) were memorizing every caption and thought bubble in Miller's comic attributed to Batman.  I was a Batman nut.

No Matter What, Dressing Like Hawkman Makes You Look Like a Lunatic

I do not cosplay, and I'd be lying if I said I do not find myself mentally judging those who do.  Not for cosplaying, but cosplaying badly.  I, for one, will never slip into a Flash costume just because  like Wally West and Barry Allen.  I know the limitations of my body and that red one-piece.

On paper, Hawkman sometimes looks totally AWESOME.  He has wings and a mace and a cool helmet.  I really want to like Hawkman.  The character appeared on Smallville for a handful of episodes, and when he had his helmet and wings on, he looked like a lunatic.

Turns out, cosplaying as Hawkman, no matter the quality of the costume or the physique of the wearer, points out one thing:  that is one crazy @#$%ing look.

Kudos to the couples costumes on this one.  At least you two know you're made for each other.

Nobody has been killed more ways or for more reasons than Thomas and Martha Wayne

editor's note:  I had called this post something about "Batman: Court of Owls", but it's not really about that, so I went back to my original title.

Many months ago when I was thinking I'd probably continue to follow DC Comics in the wake of the Nu52, I made a decision to just read the collections of Batman comics rather than single issues.  Actually, I'd been doing that for a while as I found I really could stand to wait for the trades when it came to the often ill-paced thrills of a Batman mystery unfolding.

To that end, I am now reading the first Batman New52! trade, The Court of Owls.

Thanks to Adam West, I've been a Batman fan literally since before I could talk.   Like most kids, I was somewhat unaware of the death of Thomas and Martha Wayne as a motivating factor for Bruce until I started picking up Batman comics in middle school.

Cap is a Write-In for President In a Comic Somewhere

As we head into election season, the online media looks for click-fodder, and Marvel and DC think up events that will get headlines rather than sell some damn comics...

Was I surprised to read on a mainstream news site that Captain America is going to become President of the United States in the "Ultimate" version of the Marvel Universe?  Well, yeah.  I mean, that's a pretty drastic idea.  Of course, I haven't followed the Ultimate universe in a while, and last I checked they'd also killed off Peter Parker, half the X-Men, and, I think, basically gone "dystopian" with their version of the world.  So, you know, whatever.

I mean, Cap over in the mainline Marvel U pondered a run circa 1980 (we got Reagan instead, who, while charming, couldn't have taken Batroc the Leaper).  And Superman was elected President in one of those "Imaginary Stories" back in the day, Lex won the election in 2000 as a third party candidate (with Superman's childhood pal, Pete Ross, as VP), and Morrison made a version of Superman President who appeared as recently as Action Comics #9 (Volume 2).  And, Superman has been the Prime Minister of Russia over in Red Son.  And that doesn't include the dozens of times Superman went crazy and declared himself either king of the gorillas, some locality or of all the Earth.

Back in the 1970's, Batgirl served in Congress for a number of years (it was insane).  And, of course, one must never forget DC oddball youth-culture-appeal character Prez Rickard.

and the President thought he'd really discovered something when he watched  his first Kubrick movie...

So, basically, comics are full of crazy-brained stunts and goofy ideas about our elected (and not-elected) leaders.  They always have been, and I guess they always will be.  I'm glad that superhero comics aren't above the sort of wacky story telling that leads to stuff like Batgirl running for office, but I'm an old reader and seeing Cap sworn in as President on a write-in vote doesn't exactly blow my mind.  I hope younger readers feel differently.

TL; DR: The New 52 - This Reader's One Year Later

In September of last year, DC Comics relaunched their line of comics for the first time since Crisis on Infinite Earths back in 1986.  In general, comics fans my age grew up considering Crisis to be a necessary step in the evolution of superhero comics and enable them to reach a wider and more adult audience.

The relaunch of 1986 gave DC Comics a chance to give their intellectual property a fresh start where they felt necessary (ie: Superman and Wonder Woman), and continue telling the stories about their characters that didn't seem to need a rejiggering (Batman).

What nobody ever really talks about is that:  DC spent more than the next two decades trying to fix all the messes they'd created in their half-baked relaunch effort.  The gaps in planning and execution led to numerous attempts at editorial clean-up and we were treated to numerous in-narrative attempts to "fix" the problem, from Zero Hour to Infinite Crisis and, finally, to Flashpoint with dozens of other hiccups along the way.  In short, after 20-odd years of fixing the problems created by the reboot, DC had more or less reset their universe to very much reflect the DCU that existed prior to the "necessary" change.

My initial response last June on seeing the information that DC planned another relaunch - which I read on my phone in the back of a crowded ballroom at a conference I was supposed to be managing - was absolute surprise.

In 2007, I was reading over two dozen different DC Comics titles, and, of course, other titles, too... but DC was my bread and butter.  I firmly believed that Infinite Crisis - leading into 52 and One Year Later (DC's linewide narrative jump forward a year) were going to be well executed, well realized attempts to finally merge the old, Pre-Crisis DC with the current DC, and we had a chance to enter into a new golden age at DC.  For a long, long time I had believed that DC was working on a mega-narrative intended to pull together a DCU that kept the history of the company intact in its entirety, merging Pre and Post Crisis continuities and celebrating the 75 years of publication history.

I have no idea if DC ever rolled out the promised additional characters in the sidebars.  I do know Wonder Woman is no longer in leggings.

Nope.  They were sort-of scrapping the work and works of the past 7.5 decades in order to draw in an audience that had been daunted by DC's history and the internet chatter about how confusing DC had become (that was, at best, half true), and a lot of misconceptions about DC's stable of characters.

I don't know exactly how soon it hit me, but the realization slowly sunk in that, at age 36, I had just passed out of the 18-34 demographic in a final and unceremonious fashion.  DC Comics was happy to have had my money (a LOT of my money) the past few years - but they were going to do something else now.

Over the years I've had email chatter with a few older and former readers of comics, and I watch folks at the comic shop.  I was aware that there is some point many, many comics readers hit where they hang up their guns and declare themselves done with the characters and worlds they loved - at least in trying to keep up in the Wednesday shopper fashion that the Big 2 cater to.  I'd see these older guys on comment threads, sighing and saying "it's been ten years since I picked up a new comic, and this is why I don't miss it", and sometime about four or five years ago I went from writing them off as old, grumpy men to know that this was an inevitability of the hobby.  Something made all of these people move on.

The Wonder Woman/ Superman Kiss

Apparently even the ladies on The View have weighed in on Wonder Woman and Superman having passionate smoochy-time in the pages of Justice League coming on Wednesday.

Sigh.  I suppose that means that, as a blog that likes to talk about both of these characters, I should also put in my two cents.

credit to Diane Nelson for remembering her company owns half of telecommunications and getting this stunt some publicity

The problem is that I gave up on the Geoff Johns/ Jim Lee Justice League comic 6 issues ago, so I have no idea what led to the smoochies on the actual page - so I won't comment on that.

Here's what I will comment upon:

Joe Kubert Merges with The Infinite

Comics legend Joe Kubert has reportedly passed.

I point you to the obit run at The Onion AV club, as it's a pretty damned good summary of Kubert's bio and will hopefully explain to those of you who don't follow comics who the man was and how he stood in the pantheon of comics heroes.

Kubert was at DC Comics for most of his career, first arriving in 1943 and holding positions as a writer, editor and artist, depending on where the winds blew.  Today's fans like myself are mostly familiar with his co-creations like Sgt. Rock, or his own creation, Tor and the stunning artistry he brought to the page.  Where Kirby was volcanic energy in need of an outlet, Kubert was an illustrative master capturing the world-weary faces of Easy Company, battle-worn soldiers of Earth and beyond, but a master of perspective and detail.

...and I like his Iris West.

Signal Watch Reads: Batman - Earth One

Let me get this out of the way:  I've always enjoyed the artwork of Gary Frank that's come through my buy pile, and here I felt like he somehow trumped his previous efforts and delivered the Gary Frankiest artwork that ever Gary Franked.  That's a compliment, y'all.  Beautiful illustrative linework, an ability to capture expressions that's somewhere approaching Maguire, a great sense of panel layout and page management...  In my book, this is just gorgeous work, including the inking and colorist work.  This level of quality is the sort of thing that can give a casual buyer at the book store a chance to seriously consider buying a comic even if that's not their usual thing.

I appreciate that DC seems to have tried very hard to up their game in the art department.  When you're putting a package together like this for a book store audience, and you need yet another take on the Batman origin story to sell inside comic shops, you might as well go crazy putting out terrific looking superhero art.

Unfortunately, the book isn't just about the art, and at some point you have to also tell a story.

Signal Re-Watch: Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Author's Note:  Spoiler's ahoy.  Proceed at your own risk.

So, today I teamed up with Jason, AmyD, The Admiral and Jamie and re-watched what appears to be the final installment in the Nolan-helmed Batman trilogy.

The first look at the movie was posted last week after I'd seen the movie with a different crew.

As has been the pattern with Nolan's movies since Memento (and what I tend to think is true of movies I don't just enjoy, but enjoy re-watching), once you know how it ends, it's a pleasure to re-watch the film and see how the moving pieces work together, and not just from a plotting perspective, as in a particular good espionage movie or thriller.  I've harped a lot on how Nolan has more or less used the Bat-movies as a chance to explore ideas of fear, justice, security & liberty - and it was worthwhile to take in a second viewing and watch the movie in a frame of mind more conducive to regarding what Nolan was doing and trying to say, and not just hanging on as a summer thriller unspooled and I did my best to keep up.

Of course, I don't have a score sheet that enables me to check Nolan's ideas off, and what you read here is based on nothing, really, but my own reading of the movies as a whole, so you'll have to bear with me.

A couple of quick Superman Reviews: Superman Family #3 and Superman #11

Superman Family Adventures #3
by Baltazar and Franco

The fact that this book isn't moving 80,000 copies per month is a crime.  Good-natured, action-packed, zany, bizarre and purely in love with the Superman mythos, this book is a perfect comic to hand a kid as well as your hipster pal looking for a good laugh.  If you're into a balanced diet in your comics, this is sort of the lovely pudding you should save to savor at the end of the buy pile.  Or something.

Signal Watch Watches: The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

I'm considering this post a "first take" review.  I'm stating that now partially because I do plan to see the movie again in the theater (and likely many times in the future) and partially because I've already seen how this plays out for me trying to talk about a Nolan movie on the first go-round and pretending like I got everything.

The Dark Knight Rises (2012) has a tremendous amount of territory to cover, and contains a terribly ambitious film that I think, did modern movies not get capped at 2.5 hours as a run-time, could easily have fleshed itself out a bit more and run an even 3 hours or longer.  The movie has the task of laying out it's own story, giving a conclusion that satisfactorily resolves character arcs and plot threads from prior films, and digging far deeper into the thematic elements of the prior movies.

From a content standpoint, of course it's a mishmash of the entire scope of this thing we call "Batman", with the movie seeming to borrow plot from a few different bat-sources, including Knightfall, Batman: The Cult, The Dark Knight Returns and from No Man's Land- stories from different Bat-eras and varying Bat-creators, and but all sharing central motifs of a lost city.  But, that said, Nolan has managed to very much craft a new story, making this final installment feel very much like a section or book within the book and less like an episode.

Prep for Dark Knight Rises: I May Love Batman, But It's a Complicated Thing

I love Batman.  I do.  Most importantly, Batman has always been with me, and Batman will be around in some form long after I'm worm food.  Whether the idea will endure like Arthurian legend or disappear like so many other pulp characters, I can't say.  I do occasionally imagine a future in which it's a bit of trivia where people find out that the stories of Batman and Superman originated in comic books, their roots in the pages of comics long since lost the way, say, Paul Bunyan's legend spread as part of an ad campaign.

But as I grow older, I move further and further from a place where the repetition of the stories in the comics has appeal and find myself in a place where the character works better for me in movies or in the occasional graphic novel or some such.  While the comics kind of make a joke about it and ask the reader to engage in willing suspension of disbelief, after reading Batman comics since the mid-80's, it's hard not to notice that whatever state Gotham is located in has done a simply terrible job of managing its prisons and mental health care, and that the people of the state seem to have an incredibly low bar for what they expect their politicians to do about the fact that a clown-faced killer routinely exits a supposedly high-security mental institution under his own recognizance.

somehow this movie did not feed my need for believability in my superhero franchise movie

There's the small matter of child endangerment that's hard enough to ignore on the first go-round, but by Robin #5 (2 of whom have been "killed"), one would expect Superman would take Batman aside and suggest he give the kid sidekick idea a rest for a while.

There's the whole "how has nobody figured out that Bruce Wayne is Batman" thing, especially once you add in the "youthful wards" that keep rotating through Wayne Manor, placing Man-Bat on the things that feel more likely to happen than Bruce to not be considered the Michael Jackson of the DC Universe.

Signal Re-Watch: Batman Begins (2005)

I do recall that when Batman Begins was released, it wasn't really an event.  I certainly didn't rush out to the theater to see it, and when I finally did catch it, the theater wasn't packed.  I believe the common mythology is that Batman Begins did fine at the box office, but nobody would mistake it for a spectacular game changer.  Then the movie hit home video and cable, and people sort of freaked out about the movie at that point.

Honestly, I remember a lot of people I worked with in Arizona asking me about the movie around Christmas when the DVD hit the market.

We're the franchise you need, not the franchise you deserve.  Or something.

In anticipation of Saturday's viewing of Dark Knight Rises, Jamie and I are re-watching the first two Chris Nolan helmed Bat-flicks.  If you'd like to join us Friday for Dark Knight, we'll be here with bells on.

The bottom line is that I think this movie is really a pretty darn good Batman movie, especially in 2005 when the last Bat-flick I had seen at the time was Batman and Robin.  However, I'd argue that once Nolan was able to cast off the shackles of WB studios and make a Batman movie without producer notes, their "help" casting the film, etc...  He made a movie that a whole lot of people liked better, and that stands up a bit more strongly upon review.

An Awkward Encounter with an Old Flame: Superman and a few other DC Comics Solicitations for October 2012

I've stopped trying to dwell on the end of my love affair with all things DC as nobody wants to hang out with the guy moping around after a break-up, but since DC Comics and I are still in the same neighborhood, I think we're feeling our way to try to be friends, even if we're not quite ready to spend a lot of time alone together right now as things would inevitably get awkward.  We're just a person and a comic company who have both grown, and that has meant we've grown apart.

Looking at DC's October solicitations does feel like the stormy part of the break-up is over with, and after all my pleading and their curt refusals to pay me heed, it's nice to see a few overtures of friendship in the making.  It'll never be what it was, but you have to learn to live with each other if you're going to see one another whether you like it or not.

We may disagree on Justice League, but I see things like the Joe Kubert Presents anthology on the list, and I can give a warm smile DC's direction.  Just out of nostalgia, they're playing our song.

And then, the announcements about trade collections almost feel like finding a sweater left behind that you hold for a second and wonder what you should so with it, even as you like the feel of it between your fingers.

Green Lantern: Sector 2814 by Len Wein?  Kamandi: The Last Boy on Earth Volume 2 by Kirby?  The Wonder Woman Chronicles by Marston?  You can't just toss those memories out.

Reviewing the Super-Books is always where I hold my breath for an instant, watching to see what DC does, see how DC reacts as we bump into one another again on the street.

Signal Watch Watches: Superman vs. The Elite (2012)

The latest release from DC Animation's feature group is an adaptation of the Joe Kelly penned, Doug Mahnke penciled issue of Superman, #775, actually somewhat known by the issue's tile of "What's So Funny About Truth, Justice and the American Way".


For simplicity's sake, the movie has been retitled Superman vs. The Elite, more or less letting the casual observer that this was Superman in a super fight against a bunch of punky superheroes and that they're in for big Superman fights, if that's what they're looking for.  

Too much background

At the time of the release of the original story in the comics (a single, double-length issue), for a number of years Superman had been dwindling within the DC Universe as a featured player.  In an era of trying to make superheroes "realistic", the idea of a guy with incredible super powers, a flying dog and who disguised himself with a pair of glasses didn't fit with what the aging fans of comics, guys who were into Schwarzenegger movies, saw as the proper mode for an action hero.  The sort of Roy Rogers take on Superman that had been his primary mode of existence wasn't working very well for an audience that was turning to Reservoir Dogs as it's idea of an action film.

DC Comics Father's Day Ad (from Comixology)

Ha.

Well, I can't blame Comixology for trying, but...

This was the ad I received in my email today from Comixology.

1.  I find the idea that the target market for Comixology is really buying their dad $0.99 digital comics to be a bit disingenuous at best.  I mean, The Admiral owns an iPad and I do not (and he's doing very little to remedy my situation, because I think he likes to lord his superior technology over me), but he would probably just be confused with my generosity.  So, really, you're talking about DC hoping the guys who have kids old enough to buy things online will jump on Comixology and buy them comics.  But DC went way out of their way to alienate all those guys this year (the non 18-25 year old white males), so...

2.  Oh, right.  Remember when the Flash was Wally West and he had kids and was a father and existed?  Buy those, because that storyline really went somewhere.

3.  Batman.  Father...  why daddy?  WHY?  I WILL AVENGE YOUUUUUU????  (also, Happy Father's Day!)

4.  Wonder Woman, made of clay because no men to be daddy's on Paradise Island.  Oh, right.  The Azzarello stuff?  Well, sure.  Happy Deity Daddy Day!

5.  And Black Lightning.  Who somehow hid two teenage daughters from us until they suddenly existed.  So, Black Lightning is the late 40's superhero!  Man, he keeps in shape.

I kind of think Comixology just wants to move some $0.99 digital comics, but I also think just grabbing some images and overlaying them in Photoshop may not have been the way to go.

I will not buy Superman products featuring a Superman with a Preposterously Large Head

If you ask Jamie, she'll tell you that I will buy just any old thing with an "S" Shield on it.  Cups.  Underwear.  Towels.  Dog bowls.  And there's some truth to that.  But something I've always steered away from are Superman items that depict Superman, but with a weird-shaped head or a disproportionate head.

Take the upcoming Superman USB drive from Mimobot for example.

NOPE.  Not gonna do it.

I suppose that part of it is that Superman really is just a guy with blue eyes and dark hair.  Any time you mess with that look, now you're just distending some dude's head, and not in a particularly funny or fun way.

if I have to explain why this is right and the USB drive Superman is wrong, we may need to start over from scratch  with this whole blogging enterprise

Dan Didio, you mad, beautiful genius

Not that I'm paying much attention at the moment, but DC cancelled another handful of titles with plans to replace them with, in a Direct Market populated solely by comics readers from whom their is no alternative audience, ideas just about as promising as the books that they're cutting.

On the chopping block:
Captain Atom - a conspicuously Dr. Manhattanish take on Captain Atom, the character Alan Moore was riffing on when he created Dr. Manhattan in Watchmen.
Resurrection Man - a book that was never that popular back in the 90's, so why 2011 was the time to relaunch, what with nobody asking for it...
Voodoo - I forget the exact provenance of this book, but it was never DC and part of some other line at some point and was about a stripper alien?  Maybe?  I wasn't clear, but...  they fired the character's creator off the book and put on someone who actually understood the character or something... Nobody read this.  It's all moot now, I guess.
Justice League International - a book that was intended to build off the good will garnered over 5 years of great Justice League stories that don't exist...  Here's your whole problem with the "5 year leap" thing DC was trying to do with the New 52.  Dan Didio couldn't clap enough to make everyone believe that we weren't totally rebooting the DCU.

but now you can get:
Talon - well, I can't argue that a major event should generate a new character.  I haven't read one issue of Court of Owls, so this is lost on me.
Phantom Stranger - some characters just work better in the background as mysterious figures or in mini series.  Phantom Stranger and The Spectre are at the top of this list.
Sword of Sorcery - I predict a very small, very vocal group of fans who will complain about the right treatment of Amethyst, which is an hilarious thing to do.  This book will never see 2014.
Team Seven - it seems impossible to have cooked up a more generic idea, even in light of the failure of Blackhawks.  But somehow... a book featuring too many characters that nobody cares about wearing post John Byrne armor in gray and carrying silly looking weapons seems like the ur-New 52 book, so I think this may take off.

But that's not what made me slap my forehead.