Readers of Doomsday Clock all SPOILERS thread

[JonaX]

Is it possible that Ozymandias has managed to pull the same stunt, and the reason why Jon can't see part his encounter with Superman is that Adrian triggers another tachyon burst as part of whatever his gambit is?

I think Ozy's plan is going to be foiled by Johnny Thunder finally summoning the Thunderbolt but what he wishes for I'm not too sure.

[CaptCleghorn]

I think Ozy's plan is going to be foiled by Johnny Thunder finally summoning the Thunderbolt but what he wishes for I'm not too sure.

My fanfic theory is that the Thunderbolt's removal of superheroics and supervillainy from Earth 2 transformed it into the Watchmen's Earth-W. The conclusion of DClock would have Manhattan and the Thunderbolt teaming up to restore earth-W to the original Earth 2 and the JSA and company would be restored while the Watchmen returned to the realm of stories where they belong.

[Buried Alien]

My fanfic theory is that the Thunderbolt's removal of superheroics and supervillainy from Earth 2 transformed it into the Watchmen's Earth-W. The conclusion of DClock would have Manhattan and the Thunderbolt teaming up to restore earth-W to the original Earth 2 and the JSA and company would be restored while the Watchmen returned to the realm of stories where they belong.

We could take this a step further.

WATCHMEN was published during the same time as COIE (1985-1986).

Perhaps Earth-W came into existence just as Earth-Two died in 1985-1986. Maybe Earth-W needs to die for Earth-Two to be reborn, meaning the Watchmen themselves must cease to exist for the original, Pre-COIE JSA to return to existence.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Dataweaver]

My own fanfic theory is that Convergence happened, with its ending of “the heroes who went back in time saved the original Multiverse” — but with one change: the notion that the worlds of the 52-Earth Multiverse are reboots of corresponding worlds from the pre-Crisis Multiverse is false. What actually happened was this:

The Convergence heroes intervened between episodes 10 and 11 of Crisis on Infinite Earths (10 ended with a fade-to-black as the Spectre struggled with the Anti-Monitor at the Dawn of Time; 11 began back in the present, with the first appearance of the post-Crisis DCU). They fought the Anti-Monitor at the Dawn of Time and changed things so that instead of the five surviving Earths collapsing into one, they were all saved. But not without cost: first, they were isolated from each other: instead of being so close to each other that the only thing separating them were vibrational barriers, they were now spun off into distant regions of Hypertime, far enough apart that contact between them was all but impossible. This isolation propagated forward from the Dawn of Time to the present, altering their histories — some subtly, some profoundly. The one thing in common was that all interactions that they had had with each other were erased. More on this a bit later.

The second change is that their time spent conjoined during the Crisis resulted in echoes of each world being imprinted on the others. To varying extents, each surviving Earth had its history altered to include characters that had not originally been from that Earth. There are three such Earths that deserve special consideration here:

1. The post-Crisis Earth One. This is the published post-Crisis DCU. Of relevance here, it remained a single Earth right up until Infinite Crisis, when it split into 52 closely connected Earths. The worlds of the 52 are patterned after various pre-Crisis worlds, by way of the echoes of those Earths that got embedded into Earth One; but they are not reboots of those worlds.

2. The post-Crisis Earth Four. Earth Four got isolated and transformed just like the others did. The echoes that it got infused with came from a previously unknown Earth (and as such it never got a designation that I'm aware of) that corresponded to the Archie Comics superheroes. This, not Earth Two, is the Earth that became the Watchmen universe: the Archie Comics echoes manifested among the Minutemen, and the rest of the Watchmen are reboots of the original Charlton heroes.

3. The post-Crisis Earth Two. This is where the bulk of my fanfic theory comes in. Earth Two remains the least changed of the post-Crisis Earths; but even it didn't pass through the Crisis unscathed. The pre-Crisis Earth Two remains the template for this Earth; but its history is altered to include more Golden Age heroes such as Captain Marvel, Plastic Man, and Phantom Lady. Its history is also altered to include the Justice League, though the Justice League roster replaces Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman with Iron Munro, Flying Fox, and Fury. The various interactions between the Justice Society and the Justice League still happen (e.g., Flash of Two Worlds, Crisis on Earths One and Two, etc.), but they no longer involve crossovers between different Earths. As well, after the Justice Society comes out of retirement, they resume their place as the premiere superhero team of that reality: the Justice League plays “second fiddle” to them, and only those elements of Justice League history that are relevant to the Justice Society are guaranteed to remain intact.

The history of this world continues past the Crisis, incorporating as much of the JSA-relevant post-Crisis history as possible without incorporating the “Earth One” post-Crisis retcons that were caused by removing the original Trinity from history. We get new characters like Jesse Quick, Damage, Jack Knight, Stargirl, Cyclone, and so on; but we generally don't get characters like the Teen Titans, Young Justice, or any of the other JLA-derived characters.

4. There are probably post-Crisis versions of Earth S and Earth X out there in the same manner; but I haven't put much thought into what they might be like. There might also be other pre-Crisis Earths that got a new lease on life because of Convergence; for instance, Earth D (from the 2000 “Legends of the Crisis on Infinite Earths”) might have been reborn as the Milestone universe. Or not. It's also possible that some of these worlds didn't last long after the Crisis isolated them; my inclination would be for this to be the fate of Earth X. And others may have had their own “Infinite Crisis”-like event, splitting them up into their own “Orreries of Worlds”. I've debated the possibility of doing this to the aforementioned Earth Two.

[Jody Garland]

That MLJ/Charlton idea is interesting. I've known about the MLJ connection for ages but it never occurred to me at least one analogue did make it in- Hooded Justice is a sort of mashup of the Black Hood and Hangman.

[JonaX]

There was an interesting theory on Reddit a while back that Manhattan would save both universes by going back to 1959 and preventing the accident that caused him to become Doctor Manhattan. The butterfly effect would be that Doctor Manhattan would cease to exist but Jon would be human again and be to live a normal life.

[Zorintien]

I have two problems with Doomsday Clock that come to mind: 1. The way they used "collusion" to describe what Superman did in Russia. I hate the way people use "collusion" in reference to current politics. The term they mean to use is "conspiracy." But no one wants to use that word for fear of being labeled a "conspiracy theorist." So the fact that they just threw in the term "collusion" for no apparent reason makes me mad. 2. Doctor Manhattan is functionally our antagonist, and Doctor Manhattan is boring. He is only doing the things that he is doing because he is bored. That is not a compelling motivation for anyone.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

With Alfred's death being confirmed as not a fake out, I think the idea that the entirety of Doomsday Clock being a "time bubble" that will pop once Dr. Manhattan's manipulation of the DCU has ended is looking to be the most likely outcome.

That was probably the smartest play for Johns & Frank to take, as it allowed them to do whatever they wanted with Doomsday Clock without having to work around whatever Underworld Unleashed/Forever Evil/Infinite Crisis rehash Didio is trying to get readers excited about.

[Morsoth]

There was an interesting theory on Reddit a while back that Manhattan would save both universes by going back to 1959 and preventing the accident that caused him to become Doctor Manhattan. The butterfly effect would be that Doctor Manhattan would cease to exist but Jon would be human again and be to live a normal life.

Dr. Manhattan can't travel in time. He witnesses time in a simultaneous way, but everything happens as it is supposed to. He can't go back in time to "fix" something and alter that reality.

[Dataweaver]

That was the case in the Watchmen universe, yes. In the DC Universe, time is more… flexible. In particular, Dr. Manhattan has already reached into the past and changed it. What he did to Alan Scott and the Kents was long after the events he messed with had passed into the past.

[Morsoth]

Yeah, good point...

[Dataweaver]

Also: in terms of the issue that layed out the history of the Metaverse: the scene where Dr. Manhattan retroactively removed Allan Scott and the Justice Society corresponds to the launch of the New 52; the scene where Wally West shows up and berates him corresponds to DCU Rebirth (and should be taken with a grain of salt, as I don't think Wally ever actually showed up and berated him): between those two panels lies the period of time when the Justice Society did not exist at all; after the Wally panel, we're in the iteration of the Metaverse where the Justice Society was a clandestine team of mystery men, unknown to the public. That means that, in the timeline being depicted in Doomsday Clock as the current iteration, Johnny Quick exists, knows about Alan's battery, and remembers the JSA because they were real; they just weren't public. I think that's in keeping with their recent appearance in Justice League, too.

[Robotman]

Dr. Manhattan can't travel in time. He witnesses time in a simultaneous way, but everything happens as it is supposed to. He can't go back in time to "fix" something and alter that reality.

I was also theorizing that Manhattan would prevent his own creation, basically erasing himself from the timeline. Which would explain why he can’t see past his confrontation with Superman. We’ve seen that his powers have increased exponentially since he first appeared. His power increase seems to coincide with the loss of his humanity. Maybe his ability to alter the DCU will carry over into the Watchmen universe.

That raises even more questions about the possible effects Manhattan’s absence will have on both worlds. Since he wasn’t there to stop the Vietnam War from escalating things may have occurred similar to how they happened in real life. Nixon didn’t remain in office and the Cold War eventually came to an end without a nuclear conflict. That also means that all the scientific advancements he helped with never happened. Veidt is a super genius but he probably couldn’t create most of the stuff he came up with if he doesn’t have Manhattan’s god-like powers for assistance.

As far as how the the DCU is affected it could mean the New 52, DCYou, Rebirth, etc. never happened. I guess we’ll find out the results of that if the 5G stuff takes place.

[astro@work]

My fanfic-ish theory is that Doc Manhattan will undo all his time meddling around Superman. (We already got a hint of where Dr M jumped in and messed with Clark's history as we knew it from his publication history).

This will be the event that leads to the leaked 1G-2G-3G-4G-5G timeline, putting the JSA back in the timeline, and Superman/Batman/Wonder Woman's history much earlier in the timeline.

The "missing ten years" will be restored, re-inserting the New Teen Titans history back in the timeline as well. Almost all of DC history will be restored, with a few new explanations required to connect the golden age to silver age to post-Crisis to nu52/Rebirth.

[JonaX]

I was also theorizing that Manhattan would prevent his own creation, basically erasing himself from the timeline. Which would explain why he can’t see past his confrontation with Superman. We’ve seen that his powers have increased exponentially since he first appeared. His power increase seems to coincide with the loss of his humanity. Maybe his ability to alter the DCU will carry over into the Watchmen universe.

That raises even more questions about the possible effects Manhattan’s absence will have on both worlds. Since he wasn’t there to stop the Vietnam War from escalating things may have occurred similar to how they happened in real life. Nixon didn’t remain in office and the Cold War eventually came to an end without a nuclear conflict. That also means that all the scientific advancements he helped with never happened. Veidt is a super genius but he probably couldn’t create most of the stuff he came up with if he doesn’t have Manhattan’s god-like powers for assistance.

As far as how the the DCU is affected it could mean the New 52, DCYou, Rebirth, etc. never happened. I guess we’ll find out the results of that if the 5G stuff takes place.

The fact The Comedian is alive is another factor, Manhattan clearly intervened with that event and it still hasn't been explained fully.