Quote:That's something of a misconception. DC has amazing source material but a good bit of it lied within their Vertigo imprint or it lies outside the scope of the main/powerhouse characters (The Helena Bertinelli Huntress, The Vic Sage Question, Barbara Gordon as Oracle instead of Batgirl/Birds of Prey, any incarnation of The Spectre and Black Adam...just to name a few). Sandman, just to give you one example, was absolutely amazing. The mainstream/major characters are definitely iconic and there's depth to all of them, however they also tend to wallow in their own idealisms and in many cases end up being cliches (especially Silver Age Superman) even though that's not necessarily the original intent. 

 

I go back to their conceptions, their core.  The original source, not modern inventions/reinventions and offshoots.  Stan Lee took the entire genre to a different level in the 60s, which DC also benefited from after owning the 50s themselves.

 

DC heroes were born idealistic and rigid. Something readers would aspire to be like, but were not like.  What people connected to with Marvel is that while their heroes also had powers like DC, they were also as flawed and had a human side much like the reader.  I also believe that's why Batman was so accessible and more easily able to break from the idealism of the early DC icons and be extremely human compared to his DC peers.  You can also see that in all the Bat-spinoffs it created.  DC just has the feel of spinoffs instead of the uniquely different characters born from Marvel in the 60s.  And the ones that are uniquely different don't feel to be as strong standing on their own.

 

I'll say when I was young, I liked DC more, but as I've grown older I've been able to appreciate Marvel's depth more.

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