Infinite Issues!

As if an 80-page Countdown and 4 six-issue mini-series (not to mention a 4-issue mini within a mini, and a 4-issue JLA arc) were not enough set-up for the 7-issue Infinite Crisis, the stories told in those mini-series will continue in one-shot specials scheduled to appear throughout the run of Infinite Crisis.

As the recently concluded Days of Vengeance and The OMAC Project demonstrate, the stories didn’t exactly end with their final issues. Not only will they continue in Infinite Crisis, but DC has announced 32-page one-shots for each of the four mini-series that will not only resolve the storylines, but demonstrate exactly how they will tie into Infinite Crisis.

For readers who like to collect stories in trade format, this could present a problem. Trade paperbacks of all 4 mini-series have already been announced for November and December, so they will be out before these specials hit. So what does that mean? DiDio told Newsarama he isn't worrying about that:

"Yeah, the guys in Collected Editions want to kill me. Thing is, I’m approaching this story the same way we approached things before there were collected editions to worry about ... I’m worried about doing the best comics, and I figure it can be collected as things move forward. These are good problems to have though. I want to make sure that everyone is excited about what’s coming out at that moment, and we’ll make sure that everything of importance is collected somewhere down the line. Honestly, we did give this a lot of thought, but in the end, I didn’t want collected editions driving the way the story will be told.”

The OMAC Project trade paperback, will not only include the 6-issue main story, but also the 80-page Countdown to Infinite Crisis and the final part of the "Sacrifice' story from Wonder Woman, where the heroine killed Max Lord (a reprint of tht issue contained a brief recap of what happend in the first 3 parts of Sacrifice, and presumably what will be included as well.). For $14.99, this TPB, which appears in November, is a great deal.

But now, you learn that the story continues in another book -- where will that be collected -- as part of the Infinite Crisis collection?

Guess we'll have to see. Since I'm not patient enought to wait for trade on this massive story, i guess it;s irrleavant to me. I'll be buying the individual issues AND the eventual collections. DC has got me!

Here's the info on the TPBs of the other three series:

• Day of Vengeance
• Villains United
• Rann/Thanagar War