"WTF" Wednesday

THE DC EXPLOSION: Ret-Con Style!

"In the beginning...."

Pendulums swing....back, forth, back again.

It's the nature of things to alter, shift,

grow, revert. To change.

Media, reality, countries, people,

relationships, trends; all governed by the

pendulum. I get it.

Yeah, we already suspended disbelief for flying men and
X-ray vision; but this people can't get? WTF?

When the 1960s/1970s ushered in all the

strange and wonderful new art and ideas

in comic books, fans of the prior status quo

were no doubt taken aback.

Likely, there were pangs of betrayal as

that era's standards were 'trashed' in order to

make way for the inevitable new shift.

Harsh realism like the murder of Kathy Kane,

the murder of the Earth 2 Batman,

and other major impacts rocked the fan world.

Especially when you grow up with characters,

bonding and imprinting like no body's

business--no matter their technical non-existence!)

it's hard to let go...to bid farewell to those iconic,

embedded images and notions you held.

Of how it 'should' be.

Letting go is easier if change is ushered in with

respect to the old; we never saw beloved

characters have their decapitated heads

turned into soccer balls. Not in the super hero

line, anyway!

Drama, Drama, DRAMA!



Personally, I always found it lazy writing to

resort to sensationalistic nonsense.

Especially since, when you do it continuously,

you have to 'up' your game to exceed the last

shock's impact. (Reference the last 20 years

of modern comics.)

 The DC Universe of the late 1970s was the last

time I felt connected to the comics world, truly. That

was a dependable, respectful old friend I could

return to for comfort and shorthand exchanges.

But that all changed.

In a desperate rush to 'grow up' and become more

'sophisticated,' the industry I loved lost much of what

 made it great in the first place.

Like many of us, I have longed for its return.

Like the adage says....

If you want something done right...

Do it yourself!

  

This is a world of mine own creation;

a reimagined DC Universe of 1978....

like you have never seen before.

Or...have you?

Imagine Nation: The DCU 1978 Project

***

The Real 'New Earth' DC Comics

So, way back 36 universes ago when DC Comics

did "Infinite Crisis," it was revealed sort of

matter-of-factly and under-the-radar that it was

the discontinuation of multiple earths that caused

all of these 'new style' duplicate characters (which

were so different from the originals) to manifest

there on what was considered DC Earth proper.

It was pointed out that 'Breach' was the 'Captain Atom' of

the intended New Earth in the multiverse, as were other

heroes (Kyle Raynor, Helena Bertinelli, etc) the erstwhile

duplicate earth's version of existing characters.

A pretty decent explanation (and write-off)

for some not-always-stellar and usually

mismatched players. But I was curious what the

population of this 'New Earth' would have looked like if

it had actually developed the way it was 'supposed to,'

rather than piggy-backed onto the mainstream earth.

Here's what I came up with!

***

Multiverse Goodness

I always loved the multiple earths concept!

I came into comics in the 1970s, and every year I thrilled

to the annual exploits of the JLA/JSA team-ups, especially

when a third earth's heroes were involved!

My favorites, though, were always the 'Eath 2' heroes...

the original super-heroes! Fed by a steady supply of

Golden Age story greats via DC's reprints, Treasuries,

and (later) digests.

When the time came for there to be a new generation

of heroes, continuing the Golden Age legacy on a massive

scale, I was beside myself!

There was such a different feel to each

of the groups of characters!

DC acquired different companies' stables

of characters, and that worked seamlessly

since they were simply introduced as being another,

as-yet-undiscovered earth.

Some twists were villainous 'versions' of the

characters we already knew (or were our heroes

altruistic versions of these originating villains?!)

There were simpler times in the Fawcett Universe-populated

'Earth S' after DC attained those characters, and for

a time they retained their impressive C. C. Beck goodness.

Something about the Quality heroes, especially

my first introduction-- the Freedom Fighters--

really lit my fire and grabbed my interest.

But the great thing of the day was diversity.

You didn't have to contrive to have a different

genre or story; it merely took place in its own world...

literally.

No need for fussy continuity or homogenization;

there was a beauty to having fun in comics.

It wasn't something to be ashamed of.

Even though the Super-Friends comic was

considered 'out-of-continuity,' that was foolishness

itself! Everyone knows it merely depicted the

exploits of an alternate earth's Justice League!
(And with excellent E. Nelson Bridwell scripts

that few 'mainstream' universe writers could match!)

The future is disastrous?

No problem! Alternate reality/timeline/earth!

Keep telling those awesome Murphy Anderson-illustrated tales!

TV Batman and William Shatner-alum Adam West;
too hokey for you? Who cares...it's Earth Cheese!

When next returning to Earth Cheese, if something

seems amiss, perhaps it's the closely-related

Earth Schmaltz.

There was Earth Hot-Live-Superman...

Earth 'Prime' where we 'readers' lived....

(unlike Marvel Comics' real world,

which is where the heroes also lived...

at least until Millar's '1985.')

(Whoops! Earth Prime already had a

'first super hero!' Guess we'll now call that one

Earth Lazy-Editor retcon.)

See, the magic of having characters that define and

inhabit their own special universe is that there

are less restrictions on what can and can't be done.

And I for one always found that the point of

writing; to entertain.

Your fans want to see Spider-man and Superman meet..

they don't tend to care as much about every

minutia of their entire history being delineated.

(Well, they didn't back then, at least.)

Multiple earths allows for extremism or mature

stories or multi-culturalism that the editors of the

mainstream universe are not willing to introduce.

Or, cannon fodder for major events!
(Ever notice how many 'sole survivors of a doomed planet'

DC Comics in particular has!?!)

You can have with pseudo-spoofy drug-related

earths...

..You can have a future with a wildly

alternative vision of the current characters

we know...

or even a universe in which the only thing

in common with the most known earth

are the names!

A world unto itself.

A feel, a look, a history all its own..

just like each person. Connected,

but perfectly unique.

It allows for flexibility and range in

the emotional content, the style,

and the creative team's vision.

(Goodness knows there's more than one

take on the world! Shouldn't we be

allowed to view it?)

Darkness has a place, just like light.

But the two don't have to overlap.

One doesn't need to envelop the other.

Certainly, a shared-universe between, say,

Sugar and Spike, 'Mazing Man, Angel and the

Ape, Tiny Titans, Scooter, Stanley and his Monster,

Debbi, and other fun, light-hearted titles would have been okay.

But, post-Crisis, the push was on to

make everyone and everything 'compatible' in

this shared universe. So, rather than seeing a

light-hearted book featuring serious characters,

we got the darkening of all the old beloved fun characters.

All previously light, simple, or innocent creations

had to be reinterpreted through a horrible realism

that gave them a 'reason' for existing in this newer,

more bad-ass (still fictional and four-color) universe.

Again I ask;

what's wrong with leaving enough space in a publishing company

for every story to have a place?

Certainly, not all comics or stories are created

equal, and--Thank you very much--I don't mind

having a separation between concepts to keep the good

safe from the bad.

Much of the last 25 years of DC's publishing

history has been marred by the inane need

for 'continuity' (which has never been reasonably

achieved, by the way,) at expense of story.

Different takes on characters are one thing; so long

as they don't supercede or eliminate the prior history.

Can't we all just get along?

But alas, it seems the editorial decree was

once more 'hodge-podge,' and seeing how

much of having their cake and eating it too

would fly in a new marketplace.

All things are transitory, especially in the

media market and with entertainment.

But a little loyalty to prior customers

seems a small request. Having a truckload of

options instead of one small, convoluted universe

seemed such a simple solution!

***

If you'd like to see my version of a retconned, singular universe

that still manages to blend styles and genres, check out my new

blog--a throwback to the DC Explosion of 1978--at

Imagine Nation DC '78 Project

***