The JLA/JSA crossovers that featured the heroes of two Earths coming together, often with a third Earth in the mix, introduced me into the concept of the multiverse. I loved the idea, but DC must have thought it too complicated after a while, for it lead to reboots in an attempt to streamline everything (which, of course, only made things more complicated). These days, the multiverse is back, and is widely understood thanks to shows like Fringe and The Flash, plus movies like Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse and news of the Upcoming Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. I'm glad the rest of the world has finally caught up to us comic fans!
16 comments:
Ha! Awesome cover!
I don't mind a multiverse; I just enjoy a single history and timeline. I don't know that DC really tried; the complications being Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, I would think. I liked that there was a single reality where the JSA was around to inspire the JLA - even though it was a bummer that Diana wasn't really a founding member... Dinah was a link from the JSA to the JLA - so was Hawkman. I guess Hawkman was another complication with Egypt and Thanagar...
Now this is another cover I'd love to write the story for
A cover with at least a two part story to go with it. Sales on this title are up.
Parallel Earths were being used long before Fringe --- Sliders. And going back to Dark Shadows in the early seventies and the Twilight Zone in the early sixties with two different episodes involving another Earth story. One where they came here and a different one where a crew went there. Also, if you got it, Crisis Aftermath said it was Wonder Woman that used that plot idea the earliest in DC history, even before Flash of Two Worlds. She fought or met a lot of different versions of herself in the fifties.
The Canadian series, SLIDERS, did it for me, back in the Eighties. That, and a contemporaneous article in my hometown paper's Sunday supplement. The latter published a theory by two scientists that basically compared the Big Bang to a tea kettle slowly coming to boil.
The longer the kettle boiled, the more bubbles rose to the surface. With the bubbles representing parallel-universes!
you forgetting Star Trek's Mirror Mirror.
I kept up with the multiverse just fine, even reading the JLA/JSA crossovers when my age had only one digit. The single universe created by Crisis on Infinite Earths created my confusion, especially with the mixed-up origins of Hawkman and Power Girl (and others, I'm sure, but those were the ones that stood out to me at the time). Further reboot events only made matters worse, though I admit that I was only a sporadic reader through most of them, and have yet to actually read Flashpoint or anything since (for that matter, even most of what came shortly before it).
I sometimes wonder what DC would have looked like if Crisis on Infinite Earths had resulted in something like the New 52, and DC simply put a banner on all titles not taking place on Earth-1 (like "Earth-2" for JSA and Infinity, Inc. titles, "Earth-5" for Shazam! and related titles, etc.). At the very least, it certainly would have meant very different directions for the former Fawcett and Charlton characters than what's been actually done. I think that DC could also have kept their Silver Age characters on a separate Earth and re-introduced the new versions (like John Byrne's new take on Superman) on a new Earth-1.
I'm not sure that what I just suggested would have been considered an actual improvement over what came before, or a preferred result over what was actually done. But it's something I like to ponder.
A big part of the problem at the time was that it was supposed to be hard to get between universes without a Flash or a GL doing the transfer, but Batman and Superman seemed to have visitors from other Earths (and never the right age) every other issue of Brave & Bold and DC Presents. If the editors would have just the controlled the writers a little better or put an Elseworlds banner on those issues, COIE probably wouldn't have been necessary.
The Arrowverse solved the moving-between-universes, along with the instantaneous group transportation / last minute save plot devices by Cisco figuring out how to put his portal powers into a device. Wonder when some comic character will use one to visit another Earth that has killer pizza.
Hey! I recognize part of this cover. It's from JLA (v.1) #102!
That green claw still freaks me out to this day. I wonder if DC will ever ret-con it as created by Iron Hand's son...Black Hand?
I always thought that CoIE was DC's misguided attempt to be more like Marvel who even though they dabbled in alternate Earths for the most part stuck with one mainstream universe. (What If? notwithstanding.) I say this attempt was misguided because rather than trying to be more like Marvel, I think DC should have embraced what made them unique and different.
At the time they said that they needed to streamline their continuity because their multiverse had become too complicated for new readers. I think that they were really underestimating the intelligence of their readers. As a young reader, figuring out DC's multiverse was a big part of the fun, and I doubt if the casual reader cared much one way or the other as long as the story they were reading at the time was entertaining.
And, of course, the irony now is that all these years later BOTH DC and Marvel have embraced the multiverse concept and both universes feature multiple versions of the same characters and everyone seems to be able to keep up.
It probably helps that there are scientific theories that say that the Multiverse might actually be a thing.
Wouldn't be surprised if the people who had the most problems with the multiverse were the writers and editors who didn't like the characters they were doing. Going from about 1963 to 1985 was easy for the fans, not so much for story tellers. If it was that much of a problem than why did the multiverse last so long?
That's why a lot of Star Wars fans (even harder-core-than me!) were so exasperated with Rian Johnson's work on TLJ.* On one hand, in Hollywood, you've got artsy-fartsy writers and directors who don't want the businessmen of showbiz foisting their commercialism on them. But, the on other hand, you've got these same writers and directors turning around and trying to foist their artsy-fartsy visions on the general movie-going public!
That makes them hypocrites, to say the least. And nobody I know loves hypocrites.
*I'm probably more of a moderate, by comparison.
Should CANADA's "SLIDERS" be added to Wikipedia?
@my fellow anonymous: It is already is. Although, the article posted there lists it as an "American science fiction series."
The Invaders VS The Invaders A Quinn Martin Production! But that would be 100 double sized Issues minimum.
@Anon245: sounds similar to that great joke used for the "Rocky and Bullwinkle episode that introduced Bullwinle's birthplace; the island of Moosylvania. As read by Wm. Conrad, it went: "Moosylvania was disputed territory. Canada claimed it belonged to the United States. And the U.S. claimed it belonged to Canada!"
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