The Justice League If It Were More Unlimited, In Twenty Fantastic Seasons, 2: World's Finest

The American superhero mythology begins with Superman. He's inarguably the most important superhero character in pop culture. But he's hella boring. While I only enjoy Batman stories about 50% of the time, I enjoy Superman stories somewhere between 5 -10% of the time. He's fine in a group setting but I don't enjoy his regular adventures, I don't care about his origin story or Kryptonian heritage, and I've never bought the whole Clark Kent secret identity thing. I was born way too late for any of his attributes to connect with me or impress me. Even other companies attempts to make a Superman character interesting (Marvel's The Sentry, The Boys' Homelander, The Mighty's Alpha One, Irredeemable's Plutonian, The Authority's Apollo, etc.) are usually intriguing for about ten to twelve issues before the idea gets stale.

So there won't be a ton of Superman stories in this chronology. Which also makes sense given how short Superman: The Animated Series run was vs. Batman: The Animated series. Also, Batman: The Animated Series spawned The Batman, Batman Beyond, Beware The Batman, and Batman The Brave And The Bold. Superman spawned ... The Justice League.

Still, Supes Kent gets liberally sprinkled into the Justice League series here, while we still include a ton of Batman.

For Bat's sake, Clark, PUT THE HOOD UP. You suck at secret identities.

Season 2: World's Finest

Episode 26: Superman Brave New Metropolis 

Lois Lane gets stuck in an alternate dimension where Supey and Lex Luthor are besties, and she is totally dead. Her death even led Supey to go rogue. She decides she must get back to her own universe and tell the big blue boy scout that she loves him.


Episode 27: Superman Ghost In The Machine

Braniac invades Lex Luthor's computer system, and forces Luthor to build him a new body.


Episode 28 -30: Superman World's Finest

The Joker and Lex Luthor team up to destroy Superman, but, awww buddies, Batman happens to be in town, too, leading to a Super Team Up.


Episode 31 & 32: Batman Robin's Reckoning

How will Robin (original flavor, Dick Grayson) react when a local crime boss turns out to be the person who murdered his parents?


Episode 33: Superman The Late Mr. Kent

When Clark Kent survives a murder attempt (because he's Superman, duh), the original Krytpo-currency hero must figure out how to balance his dual identity.


Episode 34: Batman The Man Who Killed Batman

A very petty criminal seems to accidentally kill Batman and becomes the most popular man in Gotham's underground. This is another Paul Dini masterpiece.


Episodes 35 & 36: Batman Heart Of Steel

Everything goes higgledy-piggledy in Gotham and the Batcave when one of Bruce Wayne's old friends turns up for dinner.


Episode 37: Batman If You're So Smart, Why Aren't You Rich?

The Riddler's capitalist origin story.


Episode 38: Batman Joker's Wild

An insurance fraud scheme designed to ensnare The Joker almost toally works.


Episodes 39 & 40: Superman Apokolips ... Now

Darkseid invades Earth and defeats Superman. Can Orion from New Genesis, and mere common humans hold back the invasion?



Episode 41: Batman The Laughing Fish

Fish tainted by Joker toxin are just part of the clown prince of crime's plans to capture Batman and seed chaos in the city. Just another Tuesday in Gotham.


Episode 42: Batman Harley & Ivy

The relationship between these two pseudo-villains is one of the purest evil things in the DCEU, and this is where it all gets started.


Episode 43: Superman New Kids In Town

It's The Legion Of Superheroes going back in time to stop Braniac, who has gone back in time to kill Superman soon after he lands on Earth.


Episode 44: Batman Zatanna

Paul Dini is as important to this chronology as Bruce Timm (who designed and set up The Animated Serieses and several other shows). He created Harley Quinn, and he wrote this great episode where super magician Zatanna is framed for a crime, and Batman swoops into help her, and the two of them don't even remotely fall in love. There's more sexual tension when he teams up with Superman. It's great.


Episode 45: Batman Almost Got 'Im

The rogues gallery sits around a table discussing all the times they almost beat Batman. Meanwhile, Harley Quinn decides to off Catwoman because she keeps helping Batman. Yeup, it's Paul Dini again.


Episode 46: Superman Knight Time

Batman has disappeared! And it's up to Robin to deal with the entire rogues gallery, luckily Superman stops by and puts on the Batsuit to help Robin figure out what happened to the caped crusader.


Episode 47 - 50: Superman Red Son

We started with Lois trapped in an alternate reality, now we see an entirely different world where baby Supe Supe's space crib lands in Russia, and instead of the US, the entire superhero boom takes place in the Soviet Union. The graphic novel is one of the best things Mark Millar has ever written. The movie adaptation is ok, and at least an intriguing Elseworlds tale.