DC Comics

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DC Comics, proper name Detective Comics, is the oldest of the two most popular comics companies of all time. If you haven't heard of them, you've been living under a real rock. They are iconic for their work in the Supers genre.

Universe

The DC Comics universe mostly defines itself by a "Supergods" motif; its characters tend to be extraordinarily powerful and it views their adventures in a largely "neo-mythical" light. Whilst it does have its share of street-level heroes, most of its heroes are battling interplanetary or cosmic threats, especially when they team up. In general, DC's universe is closer to the Silver Age in general feel, with an emphasis on aliens, monsters, hyperscience and colorful heroes battling the aforementioned.

Except for the Vertigo imprint, which is more of a grimdark branch of the universe and, perhaps coincidentally, focuses more on its magical and horror elements.

Notable Supers

Superman

Considered the original superhero (although he actually built on tropes that had appeared in early pulp novels), Superman is famous; the last survivor of the alien planet Krypton, whose parents managed to launch him to Earth in an escape shuttle before Krypton's core destabilized and the planet exploded. Raised by good-hearted farmers in the Kansas village of Smallville, he dedicates himself to fighting for truth, justice, and liberty for all.

He is perhaps most infamous as the most absurdly overpowered character in comics, with an arsenal of abilities that includes flight, superhuman strength, nigh invulnerability, ocular heat rays, superhuman hearing, superhuman speed, x-ray vision and a freezing breath weapon. Ironically, he actually started out as relatively small powered; in the original comics, Superman's powers stemmed from his species having evolved on a planet with significantly higher gravity than Earth - as a result, on Earth, Superman's strength was far greater than any human, and the durable biology needed to resist the pressure made most human-level threats insignificant. He couldn't even fly originally, but instead his superhuman strength let him run at incredible speeds and leap huge distances. The very first cartoons gave him the ability to fly for dramatic effect, and that as where it started. In particular, he lost the "heavyworlder" origin and instead his powers became something his alien biology could only do if he charged up on solar energies from a yellow sun, whilst a popular radio drama introduced his most iconic vulnerability in the form of Kryptonite, the radioactive remnants of his homeworld.

We have a seperate article about him, mainly because his fame is partly separate from the DCU.

Batman

Batman is most notable as the longest surviving and best known example of the original "costumed vigilante" type of superhero. In many ways, he is a direct continuation of the shadowy avengers and vigilantes that proliferated in pulp fiction; even his backstory as a wealthy man who, traumatized by the murder of his parents by a mugger when was a child, dedicated himself to training body and mind before outfitting himself with useful gadgets to declare war on crime, is straight out of old pulps.

Whilst mostly associated with dark, brooding and depressing almost noir-esque tales from the Bronze and Dark Ages, there is one element of Silver Age Batman which has survived and prospered: his rogue's gallery. Back in the Silver Age, Batman in particular was prone to facing off villains built from what TVTropes calls "Idiosyncrazy" - weird gimmicks and themes around which an entire criminal identity and motif were formed. Whilst the most overtly silly rogues from this time were quietly shuffled off into retirement, the fact is that a number of villains actually made this trope work. Hence the Bat's colorful cast of crazed criminal creeps, from the murderously mirthful mad clown the Joker to the plant-controlling ecoterrorist femme fatale Poison Ivy to the puzzle-spouting Riddler and beyond. Indeed, so many of them survive Bane is notable for being one of the few recognizable Batman rogues not from that era.

We have a separate article about him, mainly because he's actually fairly influential on /tg/ stuff.

Wonder Woman

Widely recognized as one of the very first superheroines, if not the first, Wonder Woman is a magical woman - a clay baby brought to life by the blessing of the Greek goddesses and then further imbued with their blessings as she aged - reared on the hidden paradise of Themyscira‎, home of the Amazons. After their isolation was broken by a male pilot crash landing on the island, she goes to "man's world" as an ambassador to spread a message of peace, love, tolerance and goodwill, but is more than willing to bash in the heads of villains to spread the good word.

Ironically, despite being considered one of "the big three" with Batman and Superman, Wonder Woman has long struggled to actually keep her titles afloat. This might have something to do with the fact that she is generally defined as "The Feminist Superheroine", and as such she has suffered a long string of silly, embarrassing or just plain stupid elements, alterations and revisions. This has less to do with her creator being a polygynous sexual deviant obsessed with bondage and femdom that also created the polygraph (the reason she was later given a lasso of truth), but the fact that too many authors try to use her to push their version of feminism, that her continued publication was originally not due to mass popularity (like Superman and Batman) but contractual complications on DC's part, and her personality is far too vague for such a major character causing it to vary wildly by writer.

The Flash

Jay Garrick is caught in a lab accident that turns him into the fastest man alive. One of the first "legacy heroes", with the Silver Age return of the character using the new character Barry Allen instead of continuing the Jay Garrick of the Golden Age. The crossover the two versions would spawn the multiverse mess that's iconic to comics to this day. Usually a giant fucking nerd. Has gotten two TV series and is a regular Justice League member.

Green Lantern

Alan Scott was an engineer who survives a sabotage induced train wreck thanks to a ring that, unknown to him, was magic. He uses the ring to go after the guy responsible and becomes a superhero.

The revival in the 1959 reboot would change the man holding the title and, unlike Flash, the basic concept. Now Hal Jordan, a test pilot, receives the power ring from a dying alien and becomes a Lensman style space cop. Since then, the title character has changed a few times, and the series has become a playground for writers and artists looking to do trippy science fiction/science fantasy stuff with lots of weird aliens.

Both incarnations have had really lame weaknesses in comparison to their incredible power. Alan Scott was unable to effect things made of wood, while Hal Jordan and most of his successors can't impact anything that was yellow.

Green Arrow

Batman rip-off but with a bow and arrow. Attempts to separate him from that, a shared series with Green Lantern (which existed for no other reason than the two characters with less than great sales having names starting with green) where the two butted heads over political issues and Robin Hood influence has gradually given him communist leanings. Got more popular after he a TV show that made him a slightly more willing-to-kill Batman, though it's often really easy to tell the writers wanted a Batman show but only had the Green Arrow license.

In many ways his sidekick Speedy is more notable than he is. The above mentioned shared series established him a drug addict (the writers wanted to avoid a character that existed only for the moral and show drugs weren't only a risk to "bad kids", plus nobody cared about him before that anyways so they could radically change his character with comparatively little pushback). Since then, he's undergone many wildly varied incarnations, many of the "dark and edgy" variety.

Aquaman

A Namor ripoff that has become better known than the original due to Marvel's refusal to include him in non-comics media. The lame Superfriends cartoon made an entire generation consider him a joke character since the restriction on violence, bad writing, and sharing many powers with the rest of the group led to his main uses being swimming and talking to fish, ignoring the superhuman strength and endurance that lets him operate at the crushing depths of the ocean. He has gradually lost stigmata due to writers going out of their way to show how awesome he really is in response. Has a movie.

Captain Marvel

Billy Batson was an orphaned twelve year old living with a miserly, abusive, uncle that kept him around to leach off his inheritance. One day he wandered onto a train that took him to a wizard that gave him the magic power to transform into the adult-bodied Captain Marvel by shouting "SHAZAM!", gaining the Wisdom of Solomon, Endurance of Atlas, power of Zeus, the Courage of Achilles and the speed of Mercury in the process. If Captain Marvel is merely Billy in a buff magical alternate form or a separate person entirely has varied over the years, though modern incarnations go with the first. Billy is perhaps the earliest child superhero that wasn't under adult leadership.

Would later have a lost sister, Mary, appear. Unlike her brother, saying SHAZAM! instead transforms Mary into Mary Marvel, who has minimal physical difference, and gains the Grace of Selena, Strength of Hippolyta, Skill of Ariadne, Speed of Zephyrus, Beauty of Aurora, and Wisdom of Minerva. Since Hippolyta was already taken in the DC universe as Wonder Woman's mom and the problems of giving a young girl supernatural beauty, the different empowering entities was dropped post-crisis. The girl transforming into a superpowered magic form makes her a very early example of a Mahou Shoujo. In the past having both Billy and Mary empowered at the same time split their powers.

Originally not a DC property at all and instead the property of Fawcett Comics. The similarity in abilities to Superman led to legal brawls, but when Fawcett saw Superheroes falling in popularity and decided to sell their properties to DC. After this he started crossing over with the DC universe and was incorporated into it proper after the Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Has a movie. On the plus side it sticks really close to the comics instead of changing things for stupid reasons. On the negative side, it sticks really close to the "New 52" version of the comics.

John Constantine

The Wizard-as-Con-Man poster boy. John rarely actually does magic, and instead tricks his enemies into doing what he wants. Was for a long time kept in a sort of limbo, because he was a "mature audiences" (back when that meant "violence and cursing", rather than just sex) character. Has since become part of the main DCU, although usually in the background. Famously (1) bisexual (2) winds up accidentally killing all his friends (although there's usually some bad juju that Constantine is trying to disarm happening at the same time involved).

The Justice League

The biggest and most notable superhero team in the DC universe, made up of all its best and brightest.

/tg/ Relevance

There have been a number of roleplaying games tied into the DC universe released for players. One of them is was a reskin of 3rd Edition Mutants and Masterminds with no mechanical changes, just the examples changed to use DC characters.