Prior to Doomsday Clock's release, and going back to the inception of DC Rebirth, DC had hinted that an external force may have been responsible for all the retcons, reshuffles and reboots that had sent the DCU into disarray over the last seven-or-so years. The blue finger of Doctor Manhattan was spotted in initial promo material for the latest relaunch, and with The Button having added further fuel to the fire, it looks as though ol' Jon Osterman has in fact been messing with the multiverse.
Once thought erased from history by the time of the New 52, Thunder has been reintroduced in Rebirth as an elderly figure kept locked away at a retirement home. He appears in this issue of Doomsday Clock wearing the same suit he wore during his superhero days, upset that a guest he'd expected hasn't arrived to take him to dinner. It's tragic stuff, and while the identity of that guest is yet to be revealed, a faint glow can again be seen brushing against his face - a hint that the man of the hour is Manhattan?
Thunder is also the only person in the new DCU to remember the world's pre-Flashpoint self, and with references to the old JSA featured in this sequence, including one mentioning Ted Grant, it looks as though those older aspects of the DCU might just be creeping back into focus.
WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well.
In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.
