DC Comics/Headscratchers


 * In a Legion Of Superheroes comic book tie-in, the charachers travel to the planet of the Amazons(formerly Io). There is a temple there dedicated to the Goddess of Love that the boys flock to eagerly. There are several things wrong with the story.
 * Why would there be a temple of love if there are no men on the whole planet? They're all lesbians?
 * Yes. Canonically the DC amazons are lesbians, this has been addressed once or twice before.
 * Lesbians can love, in whatever sense of the word you care to mention.
 * As far as I knew, canon dictates that only the majority of Amazons are lesbian. At least some are uncompromisingly straight, and have simply been doing without for millenia. Flocking to the temple of love and expecting they'll be "well received" is still a bit of a juvenile assumption, but these are teenage boys we're talking about.
 * There were many females reclining on couches, looking bored- what were they doing there? Why aren't they worshipping said goddess in her sacred temple?
 * Why were there other temples dedicated to MALE gods?
 * Because some of the gods of their Pantheon are male? While the outlook of the male gods regarding the Amazons have varied over the course of the years, at various times Hermes, Poseidon, and Hephaestus in particular have been portrayed as taking an active interest in their well being. In any case, the Amazons might just realize the unfortunate consequences that might ensue if they failed to venerate deities who portfolios include things like the ocean, weather, and the afterlife, and could be worshipping them to keep them placated.
 * Especially considering that this is the Greek pantheon we are talking about here, who are quite literally legendary re: their degree of petty vindictiveness and malicious spite towards worshippers that they feel are not giving them their due. The Amazons might be biased, but they ain't stupid.
 * The villian turned the male heroes into pigs as she knew only males could hurt her and the females were powerless. Why not turn the males into females? She got whacked around pretty thoroughly by the super-pigs...
 * So does anyone know just WHAT "big plans" DC apparently had for Cassandra Caine? From what I can tell, that was the motivating factor in telling Adam Beechen to write an excuse for her to be evil. So was their bright idea just to make one of Batman's loyal soldiers turn against the pursuit of (his sense of) justice? Or was that just another stepping stone to something else?
 * Cass Cain has finally re-emerged in Hong Kong as part of Batman, Inc., using the code name of Blackbat, and will also appear in a forthcoming limited series.


 * Sadly, we know what happens when skyscrapers full of people explode. Yet DC keeps doing it with no noted repercussions. Did Not Remember The Research?
 * Falling/exploding skyscrapers are a classic superhero trope. It goes back to the days of the Comics Code when writers had to do something to establish a villain as a threat but couldn't show any on-panel civilian deaths, so they showed him destroying property instead. And as writers kept trying to outdo previous stories the property damage caused by villains got progressively worse until whole buildings were exploding. Yes it's a Did Not Do the Research moment bordering on a Critical Research Failure, but in my opinion this is very much a case of Tropes Are Not Bad. The only real alternative (aside from massively downgrading the villains so they can't destroy skyscrapers anymore, which I don't think anyone would want to see) would be to actually show what really happens when skyscrapers explode. And that would raise a whole lot of uncomfortable nagging questions in the minds of readers. Like, why haven't the governments of the DC universe not started aggressively eliminating all supervillains and/or all metahumans in general? If battles between heroes and villains actually resulted in as many civilian deaths as would actually happen when a skyscraper exploded, why are superheroes still viewed so positively by the general public of the DCU? Why hasn't there been a push for a Marvel-style Superhero Registration Act? No, I'm happy to leave the (relative) realism to the 616 universe and keep the idealistic non-realism of the DC universe the way it is.
 * Ugh, after the way Marvel Comics bungled the Superhero Registration Act in every conceivable and possible way, it is actually relieving that DC Comics is not going down that road!
 * Ted Kord and to a lesser extent Booster Gold. Despite being always on the front lines when the chips are down, for -most- of their career they are treated like little more then drooling imbeciles just because they enjoy a good prank. Granted, sometimes they really did deserve it (like when Blue let himself go or Gold set up a fight for glory) but for the majority of their career? The League might as well be urinating on them for all the respect they got. Hell, one of Ted's best friends ended up shooting him in the skull.
 * Uh? Max Lord shooting Ted had absolutely nothing to do with how much respect the rest of the League gave those two. Max was a villain at the time, and shot him because Ted wanted to, you know, stop his villainous plan.