Tags
Ace Morgan, Captain Atom, Darwyn Cooke, Dave Stewart, Earth-21 Captain Atom, Flash, Green Arrow, Jared K. Fletcher, Martian Manhunter, New Frontier, Superman, Wonder Woman
This 2004 series, created by Darwyn Cooke, was supposedly influenced by other DC series such as Kingdom Come, The Golden Age, Watchmen, and The Dark Knight Returns. Like The Golden Age, New Frontier takes place primarily in the 1950s, and depicts the Golden Age superheroes (Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman) meeting Silver Age characters (Flash, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter). It was intended to bridge the gap from the end of the Golden Age to the beginning of the Silver Age in the DC Universe.
The mini-series takes place on Earth-21 in DC’s multiverse. Captain Atom does not appear in this series and doesn’t appear to exist in this continuity. However, in Book 5 we are introduced to Nathaniel Adam, an Air Force Captain working out of Cape Canaveral, Florida.
It seems that on Earth-21, Nate is just an Air Force career man with no super powers.
He butts heads with Green Arrow, who seems incapable of getting along with other heroes no matter what continuity he exists in.
Just when it looks like Green Arrow and Captain Adam are about to come to blows, Superman intervenes and nips that crap in the bud.
Superman gives a rousing speech about destiny and fighting oppression and persecution.
Martian Manhunter shows up, and everyone’s attitude shifts almost instantly. Guess old John Jones has been mucking about in peoples’ heads again.
The good cheer only lasts as long as Superman is fighting. When the monster burns him and dumps him in the sea, everyone seems to be in despair. Could be that in his own grief, Jones let go of his grip on their minds.
Captain Adam shows up in the pages if the next and final issue, but is more of a background character. This particular issue contained his meatiest role. He never does gain any super powers, but fights alongside the superheroes anyway. Of course, Superman is not dead and in the next issue the heroes win and everyone lives (more or less) happily ever after.
Splitting Atoms 
Loved the new Frontier stories and when they made it into animated movie I thought that was genius too. But the fact this was in Earth 21 (or a separate Earth) was news to me. I figured this was simply the bridge story between the gold and silver age of comics.
Cool that Captain Adam was there. Being that this would have taken place between the gold and silver age the accident that made him “Captain Atom” would not have occurred yet.
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I haven’t seen the film, but it is on my list. I thought the mini series was pretty good.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justice_League:_The_New_Frontier
Hal Jordan played by David Boreanaz (Angel), now THAT was hilarious a lot of the time. Wonder Woman by Lucy Lawless, that was good. Neil Patrick Harris as the Flash was a nice touch.
Honestly, I know that DC likes to play the Earth 1, Earth 2 thing, but maybe I need to look into the Earth 1 story. Who were the heroes during WW2 and before? Nah, like how this movie explains the transition from one age to the other. How Batman goes from scary to basically the campy Adam West Batman. They remembered that Wonder Woman was a Amazon and therefore taller than Superman.
But what I loved most about the New Frontier is how they point out that the Flash did not consider himself on the same level as Superman, which makes a lot of sense. If I was just some guy that could run fast and I had to work with someone that had my ability and five others, I might feel intimidated too.
But when it looks like Superman bites the big one was a tear jerker. Wow.
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I watched the movie a couple of days ago. It was pretty good. Captain Adam didn’t make the cut. I thought NPH made a great Flash and Lucy Lawless seemed like a no-brainer. Not too sure about Kyle MacLachlan and David Boreanaz. They did okay, I guess. Neither of them really seemed to bring anything to the characters they played.
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