Trinity: Aftermath

Trinity is one of those series that looks big and important on paper, but it is mostly forgotten today. But did it lead to some new things back when it just wrapped up?

After the series ended Bagley went to draw Robinson's JLA and one of their story arcs, Omega, featured CSA so that feels like a good place to start. And oh boy, it is real bad. At one point Robinson even mixes up Earth-3 with Anti-matter universe. I wouldn't be surprised if later this story was used as an argument for why going forward DC should use only Earth-3's CSA. It also has lazy plot device of another Earth getting destroyed to make the threat look big and then randomly restored at the end because who cares.

Krona was later used by Geoff Johns in his GL epic, but it didn't really have anything to do with Trinity. As everything else in this saga he was revealed to be connected to emotional spectrum. Sadly at this point Johns was already going on fumes and it is all very forgettable.

DC tried to create a new status quo for Superman with New Krypton storyline. For that purpose they tried to revamp lots of old Superman characters and find a place for them in this new status quo. One of them was Gangbuster who became security guy in STAR labs. Sounds like and odd place for him to be after Trinity? It does, Supergirl's writer (#50) tries to give a reason for it, but it doesn't really work long term and it felt like Gangbuster was coming back for this either way and they were more annoyed than grateful that his profile was raised a bit after Trinity. In the end it doesn't matter, he didn't get many pages or receive any development. And well, entire New Krypton direction flopped hard.

Good ending is usually a place where you feel like it is okay to leave the characters and move on. I feel like Gangbuster and Tarot got such an ending in Trinity and I'm okay if I never see them again.

Same probably could be said for Krona. He ended up dead in his GL return so he got another ending I suppose. But in my headcannon he is still a worldsoul for a new Earth and thats that for him.

Tomorrow Woman also had a good ending in Morrison's single issue story. And I think that Busiek did a good job with her in second and third acts, but then he had to resurrect her for good. And obviously nobody did anything with her so it all feels like a big mistake. Some characters probably should stay dead.

Trinity also planted some seeds for potential Konvikt and Enigma stories, but from what I know nothing was done with them either.

Doesn't look good so far? Fear not, we got one more thing to cover. Remember the alternate universe that we saw in second act? The one where Krona gets sent to at the end of the series? Well turns out that this is Earth-One and the place where the series of those standalone OGNs take place.

I have no idea why DC felt that they need a story to explain how that Earth came to be. It is not like it matters for any of those OGNs. But DC also likes to write stories that try to explain why they are publishing dark stories and how with big villain defeated they are now going to publish lighter stories. So I guess it is very DC moment.

Either way, at the time of writing Earth-One line looks to be defunct, but I'd say it had more of an impact than Busiek's Trinity did.

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