"Nothing Will Ever Be The Same Again!": What you have to remember at all times is that you should use this line, or variations on it, at all times when talking about your event, but fail to actually follow through on it. On the rare occasions when you appear to follow through, leave yourself at least two different ways of getting out of it if the fan backlash becomes too loud. Case in point: Marvel's Civil War can easily be undone if all of the pro-registration heroes are revealed to have been undercover aliens or brainwashed into becoming fascist dictators. Or, for that matter, if the Scarlet Witch re-writes reality, as per-House of M. Or Mephisto gets rid of another marriage. Or one of another hundred of reasons.

(The corollary of that statement is "What the hell happened?": There should be a point in the center of each event where even the most jaded fan feels the stirrings of something resembling hope that maybe, just maybe, this one will be different and actually mean something. A plot point, perhaps, which promises the potential of real change and growth for characters or a situation. This point should be immediately followed by a return to the status quo or as close to the status quo as is possible while still pretending to be something new. Think of the aftermath of Civil War where none of the "unregistered" heroes had to actually deal with the fact that they're theoretically being hunted down by government forces and breaking the law. Yes, I know that the New Avengers keep being threatened with arrest every couple of issues. But each time that they do, those threatening arrest always change their mind and let them walk away, so it really doesn't count.)

"No-one Gets Out Of Here Alive!": No "event" is complete without a superhero or two dying. What you have to remember is to make sure that the superhero dying is one who is well known enough for fans to feel something approaching nerd emotion but not popular enough to actually matter. See: Any of the body count in DC's Infinite Crisis. I mean, people got their arms ripped off and their heads punched off their bodies, and besides the fact that they were Teen Titans, I have no idea who they were. This idea ties in tightly with...

"From Out Of The Ashes... A Hero Reborn!": If you're killing off some characters, it's only fair to renew some trademarks at the same time. The ideal crossover book will set up multiple new comics to spin off, most if not all of which will be critical and commercial flops that ultimately sully whatever credibility your event will have. For example: Civil War spun out Heroes for Hire, World War Hulk spun out Warbound and Gamma Corps and Infinite Crisis spun out (deep breath) The Trials of Shazam, OMAC and a Creeper book that I can't even remember the name of.

The most important lesson to remember when crafting your ideal superhero crossover epic, of course, is "Everything Can Be Solved With Punching": Sure, it makes the rubes lay down their hard-earned dollars by having some kind of psychological hook to sell your story on ("The heroes of the DC Universe have ideological differences regarding killing!" "The heroes of the Marvel Universe don't know who to trust because of alien invaders!"), but just remember this: There is no problem that can't be solved with good, old-fashioned violence. And if there is, then that's not something that people will want to read (Who really remembers, for example, DC's Genesis, where superheroes tried to discover the shared root of their superpowers without punching, or The Final Night, where superheroes tried to relight the extinguished sun without punching? Exactly). Look at some recent greats: Infinite Crisis started with Batman, Wonder Woman and Superman having fallen out over the murder of a supervillain, and by the end had turned into everyone punching an evil Superboy. Result? Happy fans.

Civil War was initially about whether superheroes needed to be trained in order to be superheroes, but ended with Captain America whaling on Iron Man before losing when he was too much of a pussy to beat his privileged face into mush. Fans may have been upset when Cap lost, but it wasn't because he had the better argument - It was because he had given up punching. That's why he had to die. Almost everyone who has ever read a comic agrees that the greatest recent crossover was World War Hulk, because it started with punching, and then kept punching for each and every issue following. Yes, the conclusion may have disappointed, but that's only because they replaced punching with a deus ex machine laser beam that made the Hulk happy and non-Hulklike or something like that. If it had ended with someone punching the Hulk to death? Comics could've just given up as a medium right there and then; it wouldn't have gotten any better.

So now you know: Promise change, fail to deliver, kill off minor characters, service trademarks and have lots of punching. Follow those simple instructions and one day, you too may be the one person fans pretend could manage to kill Batman.

Marvel & DC - The Summer's Events In A Nutshell [Comic Nerd]

DC started the comic convention season early with an event intended only for comic store owners this weekend. Executive Editor Dan DiDio spilled the beans on the comics that will form the backbone of DC's 2008 plans, alongside the already-announced Final Crisis.

April sees the release of something called DC Universe #0, a 24-page primer on just who's who and what's what for DC's super heroes just in case you've not been paying attention over the past few years. Written by Final Crisis' Grant Morrison and Green Lantern's Geoff Johns, the book will be priced at 50 cents to try and grab the young and stingy in time for the following month's launch of Final Crisis.

A couple of months after that, DC's worst-kept secret — their third year-long weekly mini-series, Trinity — will launch. Unlike previous weeklies 52 and Countdown to Final Crisis, this series does away with the universe-spanning casts and revolving creative teams, with each issue featuring a 12-page lead story focusing on Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman by current Superman writer Kurt Busiek and former Ultimate Spider-Man artist Mark Bagley. The remaining ten pages of content will be filled by stories co-written by Busiek and Fabian Nicieza filling in backstory from the Super Friends' lead.

With both of those books marking continuity-light outreach efforts, those who read the funnybooks for long-running storylines that can't be understood by those who don't have a PhD in DCU will be happy with Rann/Thanagar: Holy War, which brings the Lady Styx plot from 52 to a head, and Reign In Hell which revives the whole "With Satan gone, who shall rule Hell?" idea, after 52 saw DC's Satan, Neron, trapped on Earth.

Whether these projects will be enough to take DC back to the top of the sales charts in a year where Marvel plan to reveal a secret alien invasion across their entire line remains to be seen, but if nothing else, it's always nice to see those little-seen characters Superman and Wonder Woman get some more publicity.

Dan DiDio, Geoff Johns on DC Universe #0 & Final Crisis' Plan [Newsarama.com]
Dan DiDio Talks Trinity [Newsarama.com]
Dan DiDio on R/T: Holy War and Reign In Hell [Newsarama.com]