EDITORIAL: Is DC Comics Pulling a Bait and Switch with The New Age of Heroes?

An interesting trend has begun to emerge within DC’s new age of heroes movement, several of the books have had shifts in their art teams within the first couple issues, the phrase bait and switch comes to mind. This time honored tradition practiced by both of the big 2 publishers at one point or another. The two books I’ve noticed so far are Damage, with Tony Daniel originally illustrating, and Silencer, with JRjr originally illustrating.

I wouldn’t even consider it particularly noteworthy if not for the insane amount of emphasis DC put on the art teams, (I’m sure we all remember the DC’s master class ads, they were all over) often giving them top billing over the writers. Also interesting is the way the covers have been done by the original artists, with the interior art being done by vastly different (more talented in JRjr’s case IMO, but that’s an argument for another place) teams. Definitely feels like a changeup for the first 2 new age books, I’ll be watching closely to see if the other books in the movement follow suit, I do know that Doc Shaner is going to be doing the Terrifics going forward, so that’s already the first 3 books changing teams within 5 issues.

I will say none of the books have gotten noticeably worse in quality, and all of them so far have been decent reads, I’m mostly complaining due to the use of established names which then get swapped out for less established talent. Who knows, we might get some new favorites out of it.