I'm typing this at 12:20 AM, and it's possible, likely even, that by the time you read this, DC will have released their full list of solicitations for April. Judging by the news DC has been peddling for the past week, I don't expect to see Booster Gold anywhere in there.
Tiffany posted on Jan. 24, 2025 at 1:17 PM
I don't know about the Ted thing. I know he was included in the new Question book. I haven't been able to read that. On the other topic I did really love Welcome To Smallville and I'm glad to see it got squeal personality.
Rob snow posted on Jan. 24, 2025 at 2:21 PM
Questions a solid read. Ted's lack of conern is troubling. Im chalking it up to editorial apathy or incompetence
Tiffany posted on Jan. 24, 2025 at 2:57 PM
I'm choosing to believe that he just believe in Booster that much.
Boosterrific [Official Comment] posted on Jan. 24, 2025 at 3:25 PM
@Tiffany, I'm certainly not mad that Fire and Ice got a sequel. I think they have been far too often ignored, and I'm happy they're getting some attention. I'm just frustrated about Booster is all.
SLW posted on Jan. 24, 2025 at 4:12 PM
According to Mark Waid, everyone forgot Booster existed in the mainstream universe, which has me tearing my hair out because how the hell do you forget a whole person who actually HAS contributed to the very existence of said universe?? But yeah, you can imagine my ranting to my friends about Ted not even acknowledging there's some undefinable hole in his life, forgotten or no. Poor Boost has gotten the short end of the stick for years now; getting outright erased from the mainstream timeline (impossible, what happens to Rip??) or just from the memories of everyone (still seems sketch) just kinda seems like more heartaching par for the course.
Bob posted on Jan. 24, 2025 at 7:07 PM
The Question is a solid read. If you read it the Question is on to the fact that there is time tampering. And she's leary of Ted because she remembers him dying. But what she doesn't remember is that Booster is the one who saved him causing the change in the time line. New Gods is also pretty good too.
Tiffany posted on Jan. 25, 2025 at 2:22 PM
I don't think they ever explained how Ted came. During rebirth they used it soft reboot the Blue Beetle mythos so it was made that Ted never got shot by Max. But then suddenly they started bring it up again (I think the first time was in heroes in crisis.) and don't explain how he came back.
SLW posted on Jan. 25, 2025 at 3:04 PM
@Tiffany - No, they never have explained it. Doomsday Clock and Death Metal both were an attempt to explain and restore the original post-Crisis history, but it's always been messy and more like bandages slapped everywhere. They have some pretty excellent opportunities to have someone explore all that -- and NOT Tom King ffs -- but they seem to keep relegating the JLI to comic relief. Or, in Booster's case, cannon fodder at the moment. (I'm holding out some hope, though, because the Absolute books have been on fire.)
Eskana posted on Jan. 26, 2025 at 1:07 PM
It's definitely hard to know what is going on with Ted's existence in general. I've been wondering it since he re-appeared in Rebirth, and as Tiffany stated, they have mentioned that he was shot by Max since he seems to remember that or at least know it. There's no reason that the Question would know about Michael saving Ted because ultimately... he didn't. Ted chose to go back and die, so technically, he was never saved.
But since Ted's death was really the catalyst for getting Booster to be a Time-Master in the first place (and led to so many other events when he is a Time-Master,) it seems weird that the writers are so edgy about it. And any time Max shows up, he doesn't seem to mention any of that; he's just straight-up-I've-always-been-evil Max, not the nuanced version.
...anyway, I am interested in Fire and Ice getting a new series, but I am EXTREMELY hesitant since I feel like that last run was a disaster.
SLW posted on Jan. 26, 2025 at 1:19 PM
@Eskana Ted remembering his own murder came up first, I believe, in Heroes in Crisis -- which was the biggest cluster I've ever seen and I'm still burning mad about LOL! -- and has had scattered acknowledgment since then? (For real, tho: If you're gonna explore trauma with Booster especially, that &$%# was all way more traumatizing than King inventing some really godawful storyline that made less than zero sense. I mean-- a good part of the excellent Vol. 2 was frankly either 'Booster's very Not Okay' or 'Hey, let's make him even MORE Not Okay by Retraumatizing Him Every Two Minutes', so yes, I'm still mad at that potential being squandered.)
I didn't find Welcome to Smallville bad myself, exactly? Just really weak. It felt kind of contrived and a little bit boring and sort of ignores some pretty significant parts of both Bea's and Tora's respective backstories (ignoring Winick's bad retconning) in order to write this excessively fluffy romp that ties into a too-neat bow at the end. Then again, my favorite past time is digging my fingers as deep into the psyches of my favorite characters as possible. XD But why did you find it a disaster? Genuine question, you're the first person I've met who has used that descriptor!
jeff posted on Jan. 26, 2025 at 11:05 PM
Wait, I'm out of the loop. why don't people remember Booster?
SLW posted on Jan. 26, 2025 at 11:25 PM
@jeff Because something happened when he crossed over into the Absolute timeline that caused him to become either erased from actual existence in the original (which makes no sense at all) or erased from their memories (which is a little more realistic, though still irritating). It's shown in the All-In special that once he's over there, his costume changes, so does his flight ring, and the Trinity repeats that they need to send someone over there like they didn't just do so.
Boosterrific [Official Comment] posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 3:03 PM
@jeff Yes, what SLW said. ALL IN SPECIAL erased Booster Gold from the DCU, and I remain angry about it.
Eskana posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 7:34 PM
@SLW I thought "Welcome to Smallville" was pretty bad characterization for everyone involved... although probalby no one so much as Bea, who came off as very desperate for attention, almost like a female version of (the mass media version of) Booster... and just willing to toss mess around with Lobo? Ice fared better, but with Fire's bad characterization it was hard to understand why these two people would be friends at all. I thought the whole thing was kind of really reducing these two female superheroes to stereotypes that they'd never presented as before, attempting to be "wacky and irreverent" but just failing badly.
IMO, anyway.
SLW posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 7:39 PM
@Eskana - It did definitely feel shallow! Bea honestly hasn't been attention-seeking of any sort since pretty early in the JLI era. You can make a fair argument for it there, especially when she's redesigning her costume, but a whole lot has happened to her since. Like being blackmailed into working for Checkmate. And everything in Generation Lost. It feels like they're keeping some pre-Flashpoint bits and outright ignoring others, which seems a little half-assed if you ask me.
Jade posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 7:43 PM
Now hold on, hold on, hold on, y'all -- WHERE did Mark Waid say that? I read the All-In Special but it was more of a skimming. THEY'VE SCREWED US AGAIN!
I'll be able to cope with this if it somehow results in Booster coming back somewhat like his pre-Flashpoint self and being matured a little. I'm sure we could get an interesting series out of an abused oul' boy like Booster returning home from an intense, crucial journey and being underappreciated & unknown again, perhaps some "greatest hero you've never heard of" action... Though I fear it sounds like a certain Tom would be helming THAT, so maybe I should be careful what I wish for.
As for the actual topic of discussion: as nice as it is to see the girls having some success, it comes from crucial misunderstanding of their characters... The last series was literally just the Blue and Gold (2021) of Fire & Ice, down to the simplification of the straight man/funny man dynamic & the idiotization of their funny man (I'll always be infuriated at the fact that Booster was the one panned as the funny man in Blue & Gold despite historic otherwises). Nobody seems to know Tora, and Bea's getting the Booster treatment (IE she's been reduced to impulsive comic relief despite her, in fact, very serious life history + general historic personality).
Oh, well.
Jade posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 7:46 PM
Also, @SLW -- spot on in the last comment regarding Bea. IT KILLS ME! Whatever happened to the depth of our characters?
And @Eskana -- also right on the money. Tora may have fared better, but it's all relative.
SLW posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 8:00 PM
@Jade "Though I fear it sounds like a certain Tom would be helming THAT, so maybe I should be careful what I wish for." -shudders- OMG, don't threaten me with a really horrible time. 🤣
But yeah, that's so deeply frustrating, that inversion of the original Blue & Gold dynamic. Booster was a pretty earnest hero through most of the JLI-era. Ted was the goofball (in a sometimes charming way, in a sometimes irritating way) who typically roped him into it, but nowadays, nobody seems to bother reading the source material, they just follow (inaccurate) zeitgeist. (My favorite characterization of Ted Kord is, ironically, his 80s solo. He was quippy and funny there, but also competent as all hell, and I loved that.) Welcome to Smallville really was kinda more of the same, now that you point that out; I hadn't ever considered it that way before!
The whole JLI has suffered a lot of being written as the lowest common denominator of themselves post-Flashpoint when I'd actually say -- straight-faced and ready to throw down in a 7-11 parking lot about it -- that they're more accurately the most heartbreaking variation of the Justice League to ever exist. Just the number of them that have been killed in battle or outright murdered alone is startling when you run the numbers, versus every other incarnation of the League. Certainly they're the most human and vulnerable incarnation, even not accounting for tragedy.
Eskana posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 8:39 PM
@SLW Definitely agree with you there about the JLI team as a whole... I've always liked them better than the main league mostly because I belive that since they are all smaller characters (B-,C-, or D-list), writers actually can develop them and they can grow, like we all know Booster has and as you pointed out that Bea has, SLW. I do not I have a problem with the main league, but I like that the JLI really grew up and matured over the years. The New 52 (such as it was) and Justice League Generation Lost were probably the last times they've been considered a respectable team.
And they HAVE gone through a lot of loss. By the end of Infinite Crisis, they'd lost Tora, Rocket Red, Ted, and Max (he counts,) and those were long-lasting if not permanent losses. When has the main league needed to come back from something like that?
Unfortunately, now most JLI characters are reduced to the "incorrect zeitgeist" versions of themselves, as someone said.
Are we breaking Boosterrific records for number or replies?
Boosterrific [Official Comment] posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 8:56 PM
@Jade I don't know what Mark Waid has said, but ALL IN writer Joshua Williams has said "And then Booster, this is a spoiler obviously, so he will be gone for a while because of this. And so, there’s a bigger piece to the story of Booster and I think people will really be surprised if and when booster returns." [per thecomicsourceblog.com] ALL IN itself does a terrible job of explaining what has happened, so we readers are forced to pick at the straws in half a dozen other comics to discern the truth. It wasn't until the release of CHALLENGERS OF THE UNKNOWN #1 that it was absolutely clear that Booster had been erased from the memories of all the Justice Leaguers, and we still don't know why, how, or what ramifications that has had in DCU history (so far: none).
SLW (Steff) posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 9:26 PM
@Eskana - Not only them, but both the Crimson Foxes, if I remember right. The Silver Sorceress. Booster died for a day or so and then got to spend a year trapped in his armor after Ted Hail Mary'd him back to life. Sue Dibny was murdered in Identity Crisis, then Ralph in 52. It's just a tragic team, and not a little heartbreaking. (And yeah, Max does count too.)
Boosterrific [Official Comment] posted on Jan. 27, 2025 at 9:30 PM
@Eskana "Are we breaking Boosterrific records for number or replies?" You made me go back and look. The answer is yes, by a good margin. The previous high was 16 comments on a post [May 3, 2012]. Of course, Boosterrific had a forum (and a comic book) back then, so dialog like this was usually handled there.
Tiffany posted on Jan. 28, 2025 at 1:11 PM
@boosterific maybe we'll see result in of Booster being erased in "We are Yesterday" the story seems to involve time travel. So maybe we'll see how Booster not existing changes the timeline. Or maybe the story happens because the timeline doesn't have it protector? Just guessing here.
Boosterrific [Official Comment] posted on Jan. 28, 2025 at 2:34 PM
@Tiffany Hey, it's comics; anything *could* happen. If you see Booster, please let me know!
