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Ah, Infinite Crisis. I'm still debating whether that title refers to the conflict brimming in the DC Universe or the one plaguing the comics industry: mind-bogglingly bad company-wide crossovers. Throughout DC's Golden and Silver Ages, multiple parallel universes coexisted in harmony with occasional crossovers that brought joy to many a comics fan. However, all those parallel worlds became too confusing for the increasingly simple fans over time and thus DC came up with a ploy to unify their properties into a single, cohesive universe: Crisis on Infinite Earths. Even though Crisis came out twenty years ago, it did seemingly little to unify much of anything — creators who fondly remembered the old days simply created new parallel worlds (and Elseworlds, and Hypertime, etc.) and things spiraled from there. However, there has essentially been only one “real” Superman, Batman, et al., as far as official DC canon goes, during all that time, which counted for something until Infinite Crisis reared its ugly head.

That's why, on principle, I refuse to buy Infinite Crisis. How can I review it then, you ask? Because most of the pages and beat-by-beat breakdowns of the entire first issue are littered all over the Internet by rabid fanboys. Led to such postings by morbid curiosity, my fears and suspicions were all confirmed by everything I saw, staunchly reinforcing my decision not to support projects by publishers who release such substantially mindless drivel. All the tenets of the pointless crossover are there: countless characters, many of whom appear for no reason other than to test the waters for potential new series; inane character deaths, done simply for shock value; and the introduction of sweeping changes to the universe-at-large that, despite the publisher's claims of fixing continuity, really just foul things up even more than they already were.

The hype alone from Infinite Crisis spawned multiple mini series before it was even released, again demonstrating that people will flock to anything that they're told to by Wizard Magazine. All those mini series were atrocious, especially

“Let's kill Phantom Lady! And Ray! No, wait, Ray might warrant a mini sometime…”

OMAC and the incalculably bad Countdown to Infinite Crisis one shot, but I was even extremely let down by Villains United, starring two of my favorite DCU characters (Deadshot and Deathstroke) and written by the usually talented Gail Simone. They were all just bad; hype built on a foundation of hype, with all the conceits of every bad superhero comic ever made.

“I know: let's make Catman a badass — no one'll expect that!”

“Let's kill Phantom Lady! And Ray! No, wait, Ray might warrant a mini sometime…”

“Let's bring back Earth 2 Superman!”

And it's that last one with which I have the biggest complaint. It's as if the formerly talented Geoff Johns and company sat around a table and discussed a variety of improbable happenings that would make a “really cool” cliffhanger final page for the first issue, and this is what they came up with. No one would expect it, and it would do huge numbers because drooling fanboys everywhere would flock to it in droves. And you know what? They were right.

Infinite Crisis did big business for DC, helping them overtake Marvel for the first time in a long time. But that's why I hate Infinite Crisis so much — it was a business decision, done solely for monetary gain under the thin guise of creative vision. No one gave any thought to telling a good story, or to what the repercussions would be in the long run to the integrity of their characters or the heritage of their creators. Many people will scoff at my remarks, satisfied with the temporary shock value of the whole affair, yet, in the long run, what is DC really saying about its characters and creators? They're telling us that they don't matter, that nothing is sacred, and that the only thing that really matters is that the parent company makes as much money as possible at all times with no regard for the creators or the characters. And that is something I simply will not condone.

DC is not the only culprit; Marvel is just as guilty, with farce like House of M and Heroes Reborn, etc. I throw up a little each

Avoid the crossovers like Infinite Crisis, and use that extra money to try out something new, something different.

time I even think of House of M. The point is that comics are an art form, despite the large companies' best efforts to turn them into advertisements to gain the attention of Hollywood and toy makers worldwide. But the companies are not the only ones at fault here; DC and Marvel do these things because they make money, and they make money because so many comic book “readers” buy this crap up like there's no tomorrow. And if comic readers don't wake up and start being selective of what they buy, and demanding quality stories and art instead of worthless hype, there may not be a tomorrow.

I will end this saying that I criticize not because I hate comics, but because I love them. I think that comics is an art form, one that is unique and one of the only partially-original forms substantially contributed to by America. I find that there is good work out there, but you have to really search hard to find it behind the sludge piles that the Big Two push on a monthly basis. Diamond's monopoly on distribution also complicates matters, and makes success for independent publishers more scarce each year. So I ask you: Please evaluate the books you buy each month and determine which ones you actually enjoy, which ones left you smiling or considering something deeper than a costume change or variant cover. Drop any and all that don't make the cut, avoid the crossovers like Infinite Crisis, and use that extra money to try out something new, something different. DC and Marvel will only start marketing and standing behind quality work when the fans demand it, and the only language those companies understand is money.

So please think before you buy, because until you at least consider a solution, you're just part of the problem.