Crisis on Infinite Earths #11

[history79]

8.66 pages of 26

Comments

[scorntx]

How odd that Helena gets all this focus on how she doesn't exist anymore.
Almost like the writer was trying to remind us she existed before killing her and then completely eradicating all traces of her existence.
And unlike Supergirl, she doesn't get to go out with as much glory. Just touched by a Shadow Demon and BAM. Goodbye Helena. Goodbye last vestiges of the original Batman's legacy.
Bit depressing.

Meanwhile, not a peep from Power Girl on how she's lost everything as well.
(It's kind of odd after the prominence Karen got in the mid-to-late aughts to see her being such a minor character here, even when her alternate counterpart dies, which you'd think would merit some focus on her.)

Though it could be the shock and surprise talking, everyone seems to be having a hard time being told the Earths they're from don't exist.
... well, technically they never will have existed, but this is hardly the time to be conjugating temporal verbs in the past impossible never tense.

And noting the fact Harbinger notes only one rocket left Krypton.
No more Kara Zor-El, for the next twenty years or so.

And the pretty chilling bit not shown when both Supermen go looking for Earth-2 and find nothing.
Seeing Kal-L being compelled to fly into oblivion... brr... and raises a few alarming questions...

[daningram.insanejournal.com]

Yeah, kind of a shame Huntress and Robin, the original, didn't get the same happy ending that the original Superman did.

...but given what happened to Superman et all later, maybe they got off easy

[tcampbell1000]

Power Girl does get a nice little moment in #9 where Earth-2 Superman and Huntress get weirdly overprotective of her, because the way Supergirl went out sort of made an impression.

[bruinsfan]

And the pretty chilling bit not shown when both Supermen go looking for Earth-2 and find nothing.
Seeing Kal-L being compelled to fly into oblivion... brr... and raises a few alarming questions...

Yeah, that part about the infinite dark void beyond the new singular universe calling out to him to join it was majorly creepy, and this was before decades of Vertigo Comics to desensitize us as readers.

[jgeils]

Power Girl did get a couple of panels in #11 which really didn't explain anything. Like Superman-2, it wiped away her world and her origin story by extension. That laid the groundwork for a new origin later in Secret Origins V2N11, where somehow she became Atlantean and was related to Arion.

[zylly]

I know the outside the story reasons why Earth-One formed the primary basis for merged Earth, with everything else folded around that, but I've always wondered about the "in story" reasons. You'd think things would solidify around the older versions of people...

[scorntx]

Wasn't the Monitor based on Earth-1? That might account for some of it.

Or maybe if Earth-2 hadn't been wiped out, it would have been the foundation for everything instead. But since it was gone, whatever forces governed the merger went with Earth-1.

[tcampbell1000]

He was born on Earth-1, though based in a satellite "somewhere beyond the universes." However, Earth-2 wasn't wiped out: it lasted as long as Earth-1 did and was preserved at the same time.

[bruinsfan]

Earth-1 was supposedly the original universe, the one with Oa and the Guardians of the Universe where Krona's experiment that originally created the Multiverse happened. It makes sense that would be the dominant parallel that formed the baseline with bits and pieces of the other universes being fitted in.

[zylly]

Now that, that actually makes sense. I'd never completely made that connection before, so thank you.

[tcampbell1000]

Considering how Earth-X is "the Earth where the Axis won World War II," it's kind of hilarious that Harbinger skips over that point. "World War II happened, and then we had Superman and Batman. You don't need to get bogged down in all those historical details. By the way, the Luxembourgians are invading America next week."

Meanwhile, gotta love how Helena and Old Dick just blurt out highly classified data in front of everyone. Here's Nightwing: "Wow, so... on YOUR world, somebody WAYNE and DICK GRAYSON were Batman and Robin! SO WEIRD HOW THESE NAMES ARE TOTALLY DIFFERENT ON OUR WORLD, YEPSIR, NO NEED TO EVER MENTION THE NAME 'DICK GRAYSON' AGAIN"

The final page is dramatic and all, but it's also like the fifth time that the entire population of Earth should have all died instantly. THERE IS NO SUN WHERE EARTH IS NOW.

[zylly]

To be fair, this was back in the days where a lot more super-heroes knew each other's secret identities than would become the norm post Crisis. I'm pretty sure the older League members, the JSA, Titans, and Outsiders all already knew who Bruce was, and that would have made Dick easy to know too.

Anybody else is just from what was then still a different Earth, so it didn't much matter.

[tcampbell1000]

I can see that. It's more of a late-Bronze Age sensibility.

[zylly]

I actually prefer that sort of "community of heroes" mentality myself, but I can see how it doesn't quite work to modern eyes.

[tcampbell1000]

All in all, I likewise prefer it when mass gatherings of heroes more or less get along, and especially when there's a pressing menace for them to fight. Superman and Batman should be able to put that "hope vs. fear" thing on hold for a few hours until Destroy-All-The-Pants-In-The-World-Man is dealt with.

But it does seem like "outing" a hero in front of relative strangers, just because they're also good guys, might read as naive. Blue Beetle and Captain Marvel don't have to be bad guys for this info to have negative consequences: they just have to be a little loose-lipped and immature, and, well...

[zylly]

Definitely a bit naive, but considering the world just about ended and still isn't quite right... perhaps a bit forgivable.

[daningram.insanejournal.com]

Yeah, kinda odd, now that I think about it, that Nazi earth survived. Besides the Freedom Fighters, where there even any trademarked characters there?

[bruinsfan]

The final page is dramatic and all, but it's also like the fifth time that the entire population of Earth should have all died instantly. THERE IS NO SUN WHERE EARTH IS NOW.

The Final Night event in the 90s did explore how it would take about 5 days for the absence of the sun to completely freeze the Earth over. Plenty of time for that assembly of superheroes to figure something out!

Also, IIRC, didn't the big final battle against the Anti-Monitor take place with a star nearby? I distinctly remember Dr. Light absorbing power from it to interfere with the Anti-Monitor doing so, and then putting the hammer down on him with all the power she'd built up.

[tcampbell1000]

You are right, I stand corrected! I was going to say that Final Night wasn't necessarily a reliable resource about such things, but a little research from actually knowledgeable sources verifies it. I'm not sure where I got it in my head that this would be fatal much faster, but there it is.

(The binary star that the Anti-Monitor is using as a backup battery may or may not be in position to give the Earth any light. But the skies are red instead of black once the action gets going, so probably I guess.)

And I suppose the Anti-Monitor is capable of moving items "safely" between the positive matter universe and his own, just like Alex Jr. is: Psycho Pirate and Barry Allen didn't explode on entry. Presumably he lost that ability when the Monitor-corpse-verse absorbed all the remaining positive matter universes, then got it back when changing the cosmology rendered that moot. Although why he decided to keep Barry alive all that time is a question best left unexamined. And the only reason he didn't just pull the Earth right into one of his universe's stars has got to be something like "Well, he's been so frustrated with these guys for so long, I guess he wants to play with his food a bit now."

[wizardru]

No, they shouldn't have died instantly. They should have been freaked out pretty majorly (especially with the sudden total darkness), but the instant disappearance of the sun doesn't actually translate to instant death for all life on Earth. Mankind would have about a week before the average surface temperature dropped to 0 degrees Fahrenheit. In a matter of weeks, it would be too cold for any living thing...but there's a lot of time for the heroes to do their thing.

[tcampbell1000]

You are correct! See my reply directly above yours.

[zylly]

Adding to other comments... I also really like how it's not just about the major characters. People like the Challengers, Cave Carson, and even Rip Hunter all have their parts to play in everything.

[daningram.insanejournal.com]

Wait, if Huntress didn't exist in this world, where did she get her civilian clothes?

[scorntx]

Maybe she keeps them in those tiny, tiny pouches on her belt?

(And where the heck did she get the duffel bag from?)

[mindsweeper]

Maybe the duffel bag is her cape?