Broken Frontier

Currently struggling through another in an interminable series of revamps, reboots and relaunches, the embattled DC imprint is floundering, with a hazy brand identity and inconsistent schedule hampering its ability to build an audience. It might be difficult to recall that less than twenty years ago, WildStorm presented a legitimate threat to both DC and Marvel. In the second of a two-part analysis (part one here) Broken Frontier looks at the history of WildStorm and its characters, now officially the inhabitants of DC's "Earth-50".

Over the next few years, WildStorm was virtually ignored by DC as their focus shifted over to the buildup towards Infinite Crisis. Alan Moore, always uneasy about working with DC following a conflict over the ownership of Watchmen, began to bring the ABC titles to a close. A further dispute over the film adaptation of V For Vendetta led to Moore swearing to never work with the company again; League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen, the only ABC title Moore intended to continue, will be published via Top Shelf Productions.

A 2003 relaunch of The Authority written by Robbie Morrison clearly lacked the spark of the original series, and the publisher was forced to resort to a crossover with the other Eye Of The Storm titles to generate any interest. 2004’s Coup d’Etat, in which the Authority took control of the United States government, briefly drummed up sales, but the publisher was unable to take advantage of this, with most of the titles involved being cancelled soon after.

Increasingly desperate to recapture an audience, WildStorm turned to titles featuring some of their older characters, launching series such as Majestic and Nemesis. With the exception of creator-owned titles such as Astro City, Brian K. Vaughan’s Ex Machina and the occasional issue of Planetary, however, WildStorm became an increasingly irrelevant and anemic presence on the shelves.

Despite its failures, DC did not give up entirely on the benighted imprint. As part of the furor surrounding Infinite Crisis, DC launched the 2005-2006 Captain Atom: Armmageddon miniseries. Long-time DC hero Captain Atom was shunted into the WildStorm Universe, encountering various characters and used as a tool by the enigmatic Void to remake the entire reality. The rebooted WildStorm continuity was now considered part of the DC Multiverse, eventually designated Earth-50, with subtle changes made to the backgrounds and status quo of its characters.

In 2006 and 2007, the new WildStorm line launched, with superstar writer Grant Morrison working on The Authority and Wildcats, Mike Carey on Wetworks, Brian Azzarello on Deathblow, Christos Gage on Stormwatch: PHD, Gail Simone on Gen13 and new title Welcome To Tranquility, and Garth Ennis on a Midnighter solo series, spun off from The Authority. The Worldstorm relaunch also saw Jim Lee’s return to the publisher he had created, as he took the penciling duties for Morrison’s Wildcats.

The Worldstorm books, however, would soon prove to be dead on their feet. In the year and a half since the relaunch, only two issues of The Authority and one of Wildcats have been published. A September 2007 interview with Authority artist Gene Ha confirmed that no further work was being done on the series by Morrison. Stormwatch: PHD has also been cancelled, while Welcome To Tranquility is on hiatus. Wetworks was last published in November, with no new issue solicited through at least April. Deathblow #9 should see print in February, having averaged a bimonthly schedule since its debut. Only Gen13 and Midnighter are continuing relatively unscathed.

Part of the difficulty may be due to the departure of Scott Dunbier. A driving force behind WildStorm’s successes in the late ‘90s, Dunbier left DC following what was rumored to be a forced leave of absence. In August 2007, CBR’s Rich Johnston reported that sources both within and outside DC Comics indicated the political controversy and maneuverings surrounding the publication of Alan Moore’s final WildStorm project, The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier, were to blame for Dunbier’s absence from the summer convention circuit. Dunbier officially left both WildStorm and DC in October, and has not made any public comment regarding the matter.

Without Dunbier’s guiding hand, the future of WildStorm is uncertain. The Worldstorm relaunch has faltered. Both WildStorm Universe and creator-owned titles ship inconsistently or are on indefinite hiatus. The attempt to relegate the Wildstorm characters to just another province of the sprawling DC continuity with crossover titles such as the Countdown: The Search For Ray Palmer miniseries have been met with disdain at best and apathy at worst. The Armageddon and Revelations miniseries and the upcoming Number Of The Beast event, beginning in April, promise to "shake the WildStorm Universe to its core", but is that what WildStorm really needs? Is the answer to the publisher’s difficulties yet another bloated crossover or reboot?

DC has created a successful mature-readers imprint before, and Vertigo continues today as the most successful mainstream, adult-oriented comics publisher. Given the success and popularity of titles such as The Authority and Sleeper, a market clearly exists for intelligent mature-readers superhero fiction. Rather than focus on hyping a singular event, or falling back on early ‘90s nostalgia, perhaps DC and WIldStorm’s efforts should be put towards building a solid, consistently on-time slate of both company- and creator-owned mature-readers superhero titles. This is a market niche that is not being addressed, and a modicum of promotional effort on DC’s part could bring back the audience that WildStorm has lost via attrition over the past several years.

Whether that is the direction the powers-that-be at WildStorm will choose to pursue remains to be seen. In his CBR column  recently, Rich Johnston once again broke news about the company, namely that Komikwerks founder Shannon Eric Denton would be taking over as editor of the line. Both Denton and Alex Segura at DC had no comment when contacted by BF regarding the veracity of the story. One can only hope, regardless of the eventual disposition of its editorial staff or the results of Number Of The Beast, that WildStorm can right itself through the considered efforts of its talented creators and publishers.