The Hypothetical Tale

Recent developments, mostly within DC's walls, have brought about a new interest in and a new depth of the hypothetical superhero tale, one which either garbles established continuity by altering the outcome of previously resolved stories, plays around with some premise that supports the foundations of a shared superhero universe, or speculates about the future of existing superheroes made somehow subject to the passing of time.

Such stories span the range of a continuum from trifling to pompous and overblown and involve premises from the ridiculous to the very probable; and deal in themes from simple entertainment to analyses of the concept of heroism.

"Imaginary" Stories

DC had irregular success with imaginary stories. Some of these represented simple wish-fulfillment, such as the "Superman Red/Superman Blue" storyline of the sixties, where Superman split into two bodies and used his increased abilities to solve the problems of humanity and a few other humanoid races, thereby making himself and superheroes in general obsolete. The weakness of this as material to support subsequent stories occurs without too much thought: What kind of comic book could survive telling stories about a world with no problems?

Others, however, had both irony and depth, such as the tale of an alternate world where Lex Luthor became Superman and Clark Kent existed as a petty gangster. This story implied things about determinism and free will and also attempted to yank the emotional levers of readers used to admiring Superman/Clark Kent and sneering at Luthor.

One can say fairly, however, that the silly imaginary tale prevailed, if we look at numbers. Many of these stories dealt with the ever-present desire of Lois Lane to become Mrs. Superman; one such story centered around Superman's invention of a formula to give Lois super-powers and thereby render her safe from the invariable assaults that must seek out anyone daring enough to assume the mantle of the Bride of Superman. Predictably enough, this formula, after giving Lois powers and allowing her to marry her Superbeau, proved poisonous, and she died. DC must have figured it necessary to poison any possible happiness between Lois and Superman in order to justify the ill-treatment Lois enjoyed as Superman defeated an endless stream of schemes she concocted to entrap him into marriage.

Other imaginary stories took a more speculative bent, including the Batman stories set in the future with Dick Grayson as "Batman II" and a new sidekick as "Robin II." These stories attempted to project a possible future, after age had forced Batman to retire, where others carried on, but belonged to the imaginary genre so that DC need not commit to a future treatment of the Batman concept that contained the speculations from this story. This involved less risk in the late period between the Golden and Silver Ages than during the Silver Age or after; for instance, DC would create an imaginary "Elseworlds" concept with a future Justice League in the acclaimed Kingdom Come series that it would evidently commit to three years later with The Kingdom.

What If?

What If? occasionally lapsed into pointless speculation (What if Nick Fury had fought World War II in outer space?) that certainly could not have reflected any persistent wondering on the part of readers, even when the title handled such stories well. It did better when it kept to the key events of the history of the Marvel universe (What if the Hulk had Bruce Banner's Brain?) than when it delved into the footnotes (What if the Punisher killed Spider-Man?) but the ability to run, across two series, for around 100 issues suggests some vigor infuses the fundamental concept even when it suffers from weak delivery.

The What If? concept receives considerable derision, especially from the more critical elements of comics readership, but this criticism fails, in a sense, to see the point; these stories, clearly happening outside of continuity, provide something that writers do not intend readers to take seriously. Readers can put aside their encyclopediae of comics trivia with these works; continuity lawyers do not need to recall a single panel of what occurs therein; and the reader can dismiss any commitment to this story even if he brought to it a sometimes-necessary understanding of the stories that went before to set up the fundamental premise.

Elseworlds

If Marvel experimented with the single-issue long story for out-of-continuity material, DC in recent years has made some mileage out of its "Elseworlds" concepts in forms like the small graphic novel and the miniseries. In general, DC attempts to present Elseworlds in which the characters retain their essence as their histories and environments change; their changed circumstances provide a mirror from which to reflect their character.

Occasionally, though, DC uses Elseworlds projects for sheer entertainment value, and in one case also employed one for a retro-crossover tale of Batman and Captain America, playing heavily on the similarities of post-creation versions of Captain America and Batman and original concepts of the Red Skull and the Joker. One need not justify entertaining works well told and well depicted, such as this excellent John Byrne piece; but DC does not always limit the ambitions of Elseworld projects to entertainment. Sometimes, they venture into simple or absurdly random speculation, and other times, into plausible or egregiously pretentious examination of the heroic concept itself.

Some of these do fall into the range of the more absurd What If? premises, including versions of Superman and/or Batman during the American Civil War, the American Revolution, or as additional cast for H. G. Wells' War of the Worlds. This material need not concert the analysts of the meta-hero, or the concept that binds all versions of certain iconic superheroes like Superman or Batman.

Other pieces take the "future imaginary story," as did Kingdom Come, a tale of a future in which the big guns of the DC universe abdicated their responsibilities and left the planet to a lawless and amoral generation of superbeings interested in squabbling for its entertainment value alone. This work dealt with the responsibilities and definitions of a hero and ultimately became canon for the "future DC universe;" DC seems committed to avoid storylines that might make the Kingdom Come concept become impossible to develop.

DC has also approached Elseworlds with the sounder What If? premise of undoing some key development that subsequently shaped the entire superhero mythos. In The Nail (as in "for want of a nail, the kingdom was lost"), superheroes attempt to undermine the machinations of an alien power in the absence of public confidence and amid growing fear of costumed superheroes, especially those with powers or visible deformities. In this case, DC proposed that the absence of Superman from its superhero world would result in these changes; and that superheroes, even given their tremendous abilities, would find that the distrust normals held for them effectively neutralized them as protectors and crime-fighters. DC feels that Superman represents the soul of superheroism, and in both Kingdom Come and The Nail, superheroism fails in his absence.

DC, therefore, puts its Elseworlds to a function that Marvel never truly explored in What If?, including the outrageous pretentions of Superman as guru, prophet, messiah, and god (perhaps capitalized). None of this represents exaggeration; by Superman #400, DC detailed the proposed future apotheosis of the line of Superman, and has hinted that said blue-clad marvel may become "Rao," the supreme being of Krypton that Superman used to curse to occasionally. If DC would impose some self-restraint on its desire to deify Superman (figuratively and literally) and use the Elseworlds model as a means whereby to examine the question of heroism and other ethical and conceptual premises underlying the concept of superheroics, it might do better.

Unexplored Possibilities

Although both DC and Marvel have created enough of these stories to saturate a market that sometimes does not care about the consequences of reversing the outcome of an old story remembered only within the inner circles of hard-core fandom, the imaginary story still offers considerable opportunities when writers and editors exercise the necessary courage to crush bogus premises under their editorial heels.

For instance, Marvel has printed enough stories about universe-devouring villains winning battles that they lost in normal continuity. One can skip the story itself, turn to the last page, and watch the universe imploding or otherwise ceasing to exist in a number of issues of What If?, and an editor doing what one should ought to realize that he need not tell another story that ends this way, regardless of who gets to destroy the universe this time.

Better premises explore situations that would shed light on established characters by putting them in differing situations so as to distort their role as a mirror of the world. Regardless of the success of delivery, tales like the What If? where Charles Xavier became the Juggernaut and developed a more ambitious, tyrranical ethos in a world over which he held more personal power performs just such examination, as did a number of tales that distorted Spider-Man's earliest history to view the effects of the changes on the development of his character.

Other visions reach for relevance and never come near grasping it, such as What If?'s tale about Conan the Barbarian and Wolverine changing places (this story ended, again, with Phoenix destroying the universe; this made the story itself superfluous, inasmuch as anyone could depict in a one-page splash the outcome without the unnecessarily complicating detail).

However, lest I seem to pick on Marvel too much, I recognize that Elseworlds matter appears intermittently and can therefore wait for a good concept (like Kingdom Come or The Nail) and What If? had to cobble something together based on a publication schedule. This not only inclined the latter publication to explore possibilities that meant nothing and interested nobody; it also had the healthier effect of disinclining the producers of that title to take themselves too seriously (a tale comes to mind where Reed Richards and Keith Richard changed places, leaving the guitarist in the Fantastic Four and the scientist in the Rolling Stones).

The hypothetic story, treated properly, defies exhaustion, and DC has managed to redefine it along a model that will hopefully serve to shape Marvel's future attempts into fictional speculation.