On the DEWLine 2.0: Dwight Williams

Some of you may have already seen the new Metropolis map that showed up a week or two ago in the pages of Superman Secret Files 2009. I was looking forward to seeing how whomever was contracted to do the artwork - I thought probably Eliot Brown would be hired for the job at the time, as he'd done a couple of works on the subject for previous Secret Files installments - would embellish the existing "Six Boroughs" map established by John Byrne and company back in 1986, and revealed to the public at large in 1988 via Mayfair Games' second edition starter kit for the DC Heroes Role-Playing Game.

Turns out that I was a little off on my expectations.

Here’s my sense of the changes they’ve announced making via that map:

• Near as I can tell from first glance, the focus on the main island - can we still call it New Troy anymore? - seems Near as I can tell from first glance, the focus on the main island - can we still call it New Troy anymore? - seems to have thrown out the Six Boroughs and the "New Meppel > New Troy > Metropolis" evolutionary backstory that went with them by playing up a heretofore unheard-of linkage to Revolutionary War heroes Tomahawk and Dan Hunter. Particularly Hunter, as the Metropolis-to-be is tied to a settlement that's been named "Fort Hunter", "Hunterville", and finally "Hunter City" before it became Metropolis. (Not saying they couldn't have fought a battle there at some point, nor that a settlement in the region couldn't be named for either or both of them, though!)
  
• Centennial Park's been moved away from being next door to both the UMet campus and Suicide Slum/Hob's Bay down towards the "front" end of the main island.
  
• Hob's Bay is no longer right next to a natural harbour. NO reference to the naval base that took up the shoreline of that harbour per the Kesel/Immonen stories.
  
• Eighth Avenue/Avenue of Tomorrow is now considered the "main street" of Metropolis as opposed to Bessolo Boulevard.
  
• Financial District - AKA Central Business District - is now on the other side of Centennial Park from LexCorp Tower. LexCorp used to be pretty much the heart of that district.
  
• STAR Labs Metropolis has moved from one shore of the main island to the direct opposite side.
  
• UMet's been moved halfway "down" the island towards the "front end".
  
• Two major-league sports stadia moved onto the main island. This may have always been the case, but I don't recall seeing any hints of it before.
  
• No mention at all of either Bessolo Boulevard or Clinton Street/Avenue(where Clark used to live as a bachelor).
  
• No mention either of the other five Byrne-created boroughs: Bakerline, Park Ridge, Queensland Park, Hell's Gate Island and St. Martin's Island.

Additions I particularly like:

• Glenmorgan Square having an actual namesake now in a 19th Century science hero.
  
• One of those two stadia I mentioned earlier is named for Frank Berkowitz, the guy who was mayor when Superman first showed up, per Byrne's Man of Steel mini-series.
  
• Galaxy Communications buying up the Daily Star - originally Supes' employer back in the 1930's edition of the character - and moving into their building.
  
• Wayne Enterprises building a local HQ to keep an eye on their local investments, and to allow whoever the Batman of the moment is to keep watch for dirty corporate deeds in the region.
  
• A building for the federal government to do likewise(as I assume they do in all major US cities on principle).

One historical gaffe:

The article in the newer tome accompanying the map posits the future Metropolis' founding as being by the Dutch in 1702...a little over a quarter-century after the Netherlands turned over all their North American holdings to the United Kingdom under the terms of the Treaty of Westminster in 1674.

Selfish admission time:
I'd love to write the book that reconciles all of the old and new stuff...