The possibility of this happening sometime in the near future is slim, I get that. I thought, for a little while, that this was actually a far greater chance but now I see it as something of a pipe dream for fans of the pre-New 52 format. For those of us who picked up comics during the New 52, like myself, the signs of a retcon aren't too prevalent. The major shakeups in the mainstream story seem to only be that Earth-3 decided to attack us and that Dick Grayson turned into a super spy. Yay.
That is unless you've been reading New 52 Futures End. In it, we are shown a war-torn future five years in the future (somewhat similar to how the New 52 is thrust five years into the lives of the super-heroes). In it, and these are hardly spoilers, Earth-2 and Prime Earth (our Earth, basically) have gone to war, killing many heroes such as the Teen Titans and forcing others to hide some dark secrets, like Superman or presumably Batman, since we haven't seen anything about him. In order to save the present, Terry McGinnis, aka Batman Beyond, has travelled back in time from his future 35 years hence in order to take down Brother Eye and save the world. Clearly he's never seen how well that went for Trunks in Dragon Ball Z.
At first, the story seems harmless. A world five years in the future, great. An war between Earths seems like an intense crossover event that will surely be interesting to read. And right now, Earth 2: World's End is starting, which is going to show us how and why they came to fight against Prime Earth in the first place. But like any story in the future, there are some problems.
Are things really going to be like this in five years? In a couple of years are we going to get the grim and deadly war between worlds? And if that happens...won't we just be re-reading Futures End again, seeing as how five years in the future that will become the present? And whose to say that future writers are going to want to continue the stories of the current ones (for the future Green Arrow writers, they had better keep to this story...).
Given all of this, I began to look at what the Futures End event could really mean. It's meant to be an 11-month series, meaning it'll end sometime next year. It began in May of this year, so it's looking to end at around April of next year. In comics time (and given the exception that all monthly DC comics are taking a break to show their future stories), that's roughly six issues, so possibly a story-line or so (if done correctly). At the time of writing this, most major storylines are either just ending or beginning. Zero Year, Superman: Doomed, Multiversity, and Godhead are among those big names. Godhead and Multiversity probably are the main two that are to have the main shakeup of DC, since Godhead deals with the Green Lantern corps vs. the New Gods and Multiversity has been 10 years in the making and might destroy the Multiverse. Yay.
So at the end of all this, we'll see obviously how things are supposed to turn out five years in the future, which kind of sucks because reading current comics will have things spoiled for us (like Hawkman dying in both Justice League: United and then being revealed as alive in Futures End...kinda lame to be honest).
It seems, to me at least, that DC is telling this story to lead up to a few different roads, but there are two that really stick out to me: either this is going to turn out to be an Elseworlds/ What If? storyline, or this is the sign that they've heard their fans and are ready to undo the New 52.
There are, of course, several problems with this. The New 52 was, yes, created because of an event, Flashpoint, but I don't think that one single even, such as this one, can cause an undoing. Why? Because Flashpoint dealt with the Flash going across dimensions. Here, we have only seen the one, being that of Prime Earth (albeit a dystopian future where the Joker still misses Batman and the future fives years ahead of time). Not only that, but the implications of Futures End don't seem to be as far reaching as completing changing contuinity. The main villains, one of which I won't spoil but I'll say that Superman fans will be happy to see, are indeed powerful and imposing but they aren't the kind of stuff to destroy the universe. Darkseid has yet to make an appearance (he probably won't) and there have been zero sightings of anything related to the great Green Lantern Corps--or heck, for that many, any Lantern! Major plays have yet to be shown and Superman finally showed his true face almost twenty issues (so basically five months) into this thing.
Plus, there's how the New 52 was even made. It was created through the combining of three different "Earths" that ultimately shifted the continuity of various comics, or if you want to be not as nice about it: undid almost every story you ever loved before the New 52. Yes, it does suck. Now, there is a way that this same formula could apply to undo the New 52:
If, somehow, during the events of Futures End, the Earth 2 forces, combined with the imposing power of Brother Eye and his allies in space, were somehow able to either destroy the Earth's forces--as Terry has seen--then perhaps we could employ the age-old retcon-tool of time-travel. But how would that work?
Well, Grant Morrison is planning an event that could destroy the multiverse. How much this relates to Futures End, I have no idea. How long Multiversity is supposed to run is yet another thing I have no idea about. But what I do know is that the characters in Futures End that are out in space (so, basically our trio of S.H.A.D.E agents), are discovering a plot that will, potentially, ravage their universe, if it hasn't already. If this were to happen, without the knowing of Terry who hadn't seen this coming, then perhaps he could travel back in time before the events of even Flashpoint and undo Barry Allen beginning Flashpoint in the first place, thus undoing the New 52.
Or if that doesn't work, then perhaps what Multiversity will do is make it so that the two "Earths" that merged with Prime Earth are sent back into their proper dimension so to save the Multiverse, or maybe make it balanced or something. That way, we could still technically have the stories of the New 52, but since Prime Earth would be the main Earth without all the other stories thrown in, we would have our classic characters back, like Barbara Gordon being paralyzed and Roy Harper being a former father again.
This plan seems far-reaching for DC and there would probably be a far bigger announcement than the nothing we have so far. But they are very much so pushing us to read Futures End by having September dedicate itself to the month. It's only been 3 years but for some people the entire retcon ruined their enjoyment of reading any DC comics, so they jumped over to Marvel.
Funny, because Marvel is looking to retcon, too. But I'll get to that on Friday.
Anyway, though, Futures End seems to me like it's something more than just a story about the future. It can't be just that, because we're coming up on that future soon, and I don't really feel like reading the same story twice. Some people despise Futures End like some despised Countdown to Final Crisis (which Final Crisis being a reboot of sorts, too, but not as significant), so maybe this is their next weekly comic to change things up in a big way. I don't know, I just don't buy the simplicity of it. Multiversity promises to shake things up and Futures End is already tearing up the future so, the signs are vaguely there. The fans are screaming for it, so, maybe DC just wants to surprise everyone?
Only time will tell!
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