Wait--Metropolis Is WHERE?!?!?!

You all know my ridiculous obsession with DC Geography.

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:

Wait now.

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:

And that address!! Yes, 2525 Broadway is an actual Manhattan address, and yes, it is in ZIP code 10025:

What the WHAT? Does that mean Metropolis is New York City? Does New York City even exist in the DC Universe? What the living hell, Geoff Johns???

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)

Spoiler Saturday--That's Not Our Saturn Girl!

WARNING: This contains spoilers for last week's Doomsday Clock #5, so if you haven't read it yet (and plan to), well, come back to this rant another day. It will still be here.

SPOILERS commence after 5 harmless pictures...

Still with us? OK, commencing rant...

Look, you all know how displeased I am that DC is continuing to do nothing with the Legion Of Super-Heroes.

Perhaps the most frustrating part is, they have people wanting to do something with the Legion, but no one is allowed to. There are even rumors that a certain big-name writer was willing to sign an exclusive with DC if he could do a Legion book, but he was told, "no."

Why? Well, again, according to rumor, no one at DC is allowed to use the Legion, or the Justice Society, until Geoff Johns has finished Doomsday Clock. Because his Watchmen/DC Universe crossover is going to have such mindbogglingly important impacts on those franchises, that anything done between now and then would just have to rebooted, apparently.

It's a pretty massive bit of ego and chutzpah, frankly. Especially as Doomsday Clock #5 just came out last week, which means there are 7 more bi-monthly issues left (with more delays not unlikely), so it will be over a year until the series finishes.

Still, this means Johns must have big, exciting plans for the Legion, right? Well, now, it's kind of hard to tell. Saturn Girl has been locked in present-day Arkham Asylum for 2 years now, since Rebirth #1. I mean, that's literally it. Once a year or so, we've gotten a panel or two reprising that concept, with zero advancement of the "plot," and zero on any other Legionnaires. Ditto for the Justice Society, where Rebirth #1 had Johnny Thunder in a retirement home raving about "the lightning," and not much since.

Well, finally, last week we got some progress. In Doomsday Clock #5, 102 year old Johnny Thunder has slipped away from the retirement home to search for something, when he's set upon by a group of druggie droogs looking for a score.

But don't worry, nu-Rorschach and Saturn Girl have escaped Arkham, and they are there to rescue him--and to dole out a little of the old ultra-v:

Brutal.

But let's look at Saturn Girl again:

Really? That's Saturn Girl, Imra Ardeen? For the 30th/31st century? From The Legion Of Super-Heroes? Who just looks on completely nonplussed as nu-Rorschach maims and/or kills these guys? (And the fact that she says they would have died anyway so "everything evens out" sure as hell implies that nu-Rorschach is indeed straight-up killing them!)

And wait a minute...how did she know all of them were going to overdose that night? Is Johns confusing her with Dream Girl, giving her prophecy powers? Or are we to believe that, because she's from a future (reminder: according to the nu52, the Legion isn't even from Earth-Prime's future!!), she somehow knows the fate of billions of people? She bothered to look up and memorize how every two-bit mugger and drug addict will die?

So this is Geoff Johns' conception of Saturn Girl: content to watch blasély as her ally beats several men to death in front of her?

At least Johnny Thunder had the sensibility to be shocked by the violence.

Look, the story's not over yet (for quite awhile). And we haven't gotten anything resembling actual story or plot advancement yet. So, maybe it will turn out that it's not really Saturn Girl. Or that being trapped in the past has driven her a bit bonkers, so she's not herself. Or, it's all Doc Manhattan's fault. Or something.

But this is also Geoff Johns, who had Superboy-Prime behead Pantha, who turned the Superman of Earth-2 into a villain for Infinite Crisis, who decided that Barry Allen couldn't be a hero unless his mother was murdered. And you've seen above, where one of the founders of the Legion has become, it seems, a sociopathic monster. This is the guy we're going to trust to establish the new status quo with the Legion?

Please, DC. Please, whomever eventually replaces Diane Nelson. Release the Legion. Geoff Johns is not the man who should be re-establishing the hopeful, optimistic future of the DC Universe.

Thus endeth the rant.

EXCLUSIVE--Rejected Script From DC's Doomsday Clock!!

As we all know, both the UN Security Council and the Illuminati have banned me from writing comic books.

Still, I feel compelled from time to time to try and sneak some things through the anti-snell firewall.

Case in point--DC's forthcoming Doomsday Clock, which will feature Geoff Johns giving every fan what they've always wanted: Alan's Moore's beloved Watchmen characters explaining why it's not Geoff John's fault that the nu52 sucked really hard.

On the sly, I submitted a script. Of course, despite a jaunty pseudonym, I couldn't disguise my writing style, and the script was swiftly rejected. And shredded. And burned.

Still, I had the foresight to save a copy. So here is a crucial scene from the 1st issue of my proposal for Doomsday Clock.

DOCTOR MANHATTAN: Behold, Kal-El, I have come to--

SUPERMAN: Hold on a second...you're just a Captain Atom knock-off!

RORSCHACH: Hrrrmmm.

BATMAN: And this guys just Travis Bickle meets The Question. Seriously, how can characters so derivative be a threat to our universe?

BOOSTER GOLD (whispers to SKEETS): Yeah, like those Metal "Dark Multiverse" Batmen weren't derivative...

OZYMANDIAS: I think you're underestimating the sheer genius I bring to the table!

BATMAN: Some genius. You kept your entire masterplan--unencrypted!!--on a computer with the password Ramses II. I mean, how stupid was that? Even the lame Nite Owl was able to crack that!

NITE OWL: Now wait just one--

FLASH: Who are you even supposed to be, anyway? Are you Batman, are you Blue Beetle...?

BOOSTER GOLD: I knew Ted Kord. I worked with Ted Kord. You, sir are no Ted Kord.

DOCTOR MANHATTAN: Listen, men of Earth-0. We successfully deconstructed the super-hero genre on our Earth, and now--

HAL JORDAN (Makes raspberry sound): Please. You had one person with super-powers in the entire universe. Even the earliest Golden Age publishers had more than that. All you "deconstructed" was the Charlton universe, and, well, there's a reason that failed multiple times!!

OZYMANDIAS: I think you're overlooking how brilliantly I manipulated the world into peace!!

SUPERMAN: Congratulations. You invented fake news. Well done. We already have enough of that here.

BATMAN: Don't forget the thousands and thousands of deaths he's responsible for. Which he conveniently didn't have to pay any price for.

RORSCHACH: Soon you will come to us for help. And we will look down and whisper--

FLASH: Don't you idiots realize that you're the villains? You're. The. Bad. Guys. You screwed up your tiny little universe with one planet and only one guy with powers. You couldn't handle even that much, so you took your world to the brink of annihilation, killing millions--and you want extra credit for that? Get bent.

DOCTOR MANHATTAN (clearing his throat loudly): A-HEM. As I was saying, we have come to... [drones on in background]

BATMAN (whispers to SUPERMAN): Keep him talking. My tachyon suit is almost ready. I'll take care of him.

BOOSTER GOLD: (whispering to SKEETS): Yeah, as long as Doc Manhattan doesn't have a mother named Martha...

Well, it just goes on like for 12 issues.

I wonder why they rejected it?