Comics / Comics News

World's Finest Isn't a Superman/Batman Anthology and That's OK

By Dan Horn
January 18, 2012 - 12:22

Dan DiDio had told the audience at the New 52 panel at SDCC last summer that a new Superman/Batman anthology series was on the way, just not as part of the initial launch. For many readers familiar with the past Superman/Batman title, it  had its ups and downs for sure, but it always seemed like a lame duck resident anthology series in the DC publication line. Sales for the series weren't particularly stellar later in the book's run, and neither were some of the story arcs, though that's a generalization. Writers like Joshua Hale Fialkov actually turned in some really great work on the series toward the end of its eight-year span.

When DC announced World's Finest as one of its six new series starting in May, I immediately assumed that it was the Superman/Batman book DiDio had referenced, because the classic World's Finest series was originally very Superman/Batman centric. I'm glad it's not, because I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed and oversaturated by all of the Batman books I'm reading now, and I've been underwhelmed by the content in the two Superman books. While Scott Snyder's work on the first volume of Detective and the second volume of Batman have been brilliant, I've dropped the New 52 Detective Comics recently, because Tony Daniel just keeps losing me. Every once in a great while he puts out a decently scripted issue that reels me back in, and then the following seven months are just terrible. I feel like I've wasted a lot of money on Tony Daniel comics that I don't like simply because Batman and Detective Comics have been on my pull list for over a decade, and I'm hesitant to take them off. The Dark Knight series is even more groan-inducing than Daniel's work, and so I've distanced myself from that book as well over time. And, as we discussed on the podcast this week, the New 52 Superman series isn't my cup of tea either. Even Morrison's Action Comics has been pretty tepid, or at least not consistently enthralling.

It was a pleasant surprise to find that the new World's Finest wouldn't be following the Superman/Batman formula. The series will actually begin by following Power Girl and Huntress. To me, the absence of a Superman/Batman book is actually refreshing, and I'm interested in seeing what Paul Levitz does with World's Finest. I do have some reservations with it starring Power Girl and Huntress, however. Not because I don't like those characters, but I'm hoping this isn't yet another book where women are running around with enormous boobs and camel toes, giving teenage boys erections. That's a trend I'd like to see stop this year.

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12