DC's next big event is set to be K-O, a giant bracket fight featuring their heroes and villains for the Heart of Apokolips and a way to stop a Resurrected Darkseid from whatever. Now, folks, I'm old, and there's a good chance you are too if you're reading this. And I think we well remember (but not fondly) the conceptually similar DC vs. Marvel event that took comic book shops by storm in 1996, almost 30 years ago. DCvM wasn't a "bracket" fight, merely straight match-ups between DC and Marvel characters, accumulating one point per victory for their side. It was all pointless anyway, because whoever won, the entities responsible would merge the universes anyway and create my beloved Amalgam universe, then split them up again in time for the next month's scheduled releases. Worth it for that, but DCvM was a frustrating exercise nonetheless.
The main reason for that was that for the fights between each company's five most popular characters (at the time, some invite face palms today), readers could vote on the result. Meaning: The most popular character won regardless of power level, intelligence or skill. If you knew anything about fandom, you knew who would win no matter what.
(KO Intermission)
So when I look at the K-O bracket, with its starring 32 "champions" already spoiled for readers, I realize that even without votes, some matches seem like foregone conclusions. You can't take Superman, Batman or Harley Quinn out until late stages, or else you can, but it's a manufactured twist that advances the story (Superman, not liking what he sees, allows himself to be trounced so he can do something else behind the scenes, for example, which I fully expect, too). So either it's pretty obvious - with characters who have solo titles, have a movie footprint (Guy Gardner) or are part of successful teams are heavily advantaged over those that do not fit that criteria - or it doesn't matter because it's not really about the fights. Just as DCvM had a viscerally fun premise, but was kind of dull and predictable in execution, so, too, must K-O be. Well, we'll see.
(And now back to DCvM)
What I'm proposing to do for a few months is to go back to DCvM's match-ups and analyze them with hindsight. Has my outrage dimmed where I thought the results were wrong? Who really deserved the win? Were the matches fair and well-chosen? Who would be involved were the event to occur today? (I mean, gosh, Marvel's Top 5 includes a Spider-clone and two whole X-Men, but Iron Man isn't even in the participating 11, can you imagine?!) I'll be the referee in this rematch.
Join me ringside every Wednesday for the next 11 weeks, won't you?
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