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Author Topic: Earth-2's "differences" from Earth-1  (Read 11806 times)
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JulianPerez
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« Reply #8 on: July 25, 2006, 11:58:08 PM »

Quote from: "MatterEaterLad"
Those retcons kind of confuse me too...I'm not sure if the "Spear of Destiny" had anything to do with it, though I do remember that the late 70s had stories about their post War retirement after appearing before Congress...way after my comics time.


As I recall, the Spear of Destiny was a Roy Thomas idea, which explained why some of the all-powerful heroes like Alan Scott or Earth-2 Superman didn't just go to Fortress Europe and end World War II in one stroke. Hitler had the Spear of Destiny, and wielded it, and so Europe could not be entered or invaded by superheroes.

Quote from: "MatterEaterLad"
I DO remember thinking that Black Canary looked pretty smokin' when she came to Earth 1, I never thought she was pushing 50...


Hehe, I agree. As good an artist as he was, Sekowsky's pretty women were never as neat looking as his weird, muppet-y monsters and aliens. Black Canary really entered into va-va-voom territory with Dick Dillin around 1968 or so, which was the same time that she came over to Earth-1.

By that same token, I always like how effort was expended to make the JSA and Earth-2 heroes have a consistent timeline. A real problem with many superheroes is that their pasts roll up behind them. If their pasts roll up behind them, that means that events in stories are totally recontextualized.

An example would be for instance, the Englehart CAPTAIN AMERICA, which featured Richard Nixon as the leader of the Secret Empire. The whole thing had the air of "1974" about it. It would NOT be the same story at all if it was set in say, the early 1990s. Ditto for the Fantastic Four; they were a product of the 1960s space race, fought Russian enemies, and so on. If they left in 1993, their whole motivation for their first spaceflight

Basically what I'm saying is that the whole sliding timescale was a bad idea, and it was pretty gutsy of Roy Thomas and others to see the JSA as a "period" team shaped by the times they emerged, and to leave them there so they keep on making sense. More likely, the reason Roy the Boy did it was because of "Greatest Generation" nostalgia, but he did the right thing for the wrong reason.

This is why it is possible to really appreciate explanation for why heroes were active for long periods of time, such as the JSA's various youthenings, the fact Captain America spent his time cryogenically frozen in a block of ice, or Nick Fury's Infinity Formula.
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MatterEaterLad
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« Reply #9 on: July 26, 2006, 01:17:14 AM »

Well, the thing about a run of comics that has an end in the past is that they get locked into a time and avoid the sliding timescale...I liked the JSA for the same reason, whether I thought they were from an Earth that was about 10 or 15 years in the past or whether they had aged...

The only thing about the Spear of Destiny that I thought I may have read somewhere was that it did have a metabolic slowdown effect as well as acting as a weapon to keep the heroes out of Word War II, but I may be wrong on that...
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Johnny Nevada
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« Reply #10 on: July 26, 2006, 04:06:26 AM »

The explanation Thomas offered for why the JSAers didn't age much was that they (along with loved ones like Joan Garrick and Earth-2's Lois Lane) were exposed to some sort of "chronal radiation" that retarded their aging during a 40's battle with a villain, as seen in an "All Star Squadron" annual.

The Spear of Destiny, as wielded by Hitler, fixed things so that anyone entering Axis European territory fell under Nazi influences (and became a Nazi)... as seen in the Capt. Marvel "All Star Squadron" crossover (where Cap, Mary and Jr. fell under Adolph's influence).

As things worked out, Earth-2 was deemed to be aging in real time, while Earth-1 kept the "sliding scale" timeline---thus, Superman meeting JFK in a 1964 story, but an early 80's "Superboy" comic has Superboy meeting JFK. (This Hembeck cartoon from the early 80's made fun of the whole thing:

http://www.hembeck.com/More/Datelinesuperjfk.htm
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TELLE
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« Reply #11 on: July 26, 2006, 04:56:21 AM »

Quote from: "Johnny Nevada"
The explanation Thomas offered for why the JSAers didn't age much was that they (along with loved ones like Joan Garrick and Earth-2's Lois Lane) were exposed to some sort of "chronal radiation" that retarded their aging during a 40's battle with a villain, as seen in an "All Star Squadron" annual.


Per Degaton?
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Johnny Nevada
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« Reply #12 on: July 26, 2006, 05:31:16 AM »

Quote from: "TELLE"
Quote from: "Johnny Nevada"
The explanation Thomas offered for why the JSAers didn't age much was that they (along with loved ones like Joan Garrick and Earth-2's Lois Lane) were exposed to some sort of "chronal radiation" that retarded their aging during a 40's battle with a villain, as seen in an "All Star Squadron" annual.


Per Degaton?


No, a villain named Ian Karkull was who they were fighting...
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« Reply #13 on: July 26, 2006, 06:56:42 AM »

What about Susie, she didn't age at all.
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« Reply #14 on: July 26, 2006, 11:34:37 AM »

Susie's similarities to Mxy suggest she may be at least 1/2 fifth-dimensional imp.
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« Reply #15 on: July 26, 2006, 01:29:01 PM »

Quote from: "Super Monkey"
What about Susie, she didn't age at all.


The only two civilians there I recalled were Joan Garrick and Lois Lane (who were both tagging along after their associated heroes); guessing it didn't occur to the writers to simply have this chronal radiation get sprayed on them at, say, some JSA party or something, with Susie, Flash's three stooges-style sidekicks, their dog, and whoever the heck else is needed, present.

That said, guess there's no explanation for why Susie didn't age; only things I can think of:
- Susie's appearances happened closer together in Earth-2 time vs. when the stories were actually published (foolish Earth-Prime writers not getting Susie-related "signals" to write her stories more often)

- Susie, like the Earth-2 Robin (who also doesn't look much older in the original stories vs. what Earth-2's real-time-aging thing would dictate), also was really older than she was physically drawn as by her apparently-sole 1950's appearance...

- It's all Mxyztplk's doing. ;-)
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