The DC Universe

 

In the golden age of superhero comics, you can't beat the "Superman DC Comic Group" for sheer volume of superheroes, or for innovation in the field. Yes, they could be more on the conservative side when it came to new ideas, having launched Superman and started the whole superhero boom and not wanting to do anything that might risk making him less popular - but they also introduced the idea of superheroes from different series hanging out together and sharing a world!

This ad from 1944 shows almost the entire range at that point. For some reason they forgot Leading Comics (and Picture Stories from the Bible, which might have been more of a deliberate omission), but otherwise these are all the titles that people see as comprising the DC Universe at that time. They were still actually published by two closely linked but separate companies then, but the lines between them were very blurry.

But the idea of a "DC Universe" in which all the stories in these anthology comics took place was entirely unheard-of then. Each superhero or non-superhero supporting-feature clearly existed in its own fictional reality. Superman didn't exist in the world where Zatara the Master Magician had his adventures in the back pages of Action Comics, let alone the other comics with a "Superman DC" logo on the cover but no sign of Superman inside.

It took the brand new idea of All-Star Comics #3 to really introduce the idea of a shared universe. It's just a framing sequence for nine individual superhero stories (including the two-page text story required by postal regulations), but eight heroes from four different comics have dinner together one night at a hotel. Two other characters from different strips crash the party too. Superman, Batman and Robin are mentioned as being too busy doing actual hero stuff to attend. Twelve different superhero-related series are officially linked in the same reality!

But does that mean ALL the superheroes under the DC banner are part of that reality? It's sort of implied, and modern-day comic creators and fans have always taken the view that any comic character published by DC (or the other companies they've purchased over the years) is fair game to include in a "DC Universe" story set in the 1940s or later, but I think we need to be a bit more strict than that.

Let's establish once and for all which heroes can be shown to exist in the shared DC Universe of the Golden Age! We'll just need to set up a few simple ground rules...

1) The Golden Age doesn't really have a defined end point, but there's a pretty clear cut-off in the early fifties when all the superheroes had been cancelled and forgotten due to lack of interest, except the select few (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and don't forget Superboy, Aquaman and Green Arrow in Adventure Comics). We only care about comics published during the time before that cut-off.

2) If two superheroes are seen to exist in the same universe in one comic story, then that means ALL the appearances of either character must exist in the one universe! Even when there's another story where Superhero A says that Superhero B is a fictional character! This is a standard rule of comic logic, believe me.

3) Covers don't count. It was normal in the golden age for the cover of an anthology comic to show multiple superheroes hanging out together, even though the stories inside were completely separate and unconnected. Actually, DC rarely did this except on the covers of World's Finest (Superman and Batman) and Comic Cavalcade (Wonder Woman, Flash and Green Lantern), but there were occasional exceptions. The gathering to the left on the cover of Action Comics No. 52 is a great image, but it doesn't mean Congo Bill shares a world with Superman.

4) The characters have to at least appear in the same story - in various stories people will mention Superman, but it's usually in an ambiguous kind of way. They might be talking about the fictional character in Action Comics. Actually, sometimes superheroes talk about themselves as being fictional characters in DC Comics, but if they're seen to physically interact with each other, they're in the same universe!

So where do we start building the universe? There's only one place - the Justice Society of America!

From All-Star Comics No. 3 to No. 57, heroes from 18 different series meet and interact in many combinations. That means our shared universe includes every adventure for the Flash, Green Lantern, Spectre, Hawkman, Dr. Fate, Hour-Man, Sandman, Atom, Johnny Thunder, Scribbly (and the Red Tornado), Superman, Batman, Dr. Mid-Nite, Starman, Wonder Woman, Wildcat, Mr. Terrific and the Black Canary.

Quite a big universe already; bigger than any other comics publisher of the 1940s can claim! But can we add more?

Oh yes, quite easily! See, there was another superhero group in DC comics - Leading Comics No. 1 to No. 14 chronicled the adventures of the Seven Soldiers of Victory! All eight of them. It was five heroes and three sidekicks, but one of the sidekicks (the comedy Chinese one) doesn't count as a member.

And in World's Finest Comics No. 9, in the Star-Spangled Kid story, the Kid meets Batman! They just pass like ships in the night - while the Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy are pursuing their own bad guys, they see the Joker, with Batman and Robin hot on his tail. They stop to say a quick hello, and go their separate ways again. It's a strange and completely irrelevant scene, but it means the Star-Spangled Kid joins our universe, and since he's one of the Seven Soldiers, we also get Green Arrow, Vigilante, Shining Knight and Crimson Avenger! We're up to 23!

Superhero interactions like that were really, really rare outside the two super-team comics at DC. Why that one exists is a real mystery, but there are a tiny handful of others that are useful to us too...

Do text stories count? I don't see why not. They're inside the comic, they're not 'symbolic scenes' like the covers, they're a complete story. So when the text story in All-Star Comics No. 8 has Hop Harrigan meet the Justice Society, that brings him into our shared universe too!

Hop wasn't just featured in text stories. His comic series was a mainstay of All-American Comics, and he had his own long-running radio show and a movie serial too! And yes, radio shows would count in this exercise, and so would the movie serials and newspaper strips and anything else  - as it happens, there was almost no superhero interaction in them, except Batman showing up in Superman's radio show, but ask any comic reader of the time if those things "exist in a different fictional universe" and they'd look at you like you were some kind of loony.

But if we're counting text stories, do we also have to count editorial pages that seem to imply that superheroes exist in the same universe? It's a bit awkward, but I'm thinking no, we don't.

Does this poll in All-Star Comics No. 6 mean that Sargon the Sorcerer, the Whip and the King exist in the DC Universe too? Does this count as a 'text story' of sorts?

I'm going to say no. It has to be a proper story, or it just gets silly. And we wouldn't want this whole exercise to be silly, now would we? If we count this kind of thing, we'd need to count the similar poll in the early issues of Sensation Comics, implying that the Black Pirate would like to join the Justice Society too. And he lives in the 16th century. What, are we supposed to believe in some kind of magic time travel? You have to draw the line somewhere.

Let's get back to comics. And there are just two more slightly dubious cases of DC characters co-existing that we need to bring in. First, we have Boy Commandos No. 1. It has one story in which the titular heroes are reported dead, and the writer-artist team of Joe Simon and Jack Kirby wonder how they can fill the pages. They consult Sandman (member of the Justice Society) and also interact with the Newsboy Legion (stars of Star-Spangled Comics). Nobody actually meets, as such, but it's a shared universe that brings in the Boy Commandos and the Newsboy Legion and Guardian! Our total is now at 26 series you need to read to experience the full wonders of the DC Universe! And there's still more!

In Flash Comics No. 77, Johnny Thunder wants to make money by hiring out the services of his magic Thunderbolt, but other heroes from the comic keep coming along and solving crimes for free! Johnny complains to the editor and insists the other heroes stay out of his strip, but not before he's met Flash, Hawkman and also the Ghost Patrol, who join the shared universe here.

And that's basically it for crossovers. The ones documented here are the only occasions in golden age DC where the inhabitants of our shared universe bump into each other. But if you're planning to read every in-universe story in the comics, don't forget the spin-offs!

Sometimes a supporting character would be promoted into their own stories. It's probably not worth mentioning that stories in the Superman comic with "Lois Lane" in the title panel still count as part of the shared universe. But it's perhaps less obvious when the Star-Spangled Kid (yes, him again) acquired a new co-star and then just disappeared forever. The last four installments of what used to be his series are simply titled Merry, Girl of 1000 Gimmicks. 

And then there are three occasions when co-stars are given their own series in a different anthology comic to where they started out. So it can be easy to miss Robin (Batman's chum, with solo adventures in Star-Spangled Comics), or even Winky, Blinky and Noddy (comical associates of the Flash, who for some reason got their own strip in All-American Comics, where the Green Lantern is the main star). And speaking of GL, he was outlasted in comics by his pet pooch, Streak the Wonder Dog, who got his own adventures in Sensation Comics!

Those are all unquestionably part of our integrated Superman DC Comics Golden Age Reality. So if you're wanting to read the entirety of the DC Universe up to, say, the end of 1950, and want to make sure you ignore anything that wasn't definitely part of it as established by comics published before that date, just read anything with one of the 33 titles in bold red font above!

(I mean, you should probably read the other stuff too. It's not Aquaman's fault no other superhero wanted to talk to him in the 1940s. And the funny-animal comics are often better than the superheroes anyway!)