if you could have done the Earth 2 series

[BatmanJones]

My previous answer was flip. Let me give this a genuine go...

I would have treated "Earth 2" the way that Julie Schwartz treated "Earth One" when he invented it along with Gardner Fox and the rest by creating new versions of classic characters.

What I mean: I wouldn't be rebooting secret identities of traditionally Earth Two/JSA characters. If the idea was to relaunch a universe from scratch, I'd have done that. Not a new Jay Garrick but a new Flash. Not a new Alan Scott but a new Green Lantern. In much the same way as we got new versions of old characters in Barry Allen Flash and Hal Jordan GL. So I wouldn't have rebooted the secret ID's and I wouldn't have limited reboot to DC's Golden Age characters. As happened in 50s/60s, new Flash, new GL, new Hawkman, new Atom, new EVERYONE.

Giving new costumes to characters with old names (both hero names and secret ID's) was a half-measure. And limiting it to DC's Golden Agers (or at least starting that way) was arbitrary and put a block on OG JSA that never needed to be there.

So those are mostly things I wouldn't have done that they did do. As for what I would do, I mostly covered that above too.

I would have been interested in seeing a new generation of heroes that were legacies in the way Barry Allen was to Jay Garrick.

But as long as we're on a new earth that isn't the main one I think we could also have new versions of the Trinity and the few characters that didn't change in the Silver Age, such as Arthur Curry Aquaman and Ollie Queen Green Arrow.

Val-Zod was a lot of fun. Great idea to do a black Superman. And that points to how this new generation might have made up for transgressions of the past when all characters were cisgender, heterosexual, white, and mostly male. Gay Alan Scott was a nice move too. And I've said many times I think when OG JSA comes back we should see at least one of them step out of the closet, one of the originals not a rebooted version.

Of course the most important thing is finding the right creative team to handle such a monumental task. I'd begin my search for the perfect creative team to relaunch my best characters by preemptively crossing off the name James Robinson who seems to have lost more than a step since his excellent Starman. If New 52's E-2 was ever going to work, they didn't really give it a chance to as it was mostly handled by really poor writers relative to the general superhero comics writing pool. I'd give this task to ANY other writer. I'd give it to my most creative and imaginative team of writers to conceive and my most creative and imaginative writer/artist team to handle the series. Nicola Scott was a great move; Robinson just wasn't. And though I forced myself to read a lot of E-2 after the fact, and enjoyed Tom Taylor's issues, Robinson was a bummer and Daniel H. Wilson was just unreadable to me.

It needs great creators because it's a monumental task and one that's only worked once though it's been tried many times over, let's say, about 60 years, giving the first generation 20 years of its own. Out of all the alt universes we've seen at DC (Tangent is a good example of new versions of classic characters that didn't really go anywhere) it was only when Barry Allen, Hal Jordan, Ray Palmer, Katar and Shayera, etc. were birthed that the new versions of classic characters were good enough to stand on their own. That was a home run and since then no one's even gotten on base. That reboot, the one overseen by Schwartz with a lot of help from Fox and others, would have been my model in creating a new Earth 2 comic book. Of course it would have been. It was the only one that ever worked.

[superduperman]

Superman and Wonder Woman are married and have a teenage daughter named Kara who they are trying to keep from becoming a super-hero. She has secretly made a costume for herself and calls herself Power Girl. Both have been around since the thirties but don't age. Her because she's immortal, him because of solar radiation. Alan Scott is still alive with the help of his ring. Jay Garrick has disappeared in the speed force and been replaced by Jessie Quick. The JSA has been around since WW2 with rotating members. The war ended in 1939 when Superman got involved and single handedly overthrew Hitler and the Nazis. In a panic, every other nation on Earth passed a resolution banning American super-heroes from entering their countries. Almost every nation on Earth has their own nuclear arsenal to keep the super-heroes at bay. The Soviet Union is still around. With more Nuclear weapons than any other country on Earth. The rest of the original JSA are dead with their legacies replacing them. Batman died back in the sixties and was replaced by Dick. Batman and Catwoman never married but they did have an illegitimate daughter he never knew about who resented her father. His granddaughter, however, is proud of her grandfather and takes up the mantle of a super-hero calling herself Huntress.

Ultra-humanite is in a coma and on his deathbed. He was Superman's arch foe for decades. A cult built around him steals his brain and puts it in a woman. He makes a comeback and plots his revenge.

[Vakanai]

Ultra-humanite is in a coma and on his deathbed. He was Superman's arch foe for decades. A cult built around him steals his brain and puts it in a woman. He makes a comeback and plots his revenge.

Wouldn't his brain still be in a coma even if you change bodies?

[superduperman]

Wouldn't his brain still be in a coma even if you change bodies?

Comic book science! It's more like he's on his deathbed.

[DrNewGod]

Comic book science! It's more like he's on his deathbed.

I really wish more got done with Ultra Humanite. Terrifying character, moving from body to body.

IMO, The Golden Age and Generations far and away made the best use of him. I have to wonder if DC doesn't like him as much because his only "signature look" is too much like Grodd, and at his best, he doesn't have one.

[docmidnite]

They should’ve just left Robinson keep creating the world he was meticulously crafting, IMO.

He was building an entire universe filled with all types of different things and you could easily tell that there multiple teams/organizations across the world of Robinson's E-2.

I was anticipating a JSA/Justice Society Incorporated headed and funded by Alan Scott, an All Star/All World Squadron under the World Army led by Wes Dodds and Al Pratt, possibly a SSoV/Seven Soldiers unit that secretly answers directly to Terry Sloan, etc, etc, Robinson was building something grand, and only an idiot would fire an architect before everything that they had planned was finished and ALREADY BUILT.

So thank you DC Comics for being idiots and ruining a good thing.

[Sandy Hausler]

Without worrying about whether or not DC would approve, my Earth 2 would have started just like DC's actual Golden Age. My MAJOR difference is that the heroes actually fight WW2. There's no "spear of destiny" keeping them from going into Berlin and Tokyo. But there are superhumans on all sides and a much shorter, but just as bloody war sees superhumans looked upon with caution. There are no atomic weapons; instead, metahumans are the new deterrent. With superheros and villains around for years, life changes drastically. We see huge differences in style and technology resulting in a retro-futuristic society.

Earth 2 takes place in the year 1985 but with the changes in history, you really can't tell it's 1985. The JSA still exist and Infinity, Inc also exists consisting of mostly the JSA's kids. The focus will be on what a world looks like after decades of superhumans and can deal with the questions you really can't ask well in a universe where Earth needs to look a lot like it really does.

Sort of sounds like Watchman. Dr. Manhattan is the new nuclear deterrent.

Sandy Hausler

[TheMaker1610]

They should’ve just left Robinson keep creating the world he was meticulously crafting, IMO.

He was building an entire universe filled with all types of different things and you could easily tell that there multiple teams/organizations across the world of Robinson's E-2.

I was anticipating a JSA/Justice Society Incorporated headed and funded by Alan Scott, an All Star/All World Squadron under the World Army led by Wes Dodds and Al Pratt, possibly a SSoV/Seven Soldiers unit that secretly answers directly to Terry Sloan, etc, etc, Robinson was building something grand, and only an idiot would fire an architect before everything that they had planned was finished and ALREADY BUILT.

So thank you DC Comics for being idiots and ruining a good thing.

I agree with so much of this
Robinson was creating something great from scratch
I was extremely inversed in the whole E2 premise, as there was so much to be told
The whole Apokolips War aftermath, The World Army qs a whole, the new wonders first steps, among many other things
I recently picked up E2 #0 again, and it still manages to take my breath away everytime.. I was completely sold on Terry Sloan's story and motivations, and wanted to see more of it (instead we got everything about him retconned away in Worlds End, only to get him miserably killed in society)

E2 was a concept destined for greatness, but well.. you know what happened instead..

[CaptCleghorn]

Sort of sounds like Watchman. Dr. Manhattan is the new nuclear deterrent.

Sandy Hausler

Pretty much, but the purpose is to find a less cockeyed way to keep Superhumans from fighting in wars. Manhattan was alone, in this case there would be metahumans on both sides and if one side's heroes fight, then the other's will get in on it and Green lantern and company dropping an asteroid on your capital city is a hell of a deterrent.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

My previous answer was flip. Let me give this a genuine go...

I would have treated "Earth 2" the way that Julie Schwartz treated "Earth One" when he invented it along with Gardner Fox and the rest by creating new versions of classic characters.

What I mean: I wouldn't be rebooting secret identities of traditionally Earth Two/JSA characters. If the idea was to relaunch a universe from scratch, I'd have done that. Not a new Jay Garrick but a new Flash. Not a new Alan Scott but a new Green Lantern. In much the same way as we got new versions of old characters in Barry Allen Flash and Hal Jordan GL. So I wouldn't have rebooted the secret ID's and I wouldn't have limited reboot to DC's Golden Age characters. As happened in 50s/60s, new Flash, new GL, new Hawkman, new Atom, new EVERYONE.

Giving new costumes to characters with old names (both hero names and secret ID's) was a half-measure. And limiting it to DC's Golden Agers (or at least starting that way) was arbitrary and put a block on OG JSA that never needed to be there.

So those are mostly things I wouldn't have done that they did do. As for what I would do, I mostly covered that above too.

I would have been interested in seeing a new generation of heroes that were legacies in the way Barry Allen was to Jay Garrick.

But as long as we're on a new earth that isn't the main one I think we could also have new versions of the Trinity and the few characters that didn't change in the Silver Age, such as Arthur Curry Aquaman and Ollie Queen Green Arrow.

Val-Zod was a lot of fun. Great idea to do a black Superman. And that points to how this new generation might have made up for transgressions of the past when all characters were cisgender, heterosexual, white, and mostly male. Gay Alan Scott was a nice move too. And I've said many times I think when OG JSA comes back we should see at least one of them step out of the closet, one of the originals not a rebooted version.

Of course the most important thing is finding the right creative team to handle such a monumental task. I'd begin my search for the perfect creative team to relaunch my best characters by preemptively crossing off the name James Robinson who seems to have lost more than a step since his excellent Starman. If New 52's E-2 was ever going to work, they didn't really give it a chance to as it was mostly handled by really poor writers relative to the general superhero comics writing pool. I'd give this task to ANY other writer. I'd give it to my most creative and imaginative team of writers to conceive and my most creative and imaginative writer/artist team to handle the series. Nicola Scott was a great move; Robinson just wasn't. And though I forced myself to read a lot of E-2 after the fact, and enjoyed Tom Taylor's issues, Robinson was a bummer and Daniel H. Wilson was just unreadable to me.

It needs great creators because it's a monumental task and one that's only worked once though it's been tried many times over, let's say, about 60 years, giving the first generation 20 years of its own. Out of all the alt universes we've seen at DC (Tangent is a good example of new versions of classic characters that didn't really go anywhere) it was only when Barry Allen, Hal Jordan, Ray Palmer, Katar and Shayera, etc. were birthed that the new versions of classic characters were good enough to stand on their own. That was a home run and since then no one's even gotten on base. That reboot, the one overseen by Schwartz with a lot of help from Fox and others, would have been my model in creating a new Earth 2 comic book. Of course it would have been. It was the only one that ever worked.

Ultimately i would have done the same. I'd probably just create new users of the mantle for the modern day.

[scary harpy]

They should’ve just left Robinson keep creating the world he was meticulously crafting, IMO.

He was building an entire universe filled with all types of different things and you could easily tell that there multiple teams/organizations across the world of Robinson's E-2.

I was anticipating a JSA/Justice Society Incorporated headed and funded by Alan Scott, an All Star/All World Squadron under the World Army led by Wes Dodds and Al Pratt, possibly a SSoV/Seven Soldiers unit that secretly answers directly to Terry Sloan, etc, etc, Robinson was building something grand, and only an idiot would fire an architect before everything that they had planned was finished and ALREADY BUILT.

So thank you DC Comics for being idiots and ruining a good thing.

Agreed.

I agree with so much of this
Robinson was creating something great from scratch
I was extremely inversed in the whole E2 premise, as there was so much to be told
The whole Apokolips War aftermath, The World Army qs a whole, the new wonders first steps, among many other things
I recently picked up E2 #0 again, and it still manages to take my breath away everytime.. I was completely sold on Terry Sloan's story and motivations, and wanted to see more of it (instead we got everything about him retconned away in Worlds End, only to get him miserably killed in society)

E2 was a concept destined for greatness, but well.. you know what happened instead..

Agreed.

[OBrianTallent]

Earth 2 would have been a banner much like Bendis' upcoming "Wonder Comics" with two titles: Justice Society of America & Infinity Inc.
Much of the history would have been the same as the original Pre-Crisis JSA with some of the post Crisis stuff tossed in. However, the original JSA would have vanished shortly after the McCarthy era "disbanding" due to machinations of Per Degaton, Wotan and other villains, the JSA is thrust into a similar Ragnarok situation that happened in the Last Days of the JSA special from 86, just in a different time frame as the story would have taken place around the 50's/60's. The only characters not sent are Superman, Wonder Woman, Spectre and Doctor Fate who manage to break free. Fate, Spectre and other magicians like Sargon and Zatarra as well as Superman eventually find a way to bring them back circa 1990 to find a drastically changed world than the one they left. Superman still operated alongside new heroes who arose. Returning were Green Lantern, Flash, Hawkman, Hawkgirl, Starman (Ted Knight), Atom, Doctor Midnight, Liberty Belle, Johnny Quick, Johnny Thunder, Hourman, Batman, Catwoman, Robin, Wildcat and Sandman, Sandy, Stripesy. (By the time the disappearances took place, Bruce and Selina had already married.)
The JSA book would be structured much the same way Robinson did his Starman series with Times Past tales filling in the years between their return and the modern stories told. During the time of their disappearance Superman retired from heroics and moved to the farm (similar to Kingdom Come.) Fate cast a spell on Lois that slowed her aging in that she now appears to be in her sixties instead of 90s. Kara Zor-L appeared during the 80's and has operated in Superman's place and set up her own software firm. Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor marry and adopt a young girl named Helena Kosmatos. She along with Iron Munro, Flying Fox, Tsunami, Dan the Dyna-mite, Tigress and Neptune Perkins emerge and attempt to take the place of the missing heroes around the late 70's early 80's.
When the JSA returns, they find a drastically changed world than the one they left behind. Flash in a desperate attempt to regain some of his life builds a new time treadmill and manages to get his wife Joan from the past before it explodes. The JSA refrain from being heroes and attempt to live normal lives, from this time they begin to have children and thus is born the future Infinity Inc members. Slowly the heroes are compelled to come out of retirement and become the JSA again alongside the heroes who took their place. Jump to now...
The JSA operates as it has along with new heroes Power Girl, Huntress and a few others. They operate as the main group of heroes similar to how the Justice League operates.
Infinity Inc are the children of the JSA: Silver Scarab, Fury II, Atom Smasher, Jesse Quick, Hourman (Rick), Jade, Obsidian, Brainwave Jr (who's now the great grandson of the original) grow up in a world in which they are idolized much like celebrities. Paparazzi follow them around, gossip mags plaster their faces all over their periodicals. Some have embraced the glamour while others try to avoid it. Along the way, Infinity Inc adopts new members who are either legacies of the mid-group heroes (the original Young All-Stars) or just new heroes all together including the daughter of Tsunami and Neptune Perkins, a new Flying Fox, Cyclone, Stargirl, Tom Cat (the son of Wildcat) among others.

[OBrianTallent]

Oops, double post.