Children of the DCU Golden Age

[Sandy Hausler]

Zatanna
Although originally a Golden Age character, and a member of the All-Star Squadron at that, Zatara was always rather tenuously connected to the capes and cowls community. As such, I think his career can be slid forward to match Zatanna's present without diminishing the break between the Golden and Modern ages. This seems to be the approach that's been taken in the JLDark corner of the DCU. so yay.

I've always been of the belief that there is an Earth 1 Zatara and an Earth 2 Zatara. It never made sense that he "moved" from Earth 2 to Earth 1. If there can be an Earth 1 and Earth 2 Flash, Green Lanturn, Atom and Hawkman (and others of course0, why can't the same be true of Zatarra? (But now I wonder if there ever was an Earth 2 Zatanna.)

[Jim Kelly]

I've always been of the belief that there is an Earth 1 Zatara and an Earth 2 Zatara. It never made sense that he "moved" from Earth 2 to Earth 1. If there can be an Earth 1 and Earth 2 Flash, Green Lanturn, Atom and Hawkman (and others of course0, why can't the same be true of Zatarra? (But now I wonder if there ever was an Earth 2 Zatanna.)

Quite so.

In fact, Zatara never really had anything to do with the Earth-Two characters until Roy Thomas got his hands on him. And that was in the early 1980s not long before the Crisis.

There's a whole line-up of characters that were established on Earth-One, that may or may not have had Earth-Two counterparts. Such as the Guardian and Air Wave. If Roy wanted to have these guys on Earth-Two, he didn't need to write a complicated tale of how they all migrated to Earth-One--they could have just had counterparts on the different Earths. But when Roy came over to the Distinguished Competition, he was given autonomy over all the Earth-Two characters--so he probably wanted to assert his control by saying every one of them originated on his Earth. In the end, I think that's what doomed him--for the other editors to regain control, they had to weaken R.T.'s reign, and the easiest way to do that was to get rid of Earth-Two.

Really, when Earth-Two first began it seemed limited to just the Justice Society--as a way for Julius Schwartz and Gardner Fox to explain away why the Flash and Green Lantern were now different guys, for anyone whose big brother had an old comic book from the 1940s. And it didn't get much bigger than that in the 1960s. Any non-J.S.A. characters were all on Earth-One. Then along came Len Wein and expanded who else existed on Earth-Two and that opened up new real estate in the 1970s comics.

And then Roy went crazy with cluttering that Earth with every 1940s character the publisher had rights to (and maybe even some they didn't have rights to). But this was also when they came up with the stupid origin that said Black Canary was her own daughter (Roy had a hand in that story, as it happens). So I would say that, just as continuity was in a state of flux immediately after the Crisis, it was likewise immediately before the Crisis. And the crazy retcons and confusion of the early 1980s were simply the first signs of an existential threat to the Multiverse.

[Doctor Know]

Seeing how the main JSA cast have been MIA since 2011's Flashpoint (wow, has it really been 11 years?). Fitting Jade, Jesse Quick, Jack Knight, Helena Wayne, Hector Hall, Lyta Hall and others into the modern DCU and timeline is a Plastic Man level stretch. Since the WWII aspect of the JSA has to remain.

Best idea I can think of is to put the JSA members and their villains back on their own Earth 2. Set things back to the way they were before COIE. With the JSA's Earth 2 being behind Earth Prime in calendar years. Have the JSA children grow up and live in the 1960s and 70s version of Earth 2. As they would all presumably have been conceived and born after 1945. When WW2 ended. Make universe crossovers the only time the JL and JSA intersect.


That allows the League to maintain it's uniqueness of being the first super team of their world and the JSA get to be the first team of their world. It would also help cut down on the crowding and clutter of having the Justice Leagues (JLA, JLI, JLD), Suicide Squad, Teen Titans, Young Justice and JSA operating at the same time on the same Earth.

[MajorHoy]

Seeing how the main JSA cast have been MIA since 2011's Flashpoint (wow, has it really been 11 years?). . .

Actually, it seems as if the JSA had been hinted at / mentioned since Rebirth in 2016, and some members have been appearing from time to time in stories after then.

It's just making the whole team present at the same time in present-day stories (beyond a panel or a page) in a meaningful way that's not happening yet.

[Doctor Know]

Actually, it seems as if the JSA had been hinted at / mentioned since Rebirth in 2016, and some members have been appearing from time to time in stories after then.

It's just making the whole team present at the same time in present-day stories (beyond a panel or a page) in a meaningful way that's not happening yet.

The most JSA we got since Flashpoint was at the tail end of Doomsday Clock’s last issue in December 2019. Where from out of nowhere the JSA and Bendis’ Legion (originally meant to be Johns’ Legion) show up to help Superman. Gang was literally all there and nothing was done with it.



Doomsday Clock and the JSA’s return was foreshadowed in Rebirth (Summer 2016), Doomsday Clock begins in earnest in 2017 but is delayed to the point that the Rebirth wave has dried up and Scott’s Snyder’s Metal shakes up the universe again. To say nothing of 2020’s Death Metal which leads to Infinite Frontier.

Johns’ Doomsday Clock is as good as an AU story, with how inconsequential it turned out to be. Big shame.

[John Venus]

I've always been of the belief that there is an Earth 1 Zatara and an Earth 2 Zatara. It never made sense that he "moved" from Earth 2 to Earth 1. If there can be an Earth 1 and Earth 2 Flash, Green Lanturn, Atom and Hawkman (and others of course0, why can't the same be true of Zatarra? (But now I wonder if there ever was an Earth 2 Zatanna.)

I thought that was the case.

I haven't read All Star Squadron, although I did see an image of Zatara with the other Squadron members. I had assumed that the Zatara seen from 'Zatanna's Search' on wards was Earth 1 Zatara who existed a decade or two before the Leaguer's and that the Zatara from the Golden Age was on Earth 2 and joined the Squadron. Then the Crisis combined them into one. They never quite explained Post COIE how Zatara could mingle with the Squadron but also have a daughter close to the present day. Was he long lived? Immortal? Time travel?

And if I'm right, Zatara never interacted with any other superheroes during his original Golden Age appearances, all that was a retcon wasn't it?

[Jim Kelly]

Curiously, Jonathan and Martha Kent took their (Super) baby, Clark, to see Zatara perform his magic act in Smallville--in "A Mix-Up in Magic" by Bob Rozakis, José Delbo and Dave Hunt--THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERBOY 14 (February 1981). Zatara seems to have just newly discovered his magic powers at this time.

Some years later, now more practiced, Zatara performed again in Smallville, and teen-age Clark Kent was in the audience with his girl friend Lisa Davis. At Lisa's insistence, Clark volunteered to take part in a disappearing act--in "Zatara's Magical Mystery Tour" by Paul Kupperberg, Kurt Schaffenberger and Dave Hunt--THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERBOY 49 (January 1984).

Around the same time that those stories were published, Zatara was also appearing in ALL-STAR SQUADRON, but that was set back in the 1940s, while these meetings with Clark would have happened much later according to the timeline for Superman. The Man of Steel was supposed to be 29. That would mean baby Clark first met Zatara a few years after 1951.

Zatara's final appearance in WORLD'S FINEST COMICS 51 (April-May 1951)--"Arabian Knight"--has him unmarried and childless in 1951. Yet when Zatanna shows up looking for her daddy it's 1964--in "The Girl Who Split in Two" by Gardner Fox and Murphy Anderson--HAWKMAN 4 (October-November 1964). She's certainly not twelve years old.

Of course, both Zatara and Zatanna are magical beings. We don't know how time passed for Zatara when he was trapped in the land of Kharma. And Zatanna might have travelled through time.

[John Venus]

I have read Zatara's appearances in the aforementioned Superboy title.

I knew he appeared in Thomas All Star Squadron book but I haven't read it. I assumed that was just the Earth 2 Zatara and thus not the same Zatara as the one on Earth 1.

[Thor-Ul]

The most JSA we got since Flashpoint was at the tail end of Doomsday Clock’s last issue in December 2019. Where from out of nowhere the JSA and Bendis’ Legion (originally meant to be Johns’ Legion) show up to help Superman. Gang was literally all there and nothing was done with it.



Doomsday Clock and the JSA’s return was foreshadowed in Rebirth (Summer 2016), Doomsday Clock begins in earnest in 2017 but is delayed to the point that the Rebirth wave has dried up and Scott’s Snyder’s Metal shakes up the universe again. To say nothing of 2020’s Death Metal which leads to Infinite Frontier.

Johns’ Doomsday Clock is as good as an AU story, with how inconsequential it turned out to be. Big shame.

ONly the right half of that spread page is beautiful The left side is an horror.

[MajorHoy]

The most JSA we got since Flashpoint was at the tail end of Doomsday Clock’s last issue in December 2019. Where from out of nowhere the JSA and Bendis’ Legion (originally meant to be Johns’ Legion) show up to help Superman. Gang was literally all there and nothing was done with it.



Doomsday Clock and the JSA’s return was foreshadowed in Rebirth (Summer 2016), Doomsday Clock begins in earnest in 2017 but is delayed to the point that the Rebirth wave has dried up and Scott’s Snyder’s Metal shakes up the universe again. To say nothing of 2020’s Death Metal which leads to Infinite Frontier.

Johns’ Doomsday Clock is as good as an AU story, with how inconsequential it turned out to be. Big shame.

But we did get appearances by individual members prior to that. Johnny Thunder was in DC Universe: Rebirth #0; the Kent Nelson version of Doctor Fate was also in the comic book where Khalid Nassour was the title character, and even recalled the JSA at one point:

And there was also the Batman / The Flash crossover ("The Button") where Jay Garrick briefly showed up, only to vanish again.