What if post-Crisis DCU was just a new Earth?

[Lee Stone]

What if the multiverse wasn't really destroyed and merged, as we thought, but a new Earth was simply created and it existed, unknowingly, alongside Earth-1, Earth-2 and the rest?
What if the JLI could have been able to travel to Earth-1 to meet the Satellite JLA, in much the same way the JLA had done with the JSA years earlier, keeping Earth-1 as a Silver Age Earth forever in the '60s and '70s much like Earth-2 had become Golden Age DC forever in the '30s to '50s?

With Earth-0 (the new Earth) holding JLI, New Titans (with Dick as Nightwing, Donna as Troia), Morrison Doom Patrol, Ostrander Suicide Squad, DnA Legion or the Zero Hour Legion (in its future), Clark never being Superboy, Batwoman, Oracle, Helena Bertinelli Huntress, Wally Flash, Kyle and Guy GLs, Zero Hour Hawkman...

And Earth-1 holding Satellite era JLA, Silver Age Teen Titans (with Dick as Robin, Donna as Wonder Girl), Silver Age Doom Patrol, Silver Age Suicide Squad, Legion (in its future), Clark having been Superboy, Batgirl, Supergirl, Barry Flash, Hal and John GLs, Katar Hol Hawkman...

And Earth-2 holding JSA (in its present) and Infinity, Inc. (in its future), Helena Wayne Huntress, Power Girl, Jay Flash, Alan GL, Carter Hall Hawkman...

[Buried Alien]

It would be fun. To me, the continuity of Earth-One was never truly, definitively resolved. It is unclear if it continued to exist independently (as it seemed to for a few months after COIE wrapped up) or it truly became Post-COIE Earth. If the latter is true, why the delay?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[superduperman]

TBH, that would actually make a lot more sense than what they did. A "new" Earth that was cut off from the rest of the multiverse. So you still have Earth One and Earth Two still out there somewhere. Geoff Johns kind of implied that was the case in his JSA run in 2008. I kind of hoped that would turn out to be the case in the long run. So the Anti-Monitor didn't destroy ALL the other universes, he just destroyed the ones in his section of the larger multiverse. If you look at it from the perspective of each "branch" of the multiverse having 52 Earths, this makes sense.

[Lonewolf36]

What if the multiverse wasn't really destroyed and merged, as we thought, but a new Earth was simply created and it existed, unknowingly, alongside Earth-1, Earth-2 and the rest?
What if the JLI could have been able to travel to Earth-1 to meet the Satellite JLA, in much the same way the JLA had done with the JSA years earlier, keeping Earth-1 as a Silver Age Earth forever in the '60s and '70s much like Earth-2 had become Golden Age DC forever in the '30s to '50s?

With Earth-0 (the new Earth) holding JLI, New Titans (with Dick as Nightwing, Donna as Troia), Morrison Doom Patrol, Ostrander Suicide Squad, DnA Legion or the Zero Hour Legion (in its future), Clark never being Superboy, Batwoman, Oracle, Helena Bertinelli Huntress, Wally Flash, Kyle and Guy GLs, Zero Hour Hawkman...

And Earth-1 holding Satellite era JLA, Silver Age Teen Titans (with Dick as Robin, Donna as Wonder Girl), Silver Age Doom Patrol, Silver Age Suicide Squad, Legion (in its future), Clark having been Superboy, Batgirl, Supergirl, Barry Flash, Hal and John GLs, Katar Hol Hawkman...

And Earth-2 holding JSA (in its present) and Infinity, Inc. (in its future), Helena Wayne Huntress, Power Girl, Jay Flash, Alan GL, Carter Hall Hawkman...

DC should hire you i would love if this was the case.

[Jim Kelly]

I never could figure out how a universe having already existed could somehow not exist. You could destroy the whole Multivese, but it still would have existed. I guess the only difficulty would be for the JLI to find a way to get to the JLA Earth. I don't think vibrating at a different frequency would be enough.

Still, it's nice to imagine that this is in fact what happened. Nobody's stopping us from imagining any of that.

[superduperman]

If you think about the theory of how multiverses are supposed to work, you can't just get rid of all of them. For every decision that you make, an alternate universe would crop up where you made the opposite decision. Multiverses would be created and destroyed with each new decision. Each one brancing off multiverses of their own. There's a reason it's considered infinite.

[bat39]

TBH, that would actually make a lot more sense than what they did. A "new" Earth that was cut off from the rest of the multiverse. So you still have Earth One and Earth Two still out there somewhere. Geoff Johns kind of implied that was the case in his JSA run in 2008. I kind of hoped that would turn out to be the case in the long run. So the Anti-Monitor didn't destroy ALL the other universes, he just destroyed the ones in his section of the larger multiverse. If you look at it from the perspective of each "branch" of the multiverse having 52 Earths, this makes sense.

Geoff Johns established Earth One as still existing?

That's surprising because back around that time, DC's 'official' stance (or the closest they ever came to one), is that the Post-COIE Earth (now 'New Earth') was basically Earth One with elements of other earths folded into it.

This reminds me of another thread a short while back where it was discussed how Earth One is the only past continuity DC completely avoids revisiting.

[mortari]

You should read Michael Moorecock's Elric and Immortal (i think) series it's deals with that problem. The multiverse is completely destroyed, just to find out that you can't end something that's infinite.

[superduperman]

Geoff Johns established Earth One as still existing?

That's surprising because back around that time, DC's 'official' stance (or the closest they ever came to one), is that the Post-COIE Earth (now 'New Earth') was basically Earth One with elements of other earths folded into it.

This reminds me of another thread a short while back where it was discussed how Earth One is the only past continuity DC completely avoids revisiting.

When Power Girl ended up on Earth 2 after Gog sent her there, the Justice Society of that Earth concluded that after the Crisis, a "new" Earth must have emerged that was an amalgamation of all the others. But didn't necessarily imply that the others were gone. But, yes, DC does tend to avoid the old Earth 1 like the plague. I imagine this has something to do with how controversial it is among fans.

[Buried Alien]

When Power Girl ended up on Earth 2 after Gog sent her there, the Justice Society of that Earth concluded that after the Crisis, a "new" Earth must have emerged that was an amalgamation of all the others. But didn't necessarily imply that the others were gone. But, yes, DC does tend to avoid the old Earth 1 like the plague. I imagine this has something to do with how controversial it is among fans.

It's a chimerical controversy, though. I don't know of any fans who hate Pre-COIE Earth-One and would object to it being ever depicted again.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[GSman]

When Power Girl ended up on Earth 2 after Gog sent her there, the Justice Society of that Earth concluded that after the Crisis, a "new" Earth must have emerged that was an amalgamation of all the others. But didn't necessarily imply that the others were gone. But, yes, DC does tend to avoid the old Earth 1 like the plague. I imagine this has something to do with how controversial it is among fans.

I think that Earth 2 in JSA was created after Infinite Crisis. When all the worlds were merged back together, the universe couldn't contain all the energy so it replicated itself 51 times and that's how we got the 52 Multiverse.

[Lee Stone]

And if you think about it, a good solution for DC would be to just create a new Earth every 20 years or so.
And reverse the numbering, as calling the Golden Age Earth 'Earth-2' was kinda conceited. This way each new Earth would simply be the next number.

Earth-1: 40s/50s DC (previously pre-Crisis Earth-2)
Earth-2: 60s/70s DC (previously pre-Crisis Earth-1)
Earth-3: 80s/90s DC (post-Crisis Earth)
Earth-4: 00's/10s DC (New52 Earth)
Earth-5: 20s/30s DC

And just make a rule that any Earths created story-wise, used letters and not numbers as designators (such as Earth-S and Earth-C), keeping the numbers free for future generations.

With a bit of creativity, I think it would work.
This way, you avoid Earths becoming overcrowded with heroes. Each new Earth would launch with new incarnations (or directions) for each of the characters that are important at the time (using the Byrne Superman, Perez Wonder Woman, Miller Batman, Baron Flash as not only the launching for Earth-3 but the template to follow on each successive Earth. Or New52, as Earth-4, as a guideline for how to do it).

And then just make it easier to travel from Earth to Earth, much like going from one city to another, for the major superteams like JLA, JSA, JLI and Justice League.
But restrict access for villains or lesser heroes, except in rare cases where they steal or stumble upon the technology.

[Jim Kelly]

We literally got 51 of the 52 because Mr. Mind pooped on them. Intially they were all copies of the same Earth, but then the worm went to the other ones and shat on them to change their continuity. I'm not kidding--this is the kind of stuff we have had to swallow.

The way I understood the explanation in INFINITE CRISIS was that after COIE there was one Earth, but the continuities of various Earths were all written upon it. So too much information was being copied onto the one Earth which caused both the wonky continuity and the darkening of the reality. So that's why the one DCU Earth is split off into 52. Earth 0 having now an all new continuity--and then the others to follow due to Mr. Mind's bodily function.

I used to think the reason DC avoided Earth-One for a lot of years was because of Superboy and the lawsuit. But that doesn't explain the whole time that they have ignored Earth-One. So I can only guess that it's the equivalent of development hell in movies. As there are so many executives at DC (sometimes it seems like they have more execs than talent), there's a constant conflict of interests. So while some might want to bring back Earth-One--others have made their careers on dismantling Earth-One. So maybe there's just not enough collective will to bring it back.

[NeathBlue]

I've never really understood how they came up with the numbering that they had... why was Earth 1 accepted as Earth 1 even by people who lived on the other earths... You'd have thought the JSA would have objected as they came first.
And then there was Earth Prime where apparently we the readers came from... What was supposed to have happened to this when COIE's occurred or was it just conveniently forgotten about?

[Jim Kelly]

If they had called the main Earth, Earth-Two, that would have confused a lof of little kids. Since all the Earths exist at the same time, there really shouldn't be a sense that one of them existed before the other. It's probably just Barry and Jay being scientists--who decides that green is 500 nm while blue-indigo is 450 nm?

Earth Prime doesn't figure into the post-Crisis reality. Which is a problem. The PTB probably hoped we wouldn't think about it too much. We still existed, so Earth Prime had to exist--therefore there were at least two universes (and three if you count the anti-matter universe).