Which is bigger: Metropolis or Gotham?

[Air Wave]

They're both New York in my mind. Placement-wise I tend to think of New York & Philly, or maybe New York & Newark. Relatively close but not able to see each other. Delaware feels too South to me. And Boston too North.

[CaptCleghorn]

How big could Gotham really be when Adam West always got a parking space in front of GCPD? Amirite?

[KNIGHT OF THE LAKE]

They're both New York in my mind. Placement-wise I tend to think of New York & Philly, or maybe New York & Newark. Relatively close but not able to see each other. Delaware feels too South to me. And Boston too North.

You do realize Boston and Delaware are like 200 miles away from New York and sub 4 hour drives? Like Camden NJ is like and hour and an hour and a half less from New York. All those places are relatively close

[Air Wave]

You do realize Boston and Delaware are like 200 miles away from New York and sub 4 hour drives? Like Camden NJ is like and hour and an hour and a half less from New York. All those places are relatively close

I do. But I'm from this part of the country so they still feel too far from NY. Boston is too New England and Delaware too mid-Atlantic for either city in my mind. But that's just me.

[Alan2099]

Metropolis has more people living in it because Joker personally kills at least a hundred people every week.

[Ascended]

I always imagined Metropolis to be the bigger city (in square miles); more sprawling, with larger and more robust suburbs. Gotham feels like it's smaller, more cramped, with few suburbs or small towns around it.

As far as population goes, I imagine Metropolis has more people, but in Gotham the population density is much higher.

Someone mentioned Boston, and I think that city is too small to really represent/stand-in for either Gotham or Metropolis. It has less than a million people in it, after all, and is only the 22nd biggest city in the US. I think if you want a real world parallel, as far as population and size goes, Boston is better fit for a place like Ivy Town or Bludhaven. Gotham and Metropolis are more like NYC, where the population is between 8 and 9 million (as big as it gets in the US). I'd say Gotham probably has maybe 9 million while Metropolis has more like 10 or 11.

[Adset]

I’m going off a 19-year old story here, but I’m doing a triangle era Superman re-read and in OWAR they mention Metropolis has a population of 6.7 million.

[Güicho]

I always assumed they were both aspects of NY. Not so much one being night the other day, more like one being more sleek, and forward looking, never finished, always being built, growing towards the future. The other more grim, weathered and filled with the spirit of past. NY City always beautifully contained aspects of both, in one, just depends where you turned or focused.
And that's exactly what the comics were doing.


Also I remember looking for the new Titian's Tower in the East River, ... and pretending it must be cloaked.
Marvel U was always a blast for all the landmarks and neighborhoods they would brazenly reference.

[DrNewGod]

I always imagined Metropolis to be the bigger city (in square miles); more sprawling, with larger and more robust suburbs. Gotham feels like it's smaller, more cramped, with few suburbs or small towns around it.

As far as population goes, I imagine Metropolis has more people, but in Gotham the population density is much higher.

Someone mentioned Boston, and I think that city is too small to really represent/stand-in for either Gotham or Metropolis. It has less than a million people in it, after all, and is only the 22nd biggest city in the US. I think if you want a real world parallel, as far as population and size goes, Boston is better fit for a place like Ivy Town or Bludhaven. Gotham and Metropolis are more like NYC, where the population is between 8 and 9 million (as big as it gets in the US). I'd say Gotham probably has maybe 9 million while Metropolis has more like 10 or 11.

Somehow, I always thought Bludhaven was more like Newark.

I always assumed they were both aspects of NY. I don't know about night and day, more like one more sleek, and forward looking, always being built growing towards the future. The other more grim, weathered and filled with the past. City always contained aspects of both, in one...

I don't know who I'm plagiarizing but I've more than once seen folks write that Metropolis is NYC by Day and Gotham NYC by night. I never much liked that notion, as I prefer the idea that they're distinct locations with their own, unique personalities.

[Ascended]

Somehow, I always thought Bludhaven was more like Newark.

I was just talking about Boston's size and population, it's not a big city, by the standards of big cities.

I don't know who I'm plagiarizing but I've more than once seen folks write that Metropolis is NYC by Day and Gotham NYC by night. I never much liked that notion, as I prefer the idea that they're distinct locations with their own, unique personalities.

That's a fairly common approach to the two cities, but I don't know who first came up with the analogy.

Metropolis and Gotham do have their own locations (though that changes) and I think both settings have developed more unique personalities than just "NYC at different times of day" but that's been a rough approximation, foundation type of approach to Gotham and Metropolis for a long, long time.

Though I want to say I read somewhere that Siegel and Shuster were inspired by Toronto more than NYC, and I *think* Finger based a chunk of Gotham on Chicago......

[The Darknight Detective]

...or maybe the DCEU didn't introduce the idea. Looks like the idea dates back to the Bronze Age:



Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

Now you got me wondering if Charles the Henchman wears his title on his shirt like they used to do on Batman.

[Flash Gordon]

I really don't like them as "twin cities". Gotham has always felt very Dutch/Anglo 'old colonial port town' that grew into a big city. Lots of gothic architecture and weird death cults populated by old money.

Metropolis is much more modern. A planned city. The last 100 years and some change, with a lot of development post-WW2 with the Greatest Generation returning home and getting to work on new ideas, before ya know, American culture totally stagnated and architecture and big ideas became "get the caulk, patch it up, and let our kids deal with the problem'.

[Vakanai]

I think Metropolis technically has a larger population during work hours because more people commute there, but Gotham has a much larger population of people who actually live there.

[NeathBlue]

When I was reading comics as a kid in the 70’s, I always assumed Metropolis and Gotham were the DC equivalents of a sort, of Washington and New York.
Their location has for whatever reason moved around over the years, but they seemed relatively close years ago.
As I’m in work and can’t put my hands on it right now, but doesn’t Superman say something along the lines of there’s no Metropolis or Gotham in Justice League 153 when they arrive in New York on ‘our’ earth? Insinuating that both cities are in close proximity to New York.

[Güicho]

How big could Gotham really be when Adam West always got a parking space in front of GCPD? Amirite?

LOL!




Although the main GPD HQ space, was likely a designated spot, And the way that universes' Gordon and O'Hara deferred to Batman, they probably had them all over the city.
But yeah traffic always seemed way to light to be Manhattan (obvious WB studio studio lot).
However that stock background footage? Is that Manhatan, downtown LA?