Editing DC Comics (section)

==Cartoons, Shows and Movies==
Much like their rivals at [[Marvel Comics]], DC has always been willing to try porting its characters from comic book to film, live action serial, or cartoon. In fact, they are ''much'' more willing than Marvel in many ways, with an enormous library of live action serials and cartoons starting as early as the 1950s (Adventures of Superman in 1952) and 1960s (their first cartoons, and the legendarily campy Adam West-led Batman serial, began in 1966). 

Most of these works have been kind of forgotten, although in their heyday serials like the 1960s Batman or the early 2000s Smallville (a drama series based on Clark Kent's teenage years) were really big. The most well-known of DC's vast library of early cartoons is, sadly, "Superfriends", a legendarily stupid cartoon based on the Justice League, but toned ''way'' down.

===DC Animated Universe===
When it came to cartoons, DC hit the ground running; from 1966 to 1992, there were ''very'' few years in which there wasn't at least one DC cartoon on the airwaves! But they didn't make much of a hit, especially due to the tendency to focus on being "kid friendly" by being very dumbed down and aimed at really young kids.

Then came 1992's "Batman: The Animated Series", and that all changed. It was the first in a new cartoon universe, which expanded in 1996 with "Superman: The Animated Series", and was followed up with "Batman Beyond" and "Justice League" (as well as "The Zeta Project", a forgotten spin-off to Batman Beyond, and the initially-unconnected "Static Shock" mentioned above). Aided by a number of explicit tie-in animated films, which were widely regarded as better than their live action counterparts of the time, this was the DC Animated Universe.

What made it different? In a nutshell, more mature storytelling: the DCAU treated its audience as having the ability to handle things that were darker and heavier than the campy Silver Age fun of the 1960s, and wrote accordingly. Batman TAS featured lots of pathos, with dramatic, often tragic storylines and even adding a layer of sympathy to its villains. Before Batman TAS, Mr. Freeze was just a goofy villain of the week; a mad scientist who used a freeze ray to rob banks. Batman TAS reinvented him as a mutated cryogenic scientist who could never interact with the human world again due to needing super-low temperatures to survive and whose only motivation was to cure his wife's fatal illness so she could be removed from her cryogenic slumber. Even the lighter and softer Superman TAS often had dark themes to it, and once Justice League came out as the official sequel to both Batman TAS and Superman TAS, with Batman Beyond as a sequel to both Batman TAS and Justice League, whoa did things get grim and gritty!

The reason these five cartoons (seven, if you count "The New Batman Adventures" - the later seasons of Batman TAS with a new artstyle, and "Justice League Unlimited", the later seasons of Justice League, as being different cartoons) came to be known ''as'' the DCAU was simple: connectivity. Whereas Marvel's cartoons of the 90s would occasionally have characters from different franchises show up for interactions with the hero of their series (Spiderman TAS had appearances by the X-Men, Iron Man and Ben Grimm from the Fantastic Four, for example), the DCAU went out of its way to establish that their worlds would be connected. Plots and characters from one series would be directly referenced in a later series, with Justice League and Batman Beyond in particular frequently invoking storythreads left dangling by their precursor series.

After the DCAU ended in 2004, DC went on to create new cartoons, dropping the shared universe concept entirely. However, these cartoons of the mid 2000s did take some lessons from the DCAU, even the lighter and softer ones like "Batman: The Brave and the Bold" (which was essentially a cartoon equivalent to the Silver Age Batman of the 1960s serial), "Teen Titans" or "The Batman".

===Arrowverse===
DC did quite a few TV serials from the 1950s onwards, although with the exception of the ten-year-long Smallville series, these shows tended to be fairly short-lived "flash in the pan" affairs, lasting from 1-6 years on average. Then came 2012's "Arrow".

The idea was simple: take a B-lister character, Green Arrow, and then exploit that character's lack of an established fanbase compared to the likes of Batman or Superman to do something more experimental. The result was to lean back on Arrow's "Left-Wing Archer Batman" characterization and throw in a dash of the Punisher; "Arrow" revolved around Oliver Queen taking up the costumed identity of the Green Arrow to become a vigilante avenger, tracking down and killing criminals connected to a conspiracy that had killed his father and almost killed him. He slowly built up a vigilante team, softened his methods, and basically exploded in popularity, going from a media nobody to a media darling.

That opened the floodgates for other series set in the same universe. In 2014, "The Flash" would debut, being established as living in the same world as Oliver Queen and his Arrow team - the two superheroes would even team up in some crossover episodes. Then things began to expand. 2015's "Supergirl" focused on the titular female Kryptonian, bringing the Martian Manhunter in as her ally, and then established her as native to one of the alternate dimensions in this new DC multiverse when she crossed paths with the Flash. 2016 would bring in "The Legion of Tomorrow", a team of time-traveling second-string characters from Oliver Queen's dimension. 2018's "Black Lightning" and 2019's "Batwoman" would finish the direct members of the Arrowverse.

At the same time as the Arrowverse was taking shape, however, DC was also airing a number of other TV serials that were, at least originally, not connected to the Arrowverse. These included Gotham (a take on the Batman story focusing on Gotham during Bruce Wayne's childhood and with future-Police Commissioner Gordon as the protagonist), Krypton (a two-season story about Superman's parents), and others. Several of these shows - Titans, Doom Patrol, Swamp Thing, and Stargirl - would later be established as being "Arrowverse Adjacent", taking place in the Arrowverse multiverse but not in the dimensions of either Arrow or Supergirl. Several of the more well-received historical DC tv shows would also be retconned into being part of the Arrow multiverse as well, including the legendary Smallville.

Whilst on the surface the Arrowverse was inspired by Marvel's idea to do tie-in serials to the MCU based on B-tier and lower characters, in fact, DC actually beat them to the punch; the earliest MCU tie-in serial, "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D", didn't debut until 2013, and the others releasing between 2015 to 2017.

===DC Extended Universe===
DC has been doing movies for a ''long'' time. Their first film<ref>If one ignores film serials. Then you get either the Captain Marvel or Batman serials of the 1940s.</ref> was 1951's "Superman and the Mole Men", a glorified pilot for the 1952 TV show. But for most of their history, their films tended to follow a formula of being Superman or Batman films that built up a universe of sequels and then ultimately crashed as they got progressively crappier, only to be rebooted. There are a number of non-Supes/Bats films in their "old school" library, but they tend to be forgotten as they often aren't very good.

Then came 2013, and with the Marvel Cinematic Universe in full swing, DC tried to catch up by launching their own equivalent film-based universe. The general consensus, however, is that... they failed. Oh, they established a universe alright, but nobody really cares, because the films tend to be largely seen as... bad, due to a combination of just inherently bad plots, bad acting, and the obvious attempt to forcibly create a counterpart to the MCU, rather than letting things emerge more organically. There are exceptions - generally considered as Wonder Woman, Aquaman and Shazam - but for many DC fans, the DCEU is considered something of an embarrassment. With the exception of Hack Snyder fanboys. It doesn't help that certain actors in the franchise have seen the fickle winds of public opinion turn against them.

It should be added that the name "DC Extended Universe" originated as a joke: The studio refused to label the universe they were creating, so one Entertainment Weekly writer joking named it that, and the name rapidly spread from there. By the time ''Justice League'' had come out, WB had settled on "the Justice League Universe", but the DCEU name had stuck, to the point that that's what HBOMax (Warner Brother's streaming platform) calls the franchise.