Before I go over this series I thought I should do a little background on it so the writers' intents are more apparent. Here are a few excerpts from Lewis Shiners' piece "The Old, Weird Stuff" found at the back of the Time Masters trade.
"In the late 80s, time travel at DC Comics was out of control--characters were going back and forth in time to get rid of hangnails or find missing care keys. The editors wanted to clean up the rules, and Bob (Wayne) sold them on the idea that a Rip Hunter series was the best way to codify and illustrate those rules...and, in the process, to dredge up every DC Character from the early sixties that we possibly could."
This was apparent in Booster Gold vol, 1 and the same rule of time travel applies here and will be explored in greater length. Of course this won't be the last time the rules have to change to limit time travel as this was also done (through a different method of "Solid Time") in the second Booster Gold series. I suspect this will be done yet again when time travel is introduced again.
"We wanted to stick as closely as possible to the things that turned us on in the original series. That meant Rip in a white T-shirt and blue jeans (my own clothing choice as a kid, and what I'm writing as I write this) rather than the dumb green uniform that showed up in issue 16 of the original series."
Rip and his team aren't superheroes but rather normal people that try to make a difference which is highlighted by the appearance of DC superheroes. In some respects it's more gritty and adult because of the more down to earth take on Rip.
"At the same time we wanted to get more deeply into the characters of the protagonists and make their relationships more complicated and realistic. Hadn't anybody noticed that Bonnie was an extremely desirable woman? Was Corky just going to stand around saying "Golly, Rip," and yelling "Yippee!" when the Time Sphere took off?"
I haven't gone through the whole run of Rip Hunter Time Master (mainly since it hasn't all been reprinted) but Rip wasn't aware of Bonnie for awhile. There wasn't any real romance to be found. I suppose that's the reason for the change and it's one of the extremes I'm not sure of. I suppose it may make sense if you read between the lines and for the most part she is a strong character that gets things done. I'm just not sure the turn to make her "desirable" was needed. (If you don't know what I'm talking about you will soon enough when I start the reviews.) The change with Corky is another one that you have to focus on since he doesn't really provide anything to the greater story. He does give us one of the most memorable moments in the mini series though.
It should be noted that there was supposed to be a sequel that never came about which might explain why some of the character development was lacking. Still keep in mind some of these things when reading and it makes what they were attempting more apparent. I will say that this isn't one of my favorites, there are some flaws but I still can't help feeling some fondness towards it. So hopefully I'll be able to convey what this mini series means to me. By going through the problems I had with it along with discussing what worked.
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