Thursday, July 27, 2017

Wanted TPB: DC Challenge

Writer: Various
Artist: Various
Publisher: DC Comics (1985-1986)
Includes: DC Challenge #1-12

Clipped from Wikipedia:
DC Challenge was a 12-issue comic book series produced by DC Comics from November 1985 to October 1986, as a round robin experiment in narrative. The book's tagline was "Can You Solve It Before We Do?"; reputedly, it was conceived during a rooftop party at a comic book convention.

The premise of DC Challenge was that each chapter would be written by a different author and illustrated by a different artist; no consultation between authors was permitted. As well, each chapter would end in a seemingly impossible cliffhanger (from which that chapter's author had to have pla
nned a viable escape), and the name of the next chapter would be provided. Authors were free to use any character or concept from DC's (then) 50 years of publication, with the exception of those whose appearances they were currently writing.
 

Clipped Review from Bad-Dreams Comic Books: DC CHALLENGE was high in concept but low on execution, but it’s saving grace is that most of the writers really had fun doing this (based on the letter pages). So…it was a labor of love. It really was a challenge for the writers and artists; it was a grand geek contest. It should have been an in-house experiment only, because trying to follow this maxi-series was virtually impossible. Theoretically, you could read DC CHALLENGE #12 only because it explains all of the dangling plots.

Dork Note:
I'd still like to have this experiment grace my shelves. If for no other purpose, but to have all those writers and artists collected within the pages of a single TPB.

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