365 Comics... 247: Green Arrow #23.1: Count Vertigo (2013)

Bleh.  So "Villains Month" has started, or as I'm calling it "Taking a break from DC Month". As I only have a handful of titles I read from DC anyway and always looking to scale down even further l find it easy to pass on this entire initiative... well mostly anyway.  l have a regular pull of just over a half-dozen New 52 titles, and of those 7 only 2 of those series' creative teams are involved in a Villains Month tie-in, Green Arrow and Wonder Woman.  So, months ago. I decided those were the only two I'm getting and I'm sticking with it, finding it rather easy to do so (even with all the hullaballoo about retailer allocations and sudden "analog" variants put aside).

There's very little appealing to me about "Villains Month" and Count Vertigo just affirms it.  It's one thing for an ongoing title to take a break and focus on one of it's major villians, if that's the creator's whim, but it's a whole other thing for it to be corporate mandated across the entire line whether it services the ongoing story or not.  In this case, given the events of GA#23 it's not really much more than a diversion, an aside that doesn't really fit within the flow of the ongoing story. I can also foresee that Wonder Woman 23.1: First Borne, given the events of WW #23 are going to be likewise.

These very well may be stories that the creators had in mind for these characters and would have worked in regardless, but in this context they don't feel at all necessary.  Beyond that, I couldn't imagine reading 52, or even half or even a half dozen of these things as they'll all be primarily done-in-one stories, largely origin stories, and most of them featuring characters who are designed to work best in contrast to the hero they battle.

This whole thing seems entirely a gimmick (did the pointless lenticular covers give it away?) and I'm struggling to find any redeeming value from the proceedings.  In fact, the only title I know for sure had planned to weave the Villains Month book into their ongoing story, Batwoman, was not allowed to participate.  I'm certain this was one of the many editorial interferences that caused Williams and Blackman to quit the book.  Of my 7 DC books, consider that one dropped (though l love Kate Kane) once they're done.