This recent updates page/change log does not include the weekly inclusion of synopses for newly released comics, which I add every single New Comic Book Day, 52 weeks a year. Nor does it include minor edits like reformatting, typos, spelling, small corrections, added caveats, image insertion, or other things of that nature. Nor does it include daily tasks of responding to emails or general site maintenance. Instead, this log highlights the last six months of changes to the order of the chronology or chronologies, mostly pertaining to items that had previously been set in stone or been missing.
–10/1/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 18. Added in missing reference from Lazarus Planet: Legends Reborn #1 Part 4.
–10/1/2025. Silver/Bronze Age Years 2 and 11. Added in synopses for Superman and Batman with Robin the Boy Wonder Annual 1975 (and associated references). Special thanks to James Mahoney IV.
–10/2/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 15. Added Gotham Academy #1-8 references and moved around a bunch of Gotham Academy stuff (as per Gotham Academy: First Year #1 and Gotham Academy: Second Semester #9-12).
–10/3/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 23. Moved the fart book and associated fart reference prior to Poison Ivy #27. Sigh.
–10/3/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 3. Moved Ventriloquist and Scarface’s debut a bit later.
–10/3/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Years 7-12. Moved handful of Victor Zsasz items.
–10/6/2025. Modern Age Year 15. Added missing reference from Hawkman Vol. 3 #33.
–10/6/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Years 10-11. Added in references to Hawkman’s banishment to supernatural realm and his return (as referenced in the second feature to New History of the DC Universe #3). Special thanks to Israel Silva.
–10/7/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 3. Moved incorrect Batman and Robin Vol. 3 #18 reference placement. Special thanks to Mike Thompson.
–10/8/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 24. Moved Aquaman Vol. 9 #9 earlier.
–10/9/2025. Modern Age Years 12-13. Added in debut of DA Richard Jaynes. Moved The Demon Vol. 3 #3-4 a bit later and The Demon Vol. 3 #7-8 a bit earlier.
–10/11/2025. Modern Age Years 12-13. Added missing flashback from The Demon Vol. 3 #8. Moved note about Bruce beginning to date Vicki Vale more seriously. Major overhaul of Year 13, moving multiple items around in order to provide a much better balance, especially in the end months.
–10/11/2025. Modern Age Years 13. Added missing flashback from The Demon Vol. 3 #12. Special thanks to Bardia.
–10/14/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 6. Deleted typo-left Lord Death Man entry. Special thanks to Mike Thompson.
–10/14/2025. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing references from Detective Comics #619-621.
–10/14/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Added in missing reference from Detective Comics #620.
–10/15/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Removed bogus reference note about Bruce dating Vicki Vale. Also, changed Batman 80-Page Giant #2 Part 4 listed entry into reference note. Also re-arranged items surrounding Tim Drake’s initial official debut as Robin.
–10/15/2025. Modern Age Year 12. Added in missing flashback from Batman 80-Page Giant #2 Part 4.
–10/15/2025. Modern Age Year 3. Added in missing reference from Robin #1.
–10/16/2025. Modern Age Years 10-11. Changed Secret Origins Vol. 2 #23 Part 2 flashback note into reference note in Year 11; and moved Secret Origins Vol. 2 #23 Part 2 flashback into Year 11. Special thanks to Bardia.
–10/16/2025. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing reference from Batman #619.
–10/16/2025. Modern Age Year 11. Added in missing reference from Batman #459.
–10/16/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Full overhaul of the start of the second half of the year.
–10/17/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 4. Updated and moved reference from Batman: Urban Legends #17 Part 1 (regarding Lois and Clark’s relationship). Special thanks to Mike Thompson.
–10/18/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued overhaul of the start of the second half of the year.
–10/19/2025. Modern Age Years 9 and 11. Added missing references from Detective Comics #626.
–10/19/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued major overhaul. Moved Green Lantern Vol. 3 #1 (and associated reference) and Green Lantern Vol. 3 #9 earlier.
–10/21/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued major overhaul, specifically the first month of the second half of the year. Added missing references from Starman #34.
–10/21/2025. Silver/Bronze Age Year 13. Updated/corrected Superman and Batman with Robin the Boy Wonder Annual 1977 Part 4. Special thanks to James Mahoney IV.
–10/22/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 2 and 4. Added missing references from Batman: Dark Patterns #9. Special thanks to Ben.
–10/22/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Future Section. Removed DC KO #1 including Terry McGinnis. (This is alt-Tim Drake.)
–10/23/2025. Modern Age Year 16. Added in death of Hank Hall.
–10/24/2025. Bronze Age Year 19. Wrote missing synopsis for the UK Batman Annual 1986 Part 2. Special thanks to James Mahoney IV.
–10/25/2025. Modern Age Year 4. Added missing Brainiac reference from Action Comics #866.
–10/26/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 20. Removed non-canon Aquaman/The Flash: Voidsong. Special thanks to Mike Thompson.
–10/26/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 21. Moved incorrect placement of Batgirls #18. Special thanks to Mike Thompson.
–10/27/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 14. Added missing reference from The Outsiders Vol. 5 #7. Special thanks to Israel Silva.
–10/27/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 13-17. Moved some things around to better reflect the timeline from the second feature to New History of the DC Universe #4.
–10/28/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 17-21. Moved some things around to better reflect the timeline from the second feature to New History of the DC Universe #4. Special thanks to Israel Silva and Dylan Hall.
–10/28/2025. Silver/Bronze Age Future Section. Added in missing entries for World’s Finest Comics #166.
–10/28/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 6, 8, 10, 13, 14, 16, 18, 20, and Future Section. Updated all Legion of Super-Heroes entries (now essentially a “Legion of Five Worlds” situation) as per the second feature to New History of the DC Universe #4. Special thanks to Israel Silva.
–10/29/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 14. Added in Dr. Manhattan’s erasure of the Flash Museum. Special thanks to Israel Silva.
–10/29/2025. Modern Age Years 1 and 21. Added in missing flashbacks and reference from Justice Society of America Vol. 3 #50. Special thanks to Luke W.
–10/30/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 8. Marked DC’s Saved By the Belle Reve #1 Part 8 as non-canon.
–10/30/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 3, 6, 7, 8, 10, 16, 17, 22, and 23. As per Batman and Robin: Year One #12, Dick is ten-years-old when he debuts as Robin (ten turning eleven toward the tail end of Year 3). As such, I conducted a major overhaul of everything pertaining to Dick’s age. I originally had Dick’s birthday in March, but then re-placed in October. But I now have good reason to believe it should be in November. I will update tomorrow (with notes)!
–10/31/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 3, 8, 10, 16, and 22. Moved Dick’s birthday to November (reflecting his classic Silver/Bronze Age birthday), and updated all corresponding notation.
–10/31/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 3. Major overhaul of the final four months of the calendar year to accommodate Batman and Robin: Year One #12 and its epilogue. And, with that, Mark Waid’s months-long attempt to kill me hopefully has come to an end.
–11/1/2025. Bronze Age Year 10. Added missing Batman and Robin Annual 1972 (Brown Watson Ltd release for UK market only). Special thanks to James Mahoney IV.
–11/2/2025. Modern Age Early Years. Added missing reference from Detective Comics #627.
–11/4/2025. Modern Age Early Year 13. Added missing reference from Detective Comics #628.
–11/6/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 6-7. Cleaned up Ra’s al Ghul and Talia redundancies.
–11/6/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 6, 9, and 15-17. As per retcon from Batman Vol. 4 #3, moved Damian’s birth-year/birth-month. Adjusted many other connected items, including major overhaul of the end of Year 15 and beginning of Year 16.
–11/12/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 11 and Future Section. Removed all items connected to non-canon DC: Love is a Battlefield #1 Part 5.
–11/12/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 14-15. Moved several incorrect Harley Quinn/Poison Ivy items.
–11/13/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Overhaul of the year—moved around several items (midyear).
–11/14/2025. Modern Age Early Period and Years 8 and 13. Added missing references from Detective Comics #629, Detective Comics #632, and Shadow of the Bat #11. Made other overhaul changes in Year 13.
–11/15/2025. Modern Age Years 5 and 13. Moved Batman: Run Riddler Run #1-3 earlier in Year 13. Added missing reference from Batman: Run Riddler Run #3 to Year 5.
–11/15/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 23. Added missing Superman: Red and Blue 2025 Special #1 Part 4. Special thanks to Dylan Hall.
–11/17/2025. Modern Age Early Years and Year 5. Added missing references from Detective Comics #633-634.
–11/17/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Added missing Robin #5.
–11/18/2025. Modern Age Years 1 and 13. Added in missing references from Batman #467-469.
–11/19/2025. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing reference from Batman/Judge Dredd: Judgment on Gotham.
–11/19/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 7 and 18. Moved Bruce purchasing stadium from Year 18 to Year 7.
–11/19/2025. Modern Age Early Period and Year 13. Added in missing references from Batman: Gotham Nights #1 and Batman: Gotham Nights #4. Adjusted entry for Batman: Gotham Nights #1-4. Special thanks to Bardia.
–11/20/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 18. Added in Marvel/DC: Deadpool/Batman #1 and associated reference.
–11/20/2025. Modern Age Years 7 and 13. Moved Catwoman: Defiant from Year 7 to Year 13. Special thanks to Bardia.
–11/20/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Moved Batman/Green Arrow: The Poison Tomorrow few months later. Special thanks to Bardia.
–11/20/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued general overhaul and clean-up.
–11/22/2025 to 11/23/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued general overhaul and clean-up. Fixed War of the Gods and Armageddon 2001 placements.
–11/23/2025. Modern Age 11. Added missing reference from Deathstroke the Terminator #9. Special thanks to Bardia.
–11/24/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued general overhaul and clean-up.
–11/26/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Early Years. Added in missing reference from DC/Marvel: Batman/Deadpool #1.
–11/27/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 15-16. Added missing references from the second feature to Wonder Woman Vol. 6 #10, Trinity: Daughter of Wonder Woman #1, and New History of the DC Universe #4. Special thanks to Dylan Robinson.
–11/27/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 8. Added missing reference from Trinity: Daughter of Wonder Woman #1.
–11/27/2025. Modern Age Year 8. Added missing reference from Suicide Squad #59 and Batgirl: Year One #9.
–11/27/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Continued general overhaul and clean-up.
–12/3/2025. Silver/Bronze Age Early Years. Moved Lance Bruner’s birth a couple years later. Special thanks to Tim Drake (yup, still my real name).
–12/3/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 11. Added in missing reference from DC/Marvel: Batman/Deadpool #1.
–12/3/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 24. Moved Cheetah and Cheshire Rob the Justice League #4 prior to Justice League Unlimited Vol. 2 #5-10.
–12/4/2025. New 52 Year 9. Added in missing Gotham Academy: Second Semester #6.
–12/8/2025. Modern Age Year 23. Removed reference to Damian killing Nobody (Morgan Ducard). Special thanks to Marcelo Millicay.
–12/9/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Early Years to Year 12. As per New History of the DC Universe, adjusted (as best we could) the now quite broken Kate Kane timeline. This might require a bit more finesse (and, sadly, ignoring of prior titles). Special thanks to Amelie.
–12/11/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Early Year 18. Added in missing reference from Batman: Urban Legends #1 Part 4.
–12/12/2025. Modern Age Year 6. Added missing debut of Egghead. Special thanks to Bardia.
–12/14/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Moved “Panic in the Sky” to correct location after “Breakdowns.”
–12/14/2025. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing reference from Armageddon: Inferno #1.
–12/14/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Slightly moved Donna Troy giving birth.
–12/15/2025. Modern Age Year 21. Added missing Superman #664. Special thanks to Dylan Hall.
–12/15/2025. Modern Age Year 21. Added missing reference from Justice Society of America Vol. 3 #10.
–12/16/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Moved space shuttle gift reference from JLA Secret Files and Origins #2 Part 2 at bit earlier. Fixed incorrect Challengers of the Unknown Vol. 2 #4 entry.
–12/17/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Years 23-24. Moved Wonder Woman Vol. 6 #23 from Year 23 to Year 24.
–12/17/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Moved DC Retroactive: Batman – The ’90s #1 right before “Return of Scarface.” And also added in missing references from Deathstroke the Terminator #6-9.
–12/18/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 8. Added in missing reference to Vigilante (Adrian Chase) fighting Batman and creation of Checkmate.
–12/18/2025. New 52 Year 3. Added missing references to Vigilante (Adrian Chase) fighting Batman and the “City of Assassins” arc.
–12/18/2025. Modern Age Early Years. Added missing reference from Detective Comics #643.
–12/18/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Fixed Detective Comics #643 entry, splitting it up accordingly.
–12/21/2025. Modern Age Year 21. Added missing Superman #669. Special thanks to Dylan Hall.
–12/21/2025. Modern Age Early Years 7 and 13. Added missing references from Batman #477-478.
–12/22/2025. Modern Age Year 13. Added missing references from The Demon Vol. 3 #23 and Detective Comics #644-646.
–12/22/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 2. Moved Clayface’s debut prior to Two-Face’s debut. Special thanks to Ben Barac.
–12/24/2025. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Early Years to Future Section. Added in Trinity: Daughter of Wonder Woman #1-6.
–12/28/2025. Updated color key/scheme for Rebirth/Infinite Frontier timeline and New 52 timeline.
–12/30/2025. Updated color key/scheme for Modern Age timeline and Silver/Bronze Age timeline.
–12/31/2025. Modern Age Past Section and Year 4. Added in Batman and Robin’s time-travel trip to meet Jeremy Coe in the 1650s.
–12/31/2025. Updated color key/scheme for Golden Age timeline.
–1/2/2026. Moved Batman #434-435 and Detective Comics #601-603 after The New Titans #55. Special thanks to Mike.
–1/4/2026. Anthony Fallone added new blog entry!
–1/7/2026. Jamison W Weber PhD added new blog entry!
–1/9/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Years 11-12. Added missing references from Justice League Europe #37-39.
–1/10/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 9. Added in DC KO: Knightfight #3 as new reference for Tim Drake’s age at the time of “A Lonely Place of Dying.” Special thanks to Jasper Derklin.
–1/10/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Years 15 and 21. Added missing Grifter Got Run Over By a Reindeer #1 Part 5 and associated reference.
–1/11/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Year 13. Added in missing references from Batman #479-480.
–1/12/2026. Modern Age Year 4. Added in missing reference from Batman #482.
–1/12/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Years 1 and 13. Added in missing references from Batman: Shadow of the Bat #1-4.
–1/12/2026. Modern Age Year 13. Continued major overhaul of the second half of the year.
–1/13/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Year 12. Added in missing reference from Detective Comics #651 and Detective Comics #653.
–1/13/2026. Modern Age Year 13. Continued major overhaul of the second half of the year.
–1/14/2026. Modern Age Year 1. Added in missing reference from Shadow of the Bat #13.
–1/14/2026. Modern Age Years 13 and 15. Moved The Batman Chronicles #23 Part 1 from Year 13 to Year 15.
–1/15/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Year 1. Added in missing references from Batman: Sword of Azrael #3-4.
–1/15 to 1/16/2026. Modern Age Year 13. Continued major overhaul of the full year.
–1/16/2026. Modern Age Year 16. Conducted major overhaul of the second half of the year, mostly in regard to Azrael: Agent of the Bat.
–1/16/2026. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing reference from Detective Comics #655.
–1/17/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Year 4. Added in missing references from Batman: DOA.
–1/18/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 8. Fixed incorrect reasoning/caveats pertaining to Power Girl’s debut and origin. Special thanks to Benjamin Barrack.
–1/20/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Year 13. Added in missing references from Batman: Unseen #5.
–1/20/2026. Modern Age Early Year 14. Started major overhaul of the first part of the year.
–1/21/2026. Modern Age Year 23. Added in missing reference from Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne #6. Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
–1/21/2026. Modern Age Years 13-14. Continued major overhaul.
–1/23/2026. Modern Age Year 22. Added in missing reference from Adventure Comics Vol. 2 #11.
–1/25/2026. Modern Age Years 10 and 12. Added in missing references from Batman #489.
–1/25/2026. Modern Age Years 13-14. Continued major overhaul.
–1/25/2026. Modern Age Year 2. Added in missing reference from Batman #490.
–1/26/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 12. Moved incorrect placement of Supergirl’s resurrection, fixed a few other items to accommodate. Special thanks to Tim Drake.
–1/26/2026. Modern Age Year 13. Added in missing Wonder Woman Vol. 2 #57. Special thanks to Dave Challis.
–1/28/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 8 and 24. Added in missing references from Jon Kent: This Internship is My Kryptonite #1, Jon Kent: This Internship is My Kryptonite #17, and Jon Kent: This Internship is My Kryptonite #20.
–1/28/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Years 1 and 11. Moved Jim Gordon definitively discovering Batman’s secret ID from Year 1 to Year 11. Special thanks to Jasper Derklin.
–1/28/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year 4. Fixed incorrect Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #7 reference.
–1/30/2026. Modern Age Early Years and Year 22. Added in missing flashbacks from Batman: Streets of Gotham #16.
–1/30/2026. Modern Age Year 13. Added in missing reference from Batman: Shadow of the Bat #7.
–1/31/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/1/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Years 4-5. Moved Eraser’s debut from Year 4 to Year 5.
–2/1/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/2/2026. Modern Age Year 9. Removed duplicate flashback from Secret Origins Vol. 2 Annual #3.
–2/2/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 13. Added in missing reference from Renaissance of Raven #1.
–2/4/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/9/2026. Modern Age Years 2, 3, and 14. Added in missing flashbacks from Showcase ’93 #7 Part 1.
–2/10/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/13/2026. Modern Age Year 4. Added in debut of J Devlin Davenport. Special thanks to João Capella.
–2/13/2026. Modern Age Year Early Years. Added in missing reference from Batman #583.
–2/13/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/13/2026. Modern Age Year 2. Added in missing references from Batman #499 Part 2 and Catwoman Vol. 2 #2.
–2/15/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/17/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul.
–2/18/2026. Modern Age Year 1. Corrected when Batman and Alfred add Kevlar and fireproofing to costume rotation (and added more detail surrounding Batman’s costume-making in general). Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
–2/19/2026. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing reference from Robert Greenberger’s Essential Batman Encyclopedia. Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
–2/19/2026. Modern Age Year 13. Added in missing flashback from Batman: Shadow of the Bat #19.
–2/19/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul of first half of the year.
–2/24/2026. Modern Age Year 14. Continued major overhaul of first half of the year.
–2/24/2026. Modern Age Years 1, 6, and 8. Added in missing references from Detective Comics #668 and Batman #682. Made associated adjustments in regard to Batmobile items.
–2/25/2026. Golden Age Year 1. Added in Batmobile note from Detective Comics #27 and Secret Origins Vol. 2 #6 Part 1.
–2/25/2026. Golden Age Years 2-3. Moved Batman #74 Part 2 from Year 2 to Year 3.
–2/25/2026. Silver Age Year 7. Added in missing references from Detective Comics #362 and Detective Comics #371 regarding Batmobile.
–2/25/2026. Modern Age Years 4-5. Moved debut of Carter Nichols and subsequent early time-travel trips from Year 4 to Year 5. Special thanks to Tyler.
–3/2/2026. Modern Age Early Years. Added in missing reference from Batman #595. Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
–3/4/2026. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 24. Moved start of Cassie Cain’s trip from Batgirl Vol. 6 #7 a bit later. Moved Oracle’s Clocktower being fixed a bit earlier. Moved death of Simone Blair a bit earlier.
–3/6/2026. Modern Age Early Years. Cleaned up a few items and made slight moves. Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
–3/6/2026. Modern Age Year 1. Added in missing reference from Batman: The Man Who Laughs (regarding Arkham’s closure). Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
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I recall you mentioned considering moving Dick’s recruitment out of Year One a bit ago- what happened there?
Still waiting for a few series, notably TK’s Killing Time, to wrap before I examine a Robin move again. (Although, I’m not sure it’s going to mention or hint at Robin at all…) Haven’t forgotten about this, though!
Also, you may be interested to hear that we’re getting a Tom King book titled ‘Gotham: Year One’, a mid-20th century tale starring Slam Bradley in a noir mystery about a stolen Wayne heir, supposedly showing the tipping point from Alan Scott’s gritty-but-decent Gotham and Batman’s hellhole Gotham.
Thanks, Dylan. Didn’t hear about that. I’ll def check it out when it comes out!
Why is Batman: The Detective in the past now? I had assumed as the present neared its future, it would be disregarded. The idea it could have already happened seems surprising .
For a handful of reasons, most notably Ducard’s age (only 59-years-old), the Wayne Manor Batcave still being in use, Amina has already debuted as Squire by Dark Crisis, and if Alfred stays back for good, then it throws a wrench in its narrative. Either we add a lot of caveats to keep in in the near future, it has already occurred, or it’s non-canon (i.e. can be disregarded).
Tom Taylor definitely intended it to be a future story, but aside from Bruce’s haircut, it actually reads as taking place in current day. Just re-read it, and it doesn’t feel like a future tale at all really. More Elseworlds-ish than anything else. Honestly, I’m leaning on throwing it out entirely. We’ll see.
The more I think about this, the more I think that I’m going to move it back to the future section, just with a few minor caveats.
Oh, I’m glad you reconsidered that one! I do think this is the best choice for now
Hey Collin, What About The ONE BAD DAY series? I saw you included the Two Face story only. Are the Riddler and Penguin’s issues non-canon? I’m also scratching my head for Batman: Fortress… That seems out-of-con to me, so may be that’s why you haven’t included it?
I guess Alfred In B Vs R is not the real Alfred based on the last scene of issue n.2
Guess Alfie is really gone forever. Shame to all DC for that!
Riddler is non-canon. I’ve placed Penguin in the future section, although it could also easily be non-canon. And Two-Face could be on the chopping block depending on what occurs in other contemporary stories. I think Alfred is coming back… but we’ll see.
I have a question about New Golden Age- since these flashbacks all appear to take place on Prime Earth, what do we make of Power Girl and Sylvester Pemberton appearing in the ‘1972’ section? Since Sylvester has to be rescued by the League, I see a couple of options.
A) All of the JLA/JSA team-ups are, in Prime Earth, time travel adventures instead of inter-dimensional crossovers. A little muddy of an explanation, but it works.
B) The JLA was also around in the 70s in current continuity. This seems unlikely, given that Geoff also has Catwoman in her Year One costume in a section listed as ‘thirteen years ago’.
C) The year listing on that page is just a cheeky reference to the year the comic in question came out, and shouldn’t be taken as continuity (see also: your decision regarding the reference to The Hill happening 23 years ago).
Any thoughts, outside of ‘why must you torture me so, Geoff Johns’?
As a side note, despite the 1972 problem, Selina’s costume in the ‘thirteen years ago’ section actually roughly lines up, despite appearing not to at first, because Selina wore her Year One costume in her story in Showcase 93′.
My bigger question is how does this jibe with Batman Beyond? If Bruce dies when Helena is age eighteen, and Helena is already in elementary school by 2032, then this means Bruce must likely die in the mid 2040s. So does all the Batman Beyond stuff get squished before that? And what is the reason for Bruce being in costume when he is killed?
The entire New Golden Age #1 issue seems to crib heavily from Earth-2 material, especially in regard to Huntress, Bruce, and Selina. If Johns is really merging this into primary canon, it’ll take some chronological gymnastics to make it work with the future stuff that is already definitively set in stone. Not to mention, yet another contradictory Bruce Wayne death, which I’m assuming would trump all the others. Not saying it can’t be done, but I feel like I need to wait a bit for a few more issues in order to really see what Johns has up his sleeve.
I do think that Helena’s origin timeline is probably just one of many possible futures, of which Batman Beyond is also one.
I hear you, although that’s not technically how my site functions, nor how I approach my personal headcanon (or a even a more concrete canon). Sure, there are myriad alternate futures throughout Hypertime, but some items definitively weave back and forth through the primary timeline, with certain stories and characters making significant impact (sometimes via time travel, but also through other narrative means) on the main line. Terry McGinnis and other members of the McGinnis family are definitively canon to Earth-0, as was Tom King’s version of Bruce’s death by cancer as an old man (at least for an undetermined period that may or may not have ended, anyway).
So in my mind, everything in the future must jibe with everything else, much akin to how things must co-exist in an orderly fashion with other things in present day and throughout history. (tbh I think right now that both Batman Beyond and New Golden Age can co-exist with minimal caveats, but I think TK’s death of Bruce by cancer might finally be 100% out on Earth-0.) However, I’d be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge and give praise to what you are saying. There have been plenty of alternate futures that had to be averted (and which were averted, to be relegated/discarded as Hypertimeline castoffs). Could this be the case? For sure. As you say, Johns isn’t making it easy. He never did, but I think he’s got a great head on his shoulders for this stuff, so I’m looking forward to the JSA series.
I tend to think of DC’s future (and hypertime) like this:
The present is a very real thing in DC. It is a point moving across time. On one end, in front of the present, there are infinite possible futures existing in hypertime. Some are more likely than others, and many share aspects.
As the present pulls across time like a zipper, it collapses the possible futures it crosses into a linear history.
As an example, there are many different versions of the legion in the future, and there will be, until the present moment crosses the year 3000.
Until the present moment passes over them, Justice League 3001, Retroboot Legion, Bendis Legion, etc, are all equally possible futures and thus are also equally capable of interacting with the present.
Once the present moment hits, those possibilities remain in the sea of hypertime, but are no longer directly connected to the ‘timeline’, so to speak.
So by your interpretation, the Legion in Bendis’ recent JL vs Legion, while Earth-0 canon now, could wind up being an alternate Hypertime Legion? i.e. We cannot deny that the JL had some interaction with the Legion and traveled into the future, but maybe the JL traveled to an alternate future, not their own primary future?
Sorry that it took me so long to respond to this- life and work, all that.
In my interpretation, all of the future Legions are equally canon and ‘real’ until they are made conclusively impossible by something occurring in the present.
Bendis’ Legion co-exists with Retroboot Legion, Five Years Later Legion, Reboot Legion, Zero Hour Legion, Justice League 3000, etc. Yes, I am actively ignoring the explanation from Legion of Three Worlds because I think it’s silly. They are all equally valid possible futures, and all of them can interact with the ‘present’ through time travel.
IE, there is no ‘primary’ future, only possible futures.
I suspect there may be some more evidence for my headcanon here soon, given that the new JSA book is going to deal with the Legion and in Flashpoint Beyond, Rip’s crazyboard mentioned ‘Legions of Four Worlds’.
No worries on the delay! I like your idea of “canon and ‘real’ until they are made conclusively impossible by something occurring in the present.” That could honestly apply to both our viewpoints in some fashion. Anyway, I think I’m going to do a deep dive blog entry about this very topic (it’s been a while since I wrote something like that). Time travel is a literal paradox, so there’s always something of the realm of impossibility and improbability attached to it. And I’m def going to wait for a few JSA issues to come out before I put anything on the site. God only knows where Johns is really going with everything.
Boy howdy, Geoff Johns is REALLY committed to making timeline problems, ain’t he.
Based on the preview for tomorrow’s issue, we now have two separate Geoff issues implying that Batman began his first year fourteen years ago, and I’ve got a friend at a shop saying that later stuff in that issue repeats the thing about the All-Star Comics relaunch with Power Girl and Sylvester Pemberton being around in the 1970s.
I could potentially abide a genuine fourteen year timeline if it weren’t for, y’know, the chronologically twelve year old Jon Kent who was born after the Death of Superman (I’m choosing to ignore the Astrid Arkham problem at the moment, since she’s a much more minor character), but Geoff, my pal, you can’t have the Seven Soldiers be rescued by the JLA before they exist! Also, having Power Girl operating before Superman is just plain weird!
I really don’t get why they didn’t just have him label these panels ‘not so long ago’ and ‘many years ago’, etc. The specific years only cause more problems.
I bet Geoff Johns is placing Power Girl and Sylvester Pemberton in the 1970s, implying that they were rookies then, but like their teammates obtained extended youth. I guess? Now, I haven’t seen any previews yet, but I’m interested to see the specificity of a “fourteen year” timeline. That seems quite odd. As you say, it muddles up the Jon Kent stuff for sure. It would also mean that Damian was conceived in Batman’s first year, which is also no good nonsense.
In any case, it all seems a bit odd, which is why I’m holding off on adding most of the Johns stuff for a bit. I want to see how it all shakes out, see if I can really step back and see the forest for the trees after a handful of issues have been released. We’ll see…
Ok, having read JSA #1, Johns is clearly doing some weird stuff with time and timelines. The entire arc is going to revolve around Huntress battling Per Degaton through time, with her trying to undo his machinations. I think by arc’s end, we could have a consistent version of things that could actually jibe with the current timeline.
OR (equally likely)
Johns is finally doing what he originally wanted to do with Doomsday Clock—reboot the DCU. DiDio wanted to reboot the DCU into 5G at the same time Johns wanted to reboot the DCU into whatever he had planned for post-Doomsday Clock. Neither of them got their wish as instead, we got Snyder’s anti-reboot which kept the same Rebirth timeline going. Now that Johns has regained his power, could we be seeing the birth of a new DCU?
Either that, or this is an alternate Johns-verse timeline. After all, a timeline where Bruce’s parents were killed 31 years ago (making Bruce currently in his late 30s) and where Batman only debuted 13 years ago is quite the novel timeline. In fact, it would squeeze all the Robins into a tight timeframe, basically going right back to New 52 compression (which barely made sense). And as you’ve mentioned, really zero room for next generation heroes like Jon Kent and Damian to have grown up.
I’m content to just ignore the ’13 years’ statements for now, because Geoff has also written books that directly state that COIE and Infinite Crisis take place a two years apart.
That said, I have to imagine that he’s not just going to leave the 1976 segments completely unexplained, right?
Related: my dumb headcanon I’ve settled upon is that any golden age appearance of Batman and Robin that can’t logically be filled with Flying Fox should filled with Mister Scarlet and Pinky the Whiz Kid. They’re surprisingly overlapping characters, to the extent that Mister Scarlet was even originally written as being from Gotham. You could even have a grown up Pinky take the place of E2 grown-up Robin in the All-Star Comics storylines Johns is saying took place in 1976.
Definitely adopting a wait-and-see on this. Love that headcanon idea lol. I should have started a Mr. Scarlet and Pinky the Whiz Kid chronology, it’d have been much easier on the brain.
I just came across this comment while looking for your placement of the Batman: Urban Legends #11-13 flashbacks (completely unrelated to this), but thought I’d my understanding of this. The scene with Power Girl and Sylverster Pemberton takes place in between pages of All-Star Comics #63 which was published in 1976, so I’d say it is more of a “topical reference” than anything else, so it should simply be placed wherever that story is placed in the overall DC Universe chronology.
Thanks, Tenzel. Hope you’ve been well! Rarely a day goes by that I don’t reference your site to make mine better. If you ever need anything, feel free to shoot me an email. 🙂
Also, with all the newer stuff that’s been released in the past couple years, I’m sure once the dust settles, placements will shift accordingly.
Will Batman: The Knight by Chip Zdarsky be included as part of his early years? Not entirely sure if its canon, but the entire story takes place prior to Year One during his training period and just finished a couple months ago.
Hello! It was already added some time ago. 🙂
Ah I see it now, in Rebirth! I was looking for it under Modern Age.
Looks like Human Target COULD actually be in-continuity, given revelations in the most recent issue.
So getting frozen and shattered into a million pieces was no problem for the power ring to fix. Okayyy. But yeah, if that wasn’t really a Guy Gardner death scene, then this doesn’t violate any canon.
I feel the revelation will probably be that it was a reflection or some kind of illusion using a Lantern construct plus the ice. I think next issue is Ice’s confession anyway, so we’ll know for sure next month.
Issue #10 already says exactly that—it was a ring illusion.
Another hink has arisen in Geoff’s weird 12-year timeline:
Monkey Prince hard establishes that Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman have been operating for at least fifteen years.
Really wish DC editorial would mandate some consistency on this.
Oh yeah, good catch. Justice League vs Ultra-Humanite 15 years ago, which hints that DC is operating with a longer timeline (at least 16 years long, but likely the 21 year timeline that we currently have in place). Johns’ short timeline just doesn’t make sense, unless it’s a reboot. We’ll see.
Yet more of Geoff’s goofiness:
To fit his weird twelve year timeline, today’s issue of Stargirl and the Lost Children is now claiming that Doctor Manhattan took five years, not ten, as was previously and repeatedly stated.
Oh yeah, he’s digging in, ain’t he? Do you remember by any chance what specific issues mentioned the “10 years of missing time”? I seem to recall that it started out as “ten years” (as explicitly stated in DCU Rebirth) and then it became more vague (just “years” without specificity) at some juncture. Never before was it five, though.
Furthermore, Johns’ goofiness stands out even more in the face of Mark Waid’s recent comics, which are clearly fleshing out a longer timeline and trying to honor the Silver Age in greater detail.
I don’t recall the specific issues, alas, outside of DCU Rebirth.
At this point, I’m mostly just curious why editorial hasn’t stepped in to force some consistency here. I appreciate editorial giving writers some leeway, but I think this is a place where they should probably be taking a firmer hand, lol.
I think it’s tough when there is a power vacuum and someone as big-time as Geoff Johns steps in to take some semblance of charge. Right now, it seems like the creators have more control than the editors, which is kinda like saying the inmates are running the asylum. Say what you will about Dan DiDio, as head of publishing, he definitely kept the creators in line and always scaffolded the power of editorial. Personally, I’m glad DiDio is gone, but someone needed to fill his shoes, and that someone never really came.
I’m currently reading trough DC’s recent digital-first series, so I’ve decided to see which of the Batman appearences on them aren’t in here. They are Flash: Fastest man alive #9, Harley Quinn: Make ’em laugh #3 and Sensational Wonder Woman #6.
Nice! It was very hard to keep track of all those, although I did my best. Thanks a million. I’ll add these to my reading list and place them accordingly.
So- Gotham: Year One. Largely fits alright (save for the Patrick/Richard thing), some really interesting characterization of Slam Bradley, and.. one doozy of an implication in regards to Thomas Wayne’s heritage.
Thoughts?
I think it’s getting mostly positive reviews (mostly as a decently-told hard boiled detective tale), but in my humble opinion it’s yet another instance of Tom King treading very heavily upon pre-existing lore. It reminds me of when King had Booster Gold re-visiting (and tromping all over) Crime Alley on the night of the Wayne Murders. The implication with Gotham City: Year One is nearly more than that. Slam sleeps with Constance nine months prior to Thomas’ birth (at time where it was made clear she was not sexually active with Richard Bruce Patrick, and she later asks Slam to act as father figure (which he declines). Of course, there’s still an out for anyone that doesn’t like it, since it’s never 100% confirmed. I don’t mind the Slam-as-Bruce’s-grandpa revelation, but it is heavy-handed. Still, not as heavy-handed as the reveal that Richard Bruce Patrick was a boozing, gambling, womanizing schemer that not only kidnapped his own child (leading to her death) but also was technically the original “Bat-Man” complete with an underground “Bat-cave” trophy room connected to Wayne Manor.
I much prefer lighter, forward-thinking tales that don’t dwell in the well-worn territory of the past while making twist retcons for shock value. There’s so much to build upon, yet I find King constantly getting grim’n’gritty with comic book history. Wally West, Adam Strange, Mr. Miracle, Booster Gold, Patrick Wayne, Marvel’s Vision… King’s depiction of all of them have left me with a bad taste in my mouth, and in the end, I’m not so sure that we receive anything of additive value for the line.
I’m not sure if this would factor into anything that’s been mentioned on the timeline at all, but comments regarding Galaxy’s presence in the upcoming Hawkgirl Book places Galaxy’s solo graphic novel as happening six years before the present day:
https://twitter.com/planetx/status/1645861240915525632?s=20
Not particularly Batman-related, but I figured on the off chance any of the points on your timeline are connected to Galaxy it was information worth knowing.
Thanks Dylan. It’s definitely neat that they are canonizing this character!
Dear Collin, I know its a long shot, but is there any chance that you can post (retrospectively) the Update Changelog between 7/3/2022 and 11/1/2022?
I tried to look up web.archive and that part wasn’t saved/recorded, but I’m still curious what changes were made in those 4 months.
Thank you in advance.
Hi Pocok, looks like there is a strange gap in the history there that didn’t properly save in web.archive or the internet archive. I keep some old Update records, but I seem to be missing a gap between 7/4/2022 and 10/4/2022. There definitely were changes made during that stretch, but I don’t have an exact record, sorry! Here’s what I do have:
–7/3/2022. Modern Age Year 8. References to Deadman’s debut come from Batgirl: Year One #7, not Batgirl: Year One #8. This has been corrected.
–7/3/2022. Modern Age Year 8. Deadman’s debut moved immediately prior to Batgirl: Year One #7-8 (in which it is specifically said that Batman is adventuring with Deadman).
–7/3/2022. Modern Age Year 8, Modern Age Year 10. Deadman Vol. 2 #1 has been moved from Year 8 to Year 10 as it features the death of Cleveland Brand, who appears alive and well in Nightwing Vol. 2 #103. Deadman Vol. 2 #1 is now placed after Nightwing Vol. 2 #103. Special thanks to Dave Challis on this one.
–7/3/2022. Modern Age Year 15 Part 1. Power of Shazam #22 moved prior to JLA #5. Thanks to Troy Doliner on this one.
–10/5/2022. Infinite Frontier Year 21. Added Joker Vol. 2 #15.
Added: –10/6/2022. Modern Age Early Years. Added Batman #681 epilogue flashback of Thomas Wayne telling Bruce “they’d probably throw someone like Zorro in Arkham.”
Added: –10/6/2022. New 52 Early Years. Added Thomas Wayne telling Bruce “they’d probably throw someone like Zorro in Arkham” (as referenced in Batman Inc Vol. 2 #3).
Added: –10/6/2022. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Age Year 4. As per the second feature to Batman Vol. 3 #12, moved the following from Year 6 to Year 4: Zur-En-Arrh hallucination, Simon Hurt’s debut, red phone line debut, and Achilles Milo’s debut.
Added: –10/8/2022. Modern Age Year 15. Added reference from Aztek: The Ultimate Man #3 about Wayne Enterprises publishing books.
Added: –10/11/2022. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 17. Moved Neal Adams’ Deadman and Batman vs Ra’s al Ghul from Year 18 to Year 17, prior to Dick Grayson’s brain injury.
Added: –10/17/2022. New 52 Futures End. Clarified some information regarding the start of the timeline and the end of the Earth-2 War. Thanks to Martin Lel on this one!
Added: –10/19/2022. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 6 through Year 16 Part 1. Updated/corrected the history of the two Ace the Bat-Hounds as per details in Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #8 and “Hounded” (Batman: Urban Legends).
Added: –10/20/2022. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Future and Year 19. Moved Batman: The Detective #1-6 from the future section to Year 19.
Added: –10/25/2022. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Future and Year 19. Moved Batman: The Detective #1-6 back to the future where it belongs. Should future narrative deem it unworthy of canon, so be it. For now, it lives on in the future section. Thanks to Drive a Sandwich for getting me to rethink this.
Added: –10/30/2022. Modern Age Early Years. Martin Lel helped re-organize various parts of this section.
Added: –11/1/2022. Infinite Frontier Era Year 21. “Failsafe” moved from Year 20 to Year 21, post-Dark Crisis.
Added: –11/2/2022. Modern Age Year 14 Part 1. Added references from Showcase ’94 #3. Special thanks to Anthony Fallone.
Wow, thank you very much! Great site as always! 🙂
Also P.S.: hopefully someone managed to save that time period locally in a .txt file and can/will post it some time in the future, just for the sake of documentation!
I think the Zur-En-Arrh vs. Failsafe training montage in #136 is actually after the death of Jason. They flash to a Robin suit in a case during the bout and are discussing failures of Batman. I could be wrong, but if you look at how advanced the cave is and how advanced Failsafe is, I’d say he has been working on it for some time.
Hey Dylan. I missed that on my first go-around, but now that I’m looking at it (and it’s weird design), this is actually the ROBIN OF ZUR-EN-ARRH costume, which we first saw in Batman Vol. 3 #127. While the Robin of Zur-En-Arrh has yet to make an appearance, this might be Chip Zdarsky hinting at something in the future. After all, in the main narrative, Bruce is worried about what other things his Zur-En-Arrh persona might have cooked up in the past that may emerge in the future. I’ll think about this some more though and I’ll def let you know if changes are to be made.
You are absolutely correct.
I guess I also assumed Failsafe wasn’t started until after Tower of Babel. But maybe I misread that in the original Failsafe arc.
Hey Dylan, the creation of Failsafe definitely goes post Batman creating anti-JL contingencies, which is reflected on my timeline. “Tower of Babel” doesn’t occur until Year 11, and while that story is obviously about Batman’s anti-JL contingencies, he comes up with said contingencies years prior. With Zdarsky’s recent output, though, it’s apparent that Zur-En-Arrh comes and goes periodically, meaning that all of his secret machinations (including Failsafe updates) could theoretically be sprinkled throughout the timeline. (Originally, I thought the building of Failsafe was only connected to the early origins of Zur-En-Arrh, but this is obviously not the case any longer.)
Duh, of course the contingencies would exist soon after meeting them. It wouldn’t just be days before Tower of Babel. And Failsafe is a contingency for himself, which would start after he creates those other ones.
Thanks for clearing that up!
I’m curious about your thoughts on the placement of World’s Finest: Teen Titans.
It’s clearly not concurrent with the regular World’s Finest book- that much is clear. Different team, different situation.
My original theory was that it was going to be set between the original Teen Titans #49 and #50, because of the presence of Bumblebee (and with the team disbanding at the end of the following arc), but now that it’s out, with the appearance of Charlie Parker (and mentioning that he’s retired), I think that Waid is just flat out establishing a new iteration of the team that existed between the disbanding of the original team and the founding of the New Teen Titans.
I think it is a totally new iteration of the Teen Titans that fits in at some point after the team disbands (following Teen Titans #50-53) but obviously before New Teen Titans #1. I suppose it could occur prior to World’s Finest, but I think Waid might have it overlap at some point with upcoming issues of World’s Finest. (I think it can be the same team seen in World’s Finest, just with Bumblebee added.)
I’m sure you’ve caught it since, but it seems like, per the interactions with Mal Duncan, Waid is instead overwriting the back half of the OG Teen Titans run. Admittedly, given that it’s a run where Wally West tacitly approves of segregation, that probably makes sense.
Hey Dylan, I’m not so sure it’s overwriting the end of the Teen Titans run so much as continuing it, adding in story the preceded the debut of the New Teen Titans. But I’ll certainly keep an eye on it—especially since it’s one of the better books being published by DC atm.
The problem is that it starts with Bumblebee on the team and THEN introduces Mal Duncan as a character Bumblebee hasn’t met and isn’t a hero yet, which isn’t exactly compatible with the actual silver age comics there.
Oh yeah, that is curious. It clearly occurs post Lilith Clay, Cave Boy (Gnarrk), and Golden Eagle… but sans Mal Duncan. I’ll look into this a bit more. If this is indeed the debut of Duncan, then I’m assuming we’ll see him become Guardian/Herald in this series? If that is indeed the case, then Waid has simply erased Duncan from earlier stories or, like you said, he’s re-writing this era. Either way, a change will def have to be made. I’ll likely wait until the series wraps, though.
Quick question: when do you think the Batman Brave and the Bold #4 Part 1 story takes place? The writers revealed it was originally meant as an inventory story that they got to put out now since it ties into their Batman Beyond series. It seems fairly early in Rebirth considering the inclusion of Cullen Row, Alfred being alive and the costume Batman is wearing. Maybe I missed you posting it elsewhere, but would love your insight.
https://twitter.com/JacksonLanzing/status/1693671494524788964
Hey Dylan, I have this item in my Year Fifteen, just prior to Joker’s “Endgame”. I realize that my search bars can’t handle a mix of italicized words and non-italicized words (i.e. “Vol. 2 #4 Part 1″), which is why, if you were trying to search for it, nothing was coming up. I’ll see if I can fix this!
I thought he didn’t have the purple cape, yellow outlined Bat symbol til after Endgame.
Oh yeah, you are correct. That era is more a blur to me than like all previous 50 years of Batman lol. I will correct. Makes me wonder if I’ve made this mistake elsewhere. Hmmm…
I’m quite nostalgic for those early days of Rebirth, it was my intro to reading monthly. That costume will always be a highlight for me.
There are too many comics, your hit rate is still pretty good all things considered.
Haha, thanks, Dylan. I like that era too, just a blur in my mind lol. Early days of Rebirth were a refreshing course correction from the fatal flaws of the New 52.
Batman Incorporated just wrapped up!
With how it ended, this could be either before Man Who Stopped Laughing starts, during the same flashback time frame where he meets up with the Legion of Doom OR sometime during it (seems less likely seeing as how the action in California seems to happen over the course of a couple days leaving less time for world travel).
Let me know what you think!
Yeah, I think putting the whole thing before The Man Who Stopped Laughing makes sense. I’ve changed it for now… although, it feels strange to put it (and The Man Who Stopped Laughing so far in the past—before Dark Crisis and material that was published well over a year ago). I wonder if there’s a way to place Batman Inc and Man Who Stopped Laughing at the very least after Dark Crisis?
Do you think that there the timeline for Joker could be as follows: Joker Vol. 2 series, then Joker: The Man Who Stopped Laughing series, then Batman Inc Vol. 3 series?
I think it goes Joker Vol. 2, certain flashbacks (like the Legion of Doom confrontation) from Man Who Stopped Laughing, then Batman Inc Vol. 3, then the main plot of Man Who Stopped Laughing. The main plot must be after Dark Crisis over the course of few weeks because I believe issue 9 leads directly into Knight Terrors and issue 10 directly references the goon shortage caused by Gotham WWA.
I think part of why Batman Inc feels so out of place is because the prelude story in the 2022 Batman annual came out a couple months before the first issue. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a delay.
I think a lot of things (even Ram’s run) will be set after Dark Crisis so the whole Dawn of DC timeline makes more sense. Look what happened with the Failsafe arc. I wonder if they’ll retcon Connor Hawke as the Green Arrow for that issue.
It would make sense for it to be Connor. I doubt they’ll address it, but that’s the only fanwank that makes sense. I’m patiently waiting for Detective to give us a sense of placement. Hopefully soon.
They have solicited that the next arc in Detective after Gotham War ends will also be set post-Gotham War.
I think the final timeline will be as follows:
Shadow War > Dark Crisis > Lazarus Planet > Ram V Detective > First halfish of Man Who Stopped Laughing > Zdarsky Batman & Knight Terrors > Gotham War plus end of Man Who Stopped Laughing > Outlaw Detective arc > Zdarsky Batman vs Joker
Thanks Dylan! I’ll take a look about re-structuring things once Ram V starts his new arc.
Where do you see Christian Ward’s Batman: City of Madness taking place in continuity (assuming it does). He has been on several interviews saying it is a sequel of sorts to Arkham Asylum by Grant Morrison and features the Court of Owls (who have not interacted with Batman in the story, so this could be before or after the original Court of Owls story by Snyder and Capullo). It’s obviously not a lot of information yet, but I’m always curious about how you determine placement and specifically how and why something is/isn’t canon.
In general, stories like this could take place anywhere, so I just look for key story indicators. If there aren’t any, and it fits in the present era, then it can likely go there. With Black Label, I’m also looking for key indicators of things that are screaming “this is not meant to tie into continuity,” although plenty of Black Label stuff is canon.
In regard to City of Madness specifically, I’ll definitely wait until the series wraps before trying to definitively place it. But after a quick skim of issue #1, it obviously has to occur while Alfred is still alive. I would imagine that it’ll be post Court of Owls debut, but we can’t be sure yet. One of the Terrible Trio gets killed, but deaths don’t mean much when Death Metal/Infinite Frontier states that numerous people were resurrected at that point. However, this would help us place it in-between Death Metal/Infinite Frontier and the prior appearance of the Terrible Trio (which if I’m not mistaken is in an issue of Batgirl). In any case, I’ll def let you know where it goes once the series wraps.
Hello again.
What did you think of City of Madness and how it added on to Arkham, the Court and several other characters?
I rather liked it and appreciated it all wrapping things up with a bow. Would love to see Ward tackle more Batman.
In terms of continuity, I feel this is possible. It could go in the Damian-less portions of the Infinite Frontier timeline, after the finale of Morrison’s run. Let me know what you think!
Hey Dylan, I just re-read it in its entirety. I think it can be canon, although imbuing another malevolent spirit within Joker (I think that’s what happens at the end?) seems like a bit much when Zdarsky and others are already heavy-handedly adding way too much to the Joker mythos as it is. Nevertheless, I dig the story, and I feel like Gotham Below links interestingly to the Dark Multiverse mythos.
In terms of placement, I’d lean on putting it closer to just prior to Alfred’s death. The costume is Christian Ward doing his own thing—I wouldn’t really use it as a means of determining placement. In any case, a neat Black Label tale. I’ll add it in shortly.
I think City Of Madness is meant to be non-canon. Batman’s costume is not always an indicator of canonicity or non canonicity, but I really do think that this is one of those cases where strange costume + strange story = non canon.
I tried reaching out to Ram V about how the events of his Detective fit into continuity, but have not received a response yet. I did pose a similar question to Chip’s substack and he said it’s honestly left up to the editors since Batman ends up in upwards of 12 books per month. Which I guess kind of makes sense, I see why writers would put crafting a good story over whether or not it lines up tidily with others.
I feel like there used to be greater effort from writers to insert natural ellipses in their ongoing arcs, but it’s been over a decade since I can really recall such an effort being done with any success. And Batman being in twelve books per month is too much. (I read all the comics, trust me he’s in well more than just twelve per month on average.) In the end though, that response by Zdarsky only motivates me more—and shows that there is plenty of reason to warrant a site like mine 🙂
Are you able to apply to be the next Batman or DC editor? I feel like it isn’t crazy to have a shared universe that can have good stories and continuity.
Haha wouldn’t that be somethin’!
Having read Detective #1080 (and seen where the solicitations are heading), there’s really no way Ram V’s arc occurs in the middle of another one (i.e. in the middle of Gotham War). Ram V’s arc is much bigger than Gotham War, especially where it seems to be heading. I think I’m going to move it, as you suggested, Dylan.
It’s just a weird run! It’s hard to place which makes it easy to read in a vacuum (making it new reader friendly, which is always nice), but it has also been referencing events and history inconsistently. We’ll see what happens next!
Just leafed back through Birds of Prey #5 to see where the age 16 was mentioned and it appears to be just the character Sin. So I guess we don’t need Cass at age 5 in No Man’s Land?
I always suspected Tim, Cass and Stephanie were early/mid 20s. Minimum college aged.
Wow yeah i totally mis-read Sin as Cassie. Phew. Thanks! Will revert. Cassie should be around 21-years-old atm. I thought it was insane that they were knocking her back five years in age! PS I have Tim and Stephanie both at age 26.
> –1/17/2024. Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Era Year 21. Added Superman: Lost #1. Notably, Superman: Lost #10 retcons its own narrative (through in-world cosmic temporal hijinks), rendering Batman’s involvement in Superman: Lost #1-10 to just be attached to the first issue.
I don’t think this is (totally) the case? My read was it all still happened, but that the Clark that went on the journey sent the other version of him created by the time-space fuckery back to Earth, so there are technically two Clarks out there- one on Earth, and one in deeeeeep space.
Hey Dylan, I’ll be honest, I read Superman: Lost twice, and I still don’t quite understand it. I guess I can agree with your synopsis—that it all happened. But by story’s end, Clark (some Clark) winds up returning mere hours after the inciting incident (thus sparing him the trauma of living that other long life). In regard to our timeline at hand, the narrative through-line of Clark being despondent and catatonic for months upon his return is removed in regard to everyone else (even if Lois still somehow experienced/remembers it). In any case, I’ll take another gander at this one.
I’ve now read the ending multiple times, and man, this is a real head-scratcher. Time-travel stories aren’t my favorite tbh, and this one seems especially paradoxical for my taste.
Here’s what I’m struggling with. Does the book end on Day One or Day Ninety after all is said and done? At the end of the story, with Superman having returned to Earth instead of Victor’s Planet (sans trauma), they show the issue #2 Contrectatio scene verbatim, only swapping out Victor’s Planet for Earth. This should in effect nullify the rest of the series from that point onward. And, in fact, when Clark returns from his mission at the end, he doesn’t know about the white solar suit and has never heard of Victor. Which seems to point to this being a new Day One—where Clark came back and Lois wrapped up her McGonigle case with ease.
Yet, bizarrely, in this sequence, Lois still knows about the white solar suit and about Adam Strange rescuing Clark. Why would she know about this? In fact, if the Contrectatio never brought Clark to Victor’s Planet, then all of that stuff never happened, right? The entire 3 months of Superman having been upset/PTSD are gone, so that entire 3 months is fundamentally altered to a point of non existence, no? The experience of being lost and then having the bad life (which happens to old Superman) gets relegated to that of an alternate timeline, no? If there’s a loop that is created and closed, I’m not seeing it. I’m just seeing plot holes.
I’m still trying to wrap my head around everything, but I’ll update the site accordingly. Again, I simply just don’t understand it in full, so it’s hard for me to correct. If you can explain the ending in layman’s terms, I’d love that.
I just read it again lol. And guess who makes a cameo in issue #6. One Alfred Pennyworth. This story is supposed to take place with Alfred alive, and with a beardless old school Aquaman. But it also has elements of canon that are more current (i.e. Black Adam as JL member). After having read this story now multiple times, it’s my firm opinion that it is non-canon.
Don’t forget the flashback of Bruce Wayne and Nora Fries in DC’s Spring Breakout #1 that came out recently. Bruce was still a child and Victor Fries was already engaged to Nora. i start to question how old is Mr Freeze and how long was Nora Frozen.
Hi Matthew, I didn’t forget! It was added the day it came out. (This update section is for any changes to the site that are not related to new weekly releases. I enter all new release stuff as it comes out week-to-week. Thanks!)
Hi Collin, what about Penguin 9 and The Boy Wonder? Are they canon?
Hi Antonio, all of Penguin is canon. Just waiting to add it in once the series finishes. Boy Wonder reads non-canon Black Label to me. Seems to be a slightly re-imagined Damian as Robin Y1 story.
Why did you choose to list Dick Grayson at age 14 in your rebirth timeline from by the looks of it, he seems to become Robin or at least he’s drawn to be at around 12 like he traditionally is depicted as being?
Hi Hassan! As stated in a footnote in Y3, Dick’s age reasoning comes from having to combine 1. Tom King’s overall timeline (from Batman: Killing Time and The Penguin #6-7, which seems to imply Dick becoming Robin in later Y3) with 2. the fact that Dick stops being Robin on his eighteenth birthday (according to Marv Wolfman’s Robin 80th Anniversary 100-Page Spectacular Part 1). Aside from that, there’s nothing in contemporary canon (so far, at least) that has definitively given Dick’s age at the time of his parents’ deaths.
is this still the case especially since in Batman and Robin Year One, he seems so much younger
There’s nothing in canon (at least not yet!) that has Dick being younger than 14 when he debuts as Robin. Batman and Robin: Year One hasn’t given Dick’s specific age. (My perception of Dick in Batman and Robin: Year One isn’t that he seems way younger. I actually read him as being a teenager, so 14 makes sense to me. After all, developmentally there are some 12-year-olds that seem older and there are some 14-year-olds that seem younger.) Suffice to say, if anything changes, I’ll certainly change things on the site. Thanks!
Curious where the Plastic Man series that just wrapped would go, if it’s canon at all?
Hey Jade, it’s definitely not canon as it doesn’t jibe with any JL or Teen Titans era, especially not in current canon. Also, Detective Chimp gets brutally murdered in it. I was unable to place it anywhere, although it does give very specific dates in Plastic Man’s life, which help generally place it on a greater overall DCU timeline, albeit one that is unique to its own narrative. I have a sneaking suspicion that almost all Black Label releases from here on out will be non-canon (as they all have been for a little while now).
Understandable. That Jenny Sparks series is sure getting hard to place unfortunately.
Hey Collin, did you check on the Batman: The Multiverse of the Dark Knight book that was released a while back? Similar to the Batman Files, it is also an In Universe document, this time made by Barbara Gordon, and there was some attempt to keep the book in continuity as the creators’ original plan was for Alfred to be the narrator, but the idea was scrapped. It would be good to know if it fits, especially as the guide has a lot of information about the many Batmen of Earth-0.
Another Mathew Manning, I see. I wasn’t familiar with it, but I’m reading it now. Thanks for pointing it out to me.
Like his previous works, it’s very unique and inventive, so I give Manning a ton of credit for pulling it off. He loves making encyclopedias into in-universe kayfabe items. It mostly works, although you have to suspend your disbelief a bit. I’d say it’s barely-canon (maybe semi-canon at best), but I’ll include some info about it on the site. If Oracle really has this level of intimate knowledge about nearly every single alternate universe and hypertimeline that’s ever existed, she must have worked very closely with Barry Allen as he charted the multiverse in (as referenced in Dark Crisis: Big Bang #1). Again, it’s adapting encyclopedia/wiki material into an in-story thing, maybe to a fault.
To Manning’s credit (and probably relief) writing about the broad strokes of an individual character’s history must be a lot easier and continuity-error free than writing their entire life up to present day like The Batman Files. And as you pointed out, as Barbara was heavily involved in multiverse study in Dark Crisis, I can see her getting some help from one of the Flashes, the Totality or even Justice Incarnate for good measure. (Or maybe she got her hands on Superman’s old computer simulations from the Silver Age, they worked just fine back then)
Hey Collin, DC Just announced that Mark Waid is to release a new version of the History of the DC Universe, literally titled The New History of the DC Universe. There was some talks about it a while back but now It seems to be fully oficial. Any thoughts on it?
I just read that news as well. Mark Waid is calling it his “dream project,” saying further that it’s “a chance to realign all of DC’s sprawling continuity into one master timeline.” Waid has more-or-less been subtly realigning things the way he sees fit (mirroring timelines of yesteryear) for a couple years now, but it would seem that DC is ready to give him the official official say on things (presuming this is canon, and it would appear to be). I think there are few better writers equipped to handle such a task as this, so I look forward to the series!
Looking at it, it could be either the best thing for DC and readers (and timeline builders), or it could be biggest nightmare for everyone. Making a official history of DC was no small task back in 1986 and it will surely be harder now almost 40 years later with so many years of stories and reboots/soft-reboots along the way. I’m more interested in how Waid will tackle the New 52 stuff that contradicts other continuity materials (like characters ages (Captain Marvel/Shazam notably) and the dual Superman from Final Days/Rebirth). He already did a History of the Marvel Universe a few years back so i’m trusting him on this.
I can only image the massive headache that book will give you if Waid decides to put a hard timeline in it haha.
I’ve faced many a headache in the past but have lived to tell the tale, so we’ll just have to see! Generally-speaking, I trust in Waid more than I have others before, so I’m cautiously optimistic.
I’m particularly interested to see what he does re: Shazam!, because the Shazamily is very much kind of the sole remaining outlier, where everything remains aligned with their n52 origin (despite references to them being present for pre-N52 events, and Billy’s appearance in World’s Finest).
I do recall that Waid said he regretted having Billy show up so early in World’s Finest because it does wonky things to his age- I wonder if he’ll try to solve that, too?
Oh yeah, definitely want to see what he does with that. I’m excited for all the Waid stuff coming up.
Hey Collin, Antonio here.
I was wondering what made you wipe out 3 Jokers? I’ve read ‘tec 1095 and nothing seems mentioning Joker… Also, how about The Last Days Of Lex Luthor and DC/Sonic crossovers? Are they canon?
Thanks as always.
Detective Comics #1095 reveals that Joe Chill is still alive. It wipes out an integral part of Three Jokers—and my favorite part of Three Jokers—the resolution, forgiveness, and death of Joe Chill. Three Jokers was already being held together with numerous caveats and fanwanks. This topples its narrative. It also further pushes Black Label as a concept into the realm of definitive non-canon. (I think that some Black Label stories can and do still fit, but they really aren’t meant to be canon.)
I haven’t read Last Days of Lex Luthor yet, so I can’t comment. Since it’s Black Label, I’d venture a guess that it’s non-canon. (Moving forward, if any Black Label feels off even for small reasons, I’m not going to include it on my timeline.) Sonic/DC crossover appears to be canon. I’ll reassess once it’s complete, but it’ll probably get added.
But couldn’t Joe Chill have been revived in the wave of resurrections post-Death Metal?
Hey Dylan, I hadn’t thought of that AT ALL lol. Damn, I’m going to have to go back and re-think this move…
My main reason for eliminating Three Jokers was because of Joe Chill—and that basically doesn’t matter anymore on account of Death Metal. I was about to undo my cancellation of the story because of this, but then I gave pause… While I’m actually a fan of the Three Jokers story, I do think that the primary timeline is much stronger without it (and I think the story works much better as a standalone or as part of a separate Johns-verse).
Three Jokers has costume issues, internal timing issues of its own, and reads as if three Jokers have clandestinely existed for many years (when we know that hasn’t been the case). I had surmised that, at the start of Three Jokers, since Joker is creating dozens of alt-Jokers, he’s managed to re-create the original other two Jokers. But again, that feels like a pretty big fanwank, one that flies in the face of Johns’ intention.
Yes, you are correct that Joe Chill is technically an invalid reason to cancel Three Jokers, but now that it’s got me re-assessing how the story actually fits (and the intent of the publishers/creators—from Johns/Fabok/Didio/Abernathy all the way to Zdarsky), I feel like Three Jokers should probably remain on the chopping block.
Obviously, Zdarsky’s entire run couldn’t exist without Three Jokers, which forms the psychological background and framework for his Joker stuff, but the meat-and-potatoes main action of Three Jokers doesn’t quite line up and never did. Originally, I thought that you couldn’t have “three Jokers” without Three Jokers, right lol? But it’s fairly clear that there was this idea of “three Jokers” inserted into the timeline (by Johns) and then Johns did this wild follow-up that kinda-sorta fit but only if you squinted your eyes. Then DC was like, let’s do our own follow-up but crib heavily from the essence of Johns’ follow-up.
This also has me re-thinking what Black Label is and was always supposed to be—something that (rather ridiculously) hovers somewhere between canon and non-canon, leaning more often toward the latter. I think the onus on timeline-builders shouldn’t be to fanwank ways for Black Label stories to jibe. Black Label is a flag that’s telling us, “Hey, this could be non-canon.” If you see that flag, you should be actively seeking reasons to disqualify it, not the other way around.
But I’m going to really continue to re-think this. Thanks!
I agree, I think it is easier to remove it than include it at this point. No other books (including Geoff’s own JSA book) after it ever referenced it. It could be argued Chip’s version is just Morrison’s distilled through the reveal from Justice League.
Also, while I’m here, curious why you think the whole of the recent Detective arc goes before the current Batman & Robin stuff. I saw that recent reference to Detective in Batman and Robin, but I more saw that as a reference for the events in intermingling. These stories since All-In have been better about leaving air for other stories.
A reference to another creator’s arc is meant to show a level of interconnectivity, for sure. That level of interconnectivity is TBD, and we’ll see if further detail is provided. It’s sometimes hard to interpret the intent of the writers these days, but since everyone seems to be writing for their own trade paperback release, I’ve (for now, anyway) kept whole arcs in-tact. If it looks like there should be some classic single-issue-overlapping, I’ll def make the change. I’ll re-asses once things wrap.
Hey Collin, I was wondering what you’d think of the first issue of New History of the DC Universe? I know it’s mostly not within your scope, as it doesn’t have a lot of Batman-related stuff in this 1st issue, but still, I’m interested in your opinion. I personally really liked it, thought it did a great job at being accurate to precious history while being easy to understand to those unfamiliar with it.
Hey hey! I’ve been looking forward to it, and it did not disappoint. I think a lot of people were mistakenly assuming that New History could really upend things in a reboot kind of way, but that’s not the case (and I don’t think it ever was). Waid has already been working with a rather set timeline that is based on a hybrid of all prior continuities dating back to the Silver Age, so this is his way of further concretizing things, in a way establishing his architectural framework as definitive canon. I was fairly confident Waid wasn’t going to include “1,000 years prior,” “100 years prior,” “50 years prior” specificity, and I don’t know that he will in the next issues either. And I like the back matter where he goes into greater detail (still sans year specificity), earmarking which items are more-or-less canon. And Batman’s time traveling does feature there.
There are also a few big retcons in there, like merging Milestone into DCU proper, the debut of the Justice Alliance, and, unless I’m mistaken, moving the JSA’s absentee Ragnarok period, going from the original span of Crisis to Armageddon: Inferno instead to now a span from the 1950/60s to the late 1980s. This actually is a genius move that better explains the origins of the JSA (and why they didn’t make a peep for decades). And, of course, the biggest retcon by far—the restoration of Hippolyta as the original Wonder Woman in the 20th century (thus returning Diana’s debut to the modern era).
New History of the DC Universe #2 does have some big changes to this timeline. Batman Year One seems to be a full year like in the original story with Zero Year not being in Year One anymore but instead moved to Year Two. It’s also stated Gordon isn’t a lieutenant until the end of Year One which is different from the original comic, instead Gordon was a detective for Year One, became Lieutenant at the end of Year One, and Captain after the events of Year Zero. Joker and Catwoman also both seem to debut after Zero Year in this timeline which considering Zero Year’s new placement would place it in Year Three at earliest depending on how long Zero Year is. The book does cite Catwoman’s debut from Year One though, so idk.
The timeline seems to put Batman’s villains debuting after Dick Grayson is Robin like in the original comics, citing their original comic appearances as their debuts. Those villains are Penguin, Clayface (Basil and Matt), Two-Face, Mr. Freeze, and Poison Ivy, all of which I’m pretty sure your current timeline places before that. Interestingly enough, Kathy Kane’s time as Batwoman and Bette Kane’s time as Bat-Girl are also shown here to pre-date those villain debuts which was definitely not the case in classic comics. Considering it says “during this period, Batman and Robin first encounter”, I’m gonna guess these villains all debut over a stretch of time after Robin’s debut and that Kathy and Bette debut sometime in the middle of all that.
The first meeting between Batman and Superman is also shown here to be after Robin, Batwoman, Bat-Girl, Bat-Mite, and many of Batman’s villains debut which would push it way later than shown on your timeline. The formation of the Justice League also happens after that which pushes that at least a year later on your current timeline.
Batman’s first encounter with Talia and Ra’s is back to being after Dick leaves for university like in the original comics. Man-Bat’s debut is pushed to after the Titans West as part of Phase 2 of the Supermen Project.
Waid really seems to be leaning into the Silver/Bronze age order of events with this issue.
I don’t think some of the event orderings, especially in the Silver Ages are supposed to be taken too literally TBF, some of them (like the bat-villains ones) are clearly meant to just be grouped together for ease of reading.
Arelious is addressing the second feature order—the back matter, which, at first glance, seems indeed to be a radically different timeline that is based mostly on publication order but with some curious Waid specificities. The grouping of the Bat-villains in the second feature shows Batman AND Robin’s (emphasis on Robin being with him) first encounters with certain villains, but even these don’t make too much sense and would contradict Waid’s own Batman and Robin Year One ongoing series (in which, for example, Robin encounters Two-Face and Matt hagen mere weeks after becoming the Boy Wonder.
In any case, I will dig deep into this and see what’s what. The main story of New History seems pretty straightforward and more-or-less matches what we already have. The second feature back matter, though, seems like a wholly novel timeline…
There are other curiosities as well. Like Joker and Catwoman’s debut where they are, seemingly after Miller’s Y1 (citing Golden Age debuts), yet Catwoman’s image is literally from Miller’s Y1. So yeah, I think the back matter is not quite right, maybe Barry is off a bit. Still, again, very strange when Waid gets super specific, especially with things like Gordon becoming Commissioner. I’m not sure Waid’s own World’s Finest stories match up with his back matter order.
Site contributor Martin Lel told me: “After issue two, we might have learned that the back-matter not being written by Waid isn’t just a convenience, but an indicator. It’s written by Dave Wielgosz, being more like a list of the research Waid had to work with, in the same vein as the back-matter of Waid’s History of the Marvel Universe, the back matter in X-Men: Grand Design, or Busiek’s Marvels Annotated.”
In any case, I’m going to try my best to adhere to the order shown in the back-matter, but when I absolutely can’t, I’ll make a retcon or caveat note.
An update. The back-matter actually isn’t very problematic. There are a few big things requiring caveats (mostly Waid and Wielgosz ignoring Tom King), but otherwise it’s actually not that bad. Making changes as we speak.
We all wish we could ignore Tom King, Collin… 🙂 We all do. Worst thing happened to Batman since… no, worst thing happened to Batman. Period.
It’s really just two different approaches to canon.
1. The Way of Dan DiDio (who initially hired Tom King), which is very much about re-writing old canon as new material in a new way, thus overwriting said old canon. This has been King’s method, of course. A little bit Bendis as well.
2. The Way of Mark Waid, which is very much about adhering to old canon as it was written and sourcing it as is when writing new material around it/in addition to it. Wielgosz, Morrison, Johns, etc have ascribed themselves to this method. Waid never liked DiDio or his ideas.
The only person I’ve really seen regularly go back and forth between these Two Ways (sometimes for better, sometimes for worse) is Scott Snyder.
I will say, Wielgosz’s back-matter timeline certainly doesn’t worry about King fitting in (and even actively avoids it/ignores it)… but my chronology still does include all of King’s canon stuff! And, despite the mess, I think I’ve done quite a fine job of accommodating both Ways.
Oh yes, Collin. I don’t know how you make it but you always deliver. Thank you for being on this planet!
Mark Waid never liking DiDio makes me love Mark even more!
I think the way DiDio and King ignored the old canon is disturbing. Did anyone really like ANY of King’s writing??? If so, please tell me why.
Haha, well the CIA guy definitely sells a lot of comics and has a lot of fans, so you’d have to ask them. But he’s become more and more divisive in recent years. I generally don’t like to yuck other people’s yums (to each their own, etc) on my site, but I can/will speak to issues of continuity—and, as I’ve said, King takes a different approach to continuity than most other writers.
Hi Collin, I noticed you’ve been doing a major overhaul of modern age chronology. Any particular reasons for this? Are there significant changes? Do you I need to re-read years 10-13 in new order to feel complete chronological comfort?! ;P
Hi Lukasz, great question haha. I just sort of started doing it without much fanfare, but there is a reason! When I initiated this project about 15 years ago, I began with the Modern Age. And when I began, I didn’t even really know what direction the project would take or what level of detail it would entail. I didn’t even really have hard or fast rules for my timeline building process. It all developed over time. That being said, I completed the Modern Age then went on to do the Golden, Silver/Bronze, New 52, and now current era timeline.
And the way I do the project now is highly refined. Simply put, my process is detail oriented and comprehensive in a way that, frankly, it just wasn’t fifteen years ago. So, I’m basically going through the entire Modern Age section with a fine tooth comb, searching for errors or things that I might have missed along the way, and then making corrections as I go. This has also served as a way for me to re-read through the Modern Age chronologically, which I haven’t done in many years. And that’s been pretty fun to do. (I’m currently in Y13 at Batman 3-D btw.)
To answer your question, there have been some changes. Some small, some more significant than others. In the end, I don’t think that, if you were using my timeline prior to the updates, it’s been anything that rocks the boat in a way that alters your perception of the general overarching Bat-story. I’ve been pretty vague about the changes I’ve made in the change-log only because it’s a lot of extra work to add detail there. But, moving forward, if something happens that’s worth letting the community know about, then I definitely will!
Thanks for your inquiry and continued support!
Do you have a page with reading orders for other Batman stories? Like non-canon stuff, Black Label, stuff like that?
That is largely not what he has this site designed for. But the nice part about most Black Label or Elseworlds tales is they are meant to be read on their own. Hope that helps.
Hi Jade. I don’t have any reading order for non-canon stuff, and to echo Dylan, most Black Label and Elseworlds stories are stand-alone. I do have a footnote in the Rebirth/Infinite Frontier Year One section that contains a list of all Black Label series that feature a version of Batman, though. As of this writing, there have been 31 Black Label series that feature a version of Batman. … but lmk if you were focusing on something more specific with your inquiry!
Matt Fraction confirmed that Alfred’s appearance in the first issue of his new run isn’t an AI or a hologram, but something else entirely, possibly a hallucination of Bruce’s internal monologue. Here’s his statement: https://www.reddit.com/r/DCcomics/comments/1n8oszz/discussion_matt_fraction_on_alfred_from_his_ama/#lightbox
Oh wow, ok thanks for sharing! I originally had the ghost Alfred as a figment of Bruce’s imagination, but the whole of the internet was screaming AI. I’ll def make this change back.
Sounds like Matt Fraction will be bringing back Dr Death into continuity as Batman’s first supervillain, just announced.
https://www.thepopverse.com/comics-rose-city-comic-con-2025-dc-batman-matt-fraction-becky-cloonan
Also, first comment ever, though I’ve been using this site for quite a while. Your site is absolutely amazing, so in-depth and detailed, it’s been super helpful in collecting Batman comics!
Darn it, wrong reply, sorry
No worries, thanks for the kind words, they mean the world to me. And thanks for sharing that news. I hadn’t heard that. I’ll keep an eye out for Dr. Death!
It is interesting to know, considering the whole “Karl Hellfern Killings of 1939” reference. Either it is bogus and just a nod to his first appearance, or the guy is immortal, or maybe even Dr. Death is actually “Karl Hellfern III” and the one from ’39 is his grandad. Then again not the first time we had people with the same name in the DCU.
Yes! Looking forward to updating that note as we get more information about the upcoming Dr. Death appearances. These are all viable options.
In a bit of response about some of the comments above. New History of the DC Universe #1-2 have already been released and after a few weeks analysing it’s time to talk about it before issue 3 comes. As some people already said, the order of events is a little off at times, taking some sensibilities of prior canons rather than what’s been established, or even forgetting important revelations of recent years. In Book #1 some that I noticed are the placements of Black Adam’s origin (per the Black Adam series), the death of the Old Gods (per Green Lanterns #23) and the death of the Martians (per Martian Manhunter Vol 5), although those last 2 could have been retconned post Infinite Frontier.
Jumping into Book #2 It does feel the same a bit in some parts, not necessarily with Batman but with the wider DCU. I’m not gonna list all of them but people have already noticed Catwoman’s debut being placed post Year 1. Another that i noticed was B/S World’s Finest #18-19 being much later despite Batman and Superman already knowing each other shortly before Wonder Woman’s debut in Year 2 (per WW Vol 5 Annual 1). I’m even skeptical of putting Zero Year in Year 2. Maybe Waid meant to say it’s after Year One the story, not Year 1 the in-universe calendar but It came out wrong, but that’s speculation on my part. As some people said, i wouldn’t take the timeline, mostly the pre JL formation, as absolute gospel.
Now what does book #2 brings of new into canon?
It’s stated that the JSA (and likely a bunch of other Golden Age figures) fought Surtur in another dimension in the 60’s and and only returned in the 80’s deaged or unchanged. It looks like this is replacing Final Days of the JSA, but they didn’t mention this story as a source. In fact in book #2 is said this is not the last time they will face him. The JSA fought Surtur a couple of times recently but i think this is implying Final Days still happened as it did, right after Crisis, but retconned as a second encounter.
JL Origins is still canon but they also say Cyborg was put in suspended animation to heal, kinda explaining his lack of aging and appearances between here and the New Teen Titans.
They canonize JLA Year One, not just the first part but the entire series from #1-12 (they also mention Vandal Savage and Eclipso as early JL villains which fits with this).
First full appearance of the original Batwoman (kinda, its a reprinted image).
Full confirmation of the Silver Age Crime Syndicate finally (unless you’re counting the Trinity book). I do wonder what that means for Alex Luthor Jr.
It is confirmed that after Crisis on Infinite Earths everyone forgot about the multiverse, pretty much serving as a replacement for it never existing. Memory blockage truly has become the main thing to use in these scenarios. Robin and Wonder Woman of the original Earth-2 (or whatever Earth they come from now) also appear here. I assume their final fates mirror the modern age. (Also yes that is Earth-2 WW, i recognize the costume). In the Crisis page they recreate the cover of issue 12 but replaces Captain Marvel. Actually the Captain don’t even appear in this issue but he does in the cover of #3. It seems Waid will keep his idea of having Billy time travel to earlier years instead of originating there.
I think that’s all noticed that nobody else pointed before i think. Sorry for the long comment but i had a lot to say.
Thanks for this commentary. Love these “annotations for New History #1-2.” I’ll def add some of these observations to the site where applicable. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on the upcoming third issue 🙂
I will say (and I do on the site), while the second feature to New History of the DC Universe #2 seems to place Catwoman’s debut in Year Two, the very blurb about it also contains an image lifted straight from her debut from Frank Miller’s “Year One.” So, this is definitely messy Waid/Wielgosz action here, but Catwoman’s debut from Miller’s “Year One” (and therefore in Year One proper) should still stand as canon.
Also, curious to know… What are your thoughts regarding Alexander Luthor Jr?
So, originally Luthor Jr was introduced as the son of the Lex Luthor of Earth-3 who survived the destruction of his universe and of the Silver/Bronze Age continuity. After this new versions of E-3 were introduced but they had nothing to do with the original so saying Luthor Jr. just comes from an unknown alt-Earth in current canon makes sense. Now that it seems Waid is connecting all the versions of E-3 into one combined history I am interested to know If Luthor will once again be connected to this Earth. In fact in Trinity: Daughter of Wonder Woman #1 we even see the death of E-3 in Crisis, but as usual with this universe it was likely recreated later. Originally in Infinite Crisis, Luthor didn’t seem very concerned with bringing back Earth-3, he only wanted to create the “perfect Earth” to replace Earth-0 as the new center, so him coming from a permanently dead universe is not really necessary anymore.
Of course this is speculation on my part. Just wait until New History #3 completely proves me wrong.
Gotcha. Good food for thought! It’ll be interesting to see if Waid tries to connect Luthor Jr to the Antimatter universe.
Weird thing I noticed recently, but Maxima is kind of a mess right now. I just recently read the Superman Treasury 2025, and the Maxima of that story is the original one that really wants to have kids with Superman, as opposed to the heroic queen of the New 52 Supergirl run who is also a lesbian. Even the DC Wiki is confused on this matter, going as far as to theorize that the classic Maxima and the New 52 Maxima are two completely different individuals. (Sorry this is not related to Batman, but this was too hard not to notice).
And the New 52 Maxima was also used in Wonder Woman #753-755, so the simple explanation of them both belonging to different canons cannot be used. Sigh
Hey Xavier, thanks for pointing this out to me! This is news to me since I never read Maxima’s backstory in the New 52, nor did I read Wonder Woman #752-755… until now! And, yeah, I usually don’t agree with the DC Wiki lol, but it really seems like these are two different characters. Maxima the Elder (Queen of Almerac, straight woman, former Justice Leaguer, sometimes villain, resurrected) and Maxima the Younger (Princess of Almerac, queer, hero). I’m gonna go that route until we hear otherwise. Maybe Waid will address it in New History. Thanks!
There is probably some implication of multiple Maximas. It is implied in Superwoman #14 that “Maxima” is both a name and a title of whoever is leader of Almerac. In fact in that very same story the title is ursuped by someone suspiciously similar to the original Maxima.
Good to know! I’ll add that info. Much appreciated!
New History #3 doesn’t change too much in terms of Batman from what I can tell, but there are a couple things I noticed that could conflict or assist this timeline:
1: Kinda surprised they didn’t say that No Man’s Land happened over the course of a year, instead saying that the Bat-Family “worked for months”, so surprisingly, no contradiction there with your timeline. However, it is stated here that Harley debuts during No Man’s Land just like Post-Crisis.
2: 52 is confirmed here to take place over the course of a year, just like originally intended. Also, apparently Jon Kent was born during 52 now? I guess they made the change so it conflicts with less Superman stories but it’s still a weird change. I guess this means there is some sort of sci-fi shenanigans going on with Jon’s age again
3: Not really important to your timeline, but Damian is stated to have gone through accelerated aging like in the New 52, so if you ever need to move Damian’s birth later in the timeline without changing his age too drastically, this basically allows for that.
Hi Arelious, thanks for the notes!
1. It actually technically doesn’t say that Harley Quinn debuts during NML—and I think the language is deliberate, keeping things vague while specifically not saying that it’s a debut. Instead, it says “she soon established a reputation for chaos in her own right,” which we should take to mean that she really comes out of her shell during NML. There are too many canonical appearances of Harley Quinn prior to NML in current canon to be ignored, and, again, I think Waid knows this. I’ll make a note of this though!
2. Yes, looks like Waid wants 52 to be a true 52 (or something close to it). I’ll go ahead and make this fix as best I can.
3. Yes, basically Damian’s birth can now go anywhere prior to “Batman and Son.”
For the Harley Quinn point, the back matter says “Dr. Harleen Frances Quinzel, a psychiatrist who works at Arkham Asylum, becomes the Joker’s partner in crime and romance, Harley Quinn. [Batman: Harley Quinn (1999) #1]”. This is placed during the No Man’s Land time period, after Cassandra’s debut as Batgirl and before Crispus Allen arrives in Gotham, unfortunately not leaving much room for ambiguity.
Ah, I’m only reading through the back matter now. Haven’t gotten there yet. It has similar things like that for Zsasz, Ventriloquist, Renee Montoya, etc. There are a handful of characters that Weilgosz just goes with their Modern Age debut story as is without recognizing that other writers (even many writers) have canonized earlier debuts. It’s interesting, I’ve mostly been ignoring it, especially when he violates Waid’s stories lol. But maybe these are attempts to retcon… I’m not sure, but we’ll have some decisions to make (or intense caveats to notate).
So there are a few items of note where Wielgosz lists a Modern Age character debut issue and writes text that says it’s their debut for contemporary canon as well. Ventriloquist/Scarface, Zsasz, Renee Montoya, Harley Quinn, Zod, Ursa, Non (and these are just off the top of my head having recently read the back matter, so there could be more). But with these examples, there are multiple instances of these characters appearing earlier in current canon. In fact, some of these characters even show up early in Mark Waid titles! There were some confusing bits about debuts in the first book’s back matter (Catwoman, Penguin, etc) that were unequivocally wrong or confusing… and I think the same thing may be true about the third book’s back matter as well. Use it as a reference guide for sure (in that regard it is stupendous!) but as a factual chronology maybe not so much.
After careful review, I’ve gone ahead and fully adhered to Waid/Wielgosz’s Harley Quinn retcon. Her debut is now NML-linked in Year 11!
I just read New History of the DC Universe, and there are some interesting choices. For one they don’t explain how Billy was able to be active before Crisis while debuting after crisis (Like in the Modern Age), Ryan Choi appears here and in his original costume which means his Rebirth debut is now no longer a debut, and Will Payton aka Starman 5 now debuts after Crisis, which contradicts his Rebirth version that was active in the late 1980’s and as I far as I know wasn’t a reincarnation of Prince Gavyn.
Always interesting choices in these, to say the least lol. Early Billy remains a mystery, but must be time-travel. I’ve already addressed the Will Payton situation, and my fanwank is that he is given Totality powers in 1988 but he doesn’t actually become Starman until Prince Gavyn merges with him years later. If you re-read the Scott Snyder issues in question, that actually doesn’t really contradict anything (and you technically can read them that way).
Re: Ryan Choi, costumes could be something or nothing, it could be an artistic error (there have been a handful in these titles, after all… Doug Mahnke fucked up half his Bat-Family images in some way or another—bogus Damian image, screwy Bane breaking Batman’s back image, etc). For Choi, I never really saw DCU Rebirth as his debut. This just defines (or redefines) Choi’s debut as it happened a few years earlier in 52.
I always interpret Ryan Choi’s origin in Rebirth as taking place just before his appearance in Justice League of America (2017), but I agree that it does fit earlier, and the fanwank with Will Payton makes a surprising amount of sense. Really the only problem here is the Big Red Cheese that we call Billy, who just can’t seem to take a break in the continuity department (At least we know his origin is his New 52 one thanks to the Justice league issues they cited, minus the Shazam Family who they don’t even allude to). And the costume that Ryan Choice wears in the issue can be easily said to be a costume he wore at one point.
Yeah, Billy is a mess. I haven’t read Weilgosz’ back matter yet, but I will when I have the chance. Captain Shazam debuts around Crisis time yet still has the newer Geoff Johns origin. Plus he appears prior to Crisis (even in Waid’s own works). There’s an explanation somewhere out there, we just have to reach out and grab it lol
What seems stranger to me is that, for example, they cited Mr Mxyzptlk Golden Age debut (Superman #30) in the back matter of the second issue yet Mark Waid and Dave Wielgosz decided to stick with the New 52 origin for the (now just) Captain (albeit a very bare bones, 20% percent intact version of it). Probably the weirdest double standard I’ve seen when it comes to Canon. Honestly I thought they were gonna use the Power of Shazam one, but oh well.
Yeah, the more of the back matter I read, the stranger some of this stuff is getting. Weilgosz certainly… did something here. lol
Time to talk about New History #3, there’s a lot to point out, but first there were some things I noticed before that. I was going to put this all in the same comment but it got too big and I had to spit it. First, In book #2 they ordered the death of the original Doom Patrol long before the era where World’s Finest should be set, a story MARK WAID HIMSELF wrote shortly before. It only pushes more that the order of events is definitely screwy. (There is also their presence in Waid’s JLA: Year One indicating their debut should be a bit earlier too, but there is no official confirmation of this in specific so i’m not counting). Second, I saw some of the interviews Mark Waid in person did to some Youtube channels and even the official DC website where he surprisingly credited “The Unauthorized Chronology of the DC Universe” and “Cosmic Teams!” (this might explain some of the placements of events that i talked about before. The Unauthorized Chronology puts the death of the Martians in the 18th century thanks to a lone piece dialogue in a specific comic). One thing Waid consistently said is that he worked in collaboration with the editors to piece together the timeline and from his own words there was a lot of back and forth on what to decide. It seems a lot of the weird choices stem more from this than any particular decision Waid made.
Now finally jumping into book #3, it touches only the Modern Age part which is thankfully one of the least retconned eras when compared to the others. Batman is also the least affected so to him things are not as messy compared to everyone else.
Power Girl is as usual said to be a survivor of a dead universe. Her debut is listed here despite already being on Earth-0 for a while, including that questionable 1976 flashback from The New Golden Age. The JSA and the Star-Spangled Kid should not be in that era considering both were in exile by this point, so there must be some form of time travel going on or the date is a mistake, Geoff Johns weird attempt to put the bronze age JSA stories in their year of release. I do suppose that a version of the flashback from JSA: Classified #1-4 happens too, where after her universe is destroyed she is time displaced to Earth-0’s recent past with amnesia, later learning the truth from Psycho-Pirate (this encounter is also loosely referenced in Lazarus Planet: Assault on Krypton).
The main thing everyone talked about: Billy Batson’s debut as Captain Marvel. Being honest the New 52 origin is the one used just because Geoff Johns wrote it and carried over to Rebirth. Waid already said on interview that he regretted putting Billy in World’s Finest and wanted to retcon his presence there to time travel using the Rock of Eternity, and so far this is the only explanation for this, even if unofficial. My only concern is how this affects the rest of the Shazam Family’s age, like Darla Dudley, in case they’re still here.
Scarface and the Ventroloquist’s and General Zod’s debuts reflect their Modern Age origins but that’s just plain continuity error, specially Zod who appears on Waid’s very on World’s Finest.
Starman Will Payton is also retconned to debut here instead of 1988. You did fanhawk that he got his powers in ‘88 and only debuts now, but the flashback to his origins shows that he already started acting in that year, escaping from the scientists that accidentally gave him his powers only to immediately after being captured by the time travelling Lex Luthor (JL Vol 4 #8). Point of notice, one of the scientists mentioned is Lionel Luthor during his golden years with the Leggionares, despite the fact that by this point Lionel would be reduced into the mess of a man we know (based on Clark Kent’s age in relation to Lex). The 1988 date was already kinda questionable to begin with. I personally just think it is a hard retcon of the character, blame it on the Death Metal soft reboot or something (In case of doubt, blame it on time travel).
The Kingdom is once again mentioned as the discovery of Hypertime. Barry Allen did see Hypertime in the past but he probably was not fully aware of it as something separate from the Multiverse. The man himself said he “only raced along its borders” (JL Vol. 3 #33).
It’s stated Carter Hall was trapped in a supernatural dimension before being brought back to life in Thanagar. Originally on the Modern Age the thanagarian Katar Hol (one of Hawkman’s past lives across space-time which may or may not have overlapped with Carter Hall) was combined with Carter and other Hawkpeople in Zero Hour before going out of control and being exiled into limbo, leading to JSA Vol 1 #23-25. It seems this still happened.
Supergirl is officially resurrected, but they don’t explain very well how. They imply it was Darkseid’s doing but the wording here is kinda vague. Waid said he was going to use an element going on during that publication time to justify her return. I personally fanhawk blaming Superboy-Prime for banging on the wall like Tom King once said, it does fit with what the other things Prime altered by doing that.
Jonathan Kent’s birth is placed during the one year gap of 52 now. Considering that the Trinity is already back in costume it seems more that Jon was conceived in the gap and then born after. Of course, this makes Jon impossibly young by the time Rebirth starts, which means that some incident will cause him to age rapidly, maybe involving time travel, and I already got a feeling what it might be… We really can’t escape Convergence, can we?
Now Infinite Crisis… (i promise i’ll end here). People talked about this but i wanted to put my opinions on the matter. What I once commented about Kal-L, Earth-2, and Alexander Luthor Jr. actually became true, I can’t even believe it. The Earth Kal-L, Lois Kent, Power Girl, adult Robin and alt-Wonder Woman come from was now definitely called Earth-2 at one point, separate from the E-2 we have now (the New 52 based Earth-2). Of course both Earths can’t have the same name, so guess “Original Earth-2” is the closest thing we have now to describe it per this very book. Luthor Jr is said to be from Earth-3, but not an “Original Earth-3”, just Earth-3, something I also commented on before. I already said he doesn’t need to come from a permanently destroyed Earth for his story to still hold, he only wanted to create a “Perfect Earth” to replace Earth-0, so there is no problem for him to come from THE E-3, specially now that Waid is trying to tie every incarnation of E-3 into one. With all of this in mind i think that’s the history of the multiverse Waid put together:
Infinite Earths exist in the Multiverse. Barry Allen discovers them and names the first one he finds “Earth-2” (for our purposes, the “Original Earth-2”). Then the JL also discovers Earth-3 where Alex Luthor Jr. is later born.
Crisis happens and the infinite Earths are destroyed, save for Earth-0 and a few select ones like the Time Trapper’s Pocket Universe and a recreated Earth-3 (in case JLA: Earth-2 is still canon, it was not mentioned on New History #3 for some reason). Hypertime is also left untouched.
Infinite Crisis happens. Alex Luthor’s plans to create his very own perfect universe fails but he still resurrects a few universes, creating a Multiverse of only 52 Earths. The Monitors are also born and give them the designated new numbers from 0 to 51 since we don’t have a bunch of them anymore (per The Green Lantern #10 “first to map and classify the 52 alternate universes comprising the local multiverse”). Because the Original Earth-2 was never recreated it never received a new designation.
Wow, genuinely shocked Waid looked at Chris J Miller’s “Unauthorized Chronology of the DC Universe” and “Cosmic Teams!” while researching for these titles. Obviously, both were hugely influential upon me when I started and I’m indebted to both. But “Unauthorized Chronology” stopped dead in it’s tracks and was left incomplete in like 2010-2011. I hope Waid realized that. And, as you said, “Cosmic Teams!” has some questionable placements. But very cool that he branched out and went deep like that! Someone get him a link to my site!
To your annotations… thank you tremendously! I will sift through them and make updates/footnotes where necessary.
Feel free to shoot me emails (ccolsher@gmail.com) if you have anything to add that feels too large for comment here. As always, thank you so much.
Tackling Power Girl and the Crises first. Technically, for Power Girl, Waid/Wielgosz never say outright that she debuts with the original Crisis, but yes it would seem like the concept of her losing her timeline during Crisis and then getting thrown back to debut earlier on the new/contemporary Earth-2 timeline definitely happens. I would say the New Golden Age 1976 item must be ignored entirely—continuity in that comic is weird anyhow. That’s a part of alt-Huntress’s bizarre timeline.
Regarding the Crises, while the concept of the Monitors (plural) derives from IC, aren’t the Monitors retroactively born immediately after the ORIGINAL Crisis? Aren’t they seeded from the death of the original Monitor? I know Alex Luthor Jr’s action during IC is the reason for the existence of the Monitors, but don’t they technically exist starting with the original Crisis?
Oh, and Jon Kent… sigh. So now we have TWO major instances of him aging-up rapidly? Convergence (maybe?) PLUS Bendis’ granpa Jor-El? Right now, fighting against that, I have an, as you said, impossibly young (like 3-year-old) Jon debuting as Superboy… which sucks. I think you may be right on this one.
You are right about that, we have seen Dax Novu appearing back in Crisis I during his origin story, but i think it goes even further than that. Sometimes it seems like the Monitors have always been around, way before any of the crises. Take Multiversity: The Society of Super-Heroes (a New 52 story but still as an example). Nix Uotan, Dax’s son, have ancient statues of himself in Earth-20 and is even supposedly the father of Mighty Atom. IC was the event of their creation but it seems they can navigate freely across the Multiverse’s history based on how their home dimension works around time (similar to how a reader might navigate across their comic book collection).
Hey Israel, my comments page isn’t built for long blocks of nested replies. So, I’m continuing our conversation about your excellent New History annotations here!
RE: Starman Will Payton. You are right. Waid is definitely retconning Scott Snyder’s 1988 flashback, which was always really strange to begin with. Made this change already, so thank you.
In regard to Lionel Luthor, we’ve seen some of deadbeat loser Lionel from when Lex was a young boy in comics for sure. But, I’m pretty sure it’s explained that Vandal Savage does a global mind-wipe that not only makes Lionel forget he was ever a succesful Legionnaires Club science-explorer, but also makes everyone on the planet forget his accomplishments and achievements. While Payton definitely doesn’t become Starman until way later, it’s possible that Savage ruins Lionel (altering everyone’s memories and perception of him) as late as 1988 (which would make his appearance in that flashback okay). To reiterate, any of Lex’s boyhood memories of Lionel being a bum (or really anyone’s memories of him being a bum) would simply be false. After all, Lionel was a super-scientist and did a bunch of important stuff for years… but no one remembers it thanks to Savage.
Again, that’s just me trying to make sense of what was an extremely convoluted continuity mess (Scott Snyder comics lol) then and now.
You are also correct about Hypertime. The Kingdom really is the first time the superhero community truly experiences/learns what it is. This doesn’t contradict current canon.
Made some updates based upon your other comments, Israel. Thanks! Notably, I added in notation about Jon Kent having had TWO SEPARATE aging events (one in and around Convergence to get him of age for his debut as Superboy) and the second being the Bendis one to get him to older current status quo. I think Waid and Wieldgosz took a bogus option here, pushing Jon’s birth later instead of moving it earlier where it wouldn’t require any aging up chicanery beyond Bendis. But oh well. If Waid somehow doesn’t wind up including a second aging up event, he could push/retcon Jon’s debut as Superboy and all the Super Sons stuff into a tight window just prior to Bendis’ run. Either option is rough.
Honestly, Jon’s birth has always been a problem because of the very nature of his origin. He was born outside of space-time and sent to live in the past until he finally catches up to the then present day of 2016 (per Convergence and Superman: Lois and Clark). His history fits best with the weirdness of The New 52 continuity. When Superman Reborn rebooted (or rather retrobooted) Superman’s history to an earlier form, fitting in Jon was inevitably an issue because of the lack of the original circumstances in the already compressed Rebirth timeline, and it showed for years, the only solution being weird retcons or complicated positioning of events. You originally put Death of Superman and his birth back in Year 6 thanks to the Dan Jurgens timeline but I don’t think that was even his intention. I think he genuinely made a goof and didn’t take into consideration the implications of a 10 year old born during the “90’s period” of the timeline. Yeah, the option is rough but it was inevitable. At the very least it allows us to divorce Jon’s birth from a specific year and not deal with a “this event has to be 5-10 years ago” anymore.
What do I suppose will happen? Brainiac kidnaps the Kents, Convergence happens and they are all sent into the past to raise Jon in secret as it originally happened in the New 52, but without any continuity hopping.
I guess we’ll have to see how Waid addresses it. Either way, whether it’s a Mr. Oz style thing or a time traveling to the past to raise Jon, it’s an ugly “aging up” event. And it had to co-exist with Bendis’ “aging up” event. I agree that Jon’s age has always been an issue due to the nature of how he was created originally. But this would have been the perfect time for Waid to de-clutter and simply it.
But, true. Waid gave us the option to place Damian’s birth anywhere thanks to artificial aging. And he’s likely trying to do something similar here with Jon. I still would have preferred Damian and Jon getting solid birthdays, but oh well.
They ended up addressing it less than I would have preferred in issue #4, but the mention of the early events of Rebirth involving reconciling contradictory origins, etc counts enough for me to consider Superman and Lois being split in two by Manhattan/Convergence to be back in play as a piece of history.
Hey Dylan, thanks! I haven’t read it yet, but I’ll certainly be doing my deep dive. It took me weeks to properly analyze issue #3, so I’m sure it’ll be the same for this issue. I’m going to be looking at the Superman, Lois, and Jon stuff with a high level of scrutiny. After all, we still don’t have an answer that satisfies my curiosity regarding Jon’s age (pre-Bendis’s aging).
Just picked up a digital copy… Issue #4 doesn’t have the Dave Weilgosz timeline second feature?? I’ve now sourced several online versions and none of them have it. Is this correct? Very strange to not include this.
Ok, so from what i learned the digital book is indeed missing several pages. Is even missing the credits page of all things. I saw at least one person online say the timeline is present in the physical book.
Thanks, Israel. I’m SHOCKED that barely anyone is talking about this online.
The timeline is indeed in the physical copy, but not in digital for some reason. I have the physical copy and it doesn’t effect too much. For the Jon Kent stuff, all the timeline says is “Clark Kent, Lois Lane, and Jonathan Kent move to Hamilton County, at which point Jon’s existence becomes public knowledge.” That is the first time the mention Jon Kent in the entire book. So how he went from born in 52 to 10 (or in your case 8) by the time of Rebirth, no one knows.
I wasn’t planning on schlepping to my local comic shop this week, but I guess I have to now. As you’ve already stated, his issue is the most straightforward of them all for sure. One BIG EVENT followed by another lol. And, yeah, Waid wasn’t touching Jon’s double-aging-up with a ten foot pole eh? Oh well—we can choose whatever adventure we want there, I suppose. In any case, once I get my hands on a physical copy, I’ll tackle the back matter. Thanks, Arelious!
He does talk about the Jon Kent age up! He also implies Mr. Oz was never the real Jor-El, which is interesting.
The other thing you may hate is his implication of multiple futures instead of just one.
Hey Dylan! Waid addresses the Bendis/Mr. Oz age up, but not the other hidden age up. Waid specifically places Jon’s birth in late Y12. Jon debuts as Superboy in early Y16. But he’s definitely not a mere 3-years-old at that time. He’s got to be around 8-years-old for any of his Super Sons stuff/relationship to Damian to make sense. So you have a conundrum where Jon is born in Y12 but he is shown as an 8-year-old by Y16. Furthermore, Jon’s Bendis/Mr. Oz age up happens in Y18. But in Y18, Jon isn’t a mere 7-years-old, he’s 11. Jon goes from 11 to 17 thanks to Mr. Oz.
So, as you can see (and as several site contributors have pointed out), there is another “age up event” that must occur to Jon. Is time travel involved? Does Convergence play a factor? Is his aging sped-up via weird sci-fi? Who knows. Despite having created the mess himself, Waid didn’t go near this one. (Quite frankly, New History shouldn’t have had Jon’s birth so specifically in Y12—he should have been born earlier and just been kept hidden.)
Other writers had hinted at Jor-El being from an alternate timeline, so Waid is merely (thankfully) more-or-less confirming this.
In regard to multiple futures, there can only be one future on the primary timeline. Period. And anything that flies in the face of that is, in my humble opinion, just broken physics. There are some writers that seem to grasp this, some that don’t, but I don’t think Waid is necessarily getting anything wrong here. Hypertime gives an out for almost any implication (or error), after all.
Given that the Rebirth #1 description in the front half of the book quietly mentions certain characters having their origins reconciled, specifically calling out Superman (IE, Superman Reborn) and Wonder Woman (Wonder Woman: Truth), and given that Jon actually mentions having two reconciled histories in one of the Lizzie Prince backups (when Damian accuses him of secretly being a Silver Age-style Superman Fingerman), my suspicion is that Superman Reborn’s fusion of N52 and pre-Flashpoint superman is no longer retroactive; ie, that at the moment of Flashpoint, Clark and Lois were split in two (as Superman Reborn establishes), with two of them proceeding to the events of Covergence and two of them existing as the N52 status quo, resulting in Jon Kent being partially raised in the past of the altered N52 reality warp/timeline/whatever we want to call it.
Hey Dylan, thanks for this note! You may definitely be onto something. I’m going to go through the second feature to New History #4 in the coming week(s), and I will definitely keep your thoughts in mind as I progress through.
Hey Dylan, finally getting around to New History #4! The “Fingerman” comment from Tom King’s Wonder Woman #10 back-up is certainly meta-commentary about this very situation, but Damian really only mentions how he never saw Jon grow up, and one day he was just there. Which is still more-or-less canon no matter what. Jon was kept a secret from the public until he was around 8-years-old. So I don’t think this is smoking gun evidence of him having his New 52/Convergence origins intact.
Nevertheless, we do still need a reason to explain how Jon ages eight years in a mere four year span.
First, let’s go over the original history. In Modern Age, Clark and Lois were snatched by Convergence, during which they gave birth to Jon. Then they went to the New 52 timeline and lived in secret. Eventually, they met New 52 Clark and Lois, but New 52 Clark and Lois died, allowing Modern Age Clark and Lois to replace them (and subsequently reveal Jon to the public).
Rebirth/Infinite Frontier (i.e. post-“Superman Reborn”) continuity naturally cleans this up, making it so there never were two sets of couples, and Jon was simply born unto the Clark and Lois. However, from Jon’s birth in Y12 until his public debut in Y16, he mysteriously ages up 8 years instead of 4. We either simply say Convergence (Y15) aged him up or we say that some version of what occurred in earlier canon aged him up. Of course, if we go with the latter, it’d have to be a very pared down version of things that can only serve to simplify, not complicate. (And I’m not sure that even a pared down version of the latter could be straightforward enough to satisfy my desire for simplicity.) But, to play devil’s advocate, here’s what a pared down version could look like: In Y15, Convergence creates a dopplegänger Lois and Clark that take Jon back in time and raise him in secret, thus explaining why he is 8yo instead of 3-4yo by Y16. Meanwhile, the real Lois and Clark would have to be mind-wiped/altered to not recall the existence of their son. (Or you’d have to have a doppelgänger Jon as well.) And then Superman Reborn would mash-up the doppelgänger couples and re-write the timeline. In the end, you’d wind up with a timeline that never had doppelgängers anyway.
So yeah, for me, having split couples etc is a no go. I’m going to just say that Convergence ages Jon up, keep it as simple as that. And the easiest (and I think best) explanation of Mark Waid’s lines about Rebirth’s reconciliation are that, yes, he is indeed referencing “Superman Reborn” and “Wonder Woman: Truth,” but it’s just a bit of meta-commentary, and the lines are really just Barry Allen’s way of expressing what happened from his bewildered in-story perspective.
I’ll def include as much of our conversation that is relevant in the notes though! As always, thank you!
Finally getting around to Trinity: Daughter of Wonder Woman #1, which continues the “Fingerman” bit, but with even more specificity where Jon describes himself as a product of a merger between two realities. I’m still pretty bullish on having a Jon Kent timeline that makes sense (and King’s Fingerman/double reality references feel very meta—a reference to publication history and less upon continuity), but there’s no doubt that an alternate Superman and alternate Lois factor into Jon’s life in some way. Again, this is King we are dealing with, who is in the running for worst continuity offender in the history of all comic-dom. In any case, I will address this on the site!
Does it make any attempt to explain the various inconsistencies? This book was so close to being amazing but the back matter seems to be all jumbled up.
Hey Vix. Are you asking if New History attempts to explain the various inconsistencies of the DCU timeline in general? Or something more specific? As Scipio (of the Absorbascon blog) says, “There is much to react to in the New History of the DC Universe: inclusions that [are] laudable, regrettable, tragic, and absurd.” That’s about how I feel too lol
Stuff like Zod debuting after the Crisis, despite him being in World’s Finest, and the orders in which Robin and Two-face debut, and also whether we should look at origin as debut issue or origin, when there are many issues that completely contradict current canon that are cited.
No, simply put, Waid and Wielgosz do not address (or try to explain) the more blatant errors in New History.
I read issue four of New History and the future section kinda confuses me. By Barry saying that there are some constants when it comes to the future, does that mean that every future shown in the page (Like The New Golden Age Helena Wayne, the post-apocalyptic Kamandi, and even the satirical 2015 Prez) are one unified future? or are they multiple futures? What muddies the water for me is the Legion of Superheroes, which constantly change with every new iteration (And its not like the one that matters is the Bendisboot meanwhile every other Legion is another timeline. For example, in 2023 Superman #29, not only does Supes say that the last time he saw the Legion they were different, but that the future constantly changes).
I haven’t seen Wielgosz’ back matter yet so I can’t comment on that, but in regard to the splash page at the end of Waid’s portion, I’d say everything there is (or could be) canon. New Golden Age Helena Wayne does travel to and live in the 31st century, Kamandi exists on the primary timeline in some capacity, and there’s no reason that a version of Prez couldn’t become president in the future. Legion has a long tradition of being screwy, but in current canon the team’s history is less complicated than ever before. In Superman #29, I don’t see anywhere where Superman says anything like that (unless I’m missing it)? Instead you have Superboy-Prime speaking openly about the different iterations of the Legion, from his 4th wall breaking meta-perspective.
In our real world where comics are mere fictive story and not an actuality with real physics, writers write continuity in the present (and sometimes the past), with the future never quite set in stone. The paradox comes from the fact that in-story the future must be set/constant for the timeline to properly function. I think Barry’s comment is literally how he sees things (especially when you factor in Hypertime), but it’s also Waid’s meta-commentary about this very future in comic book writing conundrum.
It was Superman #28, my mistake.
Oh gotcha, yes I see what you are talking about now. Yeah, that Williamson line is a bit too meta for my taste. I hate for this to be the hill I die on, but the future is just as set as the past. It’s all locked in. But of course the future “changes” only because writers haven’t written it yet. Whatever the future winds up being will be “what it always has been.” The difference in the fictive world of serialized storytelling is that future stories are way more easily prone to retcon than past or present day stories. It’s just the nature of the beast.
And yeah, the last time Superman saw the Legion they were in full Bendis mode, but—for the purposes of our continuity—this simply means that the Legion was undergoing a different phase (the same way the JL has gone through different phases over the period of its existence). From Superman’s perspective, a time traveling team from the future could appear to be different each time they visit simply because Superman doesn’t know what is affecting/shaping the team a centuries down the road.
Just an update. Again, I haven’t read the back matter of issue #4 yet, but I’ve been told my some site contributors that it very clearly states the existence of Bendis’ Legion as being from an alternate Hypertimeline future. So… that would give credence to Superman’s line in Superman #28.
I’ll update everything accordingly once I read the back matter timeline.
The final issue of New History was released. Thankfully since it is closest to the present day it doesn’t differ too much from what we already saw. In minor notes, during the Forever Evil segment they say “The third incarnation of the Crime Syndicate”, confirming the existence of the second who would be the Morrison and Quitely one. The Wildstorm cast is also said to come from another universe but settled in Earth-0 instead of already living there. Maybe we can connect this to Outsiders Vol 5 #7? It could fit if you squint your eyes a little bit.
They address Flashpoint but the way they explain it in the index is kinda weird. They straight up say the post-Flashpoint status-quo it’s a different timeline from the one pre-Flashpoint, despite it all still being the singular unified timeline of Earth-0. They really need a proper explanation of how Dr. Manhattan’s manipulations work (I have an explanation of my own based on how it is phrased and I would love to say it some other time). They also describe it as a full reality warping in a universal level, not just a memory blockage (In relation, the Flash Museum appeared in World’s Finest despite being built only at the conclusion of Flash War. Manhattan certainly did much more than just erase memories and people, he changed entire segments of the world). The conclusion to Flashpoint says that Ralph, Sue and Omen were resurrected by this, so we can infer some others who died before were also gifted with life the same way. It is also stated that many were turned years younger too, so to all your Captains and Stargirls and Blue Beetles and anyone else, there’s the solution.
Sadly no direct reference to how Jon Kent went from a baby to 10 years old between 52 and Rebirth, which is more jarring as we also have Damian who went from 10 to 13 in the same time (per original publication). If you’re going to retcon his birth again, at least give a proper explanation to how it works, that’s the whole point, or just don’t mention it at all and leave it vague. The only thing i can think to patchwork this is Convergence since it was the first official forced age-up the kid had and maybe that is the intention here as they listed Convergence: Superman #2 as his birth in the last book and not any of the retellings (despite using imagery of them).
At last we have the ending, listing both canonical futures and divergent Hypertimelines. I think what is more noteworthy here is the proper distinction of the different incarnations of the Legion of Super-Heroes. The classic Legion who first met Clark Kent is separate from the Legion that Jon joined. Geoff Johns was already alluding to that as far back as Flashpoint Beyond #0 and recently Joshua Williamson more or less confirmed this in Superman Vol 6 #28-30, although it’s stated they came from different divergent futures tied to Earth-0 while Johns established more concrete numbered alternate universes. Classic Legion for Earth-0, Reboot Legion for Earth-247 and Threeboot Legion for Earth-Prime (Superboy-Prime’s world back into existence despite being destroyed before!).
Hey Israel! As always, thanks for these annotations. I’m going to read the back matter timeline and assess everything in the coming weeks, and I’ll definitely use these annotations to guide me. In any case, despite not differing too much from straightforward continuity, the implications of issue #4 seem somewhat heavier/messier (especially in regard to Dr. Manhattan, Flashpoint, New 52, Legion, character ages, etc). Having now read New History #1-4 (sans the last back matter timeline), part of me can’t help but think that this series might have actually done a disservice, and that maybe it’s left the DCU worse than it was. A project like this shouldn’t have created more questions—it was an opportunity to shore things up (and make sense of certain confusing things) and I’m not sure that it really accomplished that.
(I actually don’t blame Waid because the comic book portion of the issues is pretty straightforward. It’s the back matter timelines that are a mess, and, I might add, wholly unnecessary to have included. Based upon Waid’s interviews, it would seem that the back matter timelines were the product of editorial committee, not just him and Wielgosz. And if the idea was to give one authorial account of the DCU, then this flies in the face of that. But I digress.)
Anyway, sometime I’d love to hear your theory about how Dr. Manhattan’s manipulations work! Talk to you soon.
Sadly i think the book had way too much to tackle with the limited space and editorial certainly didn’t help. From what I heard, Waid was limited to ~30 pages of main story plus ~15 pages of timeline across just 4 issues. They should have definitely let him do another issue or two like in Marvel. In my opinion it might have been better for the series to be a Matthew Manning style work of an in-universe timeline index, giving a lot more room for information per page, but alas.
Now the Manhattan stuff. Bear in mind this is just speculation for the fun of it, nothing definitive on my part and I doubt anyone thought of this. Barry describing the effects of Flashpoint as “Old history intertwined with new” caught my attention as it reminded me of another Waid work, The Kingdom. In issue 2 and Planet Krypton they showed how Hypertime works, with different timelines crossing with the central one and causing slight changes, sometimes rippling into the past or just affecting the present in the form of altered memories. I think this is what Dr. Manhattan did. At the conclusion of Flashpoint the doctor created and forced a distinct alternate timeline (based on the New 52) to mingle with Earth-0, superseding the true status-quo with a new one and causing the changes we see. Their true past is in a way “blocked” while only the alternate one and their recollections of it are accessible, likely explaining how we don’t see any cases of time-travellers reporting the true history unless they’re messing with Hypertime. It’s only when the Rebirth period begins that this “merger” is undone and Earth-0 slowly returns to how it was. It would explain why they describe the Post-Flashpoint status-quo as both a different timeline and the same one we already had, since from this perspective both are true. It also fits with the descriptions of Hypertime crises from Flashpoint Beyond #5.
Not a bad theory at all! Thanks for sharing. I’ll def make mention of this on the site! Having spent a great deal of time going back through old comics to figure this all Dr. Manhattan stuff out, it’s clear that there’s a mix of both timeline altering (much akin to what you theorize here) AND memory-erasure sans alteration. We know the latter occurs because certain characters are specifically exiled (like Flash-Family members being imprisoned in the Speed Force) as opposed to being simply erased (like the JSA or Legion). If one is looking for one solitary unified answer, this curious mix serves to confuse/muddle things. And Wielgosz even seems to reference both. (I know there’s also an argument to be made that altering reality and shunting characters off to an extradimensional realm could be one and the same. After all, this is, as you highlight, all about character perception—and a bit of semantics too. After all, if your timeline changes, then your memories certainly adjust with said change.)
Hey! I was just wondering, didn’t see any mention of it on the site, whether the DC/Marvel crossover with Batman and Deadpool is canon or not? If I remember correctly, Deadpool actually already made an appearance in DC back in that Fortnite book so him being in this universe or crossing over isn’t so far off. And if it’s non-canon, I haven’t been able to find a note or anything about it. Just was curious. Thanks!
Hi Jade, the first book seems to be canon. I’m just waiting for Morrison’s book to come out (it comes out this week) before I attempt to place either of them.
Collin, I think that while the Morrison’s book is certainly canon, I’ve got some doubts about the first one. Gordon is commissioner (hence your placement in Y18) but Batman’s costume is definitely Year 24 costume. So… I don’t know… sure we could ignore the costume… but… well… I don’t know..
Ugh the costumes. I honestly still can’t tell the difference sometimes between the pre-Fraction/Jiménez and post-Fraction/Jiménez costume. Artists still take liberties, and they have been for ages. If you look at Birds of Prey #20, for example, it looks totally different than others. Then in Justice League Unlimited #5, it’s literally a mix between the two (new and old) Bat-symbols. And color variation changes, even post-Fraction where he should definitively be blue. What costume is he wearing in Superman Unlimited? In Titans Vol. 4 #27? In Detective Comics #1100? Look at Detective Comics #1099, which is pre-Fraction/Jiménez costume. The bat-symbol changes from panel to panel!
I really wish they had designed a radically different costume. Quite frankly, the new one looks way to similar to the old one. Maybe it’s my eyes, but—unless it’s hyper stylized to look like the new one—I really can’t tell the difference.
Haha I’m rambling a bit here, but now that I’m really digging—unless it’s really obvious, I don’t think it’s a “wrong costume” per se. I think it’s artist liberties. Different people draw the symbol differently. And looking at other Y18 stories, Batman’s costume in the Marvel Deadpool/Batman looks kinda the same to me as other Y18 stories. I’m going to leave it where it is (for now) because of all the placement clues… including the costume. To me, it may not have the exactly correct Bat-symbol, but it’s definitely NOT the current post-Fraction/Jiménez costume.
(I will say, on the COVERS, he’s definitely wearing the new Fraction/Jiménez Bat-symbol insignia. But inside it’s less definitive.)
I’ll think on this. Honestly, the Marvel book doesn’t really jibe with the DC one for other reasons that I’ve hand-waved away…
Adding a detailed footnote about all of this in both Y18 and Y24. Thanks, Antonio!
🙂