Bleeding Cool’s Rich Johnston is suggesting that one of DC’s post-Flashpoint series will be titled Justice League Dark – and that it’ll just be one of multiple titles to be retitled with Dark somewhere in the new name. Ignoring, for a second, the “Wait, didn’t Marvel do that back in 2009?” thing (Because the answer is “Yes”), this rumor made me wonder something that sounds ridiculous, but not exactly impossible, for DC’s much-anticipated September relaunch for the DCU line.
What if the DC Universe doesn’t get re-established at the end of Flashpoint?
We’ve all assumed that it would, and have all been thinking that everything we’ve seen in Flashpoint is an alternate timeline story that will have some kind of effect on the regular DCU afterwards. But what if that effect is that the DCU can’t be restored, as such, and that we’re stuck in the Flashpoint world, or some other, midway point between the regular DCU and Flashpoint DCU, for good – or, at least, for longer than expected?
There are many, many reasons why this wouldn’t make sense (It completely ruins Grant Morrison’s larger Batman plans, it makes the groundwork for Aquaman, Firestorm, Hawkman and Swamp Thing from Brightest Day, and the JLI from Generation Lost, entirely worthless), but it would be the kind of resolution that would genuinely surprise – and anger – fans, and potentially give Flashpoint the “Today, Everything Changes” gravity that the series has been promising since the hype really started up.
Plus, we know that DC loves to follow up event crossovers with long-running “aftermath” books: Infinite Crisis begat 52, and Blackest Night begat Brightest Day. What better long-term story hook is there than having your characters know that their reality is wrong, and have to work to restore everything to the way it’s supposed to be? Admittedly, that’s what we all think Flashpoint is going to be about, one issue in, but we could be wrong about that (What if Flashpoint is actually all about getting an alternate Justice League – a Justice League Dark, if you will – together? We know that Project: Superman will introduce Kal-El, after all – What if he’s the key to bringing the team together, a la The Nail?).
I’m not convinced this is anything that DC would seriously consider, if only because it feels like it kills the licensing/merchandising of popular versions of characters for as long as the story runs. But it does make me wonder whether Flashpoint‘s speed – five issues in four months – is less of a quick self-contained event, and more just the launching point of something much, much more long-term.
May 24th, 2011 at 11:21 am
Ugh. I hope none of those things or reboot happens. Seriously does DC really think any of these be good idea? Comics is having hard time but putting off you fan base by doing any of these things may just be last nail in the coffin.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:02 pm
I thought the same thing. The 15-billion miniseries seem also to suggest that it is a quick event, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see one or two long-running titles following up the event.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:37 pm
Regardless of whether or not this happens, DC has become increasingly new reader un-friendly. I’ve picked up Green Lantern collections and Flash tpbs and found them impenetrable. I get the feeling that I need to read everything Geoff Johns has written if I want to enjoy a DC book.
May 24th, 2011 at 12:40 pm
Maybe they leave Barry Allen in the Flashpoint timeline? Wally gets to be the main Flash, but Barry gets to have his own spotlight?
May 24th, 2011 at 1:14 pm
I think the Big Two are less concerned with getting new readers than they are with keeping their current ones.
May 24th, 2011 at 1:46 pm
When DC re-established its multiverse after 52, wasn’t there talk about creating a line of books about alternate versions of characters based on one or more of the “new” Earths? Perhaps that’s the plan for some or all of these characters.
BTW, if the DCU ISN’T re-established after Flashpoint, what happens to the JSA and JSA All-Stars? With the exception of a version of the Golden Age Sandman, I’ve seen no indication that any version of the JSA exists–or ever did exist–in the Flashpoint world. Would Geoff Johns–who did so much to make the JSA popular again–create a world without a Justice Society?
May 24th, 2011 at 3:07 pm
I’d read a JSA book that took place in the past, particularly if it was the only JSA book.
May 24th, 2011 at 6:35 pm
I wouldn’t be surprised if DC actually played it both ways and had both the regular DCU and the Flashpoint one going at the same time. Not so much like Marvel and it’s Ultimate line, but closer to both going but there can only be one version of each character around. So like Superman is in one universe but not the other, but this also has a cheat in that Bruce Wayne/Dick Grayson can be Batman in one universe and the person who’s Batman in the Flashpoint one could also exist.
Sure it doesn’t really work when one thinks about it, but I could see it happening.
May 25th, 2011 at 6:57 pm
I could buy into a Ultimate Flashpoint Universe type thing. Lord knows the regular DCU is always event-driven and now movie-driven with Bane soon becoming villainous again. Who knows what will happen to Superman and Flash. Its pretty easy to guess with any movies coming. Superman is doomed to delays thanks to Jim Lee.