Jim Starlin nukes the DCU in Hawkman one-shot

[IconoclasticScream]

I haven't been following the Rann/Thanagar Holy War story, but I noticed on DC's website the solicitation for last week's Hawkman Special, written by Jim Starlin (who, in general, is a fine writer (the man created Thanos, so he must be doing something right)).

Anyway, the blurb for the Special read "Hawkman finds himself face to face with a force of unspeakable evil: Synnar. The things Hawkman will learn in the course of their confrontation may lead him to question his very existence!".

Okay, so I admit that in glossing over it I misread it (or maybe yesterday in the comic shop I just couldn't remember it correctly). Rather than Synnar I thought it would feature Onimar Synn (from the "Return of Hawkman" story in _JSA_ a few years back). I figured if Synn was going to go up against Hawkman that alone was worth the price of admission, but I wanted to see what this big reveal was.

I'm so sorry I did.

Spoiler:

Apparently, despite years of being told that the current Hawkman is Carter Hall, reincarnated Prince Khufu of Egypt, the truth is that he's actually Katar Hol, and every memory he has of being an Egyptian prince is a lie. Which would be fine, I guess, except that radically changes virtually everything that's been established with the character in the last decade, and by extension other characters who's origins are somehow connected with Hawkman's.

Am I the only person who remembers the nightmare it took almost twenty years to fix regarding who Hawkman is? That for years no one was allowed to use the Hawkman character because of the continuity quagmire the character had become?

And now, with one comic book, what David Goyer and Geoff Jones had neatly fixed, Starlin seems to have nuked.

[Trey]

OMG

Spoiler:

Shades of Highlander II. :-(

[Boone]

I used to like Starlin, but it seems like most of his stuff is basically the same story rehashed over and over. The only major changes he makes in a story is to change the characters based on the publisher. Despite that, I decided to check out last week's Hawkman Special. It was a major let down. If this Hawkman is Katar Hol, then what happened to Carter Hall?

[IconoclasticScream]

Boone wrote:

I used to like Starlin, but it seems like most of his stuff is basically the same story rehashed over and over. The only major changes he makes in a story is to change the characters based on the publisher. Despite that, I decided to check out last week's Hawkman Special. It was a major let down. If this Hawkman is Katar Hol, then what happened to Carter Hall?

I don't think Starlin will ultimately "get away with this". Hawkman is too connected with the JSA and its history, and for the foreseeable future JSA is still Geoff Johns' baby. Johns trumps Starlin, Hawkman remains Hall.

[wspatterson]

DC is making my head hurt. Again. That's just stupid and I don't know why anyone would allow that sink pit of a continuity problem to be revisited.

IconoclasticScream wrote:

Boone wrote:

I used to like Starlin, but it seems like most of his stuff is basically the same story rehashed over and over. The only major changes he makes in a story is to change the characters based on the publisher. Despite that, I decided to check out last week's Hawkman Special. It was a major let down. If this Hawkman is Katar Hol, then what happened to Carter Hall?

I don't think Starlin will ultimately "get away with this". Hawkman is too connected with the JSA and its history, and for the foreseeable future JSA is still Geoff Johns' baby. Johns trumps Starlin, Hawkman remains Hall.

[Gavgoyle]

It is definitely casting a cloud over the Rann-Thanagar Holy War, which I have otherwise been enjoying. Poor decisions on Starlin's part and on the editor's part.

[ehb1022]

I loved G. John's Hawkman run. The Starlin one-shot was a debacle, though, at least it was a mini-series. He took 8 tedious issues to kill of the New Gods.