Yesterday was the ten year anniversary of the release of DC Universe Rebirth #1.

It’s kind of weird because on one hand it definitely feels like it’s been a decade since this came out but it also feels like it was both yesterday and a hundred years ago.

Rebirth, as an initiative, was a necessary course correction for DC Comics. A healthy debate could be had about the particulars of why it was necessary and opinions are going to vary wildly, but a change was needed. The New 52 had reached its expiration date. The whole DCYou thing didn’t set the reading world on fire. Some stories were working but there was a systemic problem that needed to be fixed and Rebirth was the fix DC landed on accomplishing that goal.

I was excited for Rebirth, but I was also one of the readers that wasn’t happy with the direction that DC was taking. To be fair, I wasn’t reading a lot of the titles at the time but that was sort of the point. Justice League was the one book that I liked month to month, but the Superman titles (the other titles I was reading at the time) were doing the Truth storyline, which I thought was boneheaded at the time and still feel that way now. The only Superman comic I liked was the Superman: Lois and Clark mini-series that Dan Jurgens and Lee Weeks were writing and drawing.

Then Rebirth happened and it seemed like, to me, that DC had realized that mistakes were made with The New 52 and that maybe they should bring back some of the things they lost. I was on board for about six months and then the financial strain of buying multiple titles that were all putting out two books a month got to me and cuts were made.

It really was me, not them.

It’s kind of weird to think what a big deal this was with all of the other big deals DC has published over the past decade. Nothing in the two covers for the special is a thing anymore. Costumes have changed. Characters that were a big deal are no longer important. In the time since this comic came out we’ve gotten another soft reset, another Crisis (this one of the Dark variety), and a new universe full of alternate versions of the heroes and villains of the main universe.

Back in 2016 this was the shiny new world that was going to get DC Comics back on track and for the most part it did. Now it’s something to be read academically. You can still enjoy the stories, but a lot of what was presented is no longer relevant and all of the characters are in completely different places.

Which, now that I think about, is how it should be. New readers need to be courted and I think that DC has done a great job of giving us books that would appeal to more seasoned readers while also giving us books that would appeal to people that are just starting to get into the characters.

Still…kind of weird that this was ten years ago.

More to follow…