What does Earth-1985 look like today?

[ducklord]

Yesterday I found myself mulling over the DC Metaverse (as established in Doomsday Clock), and asked myself "What Does Earth-1985 Look Like Today?"

For those uninitiated, Earth-1985 is, essentially, the iteration of the DC Multiverse in which the original Crisis on Infinite Earths didn't happen, and the pre-Crisis versions of Earths-1, 2, 3, 4, S, X, etc. continued on their merry way. Supergirl and Barry Allen didn't die, nothing got rebooted, and time marched on.

What do you think that multiverse looks like, in 2021?

I've got a few thoughts:

Superman
While it's tempting to suggest that, at some point, Moore's "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" story eventually happened, I prefer to think that the Superman family's 2021 status is more like that of the short-lived Superman 2020 back-up series, which feature a third generation Superman in a world of news-on-demand, ubiquitous video chats, neo-nazis, and deadly diseases.

Also, I think that Lex Luthor finally reformed, as that always seemed to be his Bronze Age destiny.

Batman
Taking cues from Batman 300, Bruce is now the retired governor of whatever state Gotham is in, and married (to Silver St. Cloud?) Most of his original foes are dead. Dick and Barbara have children who fight crime. Dick may have had a brief first marriage with Kory. Barbara is the police commissioner.

Wonder Woman
As per her 300th issue, Diana married Steve Trevor. He is quite old - she, less so. They have a daughter who is the Earth-1 Lyta Trevor.

Green Lantern
Although Hal eventually reclaimed his place in the Corps, it was much later, during a rare all-Corps crisis. John Stewart remained the primary Earth Green Lantern for a long time. Guy (who was given a ring during the Crisis), never became a GL. A younger GL of color is Earth's representative in the Corps today.

JLA
Justice League Detroit was never slaughtered. The Justice League eventually returned to a "best of the best" configuration that eventually included second-and-third generation versions of their original members, as well as international heroes from the Global Guardians. In the late 80's they had a summer crossover with the Charlton heroes of Earth-4, who continue to pop up every now and then to this day.

More generally
Earth-1985 is moving inexorably toward the Great Disaster.

Anyone else have some ideas?

[SecretWarrior]

[atomicskull]

If it were me. I think i would fold JL Detroit into the main JLA. But this is a very good question. I have to think about it. It would be tempting for me to add more modern concepts to the universe like Red Lanterns, Court of Owls, JL Dark, etc. But then there wouldn't be a purpose since it'll just be all similar to what we have in the comics now. I'll have to come back to this, for sure.

[D.Z]

Earth 1985 is close to Earth 1 pre crisis. The Metaverse also saved Earth 2, Earth 52 and later Earth 5G will split off from Earth 0. Johns skipped over Zero Hour, Infinite Crisis, Final Crisis and the others.

Rest of the other pre-crisis Earths didn't get saved. But do have current day versions in the expanding 52 multiverse. Their pre-crisis versions probably exist in hypertime realities where Earth 4, 5, 10 are.

[Buried Alien]

As Pre-COIE times were generally lighter and more optimistic (relatively speaking), I imagine that Earth-1985 is a more hopeful and stable place compared to modern Earth-0.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[John Venus]

Wally West was 20 in Flash Vol 2 #1 so if he aged in real time, he would be 56 in 2021. I would say versions of events similar to Post Crisis continuity happened to these characters except the parts that are incompatible with the old continuity with some of the events happening in the year they were published in. So Wally's parents aren't crappy but he still met Linda, they had Jai and Iris and in the present day those two are adults while Wally and Linda are retired and living peacefully in the countryside. The Titans grew up to succeed and supplant the JLA as the main protectors and the current 'Flash' is an adult Bart Allen. Jesse Quick married Rick Tyler and they are the old guard now with their teenage child now on the 'Teen Titans' team. Jay Garrick pops in from Earth 2 to mentor Wally every now and then.

Superman died in 1992 fighting Doomsday, by this time Supergirl has become Superwoman and has to take over the void left by Superman. She meets the alien Matrix who uses her genetic to assume a form similar to her, the Matrix becomes the new Supergirl. The 'Lex Luthor in a cloned body pretending to be his own son' thing, I would ditch in favor of Lex straight cloning a son only for said son to rebel against him and killing his 'father' (the mad scientist Lex), the kid starts building up Lex Corp and eventually becomes President but he is not fully good nor is he a fully evil villain either.

Batman was say around 35 in 1985, he would have been crippled fighting Bane in 1993 but comes back as Batman the next year, No Man's Land happens in 1999 by which point Bruce in 49 years old and he has already gone through events like Contagion. This Bruce settles down with Selina after NML and Helena Wayne is born around 2006 by which point Gotham has been rebuilt. Jim Gordon retires in 2001. By 2021, Helena Wayne is 15 and eager to follow in her parents footsteps. Son of the Demon still happened in 1987 so by 2021, 'Damian' or rather Ibn Al Xuffasch is 34 and is like a big brother to Helena.

Dick Grayson marries Starfire in 1993, they have a child named Nightstar. Dick is in charge of the Titans who become the main protectors of the earth in the 90's and early 00's. Present day Dick Grayson would be around 60 now and trains newer heroes in the Titans Tower now floating as a satellite above space. Kory acts as earth's Tamaranian ambassador to earth.

Barbara Gordon was never crippled but she hangs up the Batgirl thing for good. She continues to be a Congresswoman and her friendship with Supergirl still continues. She still serves as an information broker for heroes, providing necessary information to help them save the day and sometimes even employs agents to help her in this cause.

John Stewart was the rookie GL during the Crisis but now he has ascended to becoming one of the Guardians of the Universe. His 90's stories where he got crippled and blew up Xanshi never happened. Hal travels through space with Carol, still has a ring but a non active duty combatant. John oversees the new younger generation GL; Jo, Jessica Cruz and Simon Baz. Jo operates primarily in space while Jessica and Simon operates on earth. Guy is retired and lives in Europe with Ice. Kyle was a GL in the 90's but retired and now spends his time selling abstract artwork depicting his time as a GL.

Zatanna: her father still died in the seance. Her relationship with John never turned romantic again. She has a crisis of confidence afterwards but regains it after she helps Raven overcome her father's influence for good. Then she becomes a guide for the younger magical heroes like Timothy Hunter and Traci 13. Eventually she starts spending more time in other dimensions than at home while Zachary becomes the primary magical protector on earth.

Green Arrow & Black Canary: Ollie still ends up dying in a plane explosion. Dinah fell into a Lazarus pit which maintained her youth. (We are going with the E1 story where she was the Earth 2 Canary who migrated to E1 after the death of her husband). This time she doesn't run away because of her husbands death and Roy helps her grieve since she is the one who helped her overcome his addiction. Roy becomes Red Arrow, Connor continues as a martial artists, they are the ones who adopt Mia Dearden and later Emiko. Lian grows up to be superhero (more of a Black Widow secret agent type) and she occasionally visits her mother in prison. 60-something Roy still helps former addicts recover.

[John Venus]

What should be done with the Hawks? Was their planet still uninhabitable in 1985? What would their status be today if their stories had been allowed to continue without the Crisis throwing their history off the rails?

[kcekada]

They'd only be slightly older than they were in 1985, so I don't see Steve Trevor being an old man. If Lyta Trevor was around -- she'd be the same age as Damian and Jonathan -- not an adult. But if you meant that time progressed as it does in real time - most of the characters would be in retirement homes or dead. That's not a premise I care to visit.

[D.Z]

Just carries on from 1985 sans the Earth X, S, 4, 2 characters. With slight differences.

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Meanwhile Earth 2 has the sliding time scale post WW2 and other ways to reduce characters aging.

[Montressor]

I've always loved the concept of The Great Disaster. If my memory serves me correctly the Legion used to refer to it as a lost period in history of which there weren't many records. I don't recall if it was ever mentioned how civilization got back going to lead us into the shiny and optimistic 30th Century.

And I love the idea of the original Steve Trevor still being around out there, somewhere. What a history that guy had, man.

[Thor-Ul]

Isn't the essense of earth-1985 than things would be as they were... until 1985??

Let's play anyway:

First, no new character created after 1985: so no Tim Drake, no Kyle Rayner, no Huntress, no Booster Gold, no Harley Quinn no Cassandra Caine. CoIE changed a lot of things, including tone and direction of comics and without that, such changes and the triggers than make it happened should not happen also.

No suicide Squad also. The Squad has a dark tone than will not work on earth 1985.

Also, the Crisis changed a lot the landscape and relationships of characters, so the stories already know should not happen. The timeline should happens totally different.
Also, no earth 2 nor characters nor the derivated characters from those: No Infinity inc, no JSA, no Keystone twin cities, no Jack Knight, no Damage, nor Kat Spencer, No Stargirl, no Jesse Quick (all characters created after 1985).
No other characters from alternate earths either. So no Blue Beetle, Captain Atom Captan Marvel, Ice and Fire (they were from earth-Superfriends, remember?) joining the JLI. No JLI at all. No Black Adam on JSA, either.

Barry Allen still the Flash. Wally west never recovered from his sickness than caused his speed (he was healed because a ray of the antimonitor. No Crisis, no Wally as Flash). Most probably the New Kid Flash is the son of Barry Allen and Iris West Allen.

John Stewart still the main Green Lantern. Hal Jordan joined Green Arrow again in a hard travelling heroes story where he is the Green Gauntlet, with special trick gauntlets built by Oliver Queen.

Dick Grayson still would be Nightwing, with that big collar and the barechest. He could marry Starfire and leave earth. If time goes around, Jason Todd quit working for Batman and start his own identity as Flamebird! (before the Crisis, Jason was a clone of Dick Grayson, Admit it!!). Batman then takes care of a new protege, a black kid who he calls Raven! (that was an idea than could had happened). Barbara Gordon still Batgirl.

The New Titans would dissolve, with most of their members joining the Justice League of America. Maybe a new Incarantion could happen later, lead by either Flamebird (Jason Todd) Or the new Raven (Batman new sidekick).

Superman basically unchanged. I am tempted to take a page from "Whatever happenend to the man of tomorrow?", but that story is also a consequence of CoIE. Maybe Supergirl would had become Superwoman, but beyond that, Superman world would be mostly the same as before 1985.

Wonder Woman, maybe has returned as secret agent but at full superpowers. In a post-1985 1985, she would be fighting the soviet menace.

Red Tornado and Zattana are married and have two sons. Joking. The Tornado would still be a robot and charter member of the Justice League and Zatanna would be still being tutored by her father, who is still alive (no CoIE, no American Gothic, NO John Constantine).


On the positive, neither Donna Troy or the Hawks would had to transform into the continuity chaos they are today and how carefully they are to be written: Donna Troy is a girl rescued by Wonder Woman, The Hawks are alien police on earth.

[Lee Stone]

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Superman
While it's tempting to suggest that, at some point, Moore's "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" story eventually happened, I prefer to think that the Superman family's 2021 status is more like that of the short-lived Superman 2020 back-up series, which feature a third generation Superman in a world of news-on-demand, ubiquitous video chats, neo-nazis, and deadly diseases.

I don't think Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow could really happen on Earth-1985, because Supergirl would still be alive, which would change the outcome of that story substantially.

I do, however, think this Earth-1 styled Superman did finally get over himself and finally got together with Lois and had kids, though.

[DrNewGod]

My vision for an E2-type treatment of pre-crisis E1 has always been that Superman put away his tights, concluding that he was teaching the wrong lessons, and mankind has to find its betterself on its own. He still helps, just a lot more discretely. The JL keeps a running list of places where miraculous events blunt the worst of natural disasters as a means of keeping track of him. He spends most of his times helping local populations with everything from democracy efforts to irrigation projects.

[RobinGA]

No superhero ever truly retires. They may think they have retired, but that is a different thing entirely.

There is something to be said for the idea that Crisis represents a great traumatic event that fundamentally
reshapes human society. I think an interesting treatment would be what happens in 1986 when everything
is over.