30 Days of Winter: Day 4 - Retcons *Master Post*

[kingrockwell]

Welcome to day 3 of scans_daily's 30 Days of Winter celebration! Today's topic is Retcons. Retcons can be funny things, usually intended to fix some kind of problem, sometimes perceived and sometimes legitimate, often they create new ones themselves and a quagmire in continuity results! But every now and then a retcon comes along where the benefits so outweigh the consequences as to be irresistible, and today is for those times.



From Robin #174, STEPHANIE BROWN: NOT AS DEAD AS ALL THAT.

So tell me, what's your favorite retcon?
And stay tuned tomorrow, when the topic will be Manga!

Comments

[sweettart1823]

Anything Donna does ever? It's like her theme, gotta love it :)

[kingrockwell]

They try so hard to get her history to make sense!

[curlyjo1]

That's the funny thing about retcons, to me they're more often bad than good. Aside from the above, I'm having a hard time thinking of one I actually liked.

There's a long list of the, "You did what?!?" type of retcons, but good ones? That's tough.

[pyrotwilight]

Best recent-ish retcon? The whole Supergirl had Kryptonite poisoning and was the reason she was so unlikeable for about 3 years of her series.

Her book was essentially radioactive to me until then.

Favorite retcon? The whole attempt to say the Batman and others in the Golden Age wasn't the Batman in the Silver Age that began the DC Multiverse IE E-1 and E-2 even if technically Wonderwoman was at it first.

[cherrybomb]

My favorite retcon is when they retconed away the 'Beaubiers are fairies' reveal. Because really, it's too ridiculous even for Alpha Flight (which is really saying something).

[kingrockwell]

Things I liked about Mantlo's run on Alpha Flight: ........................oh wait there was a bit of body horror wasn't there
At least he gave them an easy out, Loki is a pretty big liar-liar-pants-on-fire.

[pyrotwilight]

Oh and perhaps the retcon I dislike the most?The Parallax is a fear bug retcon for Hal going crazy in Emerald Twilight.

It finally gave DC a character who was really different. He wanted to be a hero but he did it in the worst ways. And when he did finally go out he didn't really redeem himself but he did save the Earth and showed he was still being a hero despite his actions.

And honestly? Even if they wanted to retcon a bunch of things and bring in the new Lantern groups it wouldn't have been all that difficult to do it without bringing Hal Jordan back, or saying he was possessed by Parallax, who is the most boring Green Lantern I can think of.

[kingrockwell]

Yeah, I guess the problem is that the only reason the franchise was revitalized was because someone, for some reason, wanted Hal Jordan back. I can't even with Green Lanterns anymore.

[nevermore999]

No contest, the above was my favorite.

Cass being on evil juice also counts, I guess. It sadly didn't fix things for her, and it was so super clumsy buuuut....at least she was no longer the Evil Dragon Lady.

[kingrockwell]

Yeah, Slade-drugs make effective retcons, I just wish the followup had been better!

[icon_uk]

Yeah, have to say I can't really think of many retcons I've liked, except possibly the reveal that Will Payton's Starman hadn't been killed in the craptacular "Darkness Within" crossover event. Even then though, we've never really got the character back per se, just a sort of time share with the Prince Gavyn Starman who is usually in charge.

[fifthie]

I loved that retcon where they made it so that Sins Past never happened and the Gwen Goblins don't exist.

...SHUT UP

[retro_nouveau]

Stephanie Brown - not dead

2. Barry Allen - not dead; 3. Kara Zor-El - not dead; 4. Bart Allen - not dead; 5. Hal Jordan - not dead; 6. Jason Todd - not dead (stupidest retcon ever -- but I LIKE IT anyway), 7. Tora Olafsdotter - not dead, 8. Donna Troy - not dead, 9. Jean Grey - not dead, 10. Conner Kent - not dead

[spam-monster.livejournal.com]

Yeah, pretty much anytime someone is not dead. You'd think they'd learn to stop killing people off by now. (HA HA HA)

[spam-monster.livejournal.com]

(Not sure if these count as recons, but...) Jason Todd being alive, for one. Putting the JSA and the Charleston-verse in the main DC universe, because then we get cute mentor-y interactions and Ted/Booster and Question/Renee bromance!

Also the "Maxwell Lord wasn't always evil." and "The JLI didn't suck." recons that are around now, and will hopefully be enforced.

[jlbarnett]

the first Avengers series I ever read, Avengers forver was one giant retcon overall, but I was a big fan.

[badficwriter]

In particular, the one where Avengers Forever reveals that Jarvis schemed to get Hawkeye on the team. :)

[stylishbastard.livejournal.com]

I can't think of too many I liked buuuut..

Bucky becoming Winter Soldier and being made into a great character.

Getting rid of the Spider marriage. Thank goodness! (kiidding :D )

[zechs80]

1.) The original Hobgoblin turned out to be alive and not Ned Leeds. 2.) MJ knew Peter was Spider-Man the whole time. 3.) Bucky being the Winter Soldier.

[siamesa]

This seems unpopular, but the whole Parallax thing. Sure, the concept's rather ridiculous, but so are half the other things in Green Lantern, and it a) brought back the Corps, and, b) allowed for Sinestro Corps War, one of the storylines that got me into comics.

[ebailey140]

Yep. It erased one of the worst examples of 90s Grimdark, and led to a bunch of great stories. The end results make it worth it.

I was sold when Sinestro returned. That is how you re-establish a classic villain. And, they didn't need to have him rape the dog to do it.

[grazzt]

The existence of Culp retcons away all of the Shade's more OOC moments.

[icon_uk]

Though Culp was only required because of the retcon that the Shade HAD a character other than the supervillain we'd known for the preceding forty years or so.

[ejne7]

Rip Hunter's paternity. Reading his appearances in the 1980s Booster Gold solo series is so funny when you interpret his behaviour with a "God, younger-than-me dad, you're so embarrassing" filter.

[rordulum]

I guess having Bucky Barnes survive Zemo's bomb-laden plane only to become a mindwashed, cryogenically frozen Soviet assassin is one of my favourites.

Brubaker brought back the guy that no one thought would ever return, made him interesting, engaging and one of the best characters in Marvel's stable, and the headliner of the best monthly book that Marvel put out.

So yeah, that worked quite well.

[lilacsigil]

When they retconned the stupid "Magneto is a gypsy" retcon which matched precisely NO prior evidence. I liked that it was a fake identity, and left open as to whether Gabrielle Haller and Israel *knew* it was a fake identity but didn't want him to be known as a Big Jewish Terrorist (in which case, nice job making him a different ethnic minority, guys) or whether it was just a very good fake identity and they didn't have all the information that the X-Men did.

[punishermax]

I'd love to post some stuff for manga but honestly, due to the whole kerfaffle with online sites getting shut down and such I ain't fucking around with it.

[deepspaceartist]

My favourite retcons are Bucky not being dead, Jean not being the Phoenix that comitted genocide and that Ion was actually the willpower equivalent of Parallax.

The only ones I really dislike is the ones that directly contradict previous stuff without even an attempt at explanation, like Dawn Granger (Dove 2) gaining a sister despite previously being stated to be an only child.

[qalchemist]

Okay, okay, off-topic but...

Look at that first panel up there.

Look at it.

TELL ME THAT IS NOT CHRISTOPHER WALKEN AS BATMAN.

Is it just me?

[heartsalliance]

Dude, that's Humphrey Bogart. Obviously.

[blackruzsa]

At first I was thinking how I didn't like the art, but then they showed Tim and I was like "whoa".
So cool :) Although Steph looks a bit weird.

[psychopathicus_rex]

Hrrm. I'm not sure I have a FAVORITE retcon, per se - I'm not really in favor of them; I'm more of the 'take the original and go in new directions with it' school - but I'd say one very good one was changing Mr. Freeze's origin to the B:TAS version. Before then, he'd just been a thug in an ice suit, who had been ignominiously dispatched by the Joker a few months before - afterwards, he got brought back in a hurry, because whoa, he was COOL now! (Eh, pun not intended - I guess.) I'm always in favor of changes that allow previously kinda lame characters to strut their stuff.
Another one I'm grateful for is the one that retconned the 'living minds in robot bodies' era of the Metal Men away as a bad dream - 'cause seriously, that would have sucked if it had remained the case.

[liara_shadowsong]

In general, my favorite retcons (and doesn't that sound like an oxymoron?) are the ones that make characters I like who the Powers That Be at their respective publishers decided to kill off become officially and canonically NOT FREAKING DEAD. For example: Stephanie Brown (as shown above), Kon-El, Bart Allen, Steve Rogers, the list goes on... One of the only things I actually like about OMD/BND/WTF is that Harry Osborn isn't dead (and is apparently not evil either, yay!). I also am quite fond of the retcon that caused it to be that Kon's human genetic donor is Lex. Don't get me wrong, I think they did a lot of dumb stuff with it after that point, and may have overblown the angst a bit, but the fact that one of my favorite DC characters (along with pretty much everyone else on the former Young Justice team, at least when they are well-written, as well as Barda and Scott, and most heroes when written by Gail Simone especially Wonder Woman) is canonically the test tube baby of Superman and Lex Luthor... just makes the part of me that loved the early seasons of Smallville very very happy.

[ruhig_knight]

Well, favorite retcons are almost always of the "Not dead!" (except Barry Allen's)and "Not evil!" variety. There are some more I'm anxiously waiting for now.

Least favorite besides One More Day and everything related to it was in Judd Winick's Titans (No surprise there...) where Raven, the sole survivng child of Trigon, suddenly had several full grown evil half brothers. Nothing's been done with them since Titans #18 where they did generic demon stuff, so hopefully them and everything else related to Winick's this Titans series will be retconned away also. Or at least better explanation to why they're here when all the other Trigon spawn besides Raven where believed to be dead.