DC's "new" timeline revealed at NYCC

[Restingvoice]

Something else to consider: there were three points in DC's “meta-history” where the DCU was radically re-imagined: not merely “taken in a radical new direction”, but “changed in ways that made it problematic to integrate stuff that came before with stuff that came after”. These three breaks in the timeline are the Interregnum between the Golden Age and the Silver Age; the Crisis on Infinite Earths; and Flashpoint. I've already addressed my thoughts about what to do concerning 1938–1956; but I'm thinking that similar creativity ought to be applied to the 1971–1986 period and the 2011–2016 period. Don't even try to fit everything from these publishing periods into Earth 0's timeline; instead, Earth 0's timeline should be more selective as to what it takes from them, and alternate Earths should be presented that stay more true to those eras: Earth 2 for the 1938–1956 era, Earth 1985 for the 1971–1976 era, and Earth 52 for the 2012–2016 era.

That's not to say that nothing from these three periods should be included in Earth 0's timeline, or that they should be hermetically sealed off from Earth 0. But what does get brought in from those publishing periods should be subject to revision — often heavy revision, with only the broadest strokes remaining consistent with the actual original publications.

Another reason why I'm fiddling around with the idea of putting the time and dimension travel elements back into Jon's origin story is that if we have an Earth 52 that stays true to the 2011–2016 comics, it would be nice to link it to Earth 0; and having Jon grow up there helps make Earth 52 more relevant to Earth 0. More generally, I don't think that Earth 0's timeline should be designed to be fully self-contained; it should incorporate some dimensional crossovers with relevant alternate Earths.

(For the record, I'm not fond of the name “Earth 1985”; but the idea that it represents, an alternate Earth that stays true to the 1971–1986 publication era, is something that I'm fond of.)

I'm only familiar with the Batman stories in the 71-86 era, and not in-depth. The rest, I'm still blank. The 2011-2016 I'm more familiar with. So I'll just start with that part.

First, I'm using Damian as a benchmark, since he has the clearest age up, going from 10 to 13 years old. That's our time frame.

Next, I'm going with the easy changes

Barry is not dating Patty Spivot. They're just colleagues.
I don't know what Ted Kord was doing Pre-Flashpoint but he will not be Lex Luthor's intern in this era.
Plastic Man was considered for JLI but then he was made into an egg in Death Metal. I don't know how he got there, but there he went.

Tim's Teen Titans are obviously not the first one, he's just returning to the team. The concept of N.O.W.H.E.R.E. kidnapping a new teen superhero is fine. The New 52 Kid Flash Bar Tor can stay, he's just treated as a new character separate from Bart. The New 52 Superboy is a clone of an alternate future son of Clark and Lois plus Lex's DNA, so he's a separate character from Conner and can stay too.

Cass Cain will return from Hong Kong to help fight Leviathan in Gotham alongside all the other Batmen

Talia has not been planning Leviathan her whole life, just after she was tortured to insanity by her sister in Death and The Maidens. Morrison wrote a whole back story justifying his version of Talia, but that will not go in a Linearverse.

Batman Eternal and Robin Eternal can now just focus on Harper Row and Arthur Brown's comeback since Cass Cain and Steph Brown are already around for a while. Steph can still be hunted by the villains, but the details of the story will differ a lot.

Red Hood and The Outlaws... since Kori doesn't have scent memory, and she just recently left Justice League just like Dick and all of their generation except for Cyborg, her reason to join Outlaws is to help Roy, who's gone the deep end after Lian died. Roy's conflict will be less about his addiction and more about his daughter.

Joker's Daughter... I don't know her story, I just know she was a Titan and hero. So if this new character stays she can't be Duela Dent. Preferably she's just gone because the position of the red-haired young woman that is Red Hood's student can be filled with Scarlet, Red Hood's sidekick and victim of Professor Pyg.

Since Steph already infiltrated St. Hadrian and the Bat fam took it down, The Spyral Dick Grayson went will be led by Headmistress Kathy Kane, filling the role of Helena Bertinelli since she's already Huntress now. His job is still preventing Mr. Minos from discovering and exposing superhero identities.

I'm not touching Superman family, Shazam family, Earth 2, Earth 3, Power Girl, Titans, JSA, and Wally just yet, because I haven't decided if I'm talking about a timeline where everything continues from where Pre-Flashpoint left or a timeline where almost everything in New 52 happened, and I don't have most of that knowledge.

By the way, New 52 Swamp Thing declared that it's the first time Alec Holland was reborn and become Swamp Thing. The previous Alec are all clones created by the Parliament. What do you wanna do with this?

[scary harpy]

Has everyone forgotten Superboy: The adventures of Superman as a boy?

Those stories created a big paradox: Superboy, Earth’s only superhero, was active in Smallville for about 5ish years…and then…the world is amazed by arrival of a Superman in Metropolis!

I always assumed that the people of Smallville made sure to keep Clark's exploits as Superboy a secret from the rest of the world(it could easily be explained since Smallville is literally in the middle of nowhere and social media didn't exist at the time).

The Smallville solution works for that: Clark was never Superboy per se; but he still had superpowered adventures. Just not ones that made the news.

So...Everything happened...expect those stories with Superboy (Superman as a boy)...

Aren't we right back where we started?


Would a better solution would be to separate Superman and Superboy?

Superman debuts in Metropolis and Superboy later debuts in Smallville...and has adventures with the LSH?

As I remember those Superboy stories, they could Not change the status quo...so they often ended badly/sadly for characters. Wouldn't a separate Superboy be better for these super-stories?

[Tzigone]

I always assumed that the people of Smallville made sure to keep Clark's exploits as Superboy a secret from the rest of the world(it could easily be explained since Smallville is literally in the middle of nowhere and social media didn't exist at the time).

There was a giant Superboy statue. He was very publicly known. Unless we're talking about a different Superboy title.

I thought originally Superboy and Superman were in different continuities (and later Superboy was folded in), but am not positive. Anyway, it's a reason I don't like Clark ever being Superboy.

[Dataweaver]

So...Everything happened...expect those stories with Superboy (Superman as a boy)...

Aren't we right back where we started?


Would a better solution would be to separate Superman and Superboy?

Superman debuts in Metropolis and Superboy later debuts in Smallville...and has adventures with the LSH?

As I remember those Superboy stories, they could Not change the status quo...so they often ended badly/sadly for characters. Wouldn't a separate Superboy be better for these super-stories?

I'm positing a new timeline instituted a few years from now, after another Crisis; and after said Crisis, “Everything Happened” ceases to be an ironclad mandate and is more of what one would call a guideline. That's the only way that a single, consistent timeline for a single Earth can be established, in contrast to the current approach of saying that the timeline explicitly is inconsistent.

That said, I think we can get “everything happened” on one primary Earth (0) plus three supplementary Earths (2, 1985, and 52). Focus Earth 0 on being fully consistent with 1956–1971, 1986–2011, and 2016–now, with only those elements from the other three eras that can reasonably be reconciled with these segments. Meanwhile, Earth 2 maintains full fidelity with 1938–1956; Earth 1985 maintains full fidelity with 1971–1986; and Earth 52 maintains full fidelity with 2011–2016.

[Dataweaver]

There was a giant Superboy statue. He was very publicly known. Unless we're talking about a different Superboy title.

I thought originally Superboy and Superman were in different continuities (and later Superboy was folded in), but am not positive. Anyway, it's a reason I don't like Clark ever being Superboy.

Incidentally, this is another reason to do with a handful of parallel Earths instead of trying to force everything into a single timeline: The Adventures of Superboy work nicely as part of the Earth 1985 continuity, and can be highlighted as something that helps distinguish that Earth from Earth 0.

[Restingvoice]

So...Everything happened...expect those stories with Superboy (Superman as a boy)...

Aren't we right back where we started?


Would a better solution would be to separate Superman and Superboy?

Superman debuts in Metropolis and Superboy later debuts in Smallville...and has adventures with the LSH?

As I remember those Superboy stories, they could Not change the status quo...so they often ended badly/sadly for characters. Wouldn't a separate Superboy be better for these super-stories?

LSH connecting and inspired by Clark is iconic to their story, so if you're creating a new Superboy in the same Earth, then he's not the one connecting with LSH and I'm gonna need to ask where he's gone after the years passed. It's basically creating entirely new story.

[bat39]

Something else to consider: there were three points in DC's “meta-history” where the DCU was radically re-imagined: not merely “taken in a radical new direction”, but “changed in ways that made it problematic to integrate stuff that came before with stuff that came after”. These three breaks in the timeline are the Interregnum between the Golden Age and the Silver Age; the Crisis on Infinite Earths; and Flashpoint. I've already addressed my thoughts about what to do concerning 1938–1956; but I'm thinking that similar creativity ought to be applied to the 1971–1986 period and the 2011–2016 period. Don't even try to fit everything from these publishing periods into Earth 0's timeline; instead, Earth 0's timeline should be more selective as to what it takes from them, and alternate Earths should be presented that stay more true to those eras: Earth 2 for the 1938–1956 era, Earth 1985 for the 1971–1976 era, and Earth 52 for the 2012–2016 era.

That's not to say that nothing from these three periods should be included in Earth 0's timeline, or that they should be hermetically sealed off from Earth 0. But what does get brought in from those publishing periods should be subject to revision — often heavy revision, with only the broadest strokes remaining consistent with the actual original publications.

Another reason why I'm fiddling around with the idea of putting the time and dimension travel elements back into Jon's origin story is that if we have an Earth 52 that stays true to the 2011–2016 comics, it would be nice to link it to Earth 0; and having Jon grow up there helps make Earth 52 more relevant to Earth 0. More generally, I don't think that Earth 0's timeline should be designed to be fully self-contained; it should incorporate some dimensional crossovers with relevant alternate Earths.

(For the record, I'm not fond of the name “Earth 1985”; but the idea that it represents, an alternate Earth that stays true to the 1971–1986 publication era, is something that I'm fond of.)

Interesting thought.

I'm curious as to why you're singling out the 1971-1986 period (aka the Bronze Age). I can understand the issues with the 2011-2016 period/New 52.

On the subject of Jon, back before Superman Reborn was published I was a strong proponent of a theory similar to yours. I don't remember the specific details, but the gist of it was that Jon wasn't born in the 'normal' timeline, and something weird happened to Lois and Clark in-universe (the latter part was technically true in-story...but then they very quickly ignored the idea of Superman and Lois being 'split apart' and re-merged). But then they just went with the simpler explanation of saying ''Jon was around all along'' and I was like "Okay then".

But your idea of other earths intersecting with the history of Earth 0 is solid. My own Earth 2 idea for the JSA is kinda in line with that.

Has everyone forgotten Superboy: The adventures of Superman as a boy?

Those stories created a big paradox: Superboy, Earth’s only superhero, was active in Smallville for about 5ish years…and then…the world is amazed by arrival of a Superman in Metropolis!

Back in the Silver Age/Bronze Age, I don't Superman's debut was ever presented as a big deal. It was just Superboy moving and changing his name.

Superboy did cause quiet a lot of continuity issues for Superman during the late Golden Age/early Silver Age...to the point where I consider Superboy to be the first reboot (albeit a 'silent' reboot) of the Superman mythos and the DCU in general.

Just looking at this thread, I can tell that none of us are going to do any better than the 'official' timeline since none of us can get on the same page especially when it comes to fundamentals. Superboy? Or no Superboy? Diana in WW2 or present day? Is Superman the first superhero or was it the JSA? What are Dick and Babs age difference? How long into his career did Robin and Batgirl debut?

I don't think one 'main' timeline as it is is going to work anymore.

Probably the best solution is to have smaller pocket universes set in their own continuity like what Tom King is doing with his minis. The main universe can continue as it is but I think you can have alternate universes like ones where all the main heroes grew old and had kids and characters like Jace, Yara and Jon took over, universes where Clark was Superboy and universe's were there was no JSA along with universe's where the Titans were now the adult heroes and the premier super team with characters like Jon and Damian closer to teens and adults.

I see where you're coming from.

That said, I don't think a 'consensus' timeline is impossible. Its possible to try to come up with a timeline that incorporates as much of the disparate elements as possible. So for instance, in the case of Superboy, have Superboy operate under the radar in Smallville, while Superman is the big debut. Wonder Woman could have started out in WW2 and return to Man's World and be reintroduced in the present-day. Superman can be the first hero of the modern age, and the JSA could be barely remembered legends from WW2 (especially in a situation where they were forcibly removed from the universe in-story somehow).

But its true that as time goes by, the notion of a 'mainstream' DC continuity will grow increasingly less relevant. Maybe that's what Infinite Frontier and the Omniverse is supposed to set up...

[Dataweaver]

I'm only familiar with the Batman stories in the 71-86 era, and not in-depth. The rest, I'm still blank. The 2011-2016 I'm more familiar with. So I'll just start with that part.

First, I'm using Damian as a benchmark, since he has the clearest age up, going from 10 to 13 years old. That's our time frame.

Next, I'm going with the easy changes

Barry is not dating Patty Spivot. They're just colleagues.
I don't know what Ted Kord was doing Pre-Flashpoint but he will not be Lex Luthor's intern in this era.
Plastic Man was considered for JLI but then he was made into an egg in Death Metal. I don't know how he got there, but there he went.

Tim's Teen Titans are obviously not the first one, he's just returning to the team. The concept of N.O.W.H.E.R.E. kidnapping a new teen superhero is fine. The New 52 Kid Flash Bar Tor can stay, he's just treated as a new character separate from Bart. The New 52 Superboy is a clone of an alternate future son of Clark and Lois plus Lex's DNA, so he's a separate character from Conner and can stay too.

Cass Cain will return from Hong Kong to help fight Leviathan in Gotham alongside all the other Batmen

Talia has not been planning Leviathan her whole life, just after she was tortured to insanity by her sister in Death and The Maidens. Morrison wrote a whole back story justifying his version of Talia, but that will not go in a Linearverse.

Batman Eternal and Robin Eternal can now just focus on Harper Row and Arthur Brown's comeback since Cass Cain and Steph Brown are already around for a while. Steph can still be hunted by the villains, but the details of the story will differ a lot.

Red Hood and The Outlaws... since Kori doesn't have scent memory, and she just recently left Justice League just like Dick and all of their generation except for Cyborg, her reason to join Outlaws is to help Roy, who's gone the deep end after Lian died. Roy's conflict will be less about his addiction and more about his daughter.

Joker's Daughter... I don't know her story, I just know she was a Titan and hero. So if this new character stays she can't be Duela Dent. Preferably she's just gone because the position of the red-haired young woman that is Red Hood's student can be filled with Scarlet, Red Hood's sidekick and victim of Professor Pyg.

Since Steph already infiltrated St. Hadrian and the Bat fam took it down, The Spyral Dick Grayson went will be led by Headmistress Kathy Kane, filling the role of Helena Bertinelli since she's already Huntress now. His job is still preventing Mr. Minos from discovering and exposing superhero identities.

I'm not touching Superman family, Shazam family, Earth 2, Earth 3, Power Girl, Titans, JSA, and Wally just yet, because I haven't decided if I'm talking about a timeline where everything continues from where Pre-Flashpoint left or a timeline where almost everything in New 52 happened, and I don't have most of that knowledge.

By the way, New 52 Swamp Thing declared that it's the first time Alec Holland was reborn and become Swamp Thing. The previous Alec are all clones created by the Parliament. What do you wanna do with this?

Do both: one for Earth 0 where everything continued from where pre-Flashpoint left off, and another for Earth 52 where everything in New 52 happened. Most of what you describe above fits the former; to the extent that it fits the latter, the question isn't how the 2011–2016 stuff changes but rather what pre-2011 and post-2016 stuff can be reconciled with it.

[Adekis]

Has everyone forgotten Superboy: The adventures of Superman as a boy?

Those stories created a big paradox: Superboy, Earth’s only superhero, was active in Smallville for about 5ish years…and then…the world is amazed by arrival of a Superman in Metropolis!

I always assumed that the people of Smallville made sure to keep Clark's exploits as Superboy a secret from the rest of the world(it could easily be explained since Smallville is literally in the middle of nowhere and social media didn't exist at the time).

Ah, but you forget, Smallville wasn't located in Kansas until the 1986 reboot! Before that, it was on the East Coast!

I just read a story from New Adventures of Superboy # 13, published 1981, pretty late in the game for Superboy, and he met young Harold (the future 'Hal') Jordan on a trip to the west coast! Jordan's reaction to Superboy wasn't surprise that a flying super-strong alien could exist, but glee at meeting someone famous! Jordan also explicitly mentions that Superboy lives on the east coast.


Now obviously all this can't be assumed to be in the world of DC's new fanfic outline timeline, but it certainly contradicts the "secret Superboy" point with regard to the pre-Crisis era!

[Dataweaver]

I'm curious as to why you're singling out the 1971-1986 period (aka the Bronze Age). I can understand the issues with the 2011-2016 period/New 52.

I've got to get to work now, so I'll be dropping out for a while. But I wanted to address this before I go. I singled out the Bronze Age because to the extent that we have a current continuity, a lot of stuff from the Bronze Age doesn't fit without considerable finagling. Clark becoming a TV anchor for, I forget what the call letters were (WGBS?), but it wasn't the Daily Planet; Bruce closing up Wayne Manor and moving to an office building in downtown Gotham; Barbara becoming a Senator; Jason Todd being another circus acrobat instead of a street urchin; and so on. When the Crisis hit, all of those changes abruptly vanished and have never been reintroduced to my knowledge. So instead of trying to shoehorn them into a consistent Earth 0 history, set up a parallel history built around them.

[Restingvoice]

Do both: one for Earth 0 where everything continued from where pre-Flashpoint left off, and another for Earth 52 where everything in New 52 happened. Most of what you describe above fits the former; to the extent that it fits the latter, the question isn't how the 2011–2016 stuff changes but rather what pre-2011 and post-2016 stuff can be reconciled with it.

Since Earth 52 is pure New 52 continuity I don't have to do anything with it. It can just be presented as-is. The changes would be when Superman, Lois, and Jon start moving there. Who are they? Does it matter since their story only matters in connection to Rebirth? I prefer if the story just cuts out before they retcon their arrival since it just complicates things.

So I'm just gonna focus on what happens if it's still on Earth 0

[Adekis]

I've got to get to work now, so I'll be dropping out for a while. But I wanted to address this before I go. I singled out the Bronze Age because to the extent that we have a current continuity, a lot of stuff from the Bronze Age doesn't fit without considerable finagling. Clark becoming a TV anchor for, I forget what the call letters were (WGBS?), but it wasn't the Daily Planet; Bruce closing up Wayne Manor and moving to an office building in downtown Gotham; Barbara becoming a Senator; Jason Todd being another circus acrobat instead of a street urchin; and so on. When the Crisis hit, all of those changes abruptly vanished and have never been reintroduced to my knowledge. So instead of trying to shoehorn them into a consistent Earth 0 history, set up a parallel history built around them.

Yeah, I agree. Maybe this is part of why the Bronze Age has been so underrepresented in reprints and such - since it's changes were largely altered, walked back or otherwise ignored by the post-Crisis reboot, it can be seen as superfluous - which is really a shame in my opinion. I love the Bronze Age.

[Restingvoice]

I've got to get to work now, so I'll be dropping out for a while. But I wanted to address this before I go. I singled out the Bronze Age because to the extent that we have a current continuity, a lot of stuff from the Bronze Age doesn't fit without considerable finagling. Clark becoming a TV anchor for, I forget what the call letters were (WGBS?), but it wasn't the Daily Planet; Bruce closing up Wayne Manor and moving to an office building in downtown Gotham; Barbara becoming a Senator; Jason Todd being another circus acrobat instead of a street urchin; and so on. When the Crisis hit, all of those changes abruptly vanished and have never been reintroduced to my knowledge. So instead of trying to shoehorn them into a consistent Earth 0 history, set up a parallel history built around them.

Alright so if that continues from where they left off

Since Babs was dating Det. Jason Bard at the time and afaik there's no reason for them to break up... after Joker knocks on Gordon's door, paralyzed Barbara, and tortures them, Babs resumes a relationship with Bard and maybe get married, but she had to quit the job while she recovers. Idk the logistics of this but there you go. Then once she became Oracle, Bard is getting more and more involved in the superhero world.

The adventures of Circus Jason continue to the late 80s with Batman and Catwoman dating. Since there's no need to make Catwoman a villain again to follow the Post Crisis reboot, and there's no reason for Jason to go to Ethiopia to look for his biological mother, basically the status quo continues like that.

Jason doesn't die, Tim is never Robin but remains a fanboy until the Obeah Man killed his mother and got his father hospitalized. After that who knows, but since Jason doesn't have anger issues anymore, he also has no reason to leave and become Red Hood.

Starfire marries Dick Grayson in the 90s and continues living in New York. They never move to Bludhaven unless, under obligation to his father and following his nature, Dick wants to investigate the bodies from Bludhaven that washed up in Gotham docks.

Supergirl's alive, Barry's alive, and Wally I guess dons his Rebirth costume and gets a new name.

Hal keeps going with his white side hair, marries Carol, and Kyle never became Green Lantern or he becomes one under different circumstances.

[Dataweaver]

Since Earth 52 is pure New 52 continuity I don't have to do anything with it. It can just be presented as-is. The changes would be when Superman, Lois, and Jon start moving there. Who are they? Does it matter since their story only matters in connection to Rebirth? I prefer if the story just cuts out before they retcon their arrival since it just complicates things.

So I'm just gonna focus on what happens if it's still on Earth 0

Last post for now: my suggestion would be to say that things start diverging just before DCU Rebirth (most of the plot elements introduced by DC Rebirth never happen), and culminates with a different resolution for Superman Reborn (Earth 52's Lois and Clark are restored to life, and Earth 0's Kents go home).

[Tzigone]

Since Babs was dating Det. Jason Bard at the time and afaik there's no reason for them to break up... after Joker knocks on Gordon's door, paralyzed Barbara, and tortures them, Babs resumes a relationship with Bard and maybe get married, but she had to quit the job while she recovers. Idk the logistics of this but there you go. Then once she became Oracle, Bard is getting more and more involved in the superhero world.

That one was kinda weird. They split up when she became a congresswoman. Aftewards, she dated another guy. Then Jason just popped up again. I liked him when we first met him. But him showing up in the 1980s was decidedly odd to me.

Also for the bronze age, a good chunk had just one Black Canary, rather than having her as a legacy. Which I like. But do you have that BC a different one than the JSA-world one? What's the timeframe and how does it work if she did move from one world to another? JSA was less anchored when she did (at least in the writer's mind), but time keeps passing. Unless it doesn't in Bronze-age-world.