Category: DCU

It’s all in Tommy’s head.

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What is the most expansive fictional universe ever created?

The Tommy Westphall Universe. A long time ago, in a fabled era known as the ’80s, there was a TV show called St. Elsewhere. It was about a run-down teaching hospital named St. Eligius in Boston and the doctors who worked there. Dr. Donald Westphall was the director of medicine, a widower who raised his two children by himself. One of those children was his autistic son Tommy. Tommy only appeared in fifteen episodes of the series. St. Elsewhere ran for six seasons and won eleven Emmys, but all anyone cares about today is its final episode. In the final scene of the final episode, Tommy Westphall holds a snow globe that reveals the building of St. Eligius inside it. And his father, who is not a doctor, comes in and says the following:

I don’t understand this autism thing, Pop. Here’s my son; I talk to him; I don’t even know if he can hear me. He sits in his world all day long, staring at that toy. What’s he thinking about?

The entire six seasons of St. Elsewhere were, in fact, a child’s daydream while looking at a snow globe.

Here’s where things get a little complicated. The character Dr. Roxanne Turner from St. Elsewhere appeared in an episode of Homicide: Life on the Street, where authorities accused her of murder. But if Dr. Turner was just a creation of Tommy, how could she possibly be on Homicide? Unless Homicide was also Tommy’s daydream. There is an episode of St. Elsewhere where the doctors of St. Eligius decide to go out for a few drinks at a local Boston bar. That bar is Cheers, the titular bar from the sitcom Cheers. So, Cheers, and Frasier are again products of Tommy’s imagination.

Detective John Munch was a character played by Richard Belzer, who starred in Homicide: Life on the Street, which we know never existed. After the cancellation of Homicide, the character was moved to Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. Detective Munch also appears in The Wire, The X-Files, and Arrested Development. So, Tommy Westphall had to create all those shows.

Cheers spun off Frasier, who crossed over with Caroline in the City, with Friends, who shared a character with Mad About You, who crossed over with Seinfeld. In a few centuries, the world of Buffy the Vampire Slayer will be Star Trek, but its distant past (sorry, spoilers) is the reboot of Battlestar Galactica. Doctor Who is canonically taking place in the same universe as I Love Lucy, Hannah Montana, Grey’s Anatomy, and All My Children.

All of it is the creation of one child, which probably explains the continuity errors. For example, no one acknowledges the zombie outbreak in Georgia in The Walking Dead, which is happening at the exact same time as It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Arrow.

If you map everything out, there are at least 419 shows that are in the same continuity with each other and canonically the creation of Tommy Westphall.

The first person to propose the Tommy Westphall Universe was legendary writer Dwayne McDuffie in a blog post criticizing comic book continuity. It was about just how silly it was to try to fit vast and mutually incoherent works all into the same rigid continuity. But he was kind of onto something with that whole Tommy Westphall stuff. They did all crossover with each other.

By the way, the Collector in Guardians of the Galaxy has Tobias Fünke on his ship, which means Tommy Westphall is responsible for the MCU.

Thanos or General Zod?

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Which villain made more sense, Thanos or General Zod? General Zod makes more sense.

On a surface level, you might think Zod versus Thanos amounts to “I want my planet to survive!” versus “I want the universe to survive!” but that’s not true.

Zod is a genetically engineered warrior. He comes from a generation of Kryptonians who were bred for specific roles on the planet and lacked the freedom to choose their paths. His role was to protect Krypton at all costs. His motivation boils down to that simple purpose, and every decision he makes in Man of Steel builds towards that goal.

Now, where Zod and Thanos resemble each other is their origin story. Both of them came before their world leaders and pitched a simple plan.

Zod wanted to save Krypton by seizing power and ending all degenerative bloodlines. He believed that he could stop the planet’s destruction and strengthen their race as a whole.

Thanos wanted to end his people’s starvation by randomly killing half of Titan’s population. He believed that those who lived would understand and thrive with the additional resources.

Already, Zod’s plan makes more sense. Sure, it’s unethical and dangerous, but it might work. The Kryptonian Council refused to acknowledge the threat to the planet. Zod had legitimate plans for reversing that and saving his race—even if it meant giving himself too much power and unjustly killing off families.

Meanwhile, Thanos’ plan was unsustainable. The population would inevitably grow back, the resources would still dwindle, and they’d have to keep killing the population. Plus, the survivors would be demoralized.

The disparity gets worse throughout their movies.

The Council banishes Zod to the Phantom Zone for his crimes. Once he escapes, he discovers that Krypton is gone. Zod faces a problem: how can he fulfill his genetic programming, which drives his purpose, now that Krypton no longer exists as he knew it? Simple: rebuild Krypton and protect the new Krypton. For Zod, it’s a perfectly reasonable solution. Knowing that one Kryptonian survived, he sits out and looks for Kal-El to take advantage of the additional genetic material. Again, knowing this is the right decision in his position.

Of course, Kal-El refuses to help, so Zod uses Earth as the birthplace of the new Krypton. It is vengeful, but the only hope of converting Kal-El is destroying the planet so that only his Kryptonian heritage remains.

When that fails, Zod forces Kal-El to kill him in combat so that—as a warrior—he can die in battle, exactly what you’d expect from a man genetically bred to fight.

Meanwhile, Thanos’ plan develops into using an infinitely powerful weapon to halve the population. If you gave Zod such a Gauntlet, he’d use it to fashion a new Krypton from scratch and ensure their genetics were perfect. Refrain from amending his plan in the slightest.

Thanos was so wrapped up in his narcissism that he would NOT admit that there were better ways to accomplish the goal of saving the universe—such as doubling resources or compelling every mind to care more about conservation. You know, one of many things you can do with a freaking Infinity Gauntlet. Sure, Thanos didn’t lack will, but he lacked imagination.

And when Thanos did get to see the failure of his plan, he decided that he’d best rip the universe apart as punishment for its inability to thank him and build a new one. It’s better to kill everybody than admit he’s wrong.

So Zod made more sense. He was a warrior tasked with protecting Krypton and did everything he could to accomplish that. Thanos was just a grumpy survivor unwilling to see his plan’s flaws.

Jack Nicholson’s Joker

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Was Jack Nicholson really terrible as Joker?

No. And a little history is important here as context. Prior to Nicholson, the only live action Joker we had was this guy:

A yukity yuk slapstick clown played by Cesar Romero who wouldn’t shave his mustache for the role in a campy, tongue in cheek tv show.

Then along came the Batman movie:

Everything changed. Batman was much darker, more serious and way more violent and he was pitted against a completely new interpretation of a character that no one had ever given much thought to.

Nicholson turned a jokey, sad villain into THE most popular bad guy in the superhero genre. He utterly redefined the modern Joker and everyone who has played the part since has built on his work. The Joker you know today is because of him.

This guy is scary.

Gone was the slapstick, the goofiness, the over the top hamming it up and cartoonishness of Romero’s character. In its place was a sense of menace and casual cruelty where over the top antics were deliberate and deadly.

Nicholson was the first actor to capture the essence of the Joker and cement the character in the mind of the audience. Everyone who has played the character since then has worked off of this template. Without Nicholson’s Joker, no one who has followed him would have even had the opportunity.

Those who see his performance for the first time decades later might be forgiven for not understanding how amazing it was at the time, but make no mistake, your favorite Joker owes everything to Jack Nicholson.