How Would Civil War Go Down in The DCU?

[Timothy Hunter]

I'm sure most of you are familiar with the synopsis of the 2006 Marvel event comic Civil War: two of Marvel's most popular character lead opposing sides fighting for or against the Superhero Registration Act. How would this play out in the DC Universe?

[daBronzeBomma]

I think we've asked the question several times in the past on these boards.

Heck, even I made a thread about it a while back.

But, sure, I'll revisit.

I guess I still think Wonder Woman would play the Iron Man role and Batman would play the Captain America role, with Green Lantern playing the Spider-Man role (with Supes stuck in the middle).

[DragonsChi]

It would basically be Injustice but with lower quality.

[MajorHoy]

I'd like to think DC heroes aren't stupid enough to repeat the mistakes made by Marvel heroes when it comes to this . . .

[Timothy Hunter]

I think we've asked the question several times in the past on these boards.

Heck, even I made a thread about it a while back.

But, sure, I'll revisit.

I guess I still think Wonder Woman would play the Iron Man role and Batman would play the Captain America role, with Superman playing the Spider-Man role.

I knew. I just didn't want to search for a months old/years old thread.

[byrd156]

I don't think it would happen.

[Digifiend]

I think we've asked the question several times in the past on these boards.

Heck, even I made a thread about it a while back.

But, sure, I'll revisit.

I guess I still think Wonder Woman would play the Iron Man role and Batman would play the Captain America role, with Green Lantern playing the Spider-Man role (with Supes stuck in the middle).

Why GL? None of them have secret identities. Superman and Batman would both be anti-registration, I think, as they both have secret identities for a reason, but I would imagine that the GLC would be on the pro-registration side, as they're cops. One of the Titans should be in the Spider-Man role.

[Jackalope89]

Why GL? None of them have secret identities. Superman and Batman would both be anti-registration, I think, as they both have secret identities for a reason, but I would imagine that the GLC would be on the pro-registration side, as they're cops. One of the Titans should be in the Spider-Man role.

And Diana is perfectly respectful of such things as well.

I guess Kingdom Come sort of had such a thing, but that was more a generation gap than anything.

Only thing I can ever think of dividing the heroes (barring some really bad OOC things like Injustice), is something like killing. Batman and Superman are pretty heavily opposed, while Wonder Woman, Aquaman, and others aren't as heavily against it (more as a last resort).

Maybe a hero vs antihero thing, but then that's more family business than an actual split.


Nope. Barring a few, I just don't see the heroes dividing themselves up and getting into a major fight over something like that.

[phantom1592]

Nope. Barring a few, I just don't see the heroes dividing themselves up and getting into a major fight over something like that.

I said the same thing about Marvel...

It would require bad writing and poor characterization... but yeah, overall it would look like Injustice.

[Zero Hunter]

Kingdom Come. The same basic split in how things should be handled. On one side you had Superman (Iron Man) and the other you had Batman (Captain America)

[phantom1592]

Kingdom Come. The same basic split in how things should be handled. On one side you had Superman (Iron Man) and the other you had Batman (Captain America)

I think it'd be interesting to see the opposite. Superman defending personal freedom like Captain America... and Batman wanting everyone registered, analyzed, trained and on a list in a giant computer somewhere... similar to what he's done in the past.

[Lightning Rider]

I think it'd be interesting to see the opposite. Superman defending personal freedom like Captain America... and Batman wanting everyone registered, analyzed, trained and on a list in a giant computer somewhere... similar to what he's done in the past.

What I like is that you can make equally valid arguments on both sides for each of them.

[kjn]

While a civil war between superheroes can make sense, I'm not sure using the Marvel template of a government registration act would work, because the DC universe is constructed rather differently than the Marvel universe. And I'd say Batman lies at the core of them.

Because Batman, as he has developed, is basically the state, or at least the repressive elements of it. He maintains a monopoly on violence in Gotham where other actors can do so only on his sufferance. He claims the right the register others. Add that to his wealth and privilege in civil society, and Bruce Wayne/Batman is basically the shadow government of Gotham. He is a state actor in his own right.

You also have the role that the X-Men has played to shape the Marvel universe, where superpowers has come to belong to the marginalised and the downtrodden. So there was a lot of background work and history that the registration act in Marvel could draw on.

So if DC is to go with such a plotline, they need to come up with a different fault line, like in Kingdom Come.

[Korath]

Assuming that what sparks the Civil War would be a registration of heroes, I think that Iron man would be Superman and Captain America would be Batman, with Wonder Woman taking a more fluid role.

I think that Superman could be relatively easily convinced that a secret identity has become a bad thing, because it allows for a lot of accountability in regard to heroes -especially vigilantes- to act however they want and flout the law. Just look at the current Bat-family, where Batman is going ballistic, Red Hood is increasingly violent, Damian has set up a secret super-prison, Batman allied with former villain without any accountability, etc. To the contrary, Superman and his family are supposed to be those honest and very open heroes, and I can see him wanting to take a step further.

Of course, where things should diverge is that the fault line should fall on the fact that most of the heroes against revealing their identities should be the less powerful metas, at DC, because they are often the ones toeing the line the most. But unlike in Injustice, where Superman is a dictator, here he would genuinely try to prevent things from flaring up, only to have those normal heroes losing when an accident lead to the death of one of their own, because he or she revealed his or her identity. Things would then spiral out of control for a time from there.

[theoneandonly]

it could be that a existing event could be repurposed as DC'S Civil War like Armageddon 2001 where a faction of heroes distrustful of Waverider could point out that the hero who has been revealed as monarch hasn't done anything yet in the present and shouldn't be charged for what he might do in future while another faction isn't ready to risk it and wait for him to turn evil and would prefer to act now to contain him. Batman could lead the faction which intends to take him in and hand him over to Waverider while Superman could be the hero who believing the best way for dealing with the problem was to further investigate the threat isn't ready to hand monarch aka Hank hall to Waverider which could lead to a split and a increasingly escalating conflict as matters get out of hand. sounds as good as civil war 2. Another storyline that could readily be constructed would be a conflict breaking out between the green lantern and the flash back in the day when they were told by the government to unmask and work for them directly with the flash disagreeing and the green lantern initially agreeing but after watching the wiping out of a city by a Alien invasion due to the unavailability of heroes would rethink his choice and feeling that there was no choice but to fall in with the choice offered by the government to work for them if they are to be able to protect the world which would lead him into a clash with jay who isn't ready to buckle under bureaucratic tyranny. of course it is a unfeasible storyline unless everyone was acting out of character.