Confused about Earth 2 and Earth 1 Batman
black...@aol.com
the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman? Or is that too simple. It
seems like later on within the DCU they kind of reconned it so that
the E-2 Batman had retired by the Silver Age and that the E-1 begins
at the dawn of the Silver Age, but don't think this was the case at
the time.
2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
A.Gerard
> 1. Is is correct to call the Earth 2 Batman the Golden Age Batman and
> the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman? Or is that too simple. It
> seems like later on within the DCU they kind of reconned it so that
> the E-2 Batman had retired by the Silver Age and that the E-1 begins
> at the dawn of the Silver Age, but don't think this was the case at
> the time.
>
'Golden Age.'
> 2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
> the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
Before and after Crisis on Infinite Earths, it's been in-continuity
that Earth-1 Batman wore the Bat Emblem in his early years, then
switched to the Oval later. The early JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA issues
show Batman in the Black Emblem.
>
> 3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
> that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
> Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
>
Some controversy on that one. Best I can say is that Earth-2 ran
normally until 1985 with CoIE. You must know that in 1940 the JSA were
bathed with a magical energy that allowed them to keep their prime
strength and vitality despite their advancing years.
> 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
As long as it took them to sire Helena and put her into college. At
least twenty-five years.
Sean MacDonald
> Correct. Earth-2 Superman and Wonder Woman are often referred to as
> 'Golden Age.'
Of course, this is somewhat incorrect. Virtually everyone refers to
the characters this way, so it would be no great error to do so.
However, the Earth-2 versions of characters often exaggerated
differences between the Earth-1 and Earth-2 versions just to make them
different, when often, they were quite similar.
Take Superman for example. The Earth-2 Clark Kent worked at the Daily
Star (not the Daily Planet) and the editor was George Taylor (not
Perry White). The Earth-2 Superman's Lex Luthor had red hair (he was
not bald). Now, go back and look at some 1940's Superman comics. Yes,
there was a story or two where Clark Kent worked at the Daily Star for
George Taylor, but that quickly changed to the Daily Planet and Perry
White. And yes, Lex Luthor started of with hair, but he was quickly
drawn as a bald character (presumably becaused the artist confused him
with the Ultra-Humanite). By around 1942 (I'd have to check the dates,
but that's a decent approximation, iirc), these details were
solidified. The 1942 (and therefore, Golden Age) Superman worked at
the Daily Planet for Perry White and battled a bald Lex Luthor.
However, the Earth-2 Superman continued to work at the Daily Star for
George Taylor and battled a Lex Luthor with hair.
The differences between the Earth-2 Wonder Woman and Golden Age Wonder
Woman are more subtle, and I can't recall any differences between the
Earth-2 Batman and the Golden Age Batman (possibly Alfred remained fat
on Earth-2?), but that doesn't mean there aren't differences.
However, to most people, this would seem like excessive nitpicking, as
most people have never read a Golden Age DC comic.
selaboc
> 1. Is is correct to call the Earth 2 Batman the Golden Age Batman and
> the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman?
Generally yes. The Earth-2 versions of Batman, Superman, and Wonder
Woman are generally considered to be the "golden age" versions though
there are some differences between the Earth-2 dipiction of those
characters and the one published in the actual golden age comics
(Superman for instance worked at the Daily Star for a brief time at
the very begining of the Golden age but that was quickly changed to
the Daily Planet for not given reason whereas the Earth-2 version
always worked at the Daily Planet)
> 2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
> the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
Yes. The oval did not appear until iirc 1964 several years after the
Earth-1 Batman had been been active in the Justice league wearing the
bat emblem (so clearly not the Earth-2 Batman). However you wlll find
articles on the net that claim the Earth-1 batman starts with the oval
but that just doesn't fit the comics as published (again see the early
JLA stories with the ovalless Earth-1 Batman). Such a mistaken belief
might even be why we ended up with an Earth-2 Batwoman and an Earth-1
Batwoman. While Batwoman first appeared in the mid-50s and thus could
concievably slot into either earth, her career lasted until the
Early-60s when it was clearly the Earth-1 Batman whose stories were
being told in the Bat books.
> 3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
> that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
> Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
Yes and no. Depends on what stories you read. Some obviously lend
itself to the real time interpretation, others specify that Earth-2
time moves slower (as a reason why the Heroes and supporting cast
weren't as old as they'd be in real time)
> 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
IIRC they were married in the mid-50s - so for however long it was on
Earth-2 from the mid-50s to their deaths in the mid-70s.
Tim Turnip
<ang...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>> 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
>
>As long as it took them to sire Helena and put her into college. At
>least twenty-five years.
Twenty-five years before Helena could enter college? Some tough
admission standards on Earth-2... :)
Eminence
Skirt vs mid-thigh shorts? Boots vs sandals? Tiara over / under the
hair?
>and I can't recall any differences between the
>Earth-2 Batman and the Golden Age Batman (possibly Alfred remained fat
>on Earth-2?), but that doesn't mean there aren't differences.
Isn't one of the established subtle differences that the Golden Age
Batman carried a gun, whereas neither the Earth-1 nor -- retroactively
-- Earth-2 Batmen did? (Or is that an esoteric fanboy nod to
"Earth-A"?)
>However, to most people, this would seem like excessive nitpicking, as
>most people have never read a Golden Age DC comic.
True.
Eminence
_______________
Usenet: Global Village of the Damned
plausible prose man
> the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman?
Eh..it's a useful idea, but the Silver Age was well underway before
the first stories appeared that are unequivocally set on Earth 1, and
Batman comics in that universe had moved into "The Bronze Age" before
Crisis on Infinite Earths. Also, at least some Golden Age Batman
comics must've happened on Earth 1, or they contradict other published
accounts. Indeed, apparently there's some trouble fitting Batwoman
into Earth 2 at all, but the only source for this is a story that
clearly shows Batwoman as existing on Earth 2, so...
> Or is that too simple. It
> seems like later on within the DCU they kind of reconned it so that
> the E-2 Batman had retired by the Silver Age and that the E-1 begins
> at the dawn of the Silver Age, but don't think this was the case at
> the time.
Earth 2 was more a Flash and Green Lantern thing, not so much a
Batman thing, outside of JLA, at least until Paul Levitz decided to do
something with it.
>
> 2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
> the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
Yes.
> 3. Did Earth 2 run at real time?
Eh...it shows the passage of time more clearly than earth 1 for
obvious reasons, but I see to recall some idea to the effect time
passed more slowly there, too.
>I've read stories that seem to say
> that it does.
> I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
> Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
>
> 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
Anlatt the Builder
>
> 3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
> that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
> Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
>
>
There were a number of different notions and/or theories, both within
the stories and outside of them, about relative time and time flow in
Earth-1 and Earth-2.
Normally it was assumed that it was the same year on both Earths, and
that time flowed at the same rate on both of them. The Earth-2 heroes
had merely started their careers earlier. They were old enough to have
young-adult children when Infinity, Inc. was introduced.
This was fine through the 1970's or so. But no one (at least, no one
among the DC PTB) wanted to move the origins of the GA heroes away
from WW II, because so many of their stories and concepts were based
there. And "real time" kept moving further and further away from WW
II, as real time has a tendency to do. Some writers, editors, and
readers thought a solution was called for.
The one we've basically wound up with (especially after Crisis on
Infinite Earths put all these people on the same world) was that the
JSA and their significant others were, in one or more adventures,
exposed to chronal energy that slowed down their aging. So they could
be older than the JLA heroes, and have young-adult children, without
being really elderly (as most WW II veterans are today).
But other concepts were thrown around. One was that it was simply 15
or 20 years earlier by the calendar year (and thus closer to WW II) on
Earth-2 than it was on Earth-1, although time flowed at the same rate
on each. (If 5 years go by on Earth-1, 5 years also go by on Earth-2,
but the 15-year gap remains the same.)
Another was that tie flowed more slowly on Earth-2 than on Earth-1. So
maybe (just for example) WW II happened simultaneously in both worlds.
But after 30 years had gone by one Earth-1, only 20 had gone by on
Earth-1, so the JSA, although older than the JLA, wasn't as much older
as they otherwise would have been. In this version, the calendar years
might have matched between the two worlds in 1938, but 1968 in Earth-2
would only be 1958 on Earth-2. And the gap would increase over time.
***
Now, of course, we have the main DCU with both GA and Modern Age
characters living on it. And out in the 52-verse, there's an
"Earth-2," maybe an Earth-1 (who knows?), a Gotham by Gaslight world,
and so on. The relationshop of time and time flow among all these
worlds can be a wild mix-up; nobody really seems to know. Anybody ever
play 52 Pick-Up?
black...@aol.com
Ok. Its just confusing because their wedding in Dc SuperStars #17 also
shows Selina's death later in the same issue. So I'm guessing the E-2
Batman was pretty much off the radar from about 1955-1975? Not seen on
panel very much if at all?
Daibhid Ceanaideach
He did, but very briefly; for about as long as GA Superman was working at
the Daily Star. In Batman #4 (1941), a caption states "The Batman never
carries or kills with a gun".
A list of all the occasions Batman's used (or held, or posessed for some
reason) a gun can be found here:
http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2005/08/batman-and-guns.html
--
Dave
"All those with psychokinesis, raise my hand."
The Room With No Doors, Kate Orman
selaboc
> > > 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
>
> > IIRC they were married in the mid-50s - so for however long it was on
> > Earth-2 from the mid-50s to their deaths in the mid-70s.
>
> Ok. Its just confusing because their wedding in Dc SuperStars #17 also
> shows Selina's death later in the same issue.
I don't see what's so confusing, the book makes it quite clear the
wedding takes place in 1955 (page 8 of the Huntress Darknight Daughter
TPB) "It was the supreme social event of 1955". The next page is a
montage of images that represent the passage of years (you see baby
Helena in one panel for example) that is describe in one text blurb as
"the happy years". Selina isn't killed until Helena is an adult. The
wedding and montage are basically a flashback sequence -a Standard
comicbook storytelling technique.
> So I'm guessing the E-2
> Batman was pretty much off the radar from about 1955-1975? Not seen on
> panel very much if at all?
Like the rest of the JSA, he pretty much went into retirement in the
mid-to-late 50s. Coming out of retirement on occasion after the heroes
of the two Earth's start their team-ups starting with Flash 123 "Flash
of two worlds". In Dc SuperStars #17 Batman even says in one panel (pg
12 of the TPB) "It's time for me to come out of semi-retirement"
black...@aol.com
Its just confusing because Batman is supposed to go into retirement
around 1955, when Flash of Two Worlds doesn't happen until 1961. So in
1955 in reality there was no Earth 2 or Earth 1 Batman. There's no
indication that were suddenly dealing with a new Batman character at
the time. Its all sort of retro-fitted or reconned in 20 years after
the fact. We see the events of the Earth-2's Batman's life from
1955-1979 in Dc Superstars #17 and the "Autobiography of Bruce Wayne"
in Brave and the Bold when all along we thought were were seeing the
events of Batman's life from 1955-1961 in the actual Batman and
Detective Comic. Its easier when they play these types of games when
there's only one entity. When you've got two different Batman
characters at the same time and they try to shoehorn these things in
it gets a bit confusing.
whoswhoz
<grey.e...@suddenlink.net> wrote:
>
>Isn't one of the established subtle differences that the Golden Age
>Batman carried a gun, whereas neither the Earth-1 nor -- retroactively
>-- Earth-2 Batmen did? (Or is that an esoteric fanboy nod to
>"Earth-A"?)
>
>>However, to most people, this would seem like excessive nitpicking, as
>>most people have never read a Golden Age DC comic.
>
>True.
>
>
the Golden Age Batman never "Carried" a gun. He did shoot a vampire
once and had a machine gun mounted on the Batplane. but all this
ended prior to Batman #2 when new Editor Whitney Ellsworth instituted
DC's own version of the comics code and prohibited such things.
So unless the Golden Age ends in 1941- then these events are
transitory, not definitive.
Golden Age Wonder Woman's mom was named Hippolyte. Silver Age is was
Hippolyta. Plus the sandals and tiara and a different robot plane.
Note all these changes happened at different points, so there's no
definitive cut off point that you can say A is one thing and B is
another.
whoswhoz
It's nowhere near as confusing as post-Crisis continuity, or even just
the last year or so of Grant Morrison-isms. Oh for the good old days
when we only had two Batmen to worry about.
selaboc
then it's not DC Superstars #17 that's confusing you despite your
saying "Its just confusing because their wedding in Dc SuperStars #17
also shows Selina's death later in the same issue" it's the whole
demarcation of stories of the 1950s between the two Earths. And sorry,
there's no easy answers there. The Two Earths were indeed a retcon
with no clean split for Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman (the three
heros who had continuious publication from the 1940 through to the 60s
when the retcon was made).
> There's no
> indication that were suddenly dealing with a new Batman character at
> the time. Its all sort of retro-fitted or reconned in 20 years after
> the fact.
It's basically retconned the moment Earth-2 is said to be the earth
that the golden age stories took place on (IE Flash of Two Worlds)
that retcon is built upon by susequent stories in Flash and JLA long
before DC SuperStars #17 rolls around.
> We see the events of the Earth-2's Batman's life from
> 1955-1979 in Dc Superstars #17 and the "Autobiography of Bruce Wayne"
> in Brave and the Bold
Yes we do. So there's no confusion there, those stories spell out
quite clearly that we are seeing the Events of the Earth-2 Batman's
life during that time period.
> when all along we thought were were seeing the
> events of Batman's life from 1955-1961 in the actual Batman and
> Detective Comic.
Yes, and by the time the JLA Started having their annual team-ups we
knew tha the stories of the 1950s where a grey area as far as which
Earth which story took place on for Superman, Batman, and Wonder
Woman. Some took place on Earth-1, any story with Superboy in it was
obviously Earth-1 as Earth-2 didn't have a superboy, but beyond that
it was best guess.
> Its easier when they play these types of games when
> there's only one entity. When you've got two different Batman
> characters at the same time and they try to shoehorn these things in
> it gets a bit confusing.
Not really. The only really confusing aspect was placing the 1950s
stories on one of the two earths - but that's a confusion only the
hardcore fanboys would ever need face, as those stories were decades
old by then.
No, If you want confusing, look no further than the post crisis era
where one story would tell you one thing about a chracters past and
then late (sometimes within a single year) you'd be told something
completely different.
Examples that spring to mind:
1) Lex Luther was a criminal scientist/genius in jail and had a
criminal record (The end of the Crisis on Infinite Earths and the
Subesquent Superman, Action, and DC Presents stories that were
published prior to Man of Steel #1) next year Lex Luthor is a ruthless
Businessman who had never been in jail for his crimes.
2) One Day, Katar Hol his wife were cops from Thanagar who had been on
Earth for years as the Superheroes Hawkman and Hawkgirl/woman and were
major players in the Invasion crossover and members of the JLA in long
standing. The next they've just left Thanagar for Earth for the first
time AFTER the invasion event thanks to the Hawkworld mini-series and
it's lack of an "X years ago" caption. (speaking of confusion that
left the Hawkman portion of the DCU in chaos for over a decade)
(I could come up with more examples if you want, as I'm sure other
posters can, but I think I've made the point)
Eminence
>Its just confusing because Batman is supposed to go into retirement
>around 1955, when Flash of Two Worlds doesn't happen until 1961. So in
>1955 in reality there was no Earth 2 or Earth 1 Batman. There's no
>indication that were suddenly dealing with a new Batman character at
>the time. Its all sort of retro-fitted or reconned in 20 years after
>the fact. We see the events of the Earth-2's Batman's life from
>1955-1979 in Dc Superstars #17 and the "Autobiography of Bruce Wayne"
>in Brave and the Bold when all along we thought were were seeing the
>events of Batman's life from 1955-1961 in the actual Batman and
>Detective Comic. Its easier when they play these types of games when
>there's only one entity. When you've got two different Batman
>characters at the same time and they try to shoehorn these things in
>it gets a bit confusing.
Yes, but that's mostly because Batman (like Superman and Wonder Woman)
was in continuous publication while the DCU was expanding to include a
brand-new Earth-1 for the Silver Age. Most of the JSA characters were
gone by 1951, but the new Flash didn't show up until 1956... that
leaves a five-year gap (n. LSH) that *probably* deals with the Earth-2
versions of Bats, Supes, et al, but we're left to infer (or be told
via editorial policy) the actual transition point on our own.
Certainly we were reading about the Earth-1 Batman by 1958 (when GL
was rebooted).
Daibhid Ceanaideach
And Owlman. And Earth-A Batman. And Earth-B Batman. And Earth-Five Batman
(the one whose parents were saved by Earth-One Batman, but who went on to
become Batman himself anyway). And Earth-E Batman and Batman Jr. And the
Batman of that universe where he was adopted by the Kents and joined the
Legion of Super-Heroes.
plausible prose man
Were you ever actually confused by any of that? I mean, sure, some
stories contradicted each other, but this was nothing new.
> Examples that spring to mind:
> 1) Lex Luther was a criminal scientist/genius in jail and had a
> criminal record (The end of the Crisis on Infinite Earths and the
> Subesquent Superman, Action, and DC Presents stories that were
> published prior to Man of Steel #1) next year Lex Luthor is a ruthless
> Businessman who had never been in jail for his crimes.
> 2) One Day, Katar Hol his wife were cops from Thanagar who had been on
> Earth for years as the Superheroes Hawkman and Hawkgirl/woman and were
> major players in the Invasion crossover and members of the JLA in long
> standing. The next they've just left Thanagar for Earth for the first
> time AFTER the invasion event thanks to the Hawkworld mini-series and
> it's lack of an "X years ago" caption. (speaking of confusion that
> left the Hawkman portion of the DCU in chaos for over a decade)
> (I could come up with more examples if you want, as I'm sure other
> posters can, but I think I've made the point)-
Is that more or less confusing than:
"Similarly, DC "grandchilded" into the Superboy stories some of his
later friends and enemies. Lex Luthor was a buddy of Superboy as a
teen and only turned bitter when an experiment gone awry resulted in
him losing all his hair. Master Mxyzptlk popped up in Superboy #78
(Jan 1960). Both these stories of course contradicted the original
appearances of those villains in Superman stories.
More serious problems developed as a result of time travel. Time
travel is always an interesting plot device and you will note that
most of the DC heroes of the Silver Age had one method or another of
traveling through time. Batman could be hypnotized by Professor
Nichols, the Flash had his cosmic treadmill, the Atom his time pool,
Superman could fly in circles, and for the rest of the DC crew there
were the ubiquitous glass bubbles.
In Adventure #247, DC introduced the Legion of Superheroes, a future
group of do-gooders who invited Superboy to join them. So far so good.
But later on in Action #252, they decided to create Supergirl, a young
cousin of Superman who survived the explosion of Krypton. Naturally
she had to join the Legion of Superheroes as well. Which meant that in
the future, Superboy and Supergirl would team up. But why then had
Superman acted surprised when his cousin arrived; wouldn't he have
known since his teen years that Supergirl would come to this planet?
The editors quickly explained that Saturn Girl placed a post-hypnotic
suggestion in Superboy's mind that resulted in him forgetting about
Supergirl when he was in the past.
A further error was made in Adventure #253, when Robin comes back in
time to save Superboy from a booby-trapped clock. He tells Superboy of
his future, including his teamups with Batman. Again, these stories
are wildly contradicted by earlier tales."
http://sacomics.blogspot.com/2005/05/problems-with-silver-age-superboy.html
Duggy
> On Tue, 28 Jul 2009 07:18:10 -0700 (PDT), Sean MacDonald
> >Earth-2 Batman and the Golden Age Batman (possibly Alfred remained fat
> >on Earth-2?), but that doesn't mean there aren't differences.
> Isn't one of the established subtle differences that the Golden Age
> Batman carried a gun, whereas neither the Earth-1 nor -- retroactively
> -- Earth-2 Batmen did? (Or is that an esoteric fanboy nod to
> "Earth-A"?)
The first oval appearence of the Batman included him holding a gun and
pointing it at the villains.
It's been claimed since he's picking up the villain's guns but that's
not what it was clearly meant to imply.
===
= DUG.
===
selaboc
Not just "contradict" completely change the past resulting in years of
attempting to repair the damage (in the case of Hawkman).
> > Examples that spring to mind:
> > 1) Lex Luther was a criminal scientist/genius in jail and had a
> > criminal record (The end of the Crisis on Infinite Earths and the
> > Subesquent Superman, Action, and DC Presents stories that were
> > published prior to Man of Steel #1) next year Lex Luthor is a ruthless
> > Businessman who had never been in jail for his crimes.
> > 2) One Day, Katar Hol his wife were cops from Thanagar who had been on
> > Earth for years as the Superheroes Hawkman and Hawkgirl/woman and were
> > major players in the Invasion crossover and members of the JLA in long
> > standing. The next they've just left Thanagar for Earth for the first
> > time AFTER the invasion event thanks to the Hawkworld mini-series and
> > it's lack of an "X years ago" caption. (speaking of confusion that
> > left the Hawkman portion of the DCU in chaos for over a decade)
> > (I could come up with more examples if you want, as I'm sure other
> > posters can, but I think I've made the point)-
>
> Is that more or less confusing than:
Apples and oranges. You are comparing retcons that happened many years
after the stories that they alter to a mainly minor degree (for
example, Superboy meeting young Lex luthor doesn't actually change
anything about the previous Lex stories other than to give him a
previously unknown motivation for his hatred of Superman) to stories
that radically alter stories that took place just a year or less
previously (such as the who Hawkman mess). Do you honestly think they
are on the same level? seriously? *rollseyes*
plausible prose man
I don't know if you're aware of this, but none of those things ever
really happened. You know, it's not like Crisis on Infinite Earths or
Man of Steel or any of several other contradictory stories and retcons
involved John Byrne sending the She-hulk over to your house to rip up
your old comics so you can't read them anymore.
> resulting in years of
> attempting to repair the damage (in the case of Hawkman).
Eh...that's a little strong. You know, it's not like the DC Universe
was "broken" in any real way, such that you couldn't read any of their
comics or anything. Anyway, I think it was more Hawkworld that did the
damage than COIE per se.
> > > Examples that spring to mind:
> > > 1) Lex Luther was a criminal scientist/genius in jail and had a
> > > criminal record (The end of the Crisis on Infinite Earths and the
> > > Subesquent Superman, Action, and DC Presents stories that were
> > > published prior to Man of Steel #1) next year Lex Luthor is a ruthless
> > > Businessman who had never been in jail for his crimes.
> > > 2) One Day, Katar Hol his wife were cops from Thanagar who had been on
> > > Earth for years as the Superheroes Hawkman and Hawkgirl/woman and were
> > > major players in the Invasion crossover and members of the JLA in long
> > > standing. The next they've just left Thanagar for Earth for the first
> > > time AFTER the invasion event thanks to the Hawkworld mini-series and
> > > it's lack of an "X years ago" caption. (speaking of confusion that
> > > left the Hawkman portion of the DCU in chaos for over a decade)
> > > (I could come up with more examples if you want, as I'm sure other
> > > posters can, but I think I've made the point)-
>
> > Is that more or less confusing than:
>
> Apples and oranges.
Well, obviously I don't agree.
> You are comparing retcons that happened many years
> after the stories that they alter to a mainly minor degree (for
> example, Superboy meeting young Lex luthor doesn't actually change
> anything about the previous Lex stories other than to give him a
> previously unknown motivation for his hatred of Superman)
The article cited suggested there was a more serious contradiction
than that, perhaps having to do with Superman's previous "first"
meeting of Luthor.
>to stories
> that radically alter stories that took place just a year or less
> previously
The stories aren't actually altered. Again, it's not like Roy and
Marv come over to your house with Perez and redraw and rewrite panels
in your comics.
> (such as the who Hawkman mess). Do you honestly think they
> are on the same level?
Yeah, I do, actually. As mentioned, the whole Earth 2 thing only sort
of works for "the big three."
> seriously?
No comic book universe robust enough to contain retcons and reboots
can ever be complete and consistent.
whoswhoz
wrote:
Superboy met Lex Luthor as a teenager only a little over a year after
two stories in which he fought Lex Luthor as an adult. That's at
least as #@#$34 up as the Modern version.
selaboc
> >> Is that more or less confusing than:
>
> >Apples and oranges. You are comparing retcons that happened many years
> >after the stories that they alter to a mainly minor degree (for
> >example, Superboy meeting young Lex luthor doesn't actually change
> >anything about the previous Lex stories other than to give him a
> >previously unknown motivation for his hatred of Superman) to stories
> >that radically alter stories that took place just a year or less
> >previously (such as the who Hawkman mess). Do you honestly think they
> >are on the same level? seriously? *rollseyes*
>
> Superboy met Lex Luthor as a teenager only a little over a year after
> two stories in which he fought Lex Luthor as an adult. That's at
Hardly. Revealing a previously untold encounter between two
individuals is hardly the same thing as completely changing everything
you know about a character and thier history (Lex criminal genius
scientist with a criminal record vs Lex corrupt Businessman whose
never been in jail for his crimes for example). The former is
something all long running serial fictions eventually engage in, the
later simplly isn't.
Daibhid Ceanaideach
I think what Duggy is saying is that Super*boy* met Luthor as an adult
before meeting him as a teenager. In other words, Luthor was an adult
when Clark was a boy, and then they were the same age a year later.
selaboc
> > > Were you ever actually confused by any of that? I mean, sure, some
> > > stories contradicted each other, but this was nothing new.
>
> > Not just "contradict" completely change the past
>
> I don't know if you're aware of this, but none of those things ever
> really happened.
Oh please, put away your strawmen. Just because you don't wish to
engage your brain when reading comic books doesn't mean those that do
somehow think "it's really happened".
> > resulting in years of
> > attempting to repair the damage (in the case of Hawkman).
>
> Eh...that's a little strong.
No, it isn't. Perhaps you are too young to remember, but the Hawkman
area of the DCU was a mess for years, so much so people thought it'd
never get back under control. I suggest you look it up in the archives
of this very group what people were saying about it during the years
between Hawkworld and when they resurrected Carter in the JSA.
> Anyway, I think it was more Hawkworld that did the
> damage than COIE per se.
I never plaing COIE per se. COIE actually attempted to give a clean
slate and a reason for it's changes. Man of Steel and Hawkworld (and
others, but those are the two biggest offenders) are the ones that
didn't play nice but contradicting what had already been established
in the months prior to their release.
> > You are comparing retcons that happened many years
> > after the stories that they alter to a mainly minor degree (for
> > example, Superboy meeting young Lex luthor doesn't actually change
> > anything about the previous Lex stories other than to give him a
> > previously unknown motivation for his hatred of Superman)
>
> The article cited suggested there was a more serious contradiction
> than that, perhaps having to do with Superman's previous "first"
> meeting of Luthor.
Which was decades earlier and minor in comparison to the the
differences that Man of Steel and Hawkworld were to the comics
published just months before. Do you HONESTLY not see a difference
between inserting an previous unmentioned meeting between two
characters (Lex meets Superboy) and completely changing a characters
character, motivation, and history (Lex criminal genious/scientist
with a criminal record vs Lex the corrupt Businessman who has never
been in jail). Here's a clue for you, the former you see all the time
in most long lasting serial fictions the later you don't.
> >to stories
> > that radically alter stories that took place just a year or less
> > previously
>
> The stories aren't actually altered. Again, it's not like Roy and
> Marv come over to your house with Perez and redraw and rewrite panels
> in your comics.
Oh, Grow up. No one is saying the Roy and Marv (or John Byrne) snuck
into their homes and redrew and rewrote books in their collection. But
What did happen was that the ongoing story as told in the ongoing
books CHANGED from one month (Hawkman long standing member of the JLA
major player in the Invasion) to the next (Hawkman hasn't been to
earth yet, wasn't in Invasion, wasn't in the JLA and yet the Invasion
and JLA stories were still supposed to happened. Huh?)
> > (such as the who Hawkman mess). Do you honestly think they
> > are on the same level?
>
> Yeah, I do, actually.
Then we'll have to agree to disagree because if you honestly believe
that I don't think there's any talking sense to you (as can be seen
from your "you know it really didn't happen, Marv didn't sneak into
your house and rewrite your comic books" strawman nonsense shows).
selaboc
wrote:
I didn't know whoswhoz and Duggy were the same person. ;)
Unless I'm mistaken the Superboy battles lex as an adult stories
involved time travel.
Daibhid Ceanaideach
> On Jul 30, 5:13�am, plausible prose man <Georgefha...@aol.com> wrote:
>> > resulting in years of
>> > attempting to repair the damage (in the case of Hawkman).
>>
>> �Eh...that's a little strong.
>
> No, it isn't. Perhaps you are too young to remember, but the Hawkman
> area of the DCU was a mess for years, so much so people thought it'd
> never get back under control. I suggest you look it up in the archives
> of this very group what people were saying about it during the years
> between Hawkworld and when they resurrected Carter in the JSA.
While I don't feel as strongly about it as you do, I do agree with this.
It reached the point where Grant Morrison wasn't allowed to have a *new*
Hawkman in the JLA, because the name itself was so tainted by the
continuity snarl.
I don't think changing the continuity is necessarily a bad thing, but I
*do* think the way it was implemented in Hawkman's case was very, very
bad.
Daibhid Ceanaideach
Whoops; I don't know how I made that mistake.
> Unless I'm mistaken the Superboy battles lex as an adult stories
> involved time travel.
There were certainly stories that did (one with Lincoln IIRC, and
probably a Legion one). But Don Markstein's Toonopedia says:
"It [baldness] made Luthor look considerably older than Superman, which
he was probably intended to be. This was confirmed during the '50s, when
he made his first appearance in the Superboy series, as a middle-aged
adult. Later, when DC Comics decided to give him an origin story, he was
retconned into Supes's contemporary."
http://www.toonopedia.com/luthor.htm
selaboc
Ah, I was unaware of that story (my 1950s collection has gaps) so I
looked it up. That would be Superboy #59 in the story "Superboy Meets
Amazing Man" the one and only story (atleast according to the Superboy
Index) featuring Superboy vs an adult Lex that wasn't said in-story to
involve time travelling. Nobody has ever said there wasn't continuity
cock-ups in pre-crisis stories, but that one there still doesn't come
anywhere near the Hawkman level of mess/confusion. (in otherwords the
Young Lex origin story only places in doubt one very minor previous
story - a common occurance when dealing with retcons. the Hawk-mess
places in doubt every story that featured Hawkman on Earth atleast
since Crisis including a very prominent storyline - Invasion - which
was said to still have happened even though without Hawkman it
couldn't have happened. That is not a common occurance when dealing
with retcons. The two are many orders of magnatude apart.
plausible prose man
Apparently a time traveling Robin, but it's a Luthor that's
contemporary to Superboy, despite being roughly the same age he'd
appear in the regular Superman comics.
whoswhoz
wrote:
You're right Duggy and whos whoz are not (shudder) the same person.
You're wrong the Superboy adult Luthor stories did not involve trime
travel.
plausible prose man
> On Jul 30, 5:13 am, plausible prose man <Georgefha...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> > > > Were you ever actually confused by any of that? I mean, sure, some
> > > > stories contradicted each other, but this was nothing new.
>
> > > Not just "contradict" completely change the past
>
> > I don't know if you're aware of this, but none of those things ever
> > really happened.
>
> Oh please, put away your strawmen.
I suppose it's snarkier than it needs to be, sure, but it does seem
that some continutity mismatch keeps you from enjoying a given comic,
and even more so some retcon can really ruin the enjoyment you take
from a story you'd previously enjoyed.
> Just because you don't wish to
> engage your brain
Yeah, I kind of think it's the people who stuggle with Man of Steel
and its associated reboots and can't keep Hawkman's incarnations
straight who are not engaging their brain.
> > > resulting in years of
> > > attempting to repair the damage (in the case of Hawkman).
>
> > Eh...that's a little strong.
>
> No, it isn't.
Again, it's not like the DCU was really broken such that you couldn't
read a comic...and remember, it's that kind of thinking that opened up
the whole "let's make everything easier to understand" can of worms in
the first place.
> Perhaps you are too young to remember, but the Hawkman
> area of the DCU was a mess for years, so much so people thought it'd
> never get back under control.
Do you feel its under control now? Someone was complaining it was
still all messed up, that the "curse" didn't happen to GA Hawkman and
Hawkgirl, and apparently their enjoyment of Blackest Night suffered as
a result.
> I suggest you look it up in the archives
> of this very group what people were saying about it during the years
> between Hawkworld and when they resurrected Carter in the JSA.
There's only so much I can get worked up about continuity glitches,
and doubly so when they involve Hawkman. I didn't recognize 2/3rds of
the characters in Legion of Three Worlds, but far from detracting from
my enjoyment, this added to it.
> > Anyway, I think it was more Hawkworld that did the
> > damage than COIE per se.
>
> I never plaing COIE per se. COIE actually attempted to give a clean
> slate
Yes, I like how the end result of making everything easier to
understand was apparently no one could understand anything.
>and a reason for it's changes. Man of Steel and Hawkworld (and
> others, but those are the two biggest offenders) are the ones that
> didn't play nice but contradicting what had already been established
> in the months prior to their release.
I just can't fathom the feelings of hurt, betrayal, and confusion I'm
picking up from you here.
>
> > > You are comparing retcons that happened many years
> > > after the stories that they alter to a mainly minor degree (for
> > > example, Superboy meeting young Lex luthor doesn't actually change
> > > anything about the previous Lex stories other than to give him a
> > > previously unknown motivation for his hatred of Superman)
>
> > The article cited suggested there was a more serious contradiction
> > than that, perhaps having to do with Superman's previous "first"
> > meeting of Luthor.
>
> Which was decades earlier and minor in comparison to the the
> differences that Man of Steel and Hawkworld were to the comics
> published just months before. Do you HONESTLY not see a difference
> between inserting an previous unmentioned meeting between two
> characters (Lex meets Superboy) and completely changing a characters
> character, motivation, and history (Lex criminal genious/scientist
> with a criminal record vs Lex the corrupt Businessman who has never
> been in jail).
Heh, I really liked the hair thing.
>Here's a clue for you, the former you see all the time
> in most long lasting serial fictions the later you don't.
Want to bet? Why don't you ask James Bond or the Shadow about that.
> > >to stories
> > > that radically alter stories that took place just a year or less
> > > previously
>
> > The stories aren't actually altered. Again, it's not like Roy and
> > Marv come over to your house with Perez and redraw and rewrite panels
> > in your comics.
>
> Oh, Grow up. No one is saying the Roy and Marv (or John Byrne) snuck
> into their homes and redrew and rewrote books in their collection.
You seem to be acting like it, really.
>But
> What did happen was that the ongoing story as told in the ongoing
> books CHANGED from one month (Hawkman long standing member of the JLA
> major player in the Invasion) to the next (Hawkman hasn't been to
> earth yet, wasn't in Invasion, wasn't in the JLA and yet the Invasion
> and JLA stories were still supposed to happened. Huh?)
And that's all different from those Silver Age Superman comics, how?
>
> > > (such as the who Hawkman mess). Do you honestly think they
> > > are on the same level?
>
> > Yeah, I do, actually.
>
> Then we'll have to agree to disagree because if you honestly believe
> that I don't think there's any talking sense to you
I'm troubled by the word "sense" here, which speaks to the (to me)
inexplicable feeling of outrage that Hawkman wasn't along on a
particular JLA case.
>(as can be seen
> from your "you know it really didn't happen, Marv didn't sneak into
> your house and rewrite your comic books" strawman nonsense shows).
I don't think that's a strawman. It might be a reductio ad absurdum,
or it might just be me being snarky with you.
Anlatt the Builder
>
> > Just because you don't wish to
> > engage your brain
>
> Yeah, I kind of think it's the people who stuggle with Man of Steel
> and its associated reboots and can't keep Hawkman's incarnations
> straight who are not engaging their brain.
>
>
You are wrong. The people you are talking about ARE engaging their
brains. They may not be doing so in a way that seems important to you,
and you are under no obligation to engage your brain in the same way
(despite what the earlier poster said). But they are engaging their
brains.
It's not that they "can't keep Hawkman's incarnations straight," it's
that they are disappointed that DC doesn't bother to keep Hawkman's
incarnations straight. That's because they enjoy and appreciate what
in SF/Fantasy - and particularly in serial form - is called "world-
building," in which stories are deliberately set in the same fictional
world, leverage the details of that world to enhance their
storytelling, and create a setting from accumulated detail that could
not have been created in a single story or arc, or even a single
series.
Some people like that kind of thing. I do.
And if you enjoy when it's done well, then it's kind of natural that
you would be a little let down when it's done poorly. Especially in
those cases where it didn't have to be done poorly - where the
essential story could have been told without violating the consistency
of the shared setting, or where the story is such that it would be
better off in an Elseworlds, or where the inconsistency comes from
laziness, apathy, and editorial ignorance, rather than an irresistable
urge to create the Best. Story. EVER. (Tha trick rarely works,
although not never.)
People should not treat you badly for not being interested in such
things. But that works both ways.
I am probably the fan you're talking about who never really liked the
"eternal Hawk reincarnation curse." For two reasons: (1) It's
inconsistent with what came before. The writer took two data points
and extrapolated, but his extrapolation only agreed with one of the
data points. (2) It forces all of the Hawks' past lives into a string
of overly similar, overly determined, angsty tragedies, rather than
opeing the door to varied and unexpected events in those past lives.
So, see? It's not just a continuity problem. (Also, we've already had
Donna Troy go through lifetime after lifetime doomed to end in
tragedy. Never like that much either, although it suggested a
superhero name for her: Martyr Girl.)
I broughtit up in the CONTEXT of Blackest Knight, because they made a
big deal about talking about it there. But I didn't say it seriously
degraded my ENJOYMENT of Blackest Night, because, for all the talk, it
didn't seem like a key aspect of the story.
grinningdemon
<George...@aol.com> wrote:
>> Perhaps you are too young to remember, but the Hawkman
>> area of the DCU was a mess for years, so much so people thought it'd
>> never get back under control.
>
> Do you feel its under control now? Someone was complaining it was
>still all messed up, that the "curse" didn't happen to GA Hawkman and
>Hawkgirl, and apparently their enjoyment of Blackest Night suffered as
>a result.
The Hawkman situation is FAR better than it was...there are still
kinks but I think Geoff Johns did a great job of weaving the various
threads of Hawk history together into something workable again...it's
not perfect but I don't think they can do much better at this point.
Of course, that all hinges on whether or not Jim Starlin gets his way
with the character...because, if he does, he's going to undo
everything Johns tried to fix...his recent Hawkman Special (tied into
the Rann-Thanagar War mini) suggests that Carter (GA Hawkman) is
actually Katar (SA Hawkman) and Carter's entire history of
reincarnation was bullshit...Starlin left an out at the end of the
issue by having Hawkman say he wasn't sure if this new origin was the
the lie...hopefully, DC will take that out and ignore Starlin's
crap...if he want's a Thanagarian Hawkman back so badly...fine...bring
him back...but don't piss all over the GA Hawkman by declaring it all
bullshit and retconning him INTO the Thanagarian Hawkman...if only the
books actually had editors who would DO THEIR DAMN JOBS, crap like
this could be avoided.
selaboc
Already covered in another post. We're talking one story that does not
involve time travel: Superboy #59 in the story "Superboy Meets
Amazing Man" and a cameo in one story (the one with Robin) which
involved Time Travel (on Robins part, not Lex's) in which Lex is
refered to a "Young Luthor". Granted the one panel that features Lex,
he doesn't look very young nor does he look much like Lex (though that
could be down to artist drawing lex dfferently in the early 50s vs
later 50s/60s - I'd actually need to compare with some other Lex
stories of the time to be certain). And again, as mentioned elsewhere,
a retcon that puts in doubt a single story (and a cameo) is orders of
magnitude different from one that tosses out entire runs of stories
fro mjust months earlier. No one expects the writers to know all the
details of every single story ever written previously. They do expect
them to know the major details of major storyline that happened
recently though.
plausible prose man
> On Jul 30, 5:58 pm, plausible prose man <Georgefha...@aol.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> > > Just because you don't wish to
> > > engage your brain
>
> > Yeah, I kind of think it's the people who stuggle with Man of Steel
> > and its associated reboots and can't keep Hawkman's incarnations
> > straight who are not engaging their brain.
>
> You are wrong. The people you are talking about ARE engaging their
> brains.
I think that's an unfortunate choice of words. Obviously neither of us
are becoming catatonic or having an epileptic fit when we sit down to
read comics.
> It's not that they "can't keep Hawkman's incarnations straight,"
It does seem that way to me.
> it's
> that they are disappointed that DC doesn't bother to keep Hawkman's
> incarnations straight.
I think if any incarnation of Hawkman had proven popular, he'd have
been straightend out from thereon in.
> That's because they enjoy and appreciate what
> in SF/Fantasy - and particularly in serial form - is called "world-
> building,"
No, that's awarding yourself too many points. I enjoy world building.
I seemingly, however, more fully appreciate the process by which this
particular world is built.
> in which stories are deliberately set in the same fictional
> world, leverage the details of that world to enhance their
> storytelling, and create a setting from accumulated detail that could
> not have been created in a single story or arc, or even a single
> series.
That world is a very big place.
> Some people like that kind of thing. I do.
I see no evidence of that.
> And if you enjoy when it's done well, then it's kind of natural that
> you would be a little let down when it's done poorly.
It seems, at least in the case under discussion, the problem isn't
that it's occaisionally done poorly, but that it's done at all, or
that some writer or editor feels the need to strip away accumlated
detrius and get back to what made that character so interesting in the
first place. Someone seems to be pretty angry they retroactively undid
the hair thing with luthor.
> Especially in
> those cases where it didn't have to be done poorly - where the
> essential story could have been told without violating the consistency
> of the shared setting, or where the story is such that it would be
> better off in an Elseworlds,
Or, say, someone doesn't like someone else's character or additions
to a character and just sort of ignores them. I don't like Leslie
Thompkins, and I don't care for Stephanie Brown, especially where she
becomes Robin.
Answer me straight up, do you think it ruins Lois Lane that she
doesn't know interlac or klukor?
> or where the inconsistency comes from
> laziness, apathy, and editorial ignorance, rather than an irresistable
> urge to create the Best. Story. EVER. (Tha trick rarely works,
> although not never.)
>
> People should not treat you badly for not being interested in such
> things.
I think your view shows a relative ignorance of how stories in
general work, and especially comics. Sometimes there are going to be
missteps, and the best thing to do, IMO, is to ignore them. Moreover,
there are even good instory reasons for this to happen, just as a
fundemental property of a place like the DCU. Kurt Busiek has a pretty
good story in his Astro Cities that touches on this; Time Travel and
other universal shifts imply that sometimes you wake up and the world
is a different place.
>But that works both ways.
>
> I am probably the fan you're talking about who never really liked the
> "eternal Hawk reincarnation curse." For two reasons: (1) It's
> inconsistent with what came before. The writer took two data points
> and extrapolated, but his extrapolation only agreed with one of the
> data points. (2) It forces all of the Hawks' past lives into a string
> of overly similar, overly determined, angsty tragedies, rather than
> opeing the door to varied and unexpected events in those past lives.
Again, it seems to fit the characters origins, ie, it seems
appropriate for someone from ancient Egypt to face a lethal curse and
reincarnation, and make him more original than the flying member of
the mean right hook wing of the JSA.
> So, see? It's not just a continuity problem. (Also, we've already had
> Donna Troy go through lifetime after lifetime doomed to end in
> tragedy. Never like that much either, although it suggested a
> superhero name for her: Martyr Girl.)
So it's more just a set of narratives you don't like than any real
quality of writing issue.
> I broughtit up in the CONTEXT of Blackest Knight, because they made a
> big deal about talking about it there. But I didn't say it seriously
> degraded my ENJOYMENT of Blackest Night, because, for all the talk, it
> didn't seem like a key aspect of the story.
It's about time DC had a successful on-going event. Marvel's really
been eating their lunch between Civil War, Secret Invasion, and Dark
Reign. It is probably about time, though, that something happened in
the Dark Reign narrative.
Sean MacDonald
wrote:
> The Hawkman situation is FAR better than it was...there are still
> kinks but I think Geoff Johns did a great job of weaving the various
> threads of Hawk history together into something workable again...it's
> not perfect but I don't think they can do much better at this point.
>
> Of course, that all hinges on whether or not Jim Starlin gets his way
> with the character...
Well, in recent issues of... what's that book he's writing?... anyway,
the one with Adam Strange, Comet (not Captain Comet... except he is),
the Weird, Bizarro, etc... apparently, he's had to change his plans
for using Hawkman. The characters talk about Hawkman has suddenly
become unavailable, how Hawkman was going to become one of the
"Aberrant Five", but he won't now, and so they have to find a
replacement.
Anlatt the Builder
You know, I tried to be polite and explain my point of view while
respecting yours. Clearly this was a waste of time, as you mainly want
to be snide and demonstrate your "superiority." Enjoy.
Michael
Blackest Night spoiler.
Unless it's undone, Hawkman & Hawkgirl got killed in Blackest Night #1.
And if it's not undone they could always reincarnate them.
Michael
OM
<grinni...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>The Hawkman situation is FAR better than it was...there are still
>kinks but I think Geoff Johns did a great job of weaving the various
>threads of Hawk history together into something workable again...it's
>not perfect but I don't think they can do much better at this point.
...See, this is what has most Hawk-fans pissed off at Didio about.
Geoff had everything worked out so it actually made sense! What little
plot holes remained weren't worth worrying about, and the "JSA" arc
that fixed the Crisis-molested histories of the Hawks was one of the
highlights of the entire series.
...No, this was a clear-cut case of Didio "fixing" something that
wasn't broken in the first place, all because he wanted the Silver Age
Hawks back. Just watch, kids - "Blackest Night" won't be finished more
than two months before we see two cops from Thanagar show up wanting
to exchange gestapo techniques with the local excuse for law
enforcement. And all because Didio's a schmuck and couldn't be
satisfied with something that worked.
OM
--
]=====================================[
] OMBlog - http://www.io.com/~o_m/omworld [
] Let's face it: Sometimes you *need* [
] an obnoxious opinion in your day! [
]=====================================[
grinningdemon
wrote:
>On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 00:16:35 -0500, grinningdemon
><grinni...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>
>>The Hawkman situation is FAR better than it was...there are still
>>kinks but I think Geoff Johns did a great job of weaving the various
>>threads of Hawk history together into something workable again...it's
>>not perfect but I don't think they can do much better at this point.
>
>...See, this is what has most Hawk-fans pissed off at Didio about.
>Geoff had everything worked out so it actually made sense! What little
>plot holes remained weren't worth worrying about, and the "JSA" arc
>that fixed the Crisis-molested histories of the Hawks was one of the
>highlights of the entire series.
>
>...No, this was a clear-cut case of Didio "fixing" something that
>wasn't broken in the first place, all because he wanted the Silver Age
>Hawks back. Just watch, kids - "Blackest Night" won't be finished more
>than two months before we see two cops from Thanagar show up wanting
>to exchange gestapo techniques with the local excuse for law
>enforcement. And all because Didio's a schmuck and couldn't be
>satisfied with something that worked.
>
>
> OM
Agreed...although I'm not yet convinced we've seen the last of this
latest incarnation of the Hawks.
OM
<grinni...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>Agreed...although I'm not yet convinced we've seen the last of this
>latest incarnation of the Hawks.
...Of course not. They're dead, so they have to come back as Black
Lanterns for at least one issue! :P
Michael
> On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 00:16:35 -0500, grinningdemon
> <grinni...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>
>
>>The Hawkman situation is FAR better than it was...there are still
>>kinks but I think Geoff Johns did a great job of weaving the various
>>threads of Hawk history together into something workable again...it's
>>not perfect but I don't think they can do much better at this point.
>
>
> ...See, this is what has most Hawk-fans pissed off at Didio about.
> Geoff had everything worked out so it actually made sense! What little
> plot holes remained weren't worth worrying about, and the "JSA" arc
> that fixed the Crisis-molested histories of the Hawks was one of the
> highlights of the entire series.
>
> ...No, this was a clear-cut case of Didio "fixing" something that
> wasn't broken in the first place, all because he wanted the Silver Age
> Hawks back. Just watch, kids - "Blackest Night" won't be finished more
> than two months before we see two cops from Thanagar show up wanting
> to exchange gestapo techniques with the local excuse for law
> enforcement. And all because Didio's a schmuck and couldn't be
> satisfied with something that worked.
How much of the Siler Age Hawks were the Thanagarian spies that were
retconned into existence?
Michael
grinningdemon
wrote:
I'm not really sure how that works now...I know a lot of the SA
Justice League stuff is now attributed to the GA Hawks even though it
was originally the SA Hawks...and I believe the Hawkworld stuff is
still more or less intact as the current version of the SA Hawks...I'm
not sure where the spies fall in between.
Duggy
> On Fri, 31 Jul 2009 18:28:09 -0500, grinningdemon
> <grinningde...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
> >Agreed...although I'm not yet convinced we've seen the last of this
> >latest incarnation of the Hawks.
> ...Of course not. They're dead, so they have to come back as Black
> Lanterns for at least one issue! :P
As someone not reading Black Lanterns, does an appearence as one
confirm that someone is dead?
As in, stopping "Oh, I was living on an island this whole time, now
I'm back" type returns?
Not that Black Lanterns can't be retconned, of course.
===
= DUG.
===
Anlatt the Builder
We've seen people in DCU Heaven who turned out not to be dead, I
think....
In Blackest Night, the key question will be how they handle Batman,
since we know he's not dead. Whose skeleton is that, anyway?
Duggy
> We've seen people in DCU Heaven who turned out not to be dead, I
> think....
Agreed...
Deadman: Dead Again (I think) featured Barry Allen & Jason Todd
heading to heaven... Barry had previous been revealed to enter the
SpeedForce and since Jason has... eh, who knows.
> In Blackest Night, the key question will be how they handle Batman,
> since we know he's not dead. Whose skeleton is that, anyway?
IDK.
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
I think it's Batman's. I don't necessarily find the idea someone's
mortal remains could exist in the present while they're alive in the
past inconsistent with the Omega Effect, but hopefully they'll come up
with something that satisfies you, which would probably be nothing
short of it's being one of those Bat-clones, or otherwise I'll have to
hear you whine about how confusing everything is.
grinningdemon
I expect it will turn out to be something along the lines of Donna
Troy where he's living one crappy life after another only, in Batman's
case, he's lost in time as well...isn't that pretty much in line with
the concept of the Omega Effect?
Anonymous Person
>
> How much of the Siler Age Hawks were the Thanagarian spies that were
> retconned into existence?
Not much. Basically, they took the Hawks' place shortly after "The
Last Days of the JSA", took Superman to Krypton, spent some time with
the Justice League (International) where "Hawkman" quibbled that the
League wasn't like the League he knew (in the comics as published) or
the League that his father belonged to (since he was pretending to be
Hawkman's son in the retcon), met the Atom in "Power of the Atom", and
helped Animal Man defuse a Thanagarian bomb during Invasion!. The
spies' career replacing the Hawks ended during Invasion!
Michael
Jason's reappearance was a Super Reality Altering Punch. Not sure why
Barry would show up in DCU Heaven if he'd already have been shown to be
one with the Speed Force, but who the heck knows?
I think it comes down to "They're currently dead until/unless they get
better or have never been dead".
Michael
Magnus, Robot Fighter
<black...@aol.com> wrote:
>1. Is is correct to call the Earth 2 Batman the Golden Age Batman and
>the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman? Or is that too simple. It
>seems like later on within the DCU they kind of reconned it so that
>the E-2 Batman had retired by the Silver Age and that the E-1 begins
>at the dawn of the Silver Age, but don't think this was the case at
>the time.
>
>2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
>the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
>
>3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
>that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
>Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
>
>4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
I just read the last Volume 1 Brave and the Bold....featuring briefly
Earth 2's Joker...I tried to find some online info for him, but
couldn't find much.
grinningdemon
wrote:
>Duggy wrote:
>
>> On Aug 1, 7:45 pm, Anlatt the Builder <tirh...@aol.com> wrote:
>>
>>>We've seen people in DCU Heaven who turned out not to be dead, I
>>>think....
>>
>>
>> Agreed...
>>
>> Deadman: Dead Again (I think) featured Barry Allen & Jason Todd
>> heading to heaven... Barry had previous been revealed to enter the
>> SpeedForce and since Jason has... eh, who knows.
>>
>>
>>>In Blackest Night, the key question will be how they handle Batman,
>>>since we know he's not dead. Whose skeleton is that, anyway?
>
>Jason's reappearance was a Super Reality Altering Punch. Not sure why
>Barry would show up in DCU Heaven if he'd already have been shown to be
>one with the Speed Force, but who the heck knows?
But it was revealed that Jason was resurrected only a year or so after
his death and then spent a few years wondering the streets as a
brain-damaged moron...while he was seen in the after life as recently
as the end of Kevin Smith's Green Arrow: Quiver storyline...a good
12-13 years (real time) after his death...in fact, Ollie didn't even
die until several years after Jason...there's really no way to
reconcile these things even with the slower passage of time in the
DCU.
And we've also seen the ghosts of Sinestro and Spoiler even though
both were subsequently revealed to have never died at all.
Anlatt the Builder
Screw you. All I did was ask an entirely reasonable question.
Duggy
> But it was revealed that Jason was resurrected only a year or so after
> his death and then spent a few years wondering the streets as a
> brain-damaged moron...while he was seen in the after life as recently
> as the end of Kevin Smith's Green Arrow: Quiver storyline...a good
> 12-13 years (real time) after his death...in fact, Ollie didn't even
> die until several years after Jason...there's really no way to
> reconcile these things even with the slower passage of time in the
> DCU.
Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
here.
I guess the spirit could be the Earth-Jason-Dies spirit.
> And we've also seen the ghosts of Sinestro and Spoiler even though
> both were subsequently revealed to have never died at all.
Yeah, pretty much par-for-the-course.
===
= DUG.
===
Duggy
> Screw you. All I did was ask an entirely reasonable question.
I think he was bullied at school today, and he's taking it out on us.
Perhaps he'll fit in better when he hits High School.
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
> On Aug 2, 2:22 am, grinningdemon <grinningde...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>
> > But it was revealed that Jason was resurrected only a year or so after
> > his death and then spent a few years wondering the streets as a
> > brain-damaged moron...while he was seen in the after life as recently
> > as the end of Kevin Smith's Green Arrow: Quiver storyline...a good
> > 12-13 years (real time) after his death...in fact, Ollie didn't even
> > die until several years after Jason...there's really no way to
> > reconcile these things even with the slower passage of time in the
> > DCU.
>
> Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
> punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
> here.
Huh?
> I guess the spirit could be the Earth-Jason-Dies spirit.
>
> > And we've also seen the ghosts of Sinestro and Spoiler even though
> > both were subsequently revealed to have never died at all.
>
> Yeah, pretty much par-for-the-course.
Oooh, somebodies widdle feewlings are sure huwt a big, nasty writer
ignored something in the background of a panel or two of comic book to
write a totally different story. It sure is hard work to read comics,
isn'tit?
Poor ol' Duggy...poor ol' Duggy.
plausible prose man
Yeah, ehr, you know, the Omega Sanction, which sounds like a Robery
Ludlum novel...
"Another type of Omega Effect is the Omega Sanction. The Omega
Sanction traps the organism in a series of alternate realities, each
worse than the previous one. Also, the ability has been shown to
transport those struck by it through time and space.
"
Neil Gaiman's "final" Batman story fits well into that, although it
stands well enough on its own, too.
In any case, it doesn't really make a lot of sense for the skeleton
to be anyone's but Batman's. You know, if you use Occam's razor, is it
more likely something supernatural like the omega sanction has exotic
properties, or is it more likely someone rather inexplicably found
another body and dressed it up like Batman, and then disappeared,
leaving no hint they'd been there to do that or guess at their
motivations?
grinningdemon
<George...@aol.com> wrote:
>On Aug 1, 6:13�pm, Duggy <Paul.Dug...@jcu.edu.au> wrote:
>> On Aug 2, 2:22�am, grinningdemon <grinningde...@austin.rr.com> wrote:
>>
>> > But it was revealed that Jason was resurrected only a year or so after
>> > his death and then spent a few years wondering the streets as a
>> > brain-damaged moron...while he was seen in the after life as recently
>> > as the end of Kevin Smith's Green Arrow: Quiver storyline...a good
>> > 12-13 years (real time) after his death...in fact, Ollie didn't even
>> > die until several years after Jason...there's really no way to
>> > reconcile these things even with the slower passage of time in the
>> > DCU.
>>
>> Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
>> punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
>> here.
>
> Huh?
Yeah...he kind of lost me there, too.
>
>
>> I guess the spirit could be the Earth-Jason-Dies spirit.
>>
>> > And we've also seen the ghosts of Sinestro and Spoiler even though
>> > both were subsequently revealed to have never died at all.
>>
>> Yeah, pretty much par-for-the-course.
>
> Oooh, somebodies widdle feewlings are sure huwt a big, nasty writer
>ignored something in the background of a panel or two of comic book to
>write a totally different story. It sure is hard work to read comics,
>isn'tit?
>
> Poor ol' Duggy...poor ol' Duggy.
Actually, there were entire storylines that revolved around the ghosts
of Sinestro and Spoiler...much more than a couple of panels...and
we've seen Jason Todd in the after life in several stories...so it
adds up to quite a bit more than a couple panels.
That said, I don't know about Duggy, but I'm not bothered that they
ignored Jason in the afterlife so much as that they brought him back
FROM the afterlife...he's an obnoxious, psychopathic twit and was
infinitely more interesting in death than he is now that he's back and
they can't decide whether he's a hero or villain from one week to the
next.
Duggy
> On Aug 1, 6:13 pm, Duggy <Paul.Dug...@jcu.edu.au> wrote:
> > Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
> > punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
> > here.
> Huh?
Look, I used simple words. Not simple enough for you, but that's
hardly unexpected.
> > Yeah, pretty much par-for-the-course.
> Oooh, somebodies widdle feewlings are sure huwt a big, nasty writer
> ignored something in the background of a panel or two of comic book to
> write a totally different story. It sure is hard work to read comics,
> isn'tit?
It must be for you.
===
= DUG.
===
Duggy
> That said, I don't know about Duggy, but I'm not bothered that they
> ignored Jason in the afterlife so much as that they brought him back
> infinitely more interesting in death than he is now that he's back and
> they can't decide whether he's a hero or villain from one week to the
> next.
Agreed. I also don't care that they ignored it, it was just an
interesting side-discussion. I also agree that everything I've read
with him in it since he came back made me wish he didn't.
The thing that annoyed me most, really, was the way he was brought
back. A silly idea, stupidly executed. (Smells of Didio)
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
> On Aug 2, 11:54 am, plausible prose man <Georgefha...@aol.com> wrote:
>
> > On Aug 1, 6:13 pm, Duggy <Paul.Dug...@jcu.edu.au> wrote:
> > > Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
> > > punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
> > > here.
> > Huh?
>
> Look, I used simple words.
Yes, I understand the individual words, but I'm not really sure how
you think they're meant to fit together; "a reality punch caused his
death from another dimension caused him to happen here."
Do you write for Wikipedia?
> Not simple enough for you,
And by simple, you mean coherent.
Duggy
> Yes, I understand the individual words, but I'm not really sure how
> you think they're meant to fit together; "a reality punch caused his
> death from another dimension caused him to happen here."
> Do you write for Wikipedia?
"Reality Punch" - see Infinite Crisis.
"caused his death from another dimension" - see the Batman Annual.
"to happen here" - see A Lonely Place of Dying.
===
= DUG.
===
YKW (ad hoc)
b35c7f...@k13g2000prh.googlegroups.com:
> Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
> punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
> here.
>
> I guess the spirit could be the Earth-Jason-Dies spirit.
Or it could be that the reality-punched version of Jason doesn't yet have
his soul back, and his shade is still sippin' lattes with the DEAD LIKE
ME cast.
>> And we've also seen the ghosts of Sinestro and Spoiler even though
>> both were subsequently revealed to have never died at all.
>
> Yeah, pretty much par-for-the-course.
>
Not remembering too many ghost-of-Sinestro moments, but I do know that
Spoiler's "ghost" appeared to only one person, and a person in a near-
death state at that; it could easily have been imagined.
--
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
|| E-mail: ykw2006 ||"The mystery of government is not how Washington||
|| -at-gmail-dot-com ||works but how to make it stop." -- P.J. O'Rourke||
|| ----------- || ------------------------------------ ||
||Replace "-at-" with|| Keeping Usenet Trouble-Free ||
|| "@" to respond. || Since 1998 ||
------------------- ------------------------------------------------
"It's not that I want to punish your success. [...]I think
when you spread the wealth around, it's good for everybody."
-- The One, 14 Oct 08
grinningdemon
No doubt...seems like pretty much all the stupid ideas out of DC in
the last few years trace back to him.
grinningdemon
<FluffyM...@foxnews.com> wrote:
>Duggy <Paul....@jcu.edu.au> wrote in news:b246ea2c-80f0-43f3-a600-
>b35c7f...@k13g2000prh.googlegroups.com:
>
>> Well, to be fair, Jason survived in this dimension, however, a reality
>> punch caused his death from another dimension caused him to happen
>> here.
>>
>> I guess the spirit could be the Earth-Jason-Dies spirit.
>
>Or it could be that the reality-punched version of Jason doesn't yet have
>his soul back, and his shade is still sippin' lattes with the DEAD LIKE
>ME cast.
>
>>> And we've also seen the ghosts of Sinestro and Spoiler even though
>>> both were subsequently revealed to have never died at all.
>>
>> Yeah, pretty much par-for-the-course.
>>
>
>Not remembering too many ghost-of-Sinestro moments, but I do know that
>Spoiler's "ghost" appeared to only one person, and a person in a near-
>death state at that; it could easily have been imagined.
Hal fought the ghost of Sinestro in his Spectre series...but you're
right that the Spoiler appearance could be dismissed as a
hallucination or some such...although that isn't the way it was
presented in the original story.
plausible prose man
What? Huh? No wonder you get so confused reading comic books...
Duggy
Him = the Jason-dies-universe to happen here.
===
= DUG.
===
Duggy
> On Sun, 2 Aug 2009 05:58:26 -0700 (PDT), Duggy
> >interesting side-discussion. I also agree that everything I've read
> >with him in it since he came back made me wish he didn't.
> >The thing that annoyed me most, really, was the way he was brought
> >back. A silly idea, stupidly executed. (Smells of Didio)
> No doubt...seems like pretty much all the stupid ideas out of DC in
> the last few years trace back to him.
To be fair, some of them the ideas are damn good, or at least
workable. The execution is stupid every time though.
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
No, sorry, I'm lost. Are you a dc editor?
Duggy
happen here." means "a 'see Infinite Crisis' 'see the Batman Annual'
'the Jason-dies-universe 'see A Death in the Family''"
It's not that hard to understand.
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
Boy, and you think Grant Morrison is incoherent...
Duggy
> Boy, and you think Grant Morrison is incoherent...
Young human male, conjunction pronoun something you don't do money for
research The Doors' lead singer is Duggy.
===
= DUG.
===
plausible prose man
The sentence, "Colorless green ideas sleep furiously", was presented
by Chomsky, as a great example of a series of words strung together
randomly. Not only is it grammatical according to the lexical
classification, and non-sense on a semantic level. Or so goes the
claim. But is the claim correct?
A green idea is, according to well established usage of the word
"green" is one that is an idea that is new and untried. Again, a
colorless idea is one without vividness, dull and unexciting. So it
follows that a colorless green idea is a new, untried idea that is
without vividness, dull and unexciting. To sleep is, among other
things, is to be in a state of dormancy or inactivity, or in a state
of unconsciousness. To sleep furiously may seem a puzzling turn of
phrase but one reflects that the mind in sleep often indeed moves
furiously with ideas and images flickering in and out.
So what is the poet telling us? (One assumes that the quoted line is
from the work of a poet working in a medium of studied precision and
ambiguity. Or rather, as we shall see...) Very simply the poet seems
to be saying that new ideas, not yet sharply defined, circulate in the
unconscious, rapidly altering at a furious rate.
One is left then with a question. Why is this nice bit of poetic
imagery cited by its author as a quintessentially meaningless
sentence? Here we have an exquisite bit of irony. The author evidently
has a turn for poetry, a turn which he turns his face against. And the
hidden face, the denied self, has taken its revenge. The scientist has
called on his creative self to exhibit a bit of nonsense. The poet
denied has replied with a sentence, apparently meaningless, which is
no such thing when listened to with an attentive ear. And yet
consider; this sentence is a very intellectualized production - it is
indeed "colorless". It was, we suspect, a new idea, a variant of a
possibility, still new at the very moment of production, one occurring
by chance in the froth of the unconscious.
In short, the cited sentence was a colorless green idea that had slept
furiously.
Duggy
> In short, the cited sentence was a colorless green idea that had slept
> furiously.
Implausible.
===
= DUG.
===
Unknown
"Black Terror" <Black_...@dynamite.org> wrote in message
news:3h07in....@news.alt.net...
>
> On 28-Jul-2009, "black...@aol.com" <black...@aol.com> wrote:
>
>> Gecko/2009070611 Firefox/3.0.12 GTB5,gzip(gfe),gzip(gfe)
>>
>> 1. Is is correct to call the Earth 2 Batman the Golden Age Batman and
>> the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman? Or is that too simple. It
>> seems like later on within the DCU they kind of reconned it so that
>> the E-2 Batman had retired by the Silver Age and that the E-1 begins
>> at the dawn of the Silver Age, but don't think this was the case at
>> the time.
>>
>> 2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
>> the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
>>
>> 3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
>> that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
>> Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
>>
>> 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
>
>
> 1. Yes, it is correct that Earth-Two Batman was indeed the Golden Age
> Batman, and The Earth-One Batman was the Silver Age Batman!
>
> 2. Yes, originally The Earth One Batman's costume was identical to his
> Earth
> Two's counterpart, but eventually added the oval circle in 1964. It is
> questionable as to when exactly did the Silver Age Batman tookover
> 'Batman'
> and 'Detective Comics'. Some believe he debuted with Detective Comics
> #225
> (first appearence of J'onn J'onnz), and others believe that the Silver Age
> Bats came into the picture two years later on the issue number that was
> being published on the month of 'Showcase #4' (1st appearence of the
> Silver
> age Flash). This is where the conflict of whether there ever was a Golden
> Age Batwoman comes to play, since her first appearence was in Detective
> Comics # 233 (1956).
>
> 3. Yes, Earth 2 did indeed run at real time, and their characters age
> regularly! Earth One was alway contempory, and their characters pretty
> much
> aged about 1 year to every 5 of ours. However I think that the new Earth
> 2,
> and the new Earth 1 are both going to be time-piece universes were the
> Original Flash will be originated in 1940, and the Silver Age Flash will
> be
> set to 1957. The New Earth Barry Allen will probably be re-set to approx.
> 1986.
>
> 4. I am uncertain when their marriage was first mentioned, but it was most
> likely told retro-actively. Since they introduced an 18 year old daughter
> taking the mantle of The Huntress just when her mother (Catwonam) was
> killed, and her father (Batman) retired perminently, then we know that
> they
> must've been married for at least 18 years, and considering that Batman
> was
> killed later the same year as Catwoman (1979), and it takes nine month
> prior
> to birth to conceive a baby, I would have imagine that they would've be
> married for about 20 years!
The wedding was first mentioned in the late '70's around the time the
Huntress was created. Huntress was older than 18 since she was already a
partner at a law firm. Later stories put the wedding in the '50's.
YKW
>
>On 28-Jul-2009, "black...@aol.com" <black...@aol.com> wrote:
>
>> Gecko/2009070611 Firefox/3.0.12 GTB5,gzip(gfe),gzip(gfe)
>>
>> 1. Is is correct to call the Earth 2 Batman the Golden Age Batman and
>> the Earth 1 Batman the Silver Age Batman? Or is that too simple. It
>> seems like later on within the DCU they kind of reconned it so that
>> the E-2 Batman had retired by the Silver Age and that the E-1 begins
>> at the dawn of the Silver Age, but don't think this was the case at
>> the time.
>>
>> 2. Did the Earth 1 Batman ever wear a costume without the oval around
>> the bat emblem? Either in continuity or out?
>>
>> 3. Did Earth 2 run at real time? I've read stories that seem to say
>> that it does. I remember one story where it does say that in 1955
>> Bruce had been Batman for 15 years.
>>
>> 4. How long were Bruce and Selina married for?
>
> It is 4:13 am, so I don't have time to be thorough at this time!
>
> 1. Yes, it is correct that Earth-Two Batman was indeed the Golden Age
> Batman, and The Earth-One Batman was the Silver Age Batman!
More or less. I believe it was eventually established that E2-Bats didn't
carry guns as the early GA stories depicted, but he otherwise lines up
pretty well. (Better than Superman!)
> 2. Yes, originally The Earth One Batman's costume was identical to his
> Earth Two's counterpart, but eventually added the oval circle in 1964.
> It is questionable as to when exactly did the Silver Age Batman
> tookover 'Batman' and 'Detective Comics'. Some believe he debuted
> with Detective Comics #225 (first appearence of J'onn J'onnz), and
> others believe that the Silver Age Bats came into the picture two
> years later on the issue number that was being published on the month
> of 'Showcase #4' (1st appearence of the Silver age Flash). This is
> where the conflict of whether there ever was a Golden Age Batwoman
> comes to play, since her first appearence was in Detective Comics #
> 233 (1956).
1950s stories were generally up for grabs. There -was- a (post-Haney, an
extremely important distinction) issue of THE BRAVE AND THE BOLD (1st
series) that established the existence of an E2 Batwoman; however, there
was quite a bit of 1970s and 1980s material establishing the existence of
an E1 version, as well.
In any event, there's no doubt that the E1 Batman was active by Feb/Mar
1960, when he cameoed in the first JLA story in B&B #28.
> 3. Yes, Earth 2 did indeed run at real time, and their characters age
> regularly! Earth One was alway contempory, and their characters
> pretty much aged about 1 year to every 5 of ours. However I think
> that the new Earth 2, and the new Earth 1 are both going to be
> time-piece universes were the Original Flash will be originated in
> 1940, and the Silver Age Flash will be set to 1957. The New Earth
> Barry Allen will probably be re-set to approx. 1986.
Jay Garrick once observed that time passed differently on the two Earths.
While the E2ers were certainly quite a bit older than their E1
counterparts, it's not necessarily accurate to state that there was a
straight-line relationship between the Earths' respective timelines.
(Else, even with Roy Thomas' retroactive help, a good many then-active
characters would have been consigned to playing shuffleboard on their
walkers at the Old Mystery-Men's Home.)
> 4. I am uncertain when their marriage was first mentioned, but it was
> most likely told retro-actively. Since they introduced an 18 year old
> daughter taking the mantle of The Huntress just when her mother
> (Catwonam) was killed, and her father (Batman) retired perminently,
> then we know that they must've been married for at least 18 years, and
> considering that Batman was killed later the same year as Catwoman
> (1979), and it takes nine month prior to birth to conceive a baby, I
> would have imagine that they would've be married for about 20 years!
>
DC SUPER-STARS #17 is likely where it was first mentioned, although it
-might- have been let slip in one of the few JLA/JSA appearances of a
Bat-family member (kinda doubt it).