First Issue Special? Bill Ranks DC's 52 #1s

For laughs, I decided to read all 52 new superhero #1s from DC Comics. I survived to tell the tale. Let's break 'em down, then, and count down from the best the new crop of series has to offer, to the comics that would have been better off remaining in tree form. To be as scientifically accurate as possible, we will rate them on the 5-star quantitative Morrissey/Marr scale, with no editorial commentary whatsoever.

There Is a Light That Never Goes Out (5 out of 5 stars):

Nope.

Last Night I Dreamt That Somebody Loved Me (4.5 stars):

Atomic Robo and the Ghost of Station X (Oops, wait, that's not DC.)

A Rush and a Push and the Land Is Ours (4 stars):

1. Static Shock
2. All Star Western

This Charming Man (3.5 stars):

3. Swamp Thing
4. Action Comics
5. Frankenstein: Agent of SHADE
6. Demon Knights
7. Birds of Prey
8. Batman
9. Animal Man
10. Batwoman

Please, Please, Please, Let Me Get What I Want (3 stars):

11. Justice League Dark
12. Men of War
13. Deathstroke
14. Wonder Woman
15. Aquaman
16. Superman
17. Batman and Robin
18. Stormwatch
19. The Flash
20. OMAC
21. Resurrection Man

What Difference Does It Make? (2.5 stars):

22. I, Vampire
23. Batwing
24. Nightwing
25. Green Lantern Corps
26. Green Lantern
27. Green Arrow
28. Captain Atom
29. Grifter
30. Blackhawks

William, It Was Really Nothing (2 stars):

31. Justice League
32. Justice League International
33. The Savage Hawkman
34. Legion Lost
35. Green Lantern: New Guardians
36. Blue Beetle
37. Supergirl
38. Superboy
39. DC Universe Presents: Deadman
40. Voodoo
41. Legion of Super-Heroes
42. Teen Titans

That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore (1.5 stars):

43. Suicide Squad
44. Mister Terrific
45. Batman: The Dark Knight
46. Detective Comics
47. The Fury of Firestorm: The Nuclear Men
48. Red Hood and the Outlaws
49. Catwoman

Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now (1 star):

50. Red Lanterns
51. Hawk and Dove
52. Batgirl

Superhero Comics

Sometimes when you try too hard, you start fuckin’ up, because you forget the fuckin’ ingredients. When McDonald’s has their 99-cent Big Mac sale, right, people love the fuckin’ Big Mac. But because it’s 99 cents, everybody fuckin’ wants ’em, right? People order four, five at a time. But now, the people who work there gotta rush. They gotta fuckin’ rush to make the fuckin’ Big Macs faster, because everybody wants ’em. They’re fuckin’ 99 cent! But, now they’ve fuckin’ rushed them so fuckin’ fast that every once in a while, you’ll bite into a Big Mac and it’s missing one of the goddamn ingredients! Everybody knows it’s two all-beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, on a sesame bun, right? You fuck around and bite the Big Mac and one of them missing special sauce, you’re like “Fuck! There’s no special sauce on this motherfucker.” You bite another one, the pickles ain’t in the shit. You know why? Because motherfuckers is rushing. It takes time. You gotta make the shit how it’s supposed to be made. When you start rushing the burger, you open the shit up, the burger crooked and shit. What the fuck? The burger’s hanging halfway off the goddamn bun, because they fuckin’ rushing, and they not doing it. You gotta make it how the ingredients was initially pitched to the person, and how it’s supposed to taste, and how it’s supposed to look, and how it’s supposed to feel. And that’s what the problem is when you start to make too many fuckin’ changes to shit. And you don’t know what the fuck they want, because they don’t know what they want.

~J.B. Smoove on a crappy sitcom he was on, but really, what doesn't it apply to?