The Multiverse
The classical Multiverse was revisited by Geoff Johns in Infinite Crisis (2005) when Superboy-Prime and Alexander Luthor, a pair of refugees from the original 1960s/70s Multiverse, tried to destroy the single Earth by splitting it back into its constituent parts. They were defeated, but there were repercussions. There were subtle differences between the old and new universes, so much so that DC started referring to their post-Infinite Crisis setting as “New Earth.” Spinning out of Infinite Crisis was a year-long, weekly comicbook series called 52 written by Grant Morrison, Geoff Johns, Mark Waid and Greg Rucka. The buried mystery behind 52 was the significance of the number itself. The answer was revealed in the final issue when it was shown that New Earth wasn’t the only Earth to survive the second Crisis. There were 51 other Earths (52 in total) which had come into existence at the same time. They had originally been identical to the New Earth, but the flight of Mister Mind altered them at a primal level causing differences in tone and identity to develop between them.
Articles
- Earth-0 Mk. 3 (New Earth) -
- Earth-0 Mk. 4 (Post-Flashpoint) -
- The Post-Flashpoint Justice League Timeline - An attempt to place into some semblance of order the events specifically referred to in the DC chronicles after Flashpoint #5. This is specifically a Justice League timeline (including Dark, International, and of America variants).
- Earth-12 (DCAU) -
- Earth-16 (Young Justice) -
- A Short History of DC Teen Superheroes -
- Young Justice Timeline -
- Earth-22 (Kingdom Come) -
Major Constituent Universes
| Anti-Matter Universe of Qward |
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| Earth-0 Mk. 3 (New Earth) |
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This was the post-Infinite Crisis “New Earth” featured in books like Justice League of America (vol. 2). It was DC’s mainstream continuity after 2006, but was rebooted (to varying degrees) by the 2011 Flashpoint Crossover, and became the Mk. 4 version of the Earth-0 mainline. |
| Earth-0 Mk. 4 (Post-Flashpoint) |
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This is the current mainstream DC Universe. It emerged from Flashpoint event and was launched with 2011′s “The New 52″ soft-reboot. It is the setting Justice League (vol. 2), Justice League International (vol. 3), Justice League Dark. |
| Earth-12 (DCAU) |
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This is a continuation of the DC Animated Universe shown in cartoon series like Justice League Unlimited and Superman TAS. New adventures are published in the Batman Beyond Unlimited revival comics. |
| Earth-16 (Young Justice) |
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This is the world created by Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman as the setting for the Young Justice cartoon series and the Young Justice (vol. 2) spin-off comicbook. |
| Earth-2 (New 52 JSA) |
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| Earth-22 (Kingdom Come) |
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Kingdom Come was 1990s mini-series which postulated a future for the DC Universe where the statesmen of the Justice League had retired and been replaced by an increasingly violent and erratic generation of new meta-humans. The world shown in this series made such an impact on the stories told by DC that it was officially recognised as a parallel Earth in the reintroduced Multiverse. |
| Earth-9 (Tangent Universe) |
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