How would Earth 1 have evolved without COIE?

[bat39]

The thought came to me while on the other thread discussing the nature of the Rebirth universe, and what an Earth 1 would look like today.

How do you think Earth 1 would have evolved had COIE not occurred?

Given that pretty much every Post-COIE iteration of DC's mainstream earth has been a variation of Earth 1 in some sense, can we assume that even had COIE not occurred, a lot of the Post-COIE developments regarding Earth 1 characters would still have occurred?

Some stuff I can imagining happening on Earth 1 sans COIE. Wally West eventually becoming Flash for instance. Even in a scenario where Barry didn't die in COIE, I can easily imagine Wally taking the mantle up at some point. Hell, without COIE, Barry might have continued to stay in the future with Iris and so Wally would take up the mantle in the present-day at some point. Most of his subsequent life could have unfolded the same way, with Linda and eventually having kids. Of course, Wally would be based in Central City, not Keystone, and he wouldn't have Jay Garrick as a mentor (trips to Earth 2 notwithstanding). Johnny Quick (and later Jesse Quick) and Max Mercury probably wouldn't have played such a major part in his life either.

What about the GL's? Their history may or may not have progressed down the same path after COIE. But honestly, I don't see how the merged earths/new timeline would have affected anything. Hal could still have gone rogue and become Parallax and later died. Kyle could still have become a GL, the only one for a long time. Etc. etc. Again, one major difference is that Alan Scott wouldn't be around and Kyle wouldn't ever have Jade as a girlfriend/partner.

Justice League...well, don't see how Justice League International wouldn't have happened on Earth 1 eventually. Blue Beetle wouldn't be part of it of course, but all the native Earth 1 characters would. And I can eventually see the Grant Morrison 'Big Seven' still coming into being.

Superman's an interesting one. Without the massive changes to his origin and overall mythology, would his life has progressed down the path it did Post-COIE. Would he eventually have married Lois? Would he have died fighting Doomsday? Is Doomsday something the Pre-COIE Krypton was capable of creating, even? Also it'd be interesting to see what role Supergirl would play (a much more experienced Supergirl than any of the later versions). LexCorp of course probably would never exist, and developments like Luthor becoming President likely would never happen at all (unless he reformed or pretended to reform but its far-fetched). One wonders about characters like Steel and Superboy/Kon-El though.

Then there's Batman. Would the Pre-COIE Jason Todd, who was pretty much Dick Grayson by another name, have become the violent punk who got reckless and died at the hands of the Joker? Would the Joker have crippled Barbara Gordon? The former I can actually envision NOT happening (except for the fact that, in the backstory of DKR, which was likely extrapolated from the Earth 1 timeline at the time of writing, Jason DID end up dying). The latter...well, there's no reason why that WOULDN'T have panned out the same way. And would Batman ever become the intense paranoid obsessed individual sometimes referred to as 'Batjerk'! Would events like Knightfall, Contagion, No Man's Land etc. occur? What about Tim Drake? Damian?

Some real food for thought here.

[colonyofcells]

If earth 1 survived the multiverse story coie, Superman and Lois would probably have gotten married and have maybe a dozen kids. Batman and Catwoman maybe would also have a dozen kids. Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor were also married on the last issue of pre coie Wonder Woman so lots and lots of wonder babies. Maybe the adventures of Flash and the Tornado Twins in the 21st century. Earth 1 probably does not have the rainbow brite lanterns. For earth 1, maybe the detroit JLA would merge with the satellite era JLA and no deaths for Vibe and Steel hank heywood. JLA could add members like adam strange, creeper, etc.

[codystarbuck]

Batman would have progressed much as it did. Wonder Woman needed a revamp, so something would have happened there; same with Superman.

People tend to forget or are ignorant of the fact that there were reboots, long before Crisis on Infinite Earths. The main books tended to get what Greg Hatcher (and others) called a 'soft reboot," about every 5 to 10 years. This was due to the turnover of comics fans, traditionally. The publishers would revamp things, modernize them, from time to time. The difference is that Crisis did it for the entire line and DC made a big deal about it. Prior to that, Superman got a makeover and Clark kent became a news reporter, for WGBS. Batman moved into Gotham City, sent Dick Grayson off to college, and went on globe-trotting missions. Wonder Woman became Emma Peel, then put the bathing suit back on, while the JLA male team members watched her in secret (ewwwwwww; creepy!) The Fantastic Four went from trying to beat the Communists (always with the Commies, Stan, always with the Commies!) to the moon and were, instead, trying to reach Mars.

Now, some of you may say, well, that is in-continuity, changing the course of the stories; but, they also used to tweak the backstory a bit. Later writers, like Roy Thomas, who were obsessed with having previous stories link together, are the ones who then had to rationalize every change and create a clear history. Most fans didn't care that deeply, at the time; because they either, A.) hadn't read the previous version; or, B.) just wanted a cool story and didn't sweat it; or even, C.) had moved on to other things. When Comics were a mass market, people didn't really obsess about continuity (except maybe within recent issues). When the Direct Market became dominant and comics were a niche market, continuity became god. Now, changes require massive events. We can no longer say, "That was then, this is now."

You'll notice that there were few really radical changes in the major characters, after Crisis. Oh, sure, the Kents were alive and some new folks took over old roles; but, most continued on. You could have easily introduced the Charlton characters as new heroes, without Crisis. They are just new heroes, which is what the post-Crisis series did. So, you could still have JLI, except maybe not with Dr Fate, unless he comes over from Earth 2, for a brief period. He was only in the book for the first half dozen issues, before heading off for his own mini-series.

[bat39]

Batman would have progressed much as it did. Wonder Woman needed a revamp, so something would have happened there; same with Superman.

People tend to forget or are ignorant of the fact that there were reboots, long before Crisis on Infinite Earths. The main books tended to get what Greg Hatcher (and others) called a 'soft reboot," about every 5 to 10 years. This was due to the turnover of comics fans, traditionally. The publishers would revamp things, modernize them, from time to time. The difference is that Crisis did it for the entire line and DC made a big deal about it. Prior to that, Superman got a makeover and Clark kent became a news reporter, for WGBS. Batman moved into Gotham City, sent Dick Grayson off to college, and went on globe-trotting missions. Wonder Woman became Emma Peel, then put the bathing suit back on, while the JLA male team members watched her in secret (ewwwwwww; creepy!) The Fantastic Four went from trying to beat the Communists (always with the Commies, Stan, always with the Commies!) to the moon and were, instead, trying to reach Mars.

Now, some of you may say, well, that is in-continuity, changing the course of the stories; but, they also used to tweak the backstory a bit. Later writers, like Roy Thomas, who were obsessed with having previous stories link together, are the ones who then had to rationalize every change and create a clear history. Most fans didn't care that deeply, at the time; because they either, A.) hadn't read the previous version; or, B.) just wanted a cool story and didn't sweat it; or even, C.) had moved on to other things. When Comics were a mass market, people didn't really obsess about continuity (except maybe within recent issues). When the Direct Market became dominant and comics were a niche market, continuity became god. Now, changes require massive events. We can no longer say, "That was then, this is now."

You'll notice that there were few really radical changes in the major characters, after Crisis. Oh, sure, the Kents were alive and some new folks took over old roles; but, most continued on. You could have easily introduced the Charlton characters as new heroes, without Crisis. They are just new heroes, which is what the post-Crisis series did. So, you could still have JLI, except maybe not with Dr Fate, unless he comes over from Earth 2, for a brief period. He was only in the book for the first half dozen issues, before heading off for his own mini-series.

Agreed. Though I'm talking hypothetically about the universe/reality itself and not from a real-world publishing perspective.

Assuming DC were to introduce a new parallel universe now and claim "This is Earth 1, 5-10 years later, had COIE not happened"...what would it look like? Is what I'm trying to guesstimate...

[Sacred Knight]

Its an interesting question to bring up....because in my opinion I think we just might be seeing it as we speak, albeit still altered in its own right. The result of COIE was changed, the multiverse was never destroyed which stands to reason to theorize that Earth One was never destroyed in the first place as that was one of if not the (I can't quite recall off the top of my head) last world standing. So how was the post-Crisis Earth born this time around if not from the resolved singularity verse of the original destroyed multiverse? I think the current Earth-0 could very well indeed be the original Earth-One.

[Buried Alien]

Earth-One Batman would likely have not had Post-COIE Batman's darker episodes. At the very least, even if his life did grow darker in later years with the crippling of Barbara, the death of Jason, etc., he'd at least have memories of times that were not so dark (Post-COIE, I feel that writers tried to subtly retcon out the happier aspects of Batman's Silver/Bronze Age life).

Furthermore, Superman's conflicts with Luthor would have played out more according to the classic Pre-COIE mythos rather than the John Byrne-rebooted mythos. I also can't see Pre-COIE Superman being killed by Doomsday.

Somehow, I see a future of Pre-COIE Earth-One without the Crisis event as somehow being more comparatively Silver/Bronze Age pristine and less "darkened." Swamp Thing did make the observation during COIE itself that when the remaining parallel universes were merged, they resulted in a darker world...something Kal-L also alluded to in INFINITE CRISIS.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[DGraysonWorldsGreatestSpy]

Who is Wonder Girl probably would have never happened since Perez would probably just tell new stories rather than Reboot Wonder Woman and leaving out Donna Troy, Since Barry did not die maybe Wally would have returned and got better story telling without Ravens mind control, Bruce and Dick having a major falling out would not have happened and he would have gotten that unwritten series where he marries Starfire.

[SiegePerilous02]

Some stuff I can imagine still happening. Batman's world getting progressively darker would be a guarantee because there would be no way DC could resist letting DKR influence the main canon. Jason would have been killed off even if he was still Dick Grayson with red hair. On the plus side, this means we wouldn't get the ridiculous "Barbara isn't Jim's biological daughter, but instead his adopted niece, but they're so close that they might as well be father and daughter anyway" nonsense.

Superman: Supergirl and other Kryptonians would likely be killed off, along with Krypto and the Super Pets, to make way for the "Clark is the only living remnant of Krypton" that post-Crisis wanted to push. The difference here is that they would still have existed, just aren't around in the present any longer. Lex being a corrupt businessman could still be on the table, just now he will do it after making a show of being "reformed" from his criminal mad scientist ways.

Wonder Woman: She was getting a reboot no matter what, especially if George Perez was interested and fresh off his NTT success. Even if her history wasn't rebooted entirely, I can see some of his changes being worked in to the present story. Steve would be killed off for real, she would ditch the Diana Prince ID, get the full power of flight, and probably Deborah Domaine getting killed off and replaced with Barbara Minerva. Thankfully, this would also mean that Donna's history would be left alone and Diana would be a founding member of the JL.

Barry dying and Wally taking over is a concept that could have worked without COIE, with the only difference being that there needed to be a Multiverse crossover any time he hangs out with Jay. Which is probably a better option, because the Multiverse was introduced in the Flash anyway. Hal would, unfortunately, still get Parallax'd.

[phantom1592]

The thought came to me while on the other thread discussing the nature of the Rebirth universe, and what an Earth 1 would look like today.

How do you think Earth 1 would have evolved had COIE not occurred?

Given that pretty much every Post-COIE iteration of DC's mainstream earth has been a variation of Earth 1 in some sense, can we assume that even had COIE not occurred, a lot of the Post-COIE developments regarding Earth 1 characters would still have occurred?

Some stuff I can imagining happening on Earth 1 sans COIE. Wally West eventually becoming Flash for instance. Even in a scenario where Barry didn't die in COIE, I can easily imagine Wally taking the mantle up at some point. Hell, without COIE, Barry might have continued to stay in the future with Iris and so Wally would take up the mantle in the present-day at some point. Most of his subsequent life could have unfolded the same way, with Linda and eventually having kids. Of course, Wally would be based in Central City, not Keystone, and he wouldn't have Jay Garrick as a mentor (trips to Earth 2 notwithstanding). Johnny Quick (and later Jesse Quick) and Max Mercury probably wouldn't have played such a major part in his life either.

What about the GL's? Their history may or may not have progressed down the same path after COIE. But honestly, I don't see how the merged earths/new timeline would have affected anything. Hal could still have gone rogue and become Parallax and later died. Kyle could still have become a GL, the only one for a long time. Etc. etc. Again, one major difference is that Alan Scott wouldn't be around and Kyle wouldn't ever have Jade as a girlfriend/partner.

Justice League...well, don't see how Justice League International wouldn't have happened on Earth 1 eventually. Blue Beetle wouldn't be part of it of course, but all the native Earth 1 characters would. And I can eventually see the Grant Morrison 'Big Seven' still coming into being.

Superman's an interesting one. Without the massive changes to his origin and overall mythology, would his life has progressed down the path it did Post-COIE. Would he eventually have married Lois? Would he have died fighting Doomsday? Is Doomsday something the Pre-COIE Krypton was capable of creating, even? Also it'd be interesting to see what role Supergirl would play (a much more experienced Supergirl than any of the later versions). LexCorp of course probably would never exist, and developments like Luthor becoming President likely would never happen at all (unless he reformed or pretended to reform but its far-fetched). One wonders about characters like Steel and Superboy/Kon-El though.

Then there's Batman. Would the Pre-COIE Jason Todd, who was pretty much Dick Grayson by another name, have become the violent punk who got reckless and died at the hands of the Joker? Would the Joker have crippled Barbara Gordon? The former I can actually envision NOT happening (except for the fact that, in the backstory of DKR, which was likely extrapolated from the Earth 1 timeline at the time of writing, Jason DID end up dying). The latter...well, there's no reason why that WOULDN'T have panned out the same way. And would Batman ever become the intense paranoid obsessed individual sometimes referred to as 'Batjerk'! Would events like Knightfall, Contagion, No Man's Land etc. occur? What about Tim Drake? Damian?

Some real food for thought here.

I'm of the belief that Wally would have NEVER been the Flash. He MAY have grown up and become a hero of his own... but not "FLASH".

They COULD have told the story of Barry dying and the sidekick taking over... but it would have been over almost immediately. Just like Connor Hawke... Dick as Batman, Artemis as Wonder Woman, or any other story where the 'real' Earth-one charcters 'died'. Barry would have received the same plot-armor that all the rest of the core characters have received.

Other than that?? I'm not really sure what else would have changed. Even after the Crisis, a lot of characters went along as normal like Green Lantern and Batman. Their changes weren't so much 'crisis' based as they were audiences changing.

The JSA would have been a huge one. No Jay Garrick or forced Legacy characters becoming mainstays in the universe. No Jade, no star spangled kid/Stargirl... They would be relegated to a yearly crossover if they weren't forgotten by now. Which is not necessarily a BAD thing. I personally preferred Jay better as a Separate character on his own world where he was the 'REAL' flash... with him and Barry or Alan and Hal being equal powered characters, just from a different reality. The 'old/retired' statesmen who got all the respect for adventures we never saw... Really got old after awhile.

Hawkman would have been spared a LOT of trouble with Katar on Earth-1 and Carter on Earth-2. Trying to keep both stories at the same time was a disaster.

Superman would have been one of the biggest differences. I think he would have been powered down somehow anyway... but I'm not sure what route they would have taken. Super-pets would have been retired somewhere... just with the aging up of the audiences... but I'm not sure they would have purged Supergirl or other Krypto-references...

[Jim Kelly]

Back in the early '70s one letter writer in the Batman comics sent in a comment that purported to be from the future where Wally West had in fact become the Flash. So maybe that was always destined to happen. But by the early '80s, Wally had a habit of his powers cutting out and he was side-lined from the Teen Titans. Frankly it's surprising that he got the job as Flash after Crisis, because there wasn't much being done with his character at that time (my understanding is that Jay Garrick was in line to get the gig).

I think that Earth-Two could have prospered. There were already some viable Earth-Two comics pre-Crisis--ALL-STAR SQUADRON, INFINITY INC., the Huntress in WONDER WOMAN, Mr. & Mrs. Superman in SUPERMAN FAMILY, Dr. Fate in THE FLASH, plus various other appearances by Power Girl, the Spectre, Alan Scott et al around the DC titles, in addition to the annual JLA/JSA crossover. Earth-Two allowed writers to try out life, death and new generation stories that they were restrained from doing on Earth-One. That's where a lot of the experimentation might have happened--and maybe on other alternate Earths. And then there wouldn't be so many deaths and new generations on Earth-One for that reason.

Grant Morrison's ALL-STAR SUPERMAN is pretty much Superman if Crisis never had happened. Maybe Alan Moore, Cary Bates, Elliot Maggin or Martin Pasko would have got a chance to bring fresh ideas into Superman. Power Girl could have been a much more important character, without all the retcons to her origins. Likewise with Huntress.

[Lee Stone]

The Last Days of the JLA (#258-261) wouldn't have happened.

Instead, the Satellite League would've reformed on a newly built satellite, with Gypsy, Steel and Vibe leaving to join the Outsiders.
Vixen would remain with the League and Supergirl, Batgirl and John Stewart would've joined.

The next JLA/JSA crossover would have Fawcett City magically transported to Earth-1 and Captain Marvel would join the League.

Dr. Fate would operate on both Earth-1 and Earth-2 with his tower being revealed to exist in a nexus outside the multiverse. Kent and Inza merge and learn they can simultaneously appear on two separate Earths as Fate.

Over the next year, Mister Miracle, Cyborg, Plastic Man and Doctor Fate would join the League, effectively Kenner 'Super Power'-ing the JLA.

Since Blue Beetle made his first appearance during Crisis, he and Hub City (and all of the Charlton characters) would be established on Earth-1.
Dan Garrett will be revealed to be originally from Earth-2 but was killed and the scarab transferred his spirit to Earth-1 where he briefly comes out of retirement to confront the Earth-1 counterpart to his Earth-2 killer before handing the legacy to Ted Kord and returning to retirement.

[codystarbuck]

Agreed. Though I'm talking hypothetically about the universe/reality itself and not from a real-world publishing perspective.

Assuming DC were to introduce a new parallel universe now and claim "This is Earth 1, 5-10 years later, had COIE not happened"...what would it look like? Is what I'm trying to guesstimate...

Well, my point is I don't think it would look any different. Crisis really didn't change things that much, for most of the characters.

[phantom1592]

Agreed. Though I'm talking hypothetically about the universe/reality itself and not from a real-world publishing perspective.

Assuming DC were to introduce a new parallel universe now and claim "This is Earth 1, 5-10 years later, had COIE not happened"...what would it look like? Is what I'm trying to guesstimate...

Ohhh... that's a bit different.

If Crisis had never happened... things wouldn't have changed all that much as I said earlier. Wally would never have been Flash, etc...


BUT...


If they suddenly threw open a window and said Here's what we think would have happened... That's a whole different thing. I think E-1 would be vastly different. I think a 10 year later Earth one. WOULD have Wally as Flash and Dick as Batman... Superman and Lois would have been married with a new Superboy floating around.... It's kind of what they did with Earth 2 after taking that big gap from golden to silver age. They skipped ahead and had Batman 2 and grown up Robin, Huntress was born and taken up the family business... All star Squadron was playing the legacy games... Heck, I think Kingdom Come and/or Alex Ross' 'Justice' series could be considered a continuation of Silver Age E-1. Well... with Capt Marvel added in....

I do not believe these stories would ever have flown naturally, with killing a core character for his sidekick to replace him... but if it was an alternate reality with a 'This is it how it COULD have gone....' I think they'd have some fun and mix things up a bit.

[Jim Kelly]

WATCHMEN is kind of an example of something pre-Crisis, in that it's on an alternate Earth with counterparts (Charlton heroes, now changed into Charlton counterpart heroes). By the rules immediately after Crisis, it could never actually exist in DCU continuity (this kind of anomaly would eventually be called an Elseworld). Yet in pre-Crisis rules, stuff like Watchmen was absolutely fair game. So more such world building could have gone on and crossed over with Earth-One and Earth-Two.

Maybe there wouldn't have been such a split between Vertigo and regular DC. It seems like the British invasion writers gravitated toward Vertigo, because it allowed them more freedom with divergent continuity. Whereas, the one true Earth of the DCU clamped down on that kind of invention.

[bat39]

Ohhh... that's a bit different.

If Crisis had never happened... things wouldn't have changed all that much as I said earlier. Wally would never have been Flash, etc...


BUT...


If they suddenly threw open a window and said Here's what we think would have happened... That's a whole different thing. I think E-1 would be vastly different. I think a 10 year later Earth one. WOULD have Wally as Flash and Dick as Batman... Superman and Lois would have been married with a new Superboy floating around.... It's kind of what they did with Earth 2 after taking that big gap from golden to silver age. They skipped ahead and had Batman 2 and grown up Robin, Huntress was born and taken up the family business... All star Squadron was playing the legacy games... Heck, I think Kingdom Come and/or Alex Ross' 'Justice' series could be considered a continuation of Silver Age E-1. Well... with Capt Marvel added in....

I do not believe these stories would ever have flown naturally, with killing a core character for his sidekick to replace him... but if it was an alternate reality with a 'This is it how it COULD have gone....' I think they'd have some fun and mix things up a bit.

Yeah, you seem to get what I mean.

But even Earth 2, while it had the huge off-screen gap, was an extrapolation of where the characters were at the end of the Golden Age. So if you look at Batman...the Batman of Earth 2 seemed a reasonable extrapolation of Batman's status quo in the Golden Age/pre-Silver Age comics of the late 1940's/early 1950's. He married a reformed Catwoman, had a kid, Dick grew up but continued to operate as Robin etc.

Applying a similar logic to Earth 1 by extrapolating Batman's status quo as it was in the early 1980's - well, the truth is that I can still see Jason Todd possibly dying (poor kid just can't catch a break). Alternatively though, I do feel that if Bruce were to have hung up the cowl, it'd be Jason, rather than Dick, who would become the new Batman. Dick being his own man, as Nightwing, was an idea already firmly established pre-COIE and I don't see him wavering from that on a long-term basis any more than he would post-COIE. Whereas Pre-COIE Jason seemed a more 'worthy' successor to the Batman mantle than Post-COIE Jason (or at any rate, a more balanced one).

I can see Barbara continuing as Batgirl - maybe becoming Batwoman. And perhaps becoming Mayor of Gotham or holding some other high post, bringing her political career closer home. Again, that's assuming something like 'The Killing Joke' wouldn't have happened on Earth 1 anyway (again, that's the difference between Earth 1 as it would have been in real-life and imagining it as a now-revisited alternate reality).