For William Moulton Marston. Girl power, doc.

Chapter Seven: All the World is Waiting for You...

Place: Offices of DC Comics, New York City

Year: 1986

"Hello everyone, I'm George Perez and some of you might know me from my earlier work on Teen Titans and Crisis. Now, I'm working on Wonder Woman. It wasn't meant to be like that though. I was just going to be drawing but when Greg Potter left, I asked Jeanette Kahn if I could be the writer too, something to which she kindly agreed. Thanks Jeanette!"

The publisher smiled. "You're welcome George."

"I've wanted to write and draw Wonder Woman for a while now; I said as much in an interview with Mile High Comics magazine. My friend Marv Wolfman here wrote and edited a few issues and told me about it." Wolfman nodded. "We've even worked on the outer edges of the character, using her little sister Donna Troy and Paradise Island in Teen Titans. It's going to be a real treat writing Diana herself with how it will let me proclaim the glory of Gaea."

At that, concerned looks came across the faces of all the men at the conference table and scooted away from Perez; he narrowed his eyes as he saw that. Back to reality… however grim it might be. "There have been rumors among the fans that Diana 'died' during the Crisis because we're going to kill her off for good. While that isn't true, the fact that Wonder Girl is doing better in someone else's team book than Wonder Woman is doing in her own bookproves something's wrong." He sighed. "Her book is dying; last year her book went bimonthly because nobody cared enough to buy it.

"…I know she can do better!" Perez shouted, causing a few people to jump at the outburst while he calmed down. "I know she can do better… Back in the seventies we advertised her as superheroine number one and her creator William Moulton Marston would agree that it's time we started treating her like it. Part of this is setting up boundaries since the headaches we've had for the last fifteen years came from every writer trying a new gimmick. The bad thing is that that works for the same reason it fails. After it loses its novelty you need to go in 'bold new direction' yet again. I'm not going down that route though God knows how close I came.

"In the wake of Crisis, I initially hoped to reboot Wonder Woman from scratch to do everything right the first time; Wolfman even said we should do that to DC's entire line. After talking to Mr. Schwartz, however, I decided that his idea is the right one. In fact, it's going to save us a lot of headaches. For example, if there's no Wonder Woman to be her sister, then where did Wonder Girl come from? To have it make sense, we'd have to remove Wonder Girl from continuity." He laughed. "Try telling that to our best seller Teen Titans!

"After all," Perez mischievously smiled, "why should Diana be retconned when there's such a great story there just waiting to be told? In terms of continuity, Wonder Woman first appeared in Wonder Woman #98, 1958, when Bobby Kanigher retold her origin and ignored all her earlier stories. If you look at her from there and trace her all the way to the eve of Crisis, whilst acknowledging all the story elements retroactively added since then, you have all the depth and complexity you could ever need.

"Like Marston before me, I plan to write Wonder Woman as a feminist character. I want to give her a depth missing from her previous incarnations and set her apart from other DC heroes. For example, she is supposedly here to promote peace as the default ambassador of her country and all we ever see her do is fight super villains. That's nice but it's nothing that any other superheroine can't do. My plan then is to let her be an Amazon, let her be a princess and emissary from Paradise Island to Man's World.

"Since to fix continuity we have to know what's wrong with it, let's start at the beginning. The classic origin is good and I see no reason to change it. The Amazons grow sick of the violence of Man's World and leave to found Paradise Island, or Themyscira as I'm going to call it, where they set up new lives for themselves. In time, Hippolyta longs for a child and the gods grant her wish by bringing to life a doll she had made from clay. She raises her daughter and Diana does, indeed, grow into a 'wonder.' But, and here is where I throw in the monkey wrench, but when Air Force Colonel Steve Trevor crash lands on Themyscira it all goes to hell."

Roy Thomas asked, "What do you mean?"

"What do I mean…" Perez pursed his lips and thought for a moment. "What I mean is that Diana, in her current incarnation, became Wonder Woman for all the wrong reasons. If you don't believe me, pick up Bobby Kanigher's first issues. As both writer and editor, he created Wonder Woman; every issue since 1958 has been based on his Silver Age reboot. Earlier stories imagined a girl made out of clay who lived on Paradise Island until Steve Trevor crash landed where on the girl now woman left against her mother's will. Kanigher, on the other hand, not only had her born in the normal way but had her mother train her for her future career as Wonder Woman. Since the DCU wasn't terribly interconnected in those days and that most heroes were being rebooted anyways, it was no biggie.

"The two stories," Perez continued, "can be meshed together and they were when Kanigher restored Diana's made from clay origin. To make this extra clear he even had his new/old origin and untold stories from early in his Wonder Woman's career drawn in her Golden Age style. Eventually, the standard look and tone of Kanigher's stories returned and his earlier pre-retro stories were reconfirmed as cannon thanks to a flashback in a later Denny O'Neil issue."

"Well, what does any of that have to do with Steve?" insisted Thomas perplexedly. "I wrote a few stories and I never saw Steve as wrecking Paradise Island."

O'Neil drummed his fingers on the table. Perez just had to bring up those black mark issues…. "Roy, I think what George is trying to say is if Marston's version and Kanigher's version are both true, then why? Why did Polly train Diana from birth to one day leave and become Wonder Woman but that when that day came wouldn't let her go?"

A fist slammed the table and they all looked at Perez. "Now you got it!" he said through his grin. "Why did Queen Hippolyta refuse to let her daughter go?" A grin turned into a conspiratorial smile. "Diana says why in #322. She tells her mom, and I'm paraphrasing, 'I'm beginning to think that the real reason you never wanted me to go is because your romance with Hercules went sour ages ago.' If you pick up Marston's Golden Age origin story, you see that when Air Force pilot Steve Trevor crashed his place on Paradise Island Diana fell in love with him at first sight. She loved him so much that she abandoned her home and her immortality for him. All for him… and there you have the starting point.

"In the same story that I just mentioned, Diana leaves the island angry with her mother telling her that 'The outside world is hard but I have seen too much of it and loved too much of it—' looks at Steve '—to ever be content with paradise again.' The romance can work. His Golden Age/Earth-Two self and the TV version he inspired were good men. …the Steve Trevor Bobby Kanigher stuck us with? Not so much.

"I've spoken with Dan Mishkin, who wrote the stories I just cited; in fact, he wrote the series for the last three years with the exceptions of a few issues. Now that I'm writing, I plan to resolve a major plot thread of his once and for all. Dan?"

They all cast a glance at the smiling Mishkin. "One of my issues introduced Artemis, the original Wonder Woman of Ancient Greece… who of course looks just like Diana." He checked his notes. "It was #301. She won the contest and went forth on her civilizing mission but threw everything away to get her boyfriend to love her. It cost Artemis her life and, attacking Themyscira for that man, her soul. Later, in modern times, Diana wants to tell Steve her secret identity but he says, quote 'You're my angel, angel, and I want you to stay that way… not turn out to be somebody who sweeps up the Pentagon at night.' End quote. You better believe I got anti-Steve hate mail for that! Like I explained in #315's letter column, Steve's either a dope or a wimp and he's writing himself out. There's more but you see where we're going."

"Thanks Dan." Perez looked pensive. Write new stories without ignoring the old ones and that goes double for Steve. "On the one hand, he's brave enough and O'Neil's first issue said he earned the Medal of Honor along the line. You might compare him to Hal Jordan; he's an idiot but he'll always try to do the right thing. And in recent issues, writers like Conway, Mishkin, and Thomas have tried to reform him.

"On the other hand, he's worse than Lois Lane ever was. Maybe she never proved Clark was Superman but she always suspected it. Diana Prince, on the other hand, not only looks but acts exactly like Wonder Woman and Trevor never figures it out!… #162 had a year one flashback where, after having just created her secret identity, Diana Prince goes to meet Trevor… who doesn't recognize her. Dumbstruck, she asks him point blank if she sees a resemblance between her and Wonder Woman; he says he doesn't and calls her a Martian! I don't know who's writing J'onn J'onzz, but," he quickly added, "no offense."

"None taken," replied John Ostrander.

"Right. Anyways," continued Perez, "Prince is a plain-Jane with her Clark Kent glasses but, dowdy or not, she is still the same woman she is in costume." A puzzled look crossed the man's face. "Hey Maggin, didn't you have a gutsy Diana Prince beat up some muggers once?"

A bemused Maggin nodded. "Yeah, she got the muggers and somebody asked if she's Wonder Woman. Everyone else says she can't be; Wonder Woman would never be so obvious in her secret identity." With that the Superman editor burst out laughing.

"That's what I mean," Perez chuckled. "Issue #130 proves it. It opens with Lieutenant Diana Prince asking Steve out on a date several times and every time he declines so he can be free to see Wonder Woman. And when he finally does agree to go on a date, he spends the entire night talking about you-know-who. It gets worse when Trevor invites Prince to a Charity Carnival."

Maggin furrowed his brow. "How could that be bad? I don't get—no, no I don't believe it!" He rolled his eyes and said, "Let me guess he's only inviting her because he can't find Wonder Woman and he wants to blow the other ticket he already has. No wait…" he said as he scoured his mind for the most ridiculous love triangles that ever (dis)graced Superman's Silver Age. "When Trevor gets the chance he dumps Prince so he can go date Wonder Woman and when he tells Prince he calls her bland or something. Oh God, what does she see in him?!"

Peres shook his head and sighed. "I'll get to that in minute Elliot, and it's 'mud hen' he calls her not 'bland.' Anyways, on realizing Steve only loves a Diana with superpowers, she accepts the date and while on the date, she casts a spell to temporarily turn herself into a freak in order to test his love. He, of course, runs away in terror. When he comes across Diana Prince a few minutes later and desperately asks her out on a date, he can't understand why she says no

"It wasn't the 'first' time, however," Perez quickly added, "because, like I said, Kanigher told a few flashback/year one stories in his run. In one, Diana thinks to herself that Steve is cute and she would spend all her time with him, presumably ignoring her responsibilities, if she didn't keep fighting herself. 'Guess I'm weak, that way,' she says. She even blatantly wonders if Steve's love for her is just all on the surface. The above story gives the answer."

A thought flashed across Perez mind. "With how the spell was originally used by her mother to dupe a buffoonish Hercules," he mused to himself, "that story has potential—it could be retold."

Puzzled by that last part, all the writers looked at Perez. Good. "It's obvious. The stories that have Hippolyta train her daughter to be a hero and then forbid her from leaving aren't contradictory at all and can even support each other. Hippolyta did raise Diana to one day leave so she could spread the glory of Aphrodite throughout the world but when she saw her daughter's infatuation for Steve Trevor she remembered her love with Hercules."

"Hey George, wait a minute!"

Perez looked at Dan Mishkin. "What do you mean."

"I'm sorry to interrupt but can you pull one of my issues out of your portfolio, its #300 according to my notes… Please George?"

The new writer obliged the old and when he did… "Oh, you mean this one!" He opened and read Hippolyta's thought balloons. "'Dear Diana you are as wise and as compassionate a daughter as I could have ever hoped to raise… but if you think the needs of Man's World were your sole reason for becoming Wonder Woman, you are fooling yourself… for it is also Colonel Steve Trevor that keeps you there!'"

Mishkin asked, "George, remember our deal. When you start writing, you send me a copy!"

"Can do. Now Elliot," he said and saw Maggin nod, "a bit back you asked me what Diana could possibly see in Steve Trevor. I was asking myself that when Mishkin told me yesterday of a letter he got about a year ago from one Michael Pickens of Utica, Ohio. Perez pulled out #317 and went straight to the letters section. "I will read the relevant section in its entirety.

"'Please break Wonder Woman and Steve Trevor. Don't kill him off again, but end their current relationship. Their love for each other would never last in real life. Steve is the first man Diana ever saw, and he was and is young and good looking. Obviously, Diana has a school girl infatuation with him. And Steve? Diana is gorgeous and saved his life. He feels a cross between gratefulness and lust. If this isn't true, then show us why Diana likes Steve. We've only seen so far that Steve embodies every facet of the human male that the Amazon's despise.'"

Perez let the comic on the table and let out a sigh. "That letter said it all. We started in this direction when I compared Diana's two origins: Hippolyta training her to leave one day vs. not letting her go when the time came. It's simple really. When Steve crashed on the island Diana was in her early twenties at the most and had never seen a man in her life. Her falling in love with Steve would thus have been her first crush. Yet while Hippolyta was afraid of a failed romance for her daughter, she was even more afraid that Diana would go to Man's World for all the wrong reasons. She was afraid that if her daughter became Wonder Woman for Steve, she might just as easily give up being Wonder Woman for Steve."

They were all paying very close attention now. Very, very good! "If you don't believe me, just read the stories written before O'Neil came and killed Trevor. As long as Steve was there, she was invincible. Hey Clark Plaid, or whatever your name is, pass these out."

"Plaid" grumbled but dutifully did as he was told. He passed around old comics. "Look here, Perez said, "she's tearing whole tank divisions apart with her bare hands. Hell, she's scrapping those metal monsters with one punch each! In this one she's catching Zeus's thunderbolts with her bare hands and throwing them back at him! The same issue shows her knocking Poseidon flat on his back—and they're underwater. Or here in this one…" This one he opened up and pointed to the panel in question. "She sees a tsunami heading towards Paradise Island and what does she do? She stands on her plane, lassoes the island, and picks it up with nothing but a smile. She's lifting hundreds of billions of tons there!

"In those issues, Diana was outmuscling giants and lifting whales as a pre-teen girl. Heck, she was so strong as a baby that she a sent birthday cake into orbit when she blew on it! The story where she picks up Paradise Island was about #100, 1958. In one recent issue, #305, back in 1983, catching a stone statue made her go 'oof.' Before Steve dies she picks up whole islands with a smile and after he dies, catching a stone statue makes her go 'oof'? Clearly a disconnect." He paused for a moment. "Hey Mishkin, you wrote #305. Why did you have Diana be so weak?"

The new guy really is going his own way, thought Mishkin as he shifted uncomfortably in his chair. "She's not that weak. She was probably just caught off guard. I mean I had her tow a nuclear sub into port once just by swimming. It's just, I never read the old issues I guess."

"Nobody ever does," sighed Perez. "The point is that Diana stayed behind for Steve's sake when the Amazons removed Paradise Island to another dimension to 'recharge their magic.' As part of her staying behind she renounced all her power and became mortal. Unfortunately, the depowered Wonder Woman failed to save Steve when he was gunned down by the villain Dr. Cyber. On his death, the days of the invincible Wonder Woman were over; she never did regain her full power, even after she supposedly regained her Amazon abilities.

"On the plus side, if you take a close look, some of the best Wonder Woman stories happened when Steve was dead. They include things like the twelve labors story line where she fights to reclaim Justice League membership, the time Ares invades Paradise Island, Orana challenging her for the name of Wonder Woman. She doesn't need some male chauvinist pig!"

Kahn smirked. "What did the 'male chauvinist pig' do? Wrap her in her own lasso and use it to mind control her into marriage?"

"Yeah, that was #167." He raised an eyebrow at his slack jawed boss. "What? You asked. Anyways, back to the story. A sexist Trevor could work as part of an opposites attract idea; Diana is a crazy feminist, he's a he-man woman hater and they both have to learn to work together. However, as we've been writing her, she just comes off as clingy. Besides, he was never shown as the one true love. Back in the Silver Age before Steve died and set up a broken heart routine, Bird Man and Merman were shown as serious contenders as was Mr. Monster."

Perez didn't to open his eyes to know the looks on everyone's faces. "…Yes… she dated a male harpy called Bird Man. Let us speak no more of it.

"Their love is supposed to be eternal but a close look at Diana and Steve says different. You might compare Diana's mourning when Trevor died to Devi's in Carl Sagan's recent novel, Contact. When aliens contact Earth and our five representatives go meet them, the aliens shape change into the people our explorers most loved. One of the five, a woman named Devi Sukhaviti, meets a simulacrum of her late husband. The two Indians were of different castes and for that her family turned their backs on her but she married him with no regrets. When he died soon after, she vowed to never marry another.

"And when Devi sees her husband's duplicate, she's outraged. He's an idiot; they're completely incompatible! As they talk she realizes that she never loved him at all; it had been infatuation. In fact, for the sake of their love, to the degree that there was any, it's good that he died because of he hadn't they would have divorced within a year. Her dreams broken, Devi no longer mourns for her foolish husband, she mourns for the family she threw away for him.

"We see that with Steve; he and Diana were happy after his first resurrection but the honeymoon didn't last. He came back and he couldn't deal with the new Diana. He tried to call the shots like it was in the 'old days' but he was dealing with a Diana who'd been on her own for eight years and who'd realized she can get on just fine without him. He died in 1968 and returned in 1976. He doesn't know how to deal with feminism, female ministers, Women's Liberation, Ms. Magazine and opening of West Point to all the ladies." Perez stopped for a moment. "Now that I think about, the Colonel really couldn't deal with that last part! Diana outright says 'he's from a different time' with how he's having difficulty dealing with it all.

"If even Kanigher was calling Trevor out as an idiot in the 60s, something's wrong with the guy. She tries to get him a job in #225 but it doesn't work. Excusing the interval when the book was set in World War II to cash in on the TV show, the stories that had Diana and Steve Howard were just a few months in terms of comic book time. And yes I see the looks on your faces; he adopted a new identity and personality to cover up his resurrection. That was even part of why they drifted apart.

"By #248 when he died again, Diana and Steve were already questioning their love for each other, and yes, Hippolyta was always against the entire romance. She even erased all memory of Steve from her daughter's mind on getting the chance!" He picked the two relevant issues from his portfolio. "She betrayed and brainwashed her own daughter! Twice!" Perez shook his head. Polly was going to have hell to pay when he started writing the book. "You better believe Diana was spitting blood when she figured it out.

"Thus, when the Steve Trevor of another Earth—though in our new continuity he'll be from a parallel dimension, or an alternate timeline, or a clone, or something else—landed on our Earth and Diana fell in love with him, she didn't really love him. She only thought she loved Steve Trevor II because of her subconscious memories of Steve Trevor I. When all's said and—"

"What!?" interrupted Julius Schwartz. "…Who the devil wrote that!?"

Dan Mishkin folded his arms and replied, "If you mean the first part it wasn't me! I spent most of my run making sense of the Steve from another dimension debacle."

Julius grumbled something under his breath before growling again. "The first part is exactly what I meant. I repeat, who the devil wrote that?"

"Alright, I'll come clean. I did it" Gerry Conway cast a nervous glance at Mishkin and then at Perez. "I thought she could use a little romance and who better than Steve. Y'know love conquers all?"

Perez looked clemently at the chastised writer and said, "Don't be too hard on yourself, these things happen. Besides, you gave me a lot to work with. In fact, your last story is the reason I'm here!" He looked at the other DC writers and artists and continued. "Conway here wrote the last issue of the old series, #329; it ties in to Crisis and was written before we decided not to reboot her so he thought he was going to write her last story ever." Perez saw Conway prick his ears. Good!

Perez threw a glance at a comic book before taking a large picture from his portfolio and placing it on a stand. It was a blow up of a double page spread from the same issue. It showed Wonder Woman storming Olympus and waging her final battle against the god of war. Behind her was a reunited Amazon nation made up of her mother's Amazons and those of a once estranged tribe in combat with an army of the dead. Before her lay Ares who had allied himself with the Anti-Monitor to undo the universe. Perez looked at Conway and read the caption.

"'Here is legend: daughter of Hippolyta, as lovely as Aphrodite, as wise as Athena, with the speed of Hermes, and the strength of Hercules, she is the greatest of all the Amazons, a beacon of light in the gathering night! Unwise are those who forget the power she wields—the power of hope, the power of justice, the power of truth restored.'" Perez looked at a humbled Conway and smiled. "'She is Wonder Woman… and this is her finest hour!'"

Conway didn't know why he'd been picked to write the swan song; he'd only written two years of Wonder Woman beforehand. Still, he sat up straight on hearing that and felt himself swell with pride at what Perez said next. "Gerry, you have no idea how much I wanted to reboot Diana. When I think what I could have done with a blank slate… I was ready to join Byrne and leave with my ideas before Schwartz there had me read this last story." The grand old man of DC gave the two writers thumbs up.

Perez looked at him. "There is nothing wrong with continuity that can't be fixed by what's right with continuity." He turned his gaze back to Conway. "Gerry, the reason I went through with Schwartz's idea of keeping this version of Wonder Woman instead of creating a new one is because for first time since Kanigher, someone dared to show just how awesome she can be!"

He felt like a truck ran him over when they all burst into cheers and started slapping him across the back. "I… I mean…" Can't cry, can't start bawling, can't… ah the hell with it! "Thanks George!" Conway got up; he had to shake Perez hand. "All I knew was if Wonder Woman was going to have her last story that I had better make it a good one. If it's going to keep going, then I want you to do it!"

"Thanks Gerry." Perez waited for everyone to settle back down. They would have to be for what he was going to do next. "Like I said, the last issue of the old series ended with Diana's big fight with Ares… and her marrying Steve. We can always have her fight Ares but the marriage is where it gets tricky.

"See, in the original context, it provides a poignant end for the 'old' Wonder Woman as she was going to be erased. Marston did have his character be a career woman but one that still enjoyed a boyfriend. It was over forty years of will they, won't they, in which Steve died, came back, then died again, then a Steve from another dimension showed up and his memories altered to think he was the original Steve. With the end of the world upon them, it looked as if they'd never be together.

"So, when Conway here wrote the last story, of course he had them marry. It was literally their last chance before they ceased to exist and the perfect way to close that chapter of Wonder Woman. We catch a glimpse of them on their wedding night as they kiss and dream of their children. They know that 'Whatever happens now or in the future...we'll be together till the end of time.' It was dedicated to the memory of Dr. William Moulton Marston. The words the end had a special resonance because it really WAS the end, the end of an era.

"And that's why I feel like a heel getting rid of it!" Perez looked remorsefully Conway. "Sorry Gerry but I'm going to undo that last part."

The writer smiled wearily. "Y'know George, if you really want to be cynical about their romance you can say that Diana married Steve II on pure impulse and that their marriage would have fallen apart anyways. Ah, don't worry about it George, just worry about telling a good story."

"Right," Perez responded thankfully. "And now that we understand the past we can go to the future. Since we're tweaking instead of abolishing old continuity we ignore a few panels from #329 to say she and Steve weren't actually married and we ignore a few panels from Crisis #12 to say she wasn't actually turned back into clay by the Anti-Monitor. The first issue or two of the new series will bring readers up to speed on what I said so they'll understand why Steve and Diana don't quite have their happily ever after.

"As it stands, she lost her secret identity right in front of Steve back in #328—Hermes flew towards her day job at the Pentagon and said the Zeus needed her help. Now, with the Crisis over, she's living with her boyfriend Steve in his apartment hoping that this time they can finally make it work. They cheated death twice and now they know the truth, so now they can get married. All you need is love, right? Wrong.

"They argue over everything, from who does the dishes or whose career comes first. With the loss of her secret identity, Steve is now a target for every crook Diana ever put in jail. Fans are mobbing them everywhere. They also laugh at him for being so stupid that he couldn't figure out that Diana Prince was Wonder Woman with glasses. He's also outraged by how she led him on for years; he accuses her of playing him for a fool, toying with his emotions as she played her double life against him.

"It gets so bad that he just gives up. He's tired of having his male ego deflated. He's tired of people laughing behind his back for always being saved by his girlfriend. He's tired of their dirty jokes about her snapping him in two when they have sex; not that she ever gave him any. Most of all, he's tired of the fact that he's not the real Steve and that she only loved him because of the original—whom he is not. Steve Trevor II even calls her a mind rapist with how her family messed with his head to make him think he was always from our Diana's dimension.

"It gets to the point where he brings up everything that I've said and asks Diana if she ever really loved him. Or any version of him, for that matter! Diana says she does and to prove it she wraps herself in her Lasso so she can ask him. But when Steve does so she can't say yes. Her teeth are clenched and she fights the Lasso all the while, trembling and frothing at the mouth. In the end, however, she spits out one word: no.

"The next day, when a disheartened Diana comes back from patrol, she finds a note where he says he's gone and he's not coming back. 'See you in hell, "angel"!' Diana reads this and she panics. She can't lose him after all they've endured together! She can't let a love so strong that it twice overcame death go away!

"But when she reaches for the telephone in hopes of contacting Steve, a brief glance at the mirror shows her the princess of the Amazons on her knees and reduced to a blubbering child. That's when all truths the lasso showed her, everything I've been saying about her and Steve come rushing to her. Her mother had raised her to be a hero but when the time came to be a champion of everything her people held dear, she threw it all away for a schoolgirl crush. Disgusted with herself, Diana crushes the phone in her hand and grumbles, 'Ah, who needs romance.'

"And that leads into the next part. Guys, next up is going to be revisions and where all this is going to go in the first year of the new run. Since this is going to take a while let's take a five minute break, ok?"

To be continued...

Author's Notes and Replies: To quote the Necronomicon, "That is not dead which can eternal lie. And with strange aeons even death may die..."

I'm like the Frankenstein monster! I don't die, I just need the occasional lightning bolt to revive! Like I said elsewhere, I was laying the groundwork for other fics; however, that's past and now I'm back on here. While I do have my responsibilities, future chapters should takes less than eight months. (Seriously, I checked and the last update was on 6/26/2012!)

As promised lettercol.

Sunflare: Electrum Age... I like the sound of it! And yes, I'm with you on Psycho Pirate. Crisis closes by showing that people who remember the multiverse and yearn for it belong in the nuthouse. Err... :-( As for Green Lantern, right now I'm working on Wonder Woman but I have been watching a few episodes of the new cartoon and I'm thinking of giving him a whole chapter.

Sir Thames: Thank you for your kind words!

Markmark: I'm back and with a whole new chapter as you can see above! For Alan Moore, it is anachronistic but I use it since he was a fan of Silver Age Superman and disapproved of DC's post-Crisis revisionism; ironic considering his work on Watchmen and "Whatever happened to the Man of Tomorrow." Thus when he wrote Rob Liefield's Supreme he imagined a DCU where the Crisis never happened. He changed the names, of course, (Polyman=Plastic Man, Dr. Mid-Nite=Batman) but his idea's clear. As for using the Batman Returns origin for Catwoman, it was watching Burton's movies as a boy that made me a bat-fan. It still holds a place in my heart and her movie origin combines well with her pre-Crisis Earth Two origin. So mix-and-match!

"Anonymous": I know she killed Black Mask but in this alternate timeline who knows and as for Hecate... In her, Isis, and Miss Kitty, the feline fatale has black cat pets three times over. The image of her with a familiar, reminding us that its not just a gimmick is so good. Its so much easier to just eliminate redundancies and let Hecate become her own character.

That's all everyone, hope to see you soon!