Friday Favorites: Reboots Edition

Oh no! Ben Affleck is Batman!!! No, no, no! Lobo looks like he walked out of Twilight! What? The new Doctor is old!

If you are reading this there is a good chance you’ve encountered—or partook—in some of the above over the past month.

The world of sci-fi and comics offers more opportunities for rebooting than any other genre. Sometimes the reboot is a disaster. The 1980s V miniseries are still amazing despite cheesy 1980s television special effects. The recent V reboot? Eh, not so amazing. And what of Battlestar Galactica? Not my cup of tea but you can’t deny the relaunch was a success.

So with the recent news of new actors and new versions of characters, this week’s Friday Favorites will look at some of our favorite reboots. We start things off with NerdSpan comics editor Mara Wood and why the new Star Trek films work:

I am a Star Wars fan to the core, which made me believe that I had no room in my heart for Star Trek. When J. J. Abrams essentially rebooted the franchise, many new fans, myself included, jumped onboard.

The reboot worked for a number of reasons. First, it paid homage to the original series without overburdening new audiences. New fans could fully appreciate the movie while lifelong fans still felt important. The movie also brought in some great action sequences and special effects, bringing to life the science fiction world Kirk and the Enterprise occupy. Finally, the story was well-rounded, making it a great way to bring in skeptical viewers of science fiction.

The success of Star Trek opened the door for Into Darkness, the summer 2013 sequel. Incorporating many of the same elements, Into Darkness amped up the action while giving audiences a heavy dose of emotion. There’s no doubt that the Star Trek fandom gained an extra boost thanks to J. J. Abrams and his careful handling of such a popular franchise.

NerdSpan contributor Leo Johnson shared one of his favorite reboots, the company-wide reset over at Valiant Comics:

Reboots and relaunches are a constant fixture of the comic book landscape. It seems that every single year at least one major title or publisher seeks to reboot in order to meet some made up standard of accessibility or tone of story. While many reboots are met with general fan outrage, few have been executed so well or received so positively as last year’s Valiant Comics relaunch.

Valiant preemptively proclaimed last summer as “The Summer of Valiant”. While it seems a bit boastful, the quality of the titles they launched in those months made it abundantly clear that Valiant was back in a big way. Leading with X-O Manowar, the story of an ancient warrior given powerful alien technology and brought to the future, Valiant brought their A-Game quickly and made a big statement. Following up with Harbinger, the story of a group of superpowered teens, Valiant diversified, but still kept the quality. Then, Bloodshot, a bloody story of the perfect soldier, brought even more action to the Valiant Universe. Finally, Archer and Armstrong, an often goofy tale of a brainwashed youth and the immortal drunkard that he teams up with, rounded out the Summer of Valiant and added a touch of humor that only made things better.

Each title was absolutely well executed. Each had top-notch creative teams, both formerly well-known talents and ones just emerging. With their books some of the best reviewed of the summer and some of the most well liked, Valiant had definitely rebooted their line in a way that most any other company would do well to take a look at. Simultaneously reaching fans of the older titles, while scooping up many new readers, Valiant executed a reboot near flawlessly.

For me, a reboot is best when it takes a character I don’t know or I don’t care about and makes me a fan. I can immediately think of four comics that did just that.

Gail Simone’s Batgirl came around at a perfect time. I was replaying Batman-Arkham Asylum and midway through the game I started thinking “Oracle is really an awesome character.” And then here comes the New 52 with a Barbara Gordon Batgirl title. Batgirl wasn’t about a new interpretation of the character or righting the ship for me. It was an opportunity to jump onboard and learn about the character. Thankfully Simone brought the same strong characterization to the comic as the creators of Arkham Island and Arkham City did in the video games.

Ed Brubaker’s Captain America and Matt Fraction’s Iron Man made me care about two legends I always passed by when I scanned the shelf for new comics to buy. Wizard Magazine used to have a weekly roundtable discussion on four new comics. Each month Captain America was discussed and as I read more and more about this book I decided to check it out. I was hooked immediately. A few months later the same occurred with the new Iron Man series. What these two comics did right was present something new while slowly introducing readers to the basics of the character. This made for perfect jumping on points for new readers. Granted, Brubaker’s Cap run was more steeped in the character’s history, but backstory was always delivered in a way that informed new readers and introduced longtime fans to a new aspect of the Captain America story.

Finally, there’s Peter David’s X-Factor, which unfortunately wrapped up its run this week. The comic was one of the finest examples of taking an existing concept and putting a new spin on it. From a government sponsored super team to a mutant detective agency, David was able to take a cast of characters I never really cared about and make them shine. Now when I make a list of favorite characters, it’s guaranteed to have several X-Factor members on it (usually a rotating cast depending on the mood I’m in). What made X-Factor so great was the team dynamic and the emotion spinning out of it. Real human drama almost always topples epic superhero fights for me. And X-Factor had drama aplenty ranging from pregnancies to gay relationships to death to despair. The first scene of the series sets the tone, showing a powerless Rictor ready to jump off a ledge, and how a Madrox dupe reacted to the situation taught readers to be prepared for anything.

Here’s the thing these series taught me about comics: there is no point in saying you don’t care about a certain character because chances are it’s temporary. In the right hands, you can love every single character ever made. I never cared about Captain America until Ed Brubaker took over. Same with Iron Man and Matt Fraction. Now it’s Fraction and Hawkeye. David took a cast of perennial second tier characters and gave them depth and made me love them.

What made all of these reboots work was the creators invested so much love into the franchise and it showed with strong characterization and stories.

So, what are your favorites?

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