Talk:DC Explosion and DC Implosion

Wrong
Many of the comics listed are wrong. A comic cancelled in 1976 cannot possibly have been cancelled as part of the DC Implosion. Likewise, just because something was in Cancelled Comics Cavalcade doesn't make it part of the DC Implosion; Cancelled Comics Cavalcade printed inventoried stories from years before as well as Implosion titles. Ken Arromdee 00:35, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

I've removed the 1976 and 1977 stories.

Bob Rozakis did a good overview of Cancelled Comics Cavalcade at  which also includes some information about the DC Implosion. Green Team was already inventoried in 1977 and was *not* cancelled as part of the implosion.

A trip to www.comics.org shows that Welcome Back, Kotter's last issue was March-April 1978, which isn't part of the Implosion.

Karate Kid and Freedom Fighters aren't Implosion titles. Karate Kid had a published ending which crossed over into Kamandi, which had another issue after that, and only *then* did the Implosion come. Freedom Fighters' intended ending was the crossover into SSOSV, which had been written before the Implosion. Both titles had letter columns stating that they were the last issues because they were being cancelled to make way for the Explosion. Ken Arromdee 05:29, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

last issue published?
Under the 'cancelled titles' section, the # listed is the last issue that actually appeared, right? For some reason this is a little unclear to me the way it is presented.ike9898 14:47, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

How did these series end?
It would be interesting to read how some of these series ended. Did they have any sort of conclusion or indiction that the last issue was going to be the last issue? ike9898 14:47, 7 October 2006 (UTC)

Two different versions of "DC Implosion" story
The story on this page of why the implosion occurred doesn't match the story on the Cancelled Comics Cavalcade page. Even the name of the corporation that owned DC at the time is different.

If I had to guess, I would speculate that National Periodical Publications owned DC during the Explosion, and that Warner later bought DC and then ordered the Implosion. That would be a clever way of merging the facts on these two pages. But of course that's just my speculation.

If someone knows the truth, can this be clarified on both pages? &mdash; Lawrence King ( talk ) 13:05, 9 April 2007 (UTC)


 * A response four years later
 * Sorry but your speculation is wrong. Kinney National Company which later became Warner Communications :(now Time Warner) bought DC in 1967 which was eleven years before the :Implosion. "National Periodical Publications" was the legal name of DC Comics until 1977 when it was changed.  See the main DC Comics article for citations.
 * Mtminchi08 (talk) 01:29, 18 August 2011 (UTC)

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Lists of titles
I have a few problems with the lists of titles/features affected by the Implosion.

Cancelled titles:
 * First item: "All Star Comics [after] #74 (#75 published in Adventure Comics #461 and 462)". It probably should be noted that the feature, "Justice Society of America," continued directly in that comic.
 * Fourth item: "Batman Family #20 ('merged' into Detective Comics)". The other way around, actually. Tec was announced as suspended, then salvaged (it is DC's flagship title) by having its name and numbering transferred to BF. One can see not only that both logos are present on the first few merged issues but that BF 's, albeit placed lower, is the larger!
 * Sixth item: "Black Lightning #11 (#12 later published in World's Finest Comics #260)". Are you certain that the WFC #260 BL story was produced for his own, Implosion-cancelled title? If so, this would virtually guarantee that the Jim Corrigan who appears there is the African-American uniformed policeman from that series, rather than the alter ego of The Spectre, as several sources report.
 * Fourteenth item: "Secret Society of Super-Villains #15 (#16 was scheduled...[for a 2007 SSOSV reprint collection])". Shouldn't some mention of the plot being picked up (if not resolved) in Justice League of America #s 166-168, possibly utilizing some of the art intended for #16, be made? A similar statement is made about Firestorm #6 and Flash #s 294-296 in the tenth item here.
 * The textual discussion at the close of this section includes a reference to New Gods as being one of a handful of titles cancelled in advance of the Ex[Im]plosion, "...announced within the comics themselves as being cancelled...." However, what is admitted here as having been broken across Adventure #s 459 & 460 was a conclusion to that run, which is also acknowledged in that text. It makes absolutely no sense for a comic to be cancelled far enough in advance for it to be discussed by the editor in the final issue when they were planning to wrap things up in the very next one! And the two installments add up to the Explosion format standard of 25 pages. No, further elaboration on this situation is required. Note further that the New Gods article lays the blame for this cancellation firmly on the shoulders of the Implosion, as opposed to the Explosion, as here.

Unpublished titles:
 * Second item: "Deserter (a cowboy western)". Uh...as opposed to what, an "Indian western" or a "cavalry western"? In fact, the title does suggest the last, as the linked-in article via the title is about desertion from the military. I still find it redundant.
 * Fifth item: "Starslayer (a Mike Grell creation later published by Pacific Comics)" and later, more successfully, by First Comics, BTW. Are you certain that these were the same thing? It doesn't seem likely that Grell could have developed it for DC in 1978 (probably beginning in '77) and had the contractual freedom to take it elsewhere. On the other hand, I can certainly see the name being duplicated so shortly after Star Wars.
 * Sixth item: "Swamp Thing (a revival by Martin Pasko, delayed until 1982)". Again, I suspect two separate projects are being confused/combined. Pasko's actual first issue asks the reader to forget Swampy's original series finale, in which he regained his Alec Holland humanity, but this in fact had been reversed in an issue of a then-very recent Challengers of the Unknown revival. Pasko successor Alan Moore's run requiring that retcon was then unforeseeable and irrelevant.
 * Following the above item is: "Three secondary features were planned, but the titles in wich they were to appear were cancelled before the stories were produced:" This is followed by a list of five features, two of which are said to have been intended for Adventure Comics, which continued into the early 1980s. Should we move those two (Metal Men, and The Man From Neverwhere) down with a heading reading something like: "Two other secondary features were prepared, but left unpublished for reasons lost in the sands of time"?

Bottom line:
 * 1) I am going to note the JSA feature's continuation; delete the Wikilink and the word "cowboy" from Deserter, as well as make a link of "western" there; and put quote marks around the features in the last list, as that is what they are said to be, not the characters, or in one case the team.
 * 2) Can anyone come up with documentation that, Tec was suspended (its own article doesn't quite get there, but is closer than this one), and/or that the abandoned Starslayer was really Grell's later independently-published creation, and/or that the Swamp Thing feature was the same one that Pasko wrote four years later? --Tbrittreid (talk) 22:21, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

Here's a source for the Starslayer claim: From Amazing Heroes #2 (July 1981) page 14

"Grell's ''Starslayer Debuts in July"

"Starslayer, a new comic book created, written, and drawn by Mike Grell debuts in July from Pacific Comics. The series was originally offered to DC Comics but was shelved in 1978 at the time of the "DC Implosion."

Mtminchi08 (talk) 06:37, 29 January 2011 (UTC)

Cancelled Comics, item 4: I think the answer here is "check the indicia". That's the official title of the comic, the title on the comic can be meaningless. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.35.82.136 (talk) 09:12, 10 March 2011 (UTC)

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2018 book "Comic Book Implosion"
Twomorrows published this book in 2018 dealing with the DC Implosion, which allows me to make some corrections.

Aquaman, Mister Miracle, Secret Society of Super-Villains, and Shade are listed on page 62 as cancelled before the Implosion, and were announced as cancelled in March 1978, not in July.

Page 67 quotes a contemporary source as giving a list of 17 titles. This list of titles is the list given in the Wikipedia as Implosion titles, plus Our Fighting Forces, minus the four titles above.

I have edited the page accordingly. Ken Arromdee (talk) 04:16, 19 October 2018 (UTC)