Tangent Comics was a DC Comics imprint created in 1997-1998, developed from ideas created by Dan Jurgens. The line, formed from various one-shots, focused on creating all-new characters using established DC names, such as the Joker, Batman, and the Flash. DC Comics is an American comic book and related media company. ... In the publishing industry, an imprint is a brand name under which a work is published. ... Dan Jurgens is an American writer and artist of comic books. ... The Joker is a fictional character, a DC Comics supervillain widely considered to be Batmans archenemy. ... Batman (originally referred to as the Bat-Man and still referred to at times as the Batman) is a DC Comics fictional superhero who first appeared in Detective Comics #27 in May 1939. ... The Flash is a name shared by several DC Comics superheroes. ...

Tangent Comics is notable as the only Fifth week event published by DC to be revisited for a second round. A fifth week event is a novelty comic book promotion. ...

Overview

As with Alan Moore and the Watchmen saga, the Tangent Universe radically diverges from our own due to the appearance of metahumans/superheroes, such as the original Atom, whose interference causes the escalation of the Cuban Missile Crisis on his world into a limited nuclear exchange that results in the nuclear obliteration of Florida but is mercifully restricted in its impact. It plays a pivotal role in the life of the Joker, and her home city, New Atlantis, the former city of Atlanta on the Georgia shoreline, formed by the aforementioned obliteration of Florida. The Sea Devils are marine mutants who have undergone accelerated change and gained sentience in inundated Florida and Georgia, now undersea. The Soviet Union has survived, and is still a superpower in the late nineties, and the Metal Men intervened in the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. Furthermore, as in our own world, the People's Republic of China is an ascendant superpower and has its own entry in the metahuman 'arms race,' Powergirl (as well as an unsuccessful prototype, Supergirl). Alan Moore (born November 18, 1953, in Northampton) is an English writer most famous for his influential work in comics, including the acclaimed graphic novels Watchmen, V for Vendetta and From Hell. ... For the 2008 film based on the comic book, see Watchmen (film). ... Properties In chemistry and physics, an atom (Greek ἄτομος or átomos meaning indivisible) is the smallest particle still characterizing a chemical element. ... President Kennedy in a crowded Cabinet Room during the Cuban Missile Crisis. ... Official language(s) English Capital Tallahassee Largest city Jacksonville Largest metro area Miami Area  Ranked 22nd  - Total 65,795[1] sq mi (170,304[1] km²)  - Width 361 miles (582 km)  - Length 447 miles (721 km)  - % water 17. ... The Joker is a fictional character, a DC Comics supervillain widely considered to be Batmans archenemy. ... Metal Men are a team of robot superheroes created by writer Robert Kanigher, pencilled by Ross Andru and inked by Mike Esposito for DC Comics in 1962. ... Power Girl (real name Kara Zor-L, also known as Karen Starr) is a DC Comics superhero, making her first appearance in All Star Comics #58 (January/February 1976). ... For other uses, see Supergirl (disambiguation). ...

Series

1997 Titles

• Doom Patrol
  • A team from the future arrives in the present, warning of the impending destruction of the Earth.

• Green Lantern
  • A woman with a lantern which, when placed upon a grave, can bring the dead back to life just long enough to complete unfinished business.

• Metal Men
  • The Metal Men are a covert military group, so named because they came back from every mission unscathed. The members were nicknamed “Hawkman,” “Lobo,” “Gravedigger,” and “Black Lightning.”

• Nightwing
  • A mystical secret society controlling much of the world. This book focuses on a group of rogue agents.

• Sea Devils
  • A society of mer-people created by the nuclear exchange that destroyed Cuba and Florida in 1962.

• Secret Six
  • The Secret Six are a covert group of heroes who formed when the Flash, Atom, Joker, Spectre, Plastic Man and Manhunter joined forces to combat Dr. Aquadus, a living ocean.

• The Atom
  • The grandson of the Tangent Earth's first super-hero, an atomic veteran, takes on the mantle and learns a horrible truth about his family.

• The Flash
  • The first baby born in space grows up to be a teenage superhero with light-based powers. She can move at the speed of light and create holographic constructs.

• The Joker
  • A costumed anarchist in the city of New Atlantis who uses pranks to highlight the failings and hypocrisy of those in power.

This article contains a trivia section. ... For the DJ, see DJ Green Lantern. ... Metal Men are a team of robot superheroes created by writer Robert Kanigher, pencilled by Ross Andru and inked by Mike Esposito for DC Comics in 1962. ... Nightwing is a name used by at least six fictional characters in the DC Comics Universe. ... The Sea Devils are a team of characters in comics published by DC Comics. ... The Secret Six is the name of three distinct, fictional comic book teams in the DC Comics universe, plus an alternate universes fourth team. ... The Atom is a fictional comicbook superhero published by DC Comics. ... The Flash. ... The Joker can mean any of the following: The Joker is a comic strip character, also included in movies and television programs based on the comic strip. ...

1998 Titles

• Powergirl
  • US agents attempt to kidnap China's genetically-engineered superhuman in a sequel to Metal Men.

• Nightwing: Nightforce
  • The rogue Nightwing team attempts to rescue the Doom Patrol from the Soviet Union, only to unleash the Ultra-Humanite.

• Superman
  • An ordinary man finds himself evolving into something millions of years beyond human.

• Tales of the Green Lantern
  • The Green Lantern tells three possible--and contradictory--stories of her origin.

• The Batman
  • A knight who once fought King Arthur is forced to atone for his sins, seeking justice through an empty suit of armor for all eternity.

• The Joker's Wild
  • The story focuses on three mischievous but essentially good superheroines (Madame Xanadu, Mary Marvel and Lori Lemaris all masquerading as the Joker) in the post-apocalyptic rebuilt city of New Atlantis.

• Trials of the Flash
  • The Flash teams up with her friends in the Secret Six to rescue one of their own from Nightwing.

• Wonder Woman
  • An alien warrior, meant to be the symbol of unity for her fractured world, is instead pursued to Earth. She battles her pursuers in Las Vegas, all the while wondering about her role in the cosmos.

• JLA
  • The Justice League of America in the Tangent Universe was started as a covert group of operatives who were formed to take out several superhumans, including the Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern and Superman. Eventually, the targets came together and formed their own Justice League.

Because the Tangent titles were not linked to DC Comics' shared universe, they were free to make sweeping changes. During the course of the 1998 titles, a huge electromagnetic pulse disables all technology worldwide, and an incredibly powerful being called the Ultra-Humanite begins taking over the world. Power Girl (real name Kara Zor-L, also known as Karen Starr) is a DC Comics superhero, making her first appearance in All Star Comics #58 (January/February 1976). ... Superman is a fictional character and comic book superhero , originally created by American writer Jerry Siegel and Canadian artist Joe Shuster and published by DC Comics. ... Batman (originally referred to as the Bat-Man and still referred to at times as the Batman) is a DC Comics fictional superhero who first appeared in Detective Comics #27 in May 1939. ... [[ For the bands, see Superheroes (band) and Super Heroines. ... Madame Xanadu is a fictional character, a mystic in the DC Comics universe. ... Mary Marvel is a fictional character, a superhero derived from the DC Comics (formerly Fawcett Comics) character Captain Marvel. ... Lori Lemaris is a fictional character in the Superman comic books published by DC Comics. ... The Flash is a name shared by several DC Comics superheroes. ... Wonder Woman is a fictional DC Comics superheroine co-created by William Moulton Marston and wife Elizabeth Holloway Marston. ... For further information, see Las Vegas metropolitan area and Las Vegas Strip. ... Wikipedia does not yet have an article with this exact name. ... The Ultra-Humanite is a fictional supervillain appearing in stories published by DC Comics. ...

Interaction with the main DC Universe

The Kingdom (1998) revealed that the Tangent universe was part of Hypertime, a fluid system of alternate realities based on splitting and re-merging timelines. Regular DC characters became aware of the Tangent universe, but did not interact with it. The Kingdom is a two-issue comic book limited series and crossover event published by DC Comics in 1999, written by Mark Waid and drawn by Ariel Olivetti/Mike Zeck. ... Hypertime is a fictional concept presented in the 1998 comic book series The Kingdom, both a catch-all explanation for any continuity discrepancies in DC Universe stories and a variation or superset of the Multiverse that existed before Crisis on Infinite Earths. ...

Superboy featured a Hyper-Tension storyline which featured Tangent superheroes as part of the storyline. Superboy is the name of several fictional characters in the DC Universe, most of them youthful incarnations of Superman. ...

Infinite Crisis (2006) identified the Tangent universe as Earth-97, part of the recreated Multiverse. As Earth-97 was being destroyed in the chaos, Green Lantern said that the heroes had to follow her lantern's light in order to survive. At the end of the story on New Earth, two children found the lantern belonging to the Tangent Universe's Green Lantern washed up on a beach. Infinite Crisis was a seven-issue limited series of comic books published by DC Comics, beginning in October of 2005. ... The Earths of the Multiverse and the different variations of the Flash inhabiting each one. ...

Tangent's Green Lantern, Flash and Atom recently appeared in Ion #9 and #10 (2007), in which they displaced Ion and the two children who had found the lantern. Ion found himself in The Bleed, where he encountered Captain Atom. Upon returning to Earth, Ion defeated the Tangent heroes, apparently by sending them back to their native dimension. Ion is a fictional hero from the DC Comics universe, with the secret identity of Kyle Rayner. ... Kyle Rayner discovers himself in The Bleed in Ion #10 (2007). ... Captain Atom is a fictional comic book superhero. ...

Trade paperback

DC Comics will collect the Tangent Comics line beginning in August 2007 with Tangent Comics vol. 1, a 208 page trade paperback collecting Tangent Comics: The Atom, Metal Men, The Flash, Green Lantern and Sea Devils.

External links

• Superman and Batman in Tangent comics
• The Flash in Tangent Comics