Well, this week, Geoff Johns dropped a bombshell. Or a bomb full of manure.
Here's an out of context, spoiler free panel from the pretty damned terrible Doomsday Clock:
So Metropolis is in the state of New York?!?
Now, most people have considered that, since Metropolis has a sea port, it's more likely elsewhere, because unless you place The City Of Tomorrow on Long Island, there's not really any place for a seaport outside of Manhattan.
Of course, if you accept the Busiek Hypothesis, that DC Earth is physically larger than our Earth so it has room for all those extra cities, than maybe there's more room in New York state than we thought.
But wait--look at that ZIP code! 10025 is a Manhattan ZIP code:
Well, of course, there are a dozen ways out of this conundrum.
If the Busiek Hypotheis is correct, a different physical scale could easily mean the ZIP codes are different than our Earth. And the address is just a coincidence--a lot of towns have a Broadway street!! So we could have both New York and Metropolis.
Or, Geoff Johns has been doing his damnedest to blame the nu52 on Doctor Manhattan's interfering with the DCU timeline--because why not meta-textually deflect responsibility for the biggest misstep DC ever made onto a fictional character? Anyhoo, maybe it's possible that, in this rejiggered reality, New York City has been replaced/overwritten with Metropolis?
[Bonus mini-rant: This week's issue of Doomsday Clock makes it definite that Dr. Manhattan did indeed actually change history to create the post-Flushpoint DCU-even though the Watchman series made it clear that, as powerful as he was, Dr. M. most certainly did NOT have the power to change history. Different rules of physics in a different universe, or lazy hack work? You decide!!]
Or, the person mailing that envelope--we don't learn who it is--could be deluded or nuts or something, because this series is filled with people who are insane and/or demented and/or are from another reality...so it's all just some big mistake...which the creators chose to do a close-up panel on...?
Oh, well, Doomsday Clock only has 10 more months left to go--TEN MORE MONTHS--so, if there are no more delays, maybe we'll eventually learn...
Panel from Doomsday Clock #7 (2018)
I choose 'lazy hack work.'
ReplyDeleteWhat happened to you, Geoff Johns? You used to be cool before you started pulling the arms and legs off your toys.
I also vote for "lazy hack work."
ReplyDeleteGenerally, I thought of DC's cities as stand-ins. Gotham and Metropolis for NY, Central City for Chicago, Coast City for L.A., and so on.
In Superman #241 (1971), though, Jimmy Olsen went to New York City on an assignment, so it must have "really" existed in the DCU. My impression was that it was reasonably close to Metropolis, in the same state or a neighboring one.
Several World's Finest stories implied that Gotham and Metropolis were neighboring cities.
Of course, with all the Crises, retcons, and reboots, I have no idea what is canon now.
Depending on which incarnation of the DC Universe you want to utilize...
ReplyDeleteMetropolis and Gotham City are counterpoints of Manhattan and Brooklyn, respectively.
Metropolis is NYC (all five boroughs) and Gotham City is Boston.
Metropolis is Jersey City and Gotham City is NYC (all five boroughs)
The only consistant aspect is that both Metropolis and Gotham are East Coast based cities.
Sometimes they're separated by a river (with bridges connecting them), sometimes they're miles apart along the coast.
TC--Wonder Woman was based in NYC for awhile, at the UN. So it always existed. But yes, they're been very vague over the years.
ReplyDeleteBritt--yes, but I think you missed the story last year where DC implied that Metropolis and Gotham were on the *west* coast.
Also, until the 1978 Superman movie, Smallville was a stone's throw from Metropolis--in Delaware or Maryland. DC still had this as canon as late as 1981. It was the Donner film and the Byrne reboot that cemented Smallville in Kansas. DC geography is...flexible.
Snell: I'm looking at it in a simple way. New York=Manhattan. I don't know that this is supposed to be an Easter Egg as to where Dr. Manhattan first appeared in, what, the nu52? But I just saw it as a reference to Manhattan.
ReplyDeleteI doubt there's anything to the address, though. Not like DC has offices there anymore.
Back in your post from 2017, I mentioned in a comment the DC ATLAS for that role playing game. I still go by those locations, for the most part.