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shaxper
04-20-2008, 11:42 AM
I don't know if this has ever been officially established, but I'm trying to determine how fast time progresses in the DCU compared to the real world. Naturally, there needs to be some suspension of disbelief, but I think I've figured out that if the DCU ages one year for every four years that pass in the real world, most things work out.

Batman will have been fighting crime for 17 years. If he started in his early twenties, this now places him around 40 years of age -- still athletic and able, but beginning to show signs of slowing down. This would be a good reason for replacing or killing him in Batman R.I.P.

Superman and Wonder Woman will also have been around for two decades, but Amazons don't age (or at least age slowly), and Superman will still be able to perform efficiently well into his 80s so long as he is nearly invulnerable and possesses super strength.

Hal Jordan, Ray Palmer, and the rest of DC's surviving second generation would have been fighting crime for approximately 12 years. Depending upon how old they were when they started, this could make them anywhere in their 30s or 40s.

Dick Grayson (and the rest of DC's third generation) would be in his mid twenties now. He would have started the original Titans when he was 14 and the New Teen Titans when he was 18.

Tim Drake (and therefore all of DC's fourth generation) are a bit of a problem here, though. In Batman: Year Three, we see a young Tim Drake watching the flying Graysons perform when they are murdered. If Dick was 8 when this happened, this puts less than five years' distance between Dick and Tim. That makes Tim 19 or 20. I believe he's only supposed to be 16.

Well, what do you guys think?


EDIT: I just remembered that, post-crisis, Dick Grayson was 12 when his parents were murdered. This could make Tim Drake as many as nine years younger than him, which makes Tim approximately 16 years old. It works.

shaxper
04-20-2008, 03:55 PM
Did some more research and found Wikipedia's explanation of time in the DCU. I sure hope this isn't an official explanation, particularly the "floating timeline" bit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_DC_Universe

Assassin Spider
04-20-2008, 04:11 PM
I've seen it and I personally work with a 15-year timeline, counting OYL. Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman first emerged fifteen years ago, while characters like the Flash (Barry Allen), Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), Black Canary (Dinah Lance), and Green Arrow debuted a year or two later. It's around that same time that Batman takes in Dick Grayson, who would be roughly 12-14 at the time. Wally West's debut as the Flash is five years prior to Infinite Crisis, whereas Tim's been Robin for roughly four or five years counting OYL, so Tim should be 17-going-on-18, as should a number of others of his generation.

That's just my take on it.

SUPERECWFAN1
04-20-2008, 04:18 PM
If you look at the back of Zero Hour #0 it has a 11 year time span for the DCU heroes. Now factor in that DC's added in a lot of the whole Pre-Crisis stories and all....plus natural time progression like One Year Later and all...

I will estimate that DCU heroes timeline is....12-15 years. That Batman is either 34-36 right now (he started at 19...) . DC's done this whole timeline thing to fix the other heroes in the DCU as Oliver Queen was de-aged from his mid 40's look to jell with the current DC heroes and is in his mid 30's now.

shaxper
04-20-2008, 05:09 PM
If you look at the back of Zero Hour #0 it has a 11 year time span for the DCU heroes. Now factor in that DC's added in a lot of the whole Pre-Crisis stories and all....plus natural time progression like One Year Later and all...

I will estimate that DCU heroes timeline is....12-15 years. That Batman is either 34-36 right now (he started at 19...) . DC's done this whole timeline thing to fix the other heroes in the DCU as Oliver Queen was de-aged from his mid 40's look to jell with the current DC heroes and is in his mid 30's now.

Thanks for sharing this. I've never had any desire to read Zero Hour, so this is all new to me. It all seems to highly unnecessary though. The simple 1 year for every 4 years formula works just as well and requires no tampering. Batman would still be 36 if he started when he was 19, and Ollie would be in his mid 30s too. Why arbitrarily create a new timeline when the old one can be so easily preserved (granted, with some post-crisis alterations and retcons)?

SUPERECWFAN1
04-20-2008, 05:48 PM
Thanks for sharing this. I've never had any desire to read Zero Hour, so this is all new to me. It all seems to highly unnecessary though. The simple 1 year for every 4 years formula works just as well and requires no tampering. Batman would still be 36 if he started when he was 19, and Ollie would be in his mid 30s too. Why arbitrarily create a new timeline when the old one can be so easily preserved (granted, with some post-crisis alterations and retcons)?

Well in the case of Green Arrow in that same Zero Hour revamp of the timeline ....they tried to describe why Oliver Queen was in his mid 40's. In the Grell issues he had celebrated his 44th and 45th birthdays. So I believe DC decided to make him be one of the 1st heroes in the timeline (12-13 years...) about 2 years before Superman showed up and Batman.


Now with the Kevin Smith series , they obviously changed things from there. And a new year 1 take on him recently when he was a really young man. To fit in DC's timeline.