The DCU Timeline Discussion Thread!

[Restingvoice]

That sounds about right. I read Bruce as 25 in Year One and because he's also that age in Zero Year, so that's my go to starting age for him
Harper was 16-17 though. She was 11 when Cass killed her mother. That happened when Dick was Robin. In New 52 timeline that's 5-4 years ago. Then Jason was Robin 3 years ago.

[Dataweaver]

The Bat-kin who were created during New 52 and who have stuck around are in a peculiar position: they were created with a five year timeline in mind, but now exist in a much longer one. Adjustments might be needed.

[D.Z]

Some characters have their history extended while others somewhat compressed.

Have to see if post TNGA fixes stuff.

[Aahz]

The Bat-kin who were created during New 52 and who have stuck around are in a peculiar position: they were created with a year timeline in mind, but now exist in a much longer one. Adjustments might be needed.

Especially Duke, him beinig in Zero Year simply doesn't work with the longer timeline.

And with Harper it kind of depends on how much of Cass new 52 Origin is still in place, if David Cain is returned to the pre Flash Point Version and Mother was out, there would be also a problem.

[Restingvoice]

Easiest way to handle or think about it is like Karen and Helena Wayne.

Duke is now time displaced from Earth-52, or time when Earth-0 was New 52, but since the transition is more seamless than Crisis on Infinite Earths where the old earths was definitely destroyed, it's not as definitive as Karen circa Infinite Crisis.

In that sense, Jon is also the same. Spectre actually said that at the beginning of Infinite Frontier. He's a child of a previous world.

[D.Z]

Jon was folded in from the Superman Reborn merging. The Super Family came from a dead timeline, and their folding in the timeline of Earh 0 reverted many things and people in the timeline and the Superman history of pre flashpoint. Well most of it.

Regardless of whar DC wikia has typed down, New Earth and Earth 0 are the same universe. It is stuck with the relabled name.

[Dataweaver]

Jon was folded in from the Superman Reborn merging. The Super Family came from a dead timeline, and their folding in the timeline of Earh 0 reverted many things and people in the timeline and the Superman history of pre flashpoint. Well most of it.

Regardless of whar DC wikia has typed down, New Earth and Earth 0 are the same universe. It is stuck with the relabled name.

Correct — although, as I've stated before, a “dead timeline” is one that's not advancing; it fits the notion of Limbo as described by Morrison in Animal Man, but for whole worlds and not just for individual characters. Such timelines are only “dead” until they aren't anymore.

In a “which universe are we in” sense, New Earth and Earth 0 are indeed the same Earth: they have the same vibrational signature, and they hold the same place in the Orrery of Worlds. But we're not talking about which universe they are; we're talking about which timeline they are: and, by definition, folding elements of the pre-Flashpoint DCU into the New 52 changed the timeline, removing many of the elements that made New 52 what it was. In every way that matters, the timeline that emerged from the Rebirth era (starting with DCU Rebirth and concluding with Doomsday Clock, and including Superman Reborn) is more like the timeline that existed before Flashpoint than it is like the one that existed after it.

[Alphaxman]

Maybe someone can help me out. I just read Stargirl The Lost Children and it seems Green Arrow and Roy (as Speedy) somehow traveled to the 40's to have adventures then. Has this been established anywhere else? And on which "Earth" is this story taking place? Is this the "main" universe (whatever that means now) or on some new "Earth2"? Is Wonder Woman a charter member of the JSA or not? I guess we'll learn who this Golden Age Aquaman is.
And how does Infinity Inc. figure into this new reshuffling? Are the JSA members who appeared in Dark Crisis the same characters in The New Golden Age?
Now that everything counts and the infinite multiverse is back, it's hard to tell where or when anything is happening.
Everything in DC is so confusing now, and this is coming from someone who's been reading comics since the late 80's.

[Dataweaver]

This is all taking place on the mainstream Earth.

Green Arrow and Speedy having spent some time in the 1940s was established in the Stargirl Spring Break special, which is basically Stargirl and the Lost Children #0 in all but name.

Wonder Woman has been established as a member of the 1940s JSA. In fact, she's retroactively been established as the inspiration for the Golden Age, in the same way that Superman is the inspiration for the modern age of heroes. See the Wonder Woman 80th Anniversary special.

The Golden Age Aquaman has been revealed, in The New Golden Age special. He's basically like the Arthur Curry that was introduced in Aquaman: Sword of Atlantis, save only for appearing in the 1940s and not having a known birth name.

The rest is speculative. Infinity Inc first appeared shortly before the Crisis on Infinite Earths, which I'm guessing was in 1985 where the All-Star Squadron and related heroes are concerned; and my own pet theory is that the Crisis ended with them transplanted to wherever on the 21st century sliding timeline that the Crisis happened. (Harlequin's Son originated before 1985, explicitly didn't join Infinity Inc, and was seen in both Crisis on Infinite Earths and more recently in Dark Crisis, I think.)

[Dataweaver]

For reference purposes, here's the Timeline Dan Didio was about to put into place when he got sacked. I'm glad it didn't get put into place (it has some rather serious flaws); but it is worth a look.

I'm rather fond of the New Golden Age's notion of using the 20th century as a stand-in for the pre-Crisis Earth 2; short of purging the JSA from Earth 0's history and bringing back the original Earth 2, it strikes me as the best way to handle the history of the JSA. So there are two major changes I'd make to Didio's timeline: first, I'd strip all JSA-related stuff from its “Generation One”, retooling that as the prelude to the Dawn of the Modern Age of Heroes; and second, I'd use it primarily as a reference for what happened and in what order; I would completely disregard the actual years given (1938, 1965, 1986, 2011, 2021, etc.), and would use even the relative years (Year 1, Year 26, Year 41, Year 56, Year 60) with a healthy grain of salt.

It would serve as a sliding timeline from Clark's arrival on Earth to the present: as written, that timeline covers 60 years: 25 years from Clark's arrival on Earth to Superman's debut in Metropolis, another 15 years to the Crisis on Infinite Earths; 15 more years to Flashpoint; and a final stretch of 5 years to the present day. That's excessive in my view, and I'd compress all four eras a bit further: without the Golden Age stuff in it, “Generation One” is limited primarily by what age Superman should be when he debuts in Metropolis; and I'd be inclined to put that around 20, not 25; and my research into the ages of the Robins strongly inclines me to compress everything from there to the present by ten to fifteen years, so that it's a total of 20 to 25 years from Superman's debut instead of 35 years, making Superman between 40 and 45, not 55. Most of that would come out of G2 and G3; but there might even be a year to be extracted from G4.

This timeline also reminded me of Zatara and Dinah Drake, two Golden Age heroes who have grown children in the pre-Crisis part of the Modern Age of Heroes. I forget how Zatanna's backstory was handled prior to the Crisis; but I remember how Black Canary was handled, and it was honestly something of a mess. The way I'd handle that matter would be to have the Golden Age Black Canary retire from crime-fighting after her husband's death and to devote her time to raising her daughter; but at some point between then and 1985, something happens that ends up time-skipping the two of them into the Generation One part of the sliding timeline, allowing Dinah Lance to grow up mostly in the modern world and to debut as Black Canary in the Generation Two part. That transition could happen as early as immediately after her husband's death; but her transition to the present would not be as simple as using the JLA/JSA team-up portal, as that would deposit her in the middle of Generation Two when she needs to arrive somewhere in Generation One.

I'd also be inclined to have Zatara migrate at some point to the start of the sliding timeline, allowing Zatanna to grow up as Bruce's childhood friend and making her (almost?) entirely a part of the modern age. Again, I'm not sure how or when that would happen; but I suspect that his departure could be as early as 1951.

As discussed before, I could see taking Wonder Woman's “depowered years” and recasting and expanding them into Diana living in Man's World and having non-superhero adventures from 1986 to the beginning of the sliding timeline's Generation Two. She keeps her longevity, though, so that that period can be stretched out arbitrarily — though after a time, she'd need to make adjustments for the fact that she doesn't age while everyone around her does. The gap between 1985 and Superman's debut isn't long enough for that to be an issue yet; but by the time we get to 2038, that will be a different matter.

That said: if DC Comics is still around in 2038 and the timeline hasn't undergone any further major shakeups by then (ha!), I think that would be a perfect time to do a hard reboot, wrapping up all of the adventures taking place on Earth 0, retiring the timeline, and starting fresh with Superman's initial debut as the world's first superhero ever, one hundred years to the day since his debut in Action Comics #1.

[Factor]

Interesting how World’s Finest is acting to reestablish a sort of canon for the Silver Age. With all the recent Golden Age changes, it would be cool to have something similar for the Golden Age period too.

[Ascended]

Interesting how World’s Finest is acting to reestablish a sort of canon for the Silver Age. With all the recent Golden Age changes, it would be cool to have something similar for the Golden Age period too.

I've really enjoyed that book and what it's doing for "the past." Wonder if Waid would be the right guy to iron out a full timeline, or if his nostalgia would make him condense things or mess with them so characters end up out of phase with what their age 'should' be, like the way Young Justice is written as teens when they should be a decade or so older.

And if Supergirl is the same age as Nightwing again, do they do anything with that? Have her join the Titans maybe?

Has anyone considered how Shazam fits into the current timeline? Clark and Bruce have been active for a good fifteen+ years, but Billy has to remain a kid. So is he eternally stuck in a "early career" phase, where he hasn't been around that long in-universe? Do we push back the age he got his powers, so he can have a longer career but still be a kid? Say he was eight/nine/ten when he got his powers and is now fifteen/sixteen/seventeen?

[Jon Clark]

I've really enjoyed that book and what it's doing for "the past." Wonder if Waid would be the right guy to iron out a full timeline, or if his nostalgia would make him condense things or mess with them so characters end up out of phase with what their age 'should' be, like the way Young Justice is written as teens when they should be a decade or so older.

And if Supergirl is the same age as Nightwing again, do they do anything with that? Have her join the Titans maybe?

Has anyone considered how Shazam fits into the current timeline? Clark and Bruce have been active for a good fifteen+ years, but Billy has to remain a kid. So is he eternally stuck in a "early career" phase, where he hasn't been around that long in-universe? Do we push back the age he got his powers, so he can have a longer career but still be a kid? Say he was eight/nine/ten when he got his powers and is now fifteen/sixteen/seventeen?

I think a lot of this is complicated by what the present is built on.

For a whole lot of meta reasons kara was never part of the Titans and it worked for the continuity of the time. Now something like what Waid is doing leaves you with either making kara closer to the Titans in his "new past" (but not really in any large body of stories in the intervening years). It's the thing I always disliked with every continuity reboot. As a long time reader I know what "happened" based on the actual published works, so any attempt to insert reworked stuff feels hollow and barely skin-deep in comparison.

Jon Sanuel Kent should have at least a decade of knowing the Planet staff and his grandparents- but tell me honestly if Jon's interactions with Jonathan and Martha feel as "authentic" as Damian's with any of the Bat-family despite Damian only being on Bruce's radar for a few years?

[Ascended]

I feel you on the reboots. I know what the history is, I read it. Telling me it was something different doesn't change what's on the page, or the way those stories influenced my perception of the characters.

As for Kara, I meant have her join the Titans now, not in the past. Even if she is in the same age bracket again, as per World's Finest, that doesn't mean I want her involved with Titans history. It just means that I wouldn't be against her joining them now. Though I'd prefer Power Girl, if we're adding Kryptonians to the mix.

And nothing about Jon feels organic or natural, and never has.

[Dataweaver]

From the JSA Appreciation Thread:

Here’s a question.
Should DC incorporate Wildstorm and Milestone stuff retroactively to 1940s Golden age stuff?
Like Majestic being sort of Justice League Dark as an example.

For Milestone, no. I'd have the heroes of Dakota (the city) integrated into the modern, floating part of DC's timeline, with the Worlds Collide story from the mid-90s reimagined as an encounter between the heroes of Dakota and the heroes of Metropolis. I'd have no problem with incorporating appropriate heroes from DC's past into Dakota's history, though. Not that there are many; the character of Dakota is that it features various minorities as heroes, something which the All-Star Squadron history (i.e., 1940–1985 on the New Golden Age timeline) tends to lack.

But for Wildstorm? Absolutely! Take their history from its earliest time to roughly the turn of the millennium, and have it shadow the DCU's history. And by “shadow”, I mean “it happened, but in secret”. The Wildstorm characters have a tendency to take an espionage-like angle to things; so play that up, and say that when, for example, Majestos and Zealot were running around in the early 20th century, they were fighting a hidden war against the Daemonites while the All-Star Squadron was fighting a much more visible war against the Axis powers. Continue that parallelism right up through 1985, when most of the All-Star Squadron and related characters all disappear (skipped forward to the JLA's side of the Crisis on the modern floating timeline). The Wildstorm history continues more or less in secret for up to another seven years*, until the likes of the WildCATS, Stormwatch, Gen13, etc. make a big splash. That continues on for a little over a decade, including versions of nearly every story from the original Wildstorm universe, until Captain Atom shows up about 12 years later. That event causes the Wildstorm characters to time-skip forward to the Flashpoint, where they participate in Barry's altered history before being integrated into the post-Flashpoint events. (We lose the stories under the Worldstorm banner doing this, with the Worldstorm being reimagined as the down-time end of the Wildstorm characters' time-skip, much like the Flashpoint serves as the up-time end of it. But that's okay, because the subsequent events from Worldstorm to the conclusion of the Wildstorm Universe still exist in Hypertime, as part of the original Wildstorm timeline.)

* I say “up to seven years”, because I'd want Captain Atom's arrival and the disappearance of the Wildstorm characters to all happen before Superman's debut in Metropolis. So I'd backdate the start of the Wildstorm era to at least 12 years before the modern age of heroes, or to 1993, whichever is earliest. If we go with Superman's debut being 13 years ago, then the Wildstorm era was 1993 to 2005, and there was at least a five-year period between the disappearance of the Wildstorm characters and Superman's debut; if we set Superman's debut at 23 years ago (in 2000, as I write this in 2023), then the Wildstorm era began in 1988 and ended in 2000, right before Superman's debut. Either way, it engulfs the 90s; and that's Wildstorm's primary purpose as I envision it: to represent the zeitgeist of the 90s in all its cynical glory. Superman's debut would serve to represent a new age of superheroes, not in the sense of “people with superhuman abilities” (those won't have been gone for long, if at all) but in the sense of a tonal shift featuring “people with an essentially hopeful outlook and a heroic character”.

Granted, that puts a whole new spin on the dawn of the modern age of heroes: instead of being a resurgence of superheroes in a mostly peaceful era where Superman's have mostly been forgotten, it would take place in the aftermath of a time when the Authority took over the US government — at least for now. The Justice League's first task, at this point, would lie in regaining the public's trust after the abuse of that trust that the Authority inflicted.