Multiversity: Required Reading

I'm pretty new to comics (I started reading DC with Rebirth) and I would like to read Grant Morrison's Multiversity. what would you recommend as reading before I read the series?

nothing will prepare you for multiversity

Morrison is shit, don't bother. Bargain bin Moorcock.

This. Just brace yourself for disappointment.

Fuck off Mike you admitted you never read Grant's work

Not sure really.. Seven Soldiers of Victory would be a start though. maybe DC one million? (I haven't read it but i think it involves alot of morrison multiverse shit?)

Final Crisis so you have some backstory on Nix
Action Comics 18(New 52)

Great taste in TVs, man.

You can probably get away with reading just Multiversity itself honestly. It's fairly contained.

But Final Crisis is not newbie friendly exactly but tells you the Nix Uotan stuff and Action Comics #9 introduces Obama Superman.

Action comics 9 as well, downloading it now, I'll storytime it

You can read and enjoy it just fine on its own. But as an entry in a saga, you'll probably need to read the entirety of Grant Morrison's DC superhero work.

You don't need to read anything before Multiversity. Grant Morrison is good about making his works stand on their own even if you've never read anything else he's written.

Obama Superman was introduced in FC, Action Comics 9 reintroduces the transmatter cube

>tfw we'll never see based Calvin Harris again
President Superman was cool.

Who do you think followed him up as President?

true I guess spotlight is the better term there

...

To expand on this, Multiversity is more or less a direct sequel to Final Crisis. You COULD read Final Crisis without doing any homework, but it will be almost completely impenetrable. If you want to get the most out of Final Crisis, you're going to need to read Animal Man, JLA, Seven Soldiers, 52, and his Batman run.

What's with all the Morrison hate lately? Is it just one autist or what?

It's the same autists that shitpost to complain about degeneracy in threads with recreational drug use topics. They don't like abstract content.

dumb frogposter

First there were anons who genuinely enjoyed his work and the process of analyzing it who collectively came to the idea of hypercrisis

Then DC kind of ruined Inc with New 52 and the delays on Multiversity kind of ruined its momentum, so those anons moved on

Then came more anons who kept making hypercrisis threads simply for the purpose of sharing image macros made by those before them and mindlessly dropping catchphrases

Those new anons spread all over the board and annoyed everyone to no end with endless praise for Morrison - who at that was putting out frankly subpar comics nowhere near the quality of his earlier work

Hence the knee jerk

Why are you making shit up

Except there was no anti-Morrison shitposting for a while. It just randomly started up in the past month.

Which part?

riiight...

That was literally what he's asking about. Why has the shitposting started up recently when it wasn't happening before? We even had a WW Earth One thread that was tame discussion.

This is actually really helpful. Thank you.

I would say, read Seven Soldiers, Final Crisis, and his Action Comics run at the very least. His Batman run and pretty much everything else he's ever done at DC should be recommended as well but they're not quite as essential.

Just read it standalone

Hypercrisis threads where really fun, then it went full retard with all the shitposting

Why hello newfag...

People have been shitposting about Morrison for quite some time, its probably the same morons who shitpost in company war situations or the whole DC vs Marvel "shill" stuff.

Although there is obviously going to be some people who legitimately don't like Morrsions work.

It really should have been included in the trade, it's basically chapter 0.

I'm not new. I'm just saying it had died out and people brought it back for no real reason even before he had new books announced.

This.

Thats the thing, they don't need a reason. Its shitposting for lels.

It's two guys. There's the guy you quoted, and there's a phoneposter who doesn't use any kind of capitalization/punctuation.

Alright, OP here, I checked this thread and a few other sources, and I made this reading list. Tell me if it's any good
-Crisis on Infinite Earths
-Infinite Crisis
-Seven Soldiers
-Final Crisis
-Action Comics #9

Sound alright? I'm pretty familiar with the DC universe and it's characters

Thematically might as well include Flash of Two Worlds (#123). And I would recommend 52 (unless length is a concern) over Infinite Crisis because it's actually where the multiverse shit goes down, though I guess you can read both.

I think you generally would be fine just reading Multiversity though. Just do the list for fun.

Alright, thanks for the advice

>Still no ongoing featuring all the Earth's Morrison introduced

Why

Trump as DKR Batman.

As others have said, Multiversity has no real required reading. However, just for fun, here's a list of some recommended reading for each of the 52 earths. I'll put the actual book titles in greentext for people who just want the short version.

The world we currently call Earth-0 began as the pre-crisis Earth-1. It basically encompassed all mainline DC comic books between
>Showcase #4 (Barry Allen's first appearance)
and
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
Crisis combined Earth-1 with Earth-2, Earth-4, Earth-S, and Earth-X, destroying the rest of the pre-crisis multiverse in the process. This created the world that fans sometimes called "composite earth" or the more derogatory "clutter earth". Later on, a story called
>Zero Hour: Crisis in Time
restored some of the pre-crisis elements that had been erased by CoIE. But the actual multiverse itself didn't return until
>Infinite Crisis
With the multiverse restored, the composite earth was assigned a new number, and it's been Earth-0 ever since. The current version of Earth-0 was created by the
>Flashpoint
event, which also shaped most of the other worlds of the multiverse into their current forms.

The current version of Earth-1 (not be confused with the pre-crisis Earth-1, which is now the current Earth-0) is based on a series of original graphic novels that feature versions of DC's most popular superheroes who are just starting out in the modern day, similar in concept to Marvel Comics' now defunct Ultimate line. Here are all the current Earth-1 OGNs:
>Superman: Earth One vol. 1&2
>Batman: Earth One vol.1&2
>Teen Titans: Earth One
>Wonder Woman: Earth One

Earth-2 was originally the home for all stories DC published during their "golden age", so essentially everything in between
>Action Comics #1
and Showcase #4. Earth-2 was first established as a distinct and separate world from Earth-1 in
>The Flash #125
where Barry Allen met Jay Garrick for the first time. This led to a series of annual team ups between the Justice League and the Justice Society, most of which are collected in the
>Crisis on Multiple Earths
series of trade paperbacks. The return of the golden age characters proved to be so popular that DC launched several ongoings set on Earth-2, such as the following:
>All-Star Squadron
>Infinity Inc.
Eventually, Earth-2 was absorbed into Earth-1 during
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
and stopped existing as a unique world until it was restored in
>Infinite Crisis
and
>52
This recreated Earth-2, essentially a copy of the original from before CoIE, was only really explored in one story,
>JSA Annual #1
and proved to be short lived, as it was replaced by another completely different version as a result of the Flashpoint event. The new Earth-2 tried to modernize the golden age characters by distancing them from their World War 2 backgrounds. This new version of Earth-2 is, as far as we know, the version that still exists to this day. You can read about it in the following series:
>Earth 2
>Earth 2: World's End
>Earth 2: Society

There is nothing that is required nor recommended to read Multiversity. Certainly, you neither have to nor *should* read DC event series, since all of them will have books that are ACTUALLY required to be read in order to make sense of them.

Read Watchmen for Pax. Look up any new heroes/etc. on the DC wikia. You'll be fine.

Earth-3 has also had many incarnations over the course of DC's history. The pre-crisis Earth-3 first appeared in one the above mentioned JLA/JSA team ups, "Crisis on Earth-3"
>Justice League of America #29&30
After that, the champions of Earth-3, the evil Crime Syndicate, make a few appearances here and there, including some regular roles in the
>Secret Society of Supervillains
But the pre-crisis Earth-3 was the very first world to be utterly destroyed in the
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
and didn't return until the
>JLA: Earth-2
OGN, which reintroduced the Crime Syndicate and their world as part the Anti-Matter Universe, which is also home to the Weaponers of Planet Qward, one of the Green Lantern Corps' oldest foes. There was even a story called
>JLA: Syndicate Rules
where the Justice League had to go to the Anti-Matter Universe to intervene in a conflict between the Crime Syndicate and the Weaponers. When
>Infinite Crisis
and
>52
restored the multiverse, Earth-3 was recreated as well. Because of this, there was a brief period where DC actually had two distinct Crime Syndicate worlds at the same time. Flashpoint reconsolidated these into the version of Earth-3 we have today, which made it's first appearance in the
>Forever Evil
event.

wut?

The pre-crisis version of Earth-4 was meant to be the home of all stories publish by Charlton Comics before they were bought out by DC in the 80's. Many of these stories are collected in the
>Action Heroes Archive
series of hardcovers, if you're interested in reading them. The pre-crisis Earth-4 only appeared in one story that was actually published by DC Comics,
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
before it was immediately absorbed into the pre-crisis Earth-1. Around the same time that was going on, DC also published a story called
>Watchmen
that featured characters who were analogues of the Charlton heroes. Watchmen turned out to be a hugely influential series that would shape the direction of the comic book industry for decades afterward, ironically becoming much more famous than the original Charlton stories it was based on. DC tried to utilize the newly acquired Charlton characters in series like
>The L.A.W.: Living Assault Weapons
but could never garner much interest for them from readers. The current version of Earth-4 was technically introduced in
>52
but wasn't really explored until
>Final Crisis: Superman Beyond
It takes many elements from both the original Charlton Comics and Watchmen to try and create a new cohesive identity for these characters.

DO NOT READ MULTIVERSITY YET, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD

Please OP, you will ruin it for yourself. There are things you need to know about to fully enjoy it. I have a feeling you'd miss out on a most of the analogues, the Shazam stuff, the cover to ultra comics, arguably the entire plot, etc.

Wait until you've been reading comics for like, 5 years. You need to know what you're talking about or you won't get multiversity.

Earth-5 began it's life as the pre-crisis Earth-S. There was never a pre-crisis Earth-5 because editors at the time believed 5 looked too much like S and would confuse readers. Earth-S was the home of all stories published by Fawcett Comics before DC acquired them in the 70's. Many of those stories are collected in the following hardcovers:
>The Shazam! Archives
>Shazam! Family Archives
DC reintroduced several Fawcett superheroes as The Justice Battalion of America in the story "Crisis in Eternity", which is also where Earth-S received it's name.
>Justice League of America #135
DC then started heavily pushing Captain Marvel and his Marvel Family in their own
>Shazam!
series, while most of the Fawcett heroes outside of the Marvel Family were thrown in the trash. Earth-S was yet another world that that was folded into the pre-crisis Earth-1 during
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
and like so many others, wasn't restored until
>Infinite Crisis
and
>52
where it was assigned it's new designation, Earth-5.

Earth-6 is based on the
>Just Imagine Stan Lee creating the DC Universe
mini-series. Its title is pretty self-explanatory.

Earth-7 is based on the Ultimate Comics line published by Marvel Comics, which was the inspiration for the OGNs that the new Earth-1 is based on. Some of the more well known comics from that line include:
>The Ultimates
>Ultimate Spider-Man
>Ultimate X-Men
>Ultimate Fantastic Four
>Ultimatum
The first time DC comics created analogues of the Ultimates was in
>Superman/Batman: With a Vengeance
which may have served as the inspiration for this Earth.

>Bargain bin Moorcock.
That Moorcock plagiarism thing is bullshit. Grant Morrison's Invisibles had a character in it who mentioned Jerry Cornelius comics by name as something he was into and said character deliberately used a stereotypical Jerry Cornelius story during 1 issue out of 59 as a way to mentally escape into a pleasant fantasy world while he was being tortured in the real world. That's not fucking plagiarism. If The Invisibles were just one big Jerry Cornelius story with no credit given to Moorcock that'd be one thing, but the reality is nothing like that at all. It's not plagiarism if your character mentions the story by name and part of the plot involves him fantasizing about being in it. Moorcock probably saw one page from that issue out of context when he started complaining about it.

There's one user who gets assmad as fuck when you explain this, with some legitimate reservations because Morrison said he wasn't based off of Jerry Cornelius and then later admitted it. So someone might come in triggered. But yea, having an 10 page homage in a 60 issue series is about as far from plagiarism as it gets.

>Why
Because everyone writing comics nowadays wants to reboot everything and do their own story so no lore gets built up over time anymore.

Whut? That's a retarded explanation, half of these worlds have literally 0 stories written for them beyond their original conception. It's the perfect place to build their own stories. The actual reason is because AU books never fucking sell. But DC seems to not give a shit about minis that don't sell (because they sometimes become big trade sellers) so a mini would work.

Earth-8 is based on Marvel's 616 universe, basically every mainline Marvel comic ever made. The first time DC did analogues of Marvel's characters was in
>Justice League of America #87
which are pretty much the same analogues who appear in the modern day Earth-8. They became regular characters in the Keith Giffen/J.M. Dematteis era
>Justice League
and
>Justice League Europe
When Infinite Crisis and 52 restored the multiverse, the Marvel analogue world, which had previously only been called Planet Angor, was finally assigned it's own number, Earth-8, and was featured in the mini-series
>Countdown Presents: Lord Havok and the Extremists

Earth-9 is based on
>Tangent Comics
an experiment by DC to create entirely new characters with the same codenames as their classic characters. After the initial two runs of Tangent one-shots, the characters were not seen again until they had a crossover with Earth-0 in the
>Tangent: Superman's Reign
mini-series.

Earth-10 began as the pre-crisis Earth-X, which was originally going to be named Earth-卐 before editors decided that was too insensitive. Earth-X was the home of all stories published by Quality Comics before they where acquired by DC in the 50's. Most of this material has never been reprinted and is actually pretty hard to track down. Earth-X was also a world that was different from most others in that World War 2 never ended, continuing to drag on decade after decade. The main heroes of this world, the Freedom Fighters, summoned the Justice League and Justice Society to help end the ceaseless war once and for all, in a story called "Crisis on Earth-X"
>Justice League of America #107&108
DC took a gamble on giving the Freedom Fighters their own series in the 70's, descriptively named
>Freedom Fighters
but it only lasted a few issues before it was cancelled. Earth-X was the last of the pre-crisis Earths to be folded into what was then Earth-1 in
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
and just like the others, was restored in
>Infinite Crisis
and
>52
now under the moniker of Earth-10. The current version of Earth-10 made its first real appearance in
>Final Crisis: Superman Beyond

The first appearance of a gender-reversed world like Earth-11 was in
>Superman #349
a story called "The Turnabout Trap. It didn't appear again until
>Superman/Batman: With a Vengeance
much later. Most recently, this world appeared in
>Countdown Presents: The Search for Ray Palmer: Superwoman/Batman #1

Earth-12 is largely based on the following television animated series:
>Batman: The Animated Series
>Superman: The Animated Series
>Batman Beyond
>Justice League
>Justice League Unlimited
and their various tie-in comic books:
>Batman Adventures
>Superman Adventures
>Batman Beyond
>Justice League Adventures
>Justice League Unlimited
>Justice League Beyond

The only prior appearance of Earth-13 is in
>Doom Patrol #53
a story titled "And Men Shall Call Him -- Hero!"

The sad, sad story of Earth-15 is recounted in the infamous weekly series
>Countdown to Final Crisis

Earth-16 is based on Bob Haney's super sons stories, which conveniently got reprinted in a recent trade paperback
>Superman/Batman: Saga of the Super Sons
It's also sort of a sequel to
>All-Star Superman
which in turn make it a prequel to
>JLA: One Million

>tfw no Earth 11 comics
JUST

Earth-17 is based on several post-apocalyptic stories published by DC Comics. To learn more, pick up the
>Atomic Knights
hardcover and the
>Hercules Unbound
series. Or you could just grab the
>Showcase Presents: The Great Disaster featuring the Atomic Knights
paperback which contains both.

read his book, it will help you.

Earth-18 is very loosely based on the
>Justice Riders
elseworld series. It also uses a lot of the characters from DC's 70's western comics like
>Weird Western Tales
but most of that stuff has never been reprinted.

Earth-19 is based on
>Gotham by Gaslight
and it's sequel
>Master of the Future
as well as a similar elseworld story
>Wonder Woman: Amazonia
It most recently appeared in
>Countdown Presents the Search for Ray Palmer: Gotham by Gaslight #1

Earth-20 is based on the adventure stories featured in pulp magazines, which were sort of like the precursor to comic books. To learn more, look into characters like
>Doc Savage
and
>The Shadow
Earth-20 also contains an homage to the science fiction story
>Childhood's End

Earth-21 is based on the elseworld story
>DC: The New Frontier
and it's sequels:
>Solo #5
>Justice League: The New Frontier Special #1

Earth-22 is based on the elseworld story
>Kingdom Come
and its sequel
>The Kingdom
The Superman of Earth-22 also appeared in a crossover with Earth-0 in the story
>JSA: Thy Kingdom Come

Earth-23 is one of the newer additions to the multiverse. It first appeared in the last issue of
>Final Crisis
and later returned in
>Action Comics #9

Earth-26 was originally the pre-crisis Earth-C. It first appeared as a back-up story in
>New Teen Titans #16
before receiving his own spin-off series
>Captain Carrot and his Amazing Zoo Crew
Even after the multiverse was destroyed, the Zoo Crew continued to exist as fictional comic book characters read by the inhabitants of the composite earth, such as in
>Teen Titans #30&31
When Earth-C reappeared as Earth-26, it was seemingly destroyed in
>Captain Carrot and the Final Ark
but this status proved to be highly impermanent. Earth-26 has also been implied to be the home DC's funny animal comics from the 50's like
>The Fox and The Crow
but most of those have never been reprinted.

>Batman still being a rich white man

That's not necessarily true. Reading something like this can be impenetrable at the beginning, bu t that often inspires people to go read other things to understand better, and co tinually coming back to the work and understanding it more and more can be really cool. That was my process with Final Crisis.

Earth-29, the legendary Bizarro World, made its first appearance in
>Action Comics #263
before becoming a regular back-up feature in Adventure Comics. Most of the stories from the back-up are collected in the
>Tales of the Bizarro World
trade paperback, a must for any Bizarro fan. More modern takes on Bizarro World include
>Superman: Escape from Bizarro World
and
>All-Star Superman #7&8

Earth-30 is based on the elseworld story
>Superman: Red Son
and appeared more recently in
>Countdown Presents: The Search for Ray Palmer: Red Son #1

>DC forced Quitely to remove Batman's trunks and have him appear in the shitty boardroom designed costume even though a big part of Morrison's run was paying respects to Batman's history
Nevar forget

Frankly this. Multiversity was the first comic arc I read while it was being published, and I had only the mythology knowledge granted by the cartoons and the occasional entry-level reading (Long Halloween, Birthright, Kingdom Come and others), and the complexity of the story is what prompted me to follow more comics, read all Crises and start buying trades.
I honestly think Multiversity is a great entry point for those who enjoy the idea of a narrative multiverse. Of course you'll miss stuff and references, but it's a compelling read encouraging further reading.

Earth-31 has only appeared twice, first in
>Detective Comics Annual #7
and again in
>Batman Chronicles #11

Earth-32 is loosely based on the elseworld
>Batman: In Darkest Knight
If you like that story, here's some others with a similar fusion theme:
>Superman: Speeding Bullets
>Superman/Batman #60&61
>Superman: Last Son of Earth
>Superman #147, Action Comics #757, Adventures of Superman #570, Superman: The Man of Steel #92

Get off your computer for a second and go look outside your window. You see that? That's Earth-33. The first comic book appearance of Earth-33 was
>The Flash #179
but it didn't get it's pre-crisis name, Earth-Prime, until
>Justice League of America #123&124
The first superhero of Earth-Prime, Ultraa, was discovered in
>Justice League of America #153
But he left for outer space when he decided that our world was not yet ready for real superheroes. The second hero of Earth-Prime was that world's version of Superman, who first appeared in
>DC Comics Presents #71
Unfortunately, this "Superboy-Prime" didn't get to enjoy his newly discovered powers for long, as his world was immediately destroyed in the
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
But he played a pivotal role in restoring it and all the other world of the multiverse in
>Infinite Crisis
Mark Waid's run on
>Legion of Superheroes
was revealed to be Earth-Prime's distant future in
>Final Crisis: Legion of 3 Worlds
Earth-Prime also made some appearances in
>Adventure Comics #4&5
and
>Teen Titans #98-100
It wasn't until after Flashpoint that Earth-Prime was finally assigned it's own number, Earth-33.

Earth-35 is based on Kurt Busiek's
>Astro City
Universe.
It also made a brief appearance in the last issue of
>Final Crisis

Earth-35 is based on Rob Liefeld's Awesome Comics Universe, particularly that company's hallmark character
>Supreme
It also made a brief appearance in the last issue of
>Final Crisis

Earth-36 is based on the Big Bang Comics Universe, particularly that company's preeminent superhero team, the Round Table of America, who first appeared in
>Big Bang Comics #3
Earth-36 also made a brief appearance in the last issue of
>Final Crisis

Earth-37 is based on several elseworld stories that where all written by Howard Chaykin. These include:
>Batman: Thrillkiller
and its sequel
>Batman: Thrillkiller '62
>Twilight
>Weird Worlds #1-10

Earth-38 is based on a series of elseworlds written by John Byrne.
>Superman & Batman: Generations
>Superman & Batman: Generations II
>Superman & Batman: Generations III

Earth-39 is based on the
>T.H.U.N.D.E.R. Agents
who were originally published by Tower Comics, but have since been licensed by numerous other publishers, including DC.

Earth 31 Wonder Woman is FANTASTIC!
Where's her ongoing?

Wasn't 31 originally the Millerverse?

The pulp magazines that Earth-20 is based on didn't just make adventure stories, you know. Earth-40 is based on another genre that was popular in that medium. Horror! Unfortunately, I don't know enough about pulp magazine horror to recommend any good stories to you.

Earth-41 is based on several characters published by Image Comics, including the following:
>Savage Dragon
>Spawn
>Youngblood

Earth-42 was first seen as a hallucination experienced by Superman in
>Superman/Batman #46
but was later revealed to be a real world that actually exists in
>Superman/Batman #51-52
Other series that also resemble this world include the following:
>Tiny Titans
>Li'l Gotham

How the hell is anyone supposed to get into comics if they're new or coming back after a long hiatus?

>Quitely
Just leave nigga. Don't come back.

Earth-43 is based on the
>Batman and Dracula: Red Rain
elseworld story, and its two sequels,
>Batman: Bloodstorm
and
>Batman: Crimson Mist.
Amusingly, the Ultraman who inhabits this Earth is actually the pre-Flashpoint version from
>JLA: Earth-2
who was turned into a vampire in
>Final Crisis: Superman Beyond
Some cosmic twist of fate must have taken pity on him, because it deposited him on a world where he'll fit right in!

Pick a character, read their ongoing, branch out from there

Earth-44 is an entirely new creation, not based on any previously published work. It's only prior appearance is a brief cameo in the last issue of
>Final Crisis

What day is it? It's Superdoomsday! Earth-45 first appeared in
>Action Comics #9
for a fight with the Superman of Earth-23, then came back in
>Action Comics #16-18
to face off against the Superman of Earth-0.

Earth-47 is a tribute to Joe Simon and is based on the following two of his works:
>Prez #1-4
>Brother Power, the Geek #1&2
It also features the Love Syndicate of Dreamworld, who first appeared in
>Animal Man #22-24

Earth-48 is based on Alan Moore's
>Top 10
universe, which was originally published by DC under the America's Best Comics imprint. It also features Lady Quark, Lord Volt, and Princess Fern, who were originally from the pre-crisis Earth-6, before that world was destroyed in
>Crisis on Infinite Earths
Lady Quark was one of the few pre-crisis characters to survive into the composite earth, where she spent a few years as a member of
>L.E.G.I.O.N.
It also features the character Forerunner, who stared in the back-up stories of the book
>Countdown to Adventure

Earth-50 is based on an episode of the Justice League cartoon entitled
>A Better World
It didn't appear in the comics until
>Batman Beyond Universe #9-12

Earth-51 is a tribute to Jack Kirby. You can read the stories it's based on in the following trade paperbacks:
>Kamandi, The Last Boy on Earth Omnibus vol. 1&2
>Jack Kirby's Fourth World Omnibus vol. 1-4
>Jack Kirby's O.M.A.C.: One Many Army Corps

Great list user, useful even for a buff

Thanks a lot, user. That was very informative.The DC Multiverse is pretty cool