Crisis on Infinite Earths is nearing its end.  The heroes and villains have done their part to prevent the Anti-Monitor from changing all of creation.  By stopping the Anti-Monitor from changing the universe into a multiverse of anti-matter, the accidental creation of the infinite universes that created the DC Multiverse has been reversed.  But did they succeed in ending the threat to the remaining Earths?  What kind of existence do they live in now?  Let’s jump into today’s Comic Book Classics Revisited – Crisis on Infinite Earths #11!

NOTE: I will be using a lot of “Earth 1 this” and “Earth 2 that” or “Superman of whatever Earth” and “Superman of another Earth” speak in this article.  I tried to be as clear as I could, but I do realize that this may cause some people’s heads to spin trying to keep everything straight.  This isn’t that difficult of a story to read as the differences in characters are well defined, and you don’t have to know every single character that is in every single panel to understand what’s going on. I think that feeling is an unfair assessment of this story in general, but I did realize while I wrote this article how confusing it could read when I try to break it down.  That said…  Read on!

On a sunny morning in Metropolis in 1985, Kal-L, Earth 2’s Superman, awakes from what feels like a horrible dream.  He finds the apartment slightly different than what he remembers.  He figures Lois has made a change in decor while he was wherever he was.  He gets dressed and heads to the Daily Star where he is now the editor in chief.  As he walks through the newsroom, this older Clark Kent is getting odd looks from the reports and copy editors at their desks.  After sitting down in what he believes is his desk, he is yelled at by Perry White, the editor in chief of the Daily Planet.  Clark realizes that he is on Earth 1, not his Earth.  The Clark Kent of Earth 1 comes rushing in to get Perry off the other Clark’s back.  A few minutes later, both Clarks meet on the roof.  Both plan to go to the warp zone in New York City to get Earth 2 Clark back  home.

When they get to New York, they find no warp zone and no one seems to remember anything of the tumultuous weather the Earth suffered during the crisis.  However, they do know Supergirl died in some battle but the details are sketchy.  With no warp zone, they fly to Central City to use Barry Allen’s cosmic treadmill to breach the barriers between Earths.  When they approach, they find that there is now a sign welcoming outsiders to the twin cities of Central and Keystone.  Earth 2 Superman mentions that Keystone City is from his Earth.

They arrive at Jay and Joan Garrick’s home in Keystone City.  Jay Garrick, of course, recognizes both Supermen, but Joan doesn’t recognize the Earth 2 version that she should have known for years.  They go into Jay’s lab where Wally West is working on the cosmic treadmill.  Jay mentions that he’s discovered that people are aware of both histories of the Flash (Jay’s and Barry’s) when they should only know one or the other’s history.  The two Supermen and both Flashes decide they need to get some answers.  They use the treadmill to access Earth 2, but are horrified to find there is empty blackness – nothing where Earth 2 should be.  They discover that there must be only one Earth, one Universe, one time line in which everything that ever existed throughout has been folded into.  Earth 2 Superman doesn’t want to return to the merged Earth.  It’s like the void is calling out to him to live in the nothingness and fade into it to essentially become nothing.  Earth 1 Superman refuses this to happen and saves the Earth 2 Superman.  They all return to Earth, but in the process, the cosmic treadmill is destroyed beyond repair.

Out in space, Rip Hunter, Atomic Knight, Animal Man, Dolphin, Captain Comet, and Adam Strange see that time has realigned itself.  They find Brainiac’s ship.  Scanning no life or any movement on board, they go into the massive ship and find Brainiac’s lifeless body (remember, he shut himself down to wait out the results of the battle against the Anti-Monitor).

At Titans Tower, the Teen Titans play host to pretty much every superhero ever.  No matter what Earth the person came from, they find they cannot get back to their homes.  They slowly come to the realization that there isn’t multiple Earths anymore, but just one.  Then, Harbinger appears revealing that she regained her powers when the universe was rebooted.  Harbinger warns that the New Earth is still imperiled, but that’s not as jarring as some heroes have discovered.  It appears that people who had, or came from, the doubled heroes on Earth 2 are “non-persons” on New Earth.  So, for Kal-L, Earth-Prime Superboy, Dick Grayson, and Helena Wayne (the daughter of Earth 2’s Batman), they have no history, and no existence.  It’s as if they live, but were never born.  All that remains are the Earth 1 versions of Kal-El and Dick Grayson.  This wrecks the characters because they’ve come to realize that while they live, they don’t exist.  Earth 2 Superman really starts to figure things out now and realizes that his beloved wife, Lois, also never existed.  All he sacrificed and all he fought against lost him his one true love.  He takes off in anger, but is followed by Earth 1 Superman.  Harbinger tells him that he must bring back Kal-L as there are things he does not know yet.

Elsewhere, Deadman and Phantom Stranger find a hibernating Spectre.  It seems his powers have been drained in his fight against the Anti-Monitor.  In Salem, Massachusetts, Dr. Fate and the Demon see Princess Amethyst getting attacked in a village by those who believe her to be a which that has caused shadow demons to attack the town.  Dr. Occult arrives to break up the crowd by telling them she’s innocent.  The peacefulness he creates is soon broken by the shadow demons returning to attack the townsfolk.  Thankfully the Demon and Dr. Fate arrive to save Amethyst.  When she is blinded by one of the shadow demons, Dr. Fate sees something in her that is astonishing, even to him.  He quickly spirits her away back to her home, Gemworld.  (This story is continued in Amethyst’s on series and not referenced here any further).

Kal-El catches up to his Earth 2 counterpart and says he’s not going to let him give up as thanks for Kal-L sticking by him when Supergirl died.  Donna Troy tells the heroes in Titans Tower about an experience she had firsthand of this new Earth problem.  On Paradise Island, Wonder Woman and Wonder Girl of Earth 1 rush to the Queen’s throne room.  There they find Earth 2’s Wonder Woman and her daughter Fury.  Queen Hippolyta is confused because she does not know who this older Wonder Woman is and the Earth 2 Wonder Woman is confused because everything is wrong.  Batman, Robin, and Alex Luthor enter to tell the heroes that they spoke to Lex Luther who remembered nothing of helping by going to the past to prevent Krona from viewing the beginning of the universe.  It proves that only those who were at the dawn of time had any memory of what’s happened.  However, it seems that still doesn’t quite explain why some heroes are forgotten and others aren’t.

Soon, a weird weather pattern stretches across the world quickly and the shadow demons come with it.  The sky shifts and changes.  Superman of Earth 2 exclaims that they have been pulled into the anti-matter universe.  Soon, the Anti-Monitor’s face appears in the sky welcoming everyone to his universe…  And their doom!

(I want to place something here that I did not put into my breakdown of the issue.  After Superman of Earth 2 takes off in anger over losing Lois, and before Dr. Fate jumps in to save Amethyst, there is a little sidetrack made.  The story shifts to Las Vegas where a bunch of DC’s detective characters are attending a convention.  They find that a room had exploded from behind a locked door.  Inside is an old Wonder Woman foe, Angle Man.  Nothing is gone into any further detail about this, nor is it ever really mentioned in any context during the series or after the reboot. Most believe he was using his time warping Angler that was created on Apokolips to mess about with time and space when the cosmic realignment occurred.  That basically cased the Angler to blow up in Angle Man’s face and killed him, but no one knows for sure if this is actually what happened or not.  It did give a chance for Harvey Bullock, of Batman fame, and a whole bunch of detective type characters that really digs deep into DC’s past, a chance to do something in the story.)

Now we have all the makings for the final confrontation for the life of the entire DC Universe.  If you haven’t realized by now, this issue is the culmination of the entire event and the purpose DC set out to accomplish in the three or four years prior to this moment.  Unlike most events, that culmination happened in issue #10.  Most would have had the big climax and that one big moment happen somewhere in the middle or toward the end of the second third of the last issue.  The death of the multiverse kinda just happened with the end of the tenth issue.  Yes, the tenth issue did have one hell of a battle and conclusion, but we don’t see that moment where everything goes bonkers and see a bunch of Earths merging into one with a caption calling it New Earth.  They saved that for the sequel, Infinite Crisis, but that’s a story for another time.

The one mystery that was has not been answered that gets asked time and time again in this issue is why some heroes have basically been wiped from history.  I basically touched on it previously, but it’s a good idea to dig a little deeper into the idea.  It’s the Earth 2 doppelgangers that have been wiped.

Earth 2’s Superman, Robin, Wonder Woman, Huntress, and Fury (and Earth-Prime’s Superboy) don’t have a place in the new world.  It had nothing to do with the battle at the dawn of time.  This has to do with their alter egos.  Earth 1’s history ultimately won out since it was the most contemporary of the Earths.  So the present day versions of Kal-El, Lois Lane, Lex Luthor, Princess Diana, and pretty much all the Batman characters are the real people in this new Earth.  For those that would have been on a different Earth, they become a paradox that cannot be reconciled.

That basically means those on Earth 2 that share those identities become those paradoxes.  I’ll let you in on a little bit of a spoiler alert – this doesn’t bode well for those heroes.  Also, Superboy from Earth-Prime is another special case.  Earth-Prime is considered the “real world” in the DC Universe.  I’m not exactly sure why he shows up here. There’s not a great deal of info about when Earth-Prime was destroyed or how Superboy made it to Earth 1 to join the fight against the Anti-Monitor.  But because he is Kal-El of Krypton, he doesn’t have anyplace to be in the new universe.  I should also point out that Jay Garrick and Alan Scott (Earth 2’s Flash and Green Lantern, respectively) are safe here because they are not the same people from another time as their Earth 1 counterparts.  Another safe Earth 2 character is Power Girl, but I don’t have the time or the energy to try to cover all of what was done to her continuity to try to make her fit in this new Earth setting.  Technically, she should be one of the paradoxes because she is the Earth 2 version of Kara Zor-El, also known as Earth 1 Supergirl.  Anyway, that’s a real tough nut to crack because she was popular enough to keep, but problematic enough to not be able to truly fit into the idea of her original Kryptonian ancestry.

There is a larger question that will have to wait until after Friday’s conclusion to our Crisis on Infinite Earths series in Comic Book Classics Revisited.  It leads to pretty large problems in the DC Universe post Crisis, and it’s a problem that DC still struggles with to this day.  So, come back on Friday and we will wrap this bad boy up!