Editing Silver Age of Comic Books (section)

===DC Comics===
The Silver Age began with the publication of DC Comics' ''[[Showcase (comics)|Showcase]]'' #4 (October 1956), which introduced the modern version of the Flash, [[Barry Allen]].<ref name=Shuttp20>{{cite book | last = Shutt | first = Craig | title = Baby Boomer Comics: The Wild, Wacky, Wonderful Comic Books of the 1960s! | publisher = [[Krause Publications]] | location = [[Iola, Wisconsin]] | year=2003 | page = 20 | isbn = 0-87349-668-X | quote = The Silver Age started with ''Showcase'' #4, the Flash's first appearance.}}</ref><ref name=sassienep69>{{cite book | first = Paul | last = Sassiene | title = The Comic Book: The One Essential Guide for Comic Book Fans Everywhere | year = 1994 | publisher = Chartwell Books, a division of Book Sales | location = [[Edison, New Jersey]] | page = [https://archive.org/details/comicbookoneesse0000sass/page/69 69] | isbn = 978-1555219994 | quote = DC's ''Showcase'' No. 4 was the comic that started the Silver Age | url = https://archive.org/details/comicbookoneesse0000sass/page/69 }}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=10649|title=DC Flashback: The Flash|access-date=2008-06-27|date=July 2, 2007|website=Comic Book Resources|archive-date=January 12, 2009|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090112154005/http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=10649|url-status=dead}}</ref> At the time, only three superheroes—[[Superman]] (and his younger incarnation as [[Superboy (Kal-El)|Superboy]]), [[Batman]] (with his sidekick [[Dick Grayson|Robin]]), and [[Wonder Woman]]—were still published under their own titles.<ref name="Jacobs34"/> According to DC comics writer [[Will Jacobs]], Superman was available in "great quantity, but little quality". Batman and Robin were doing better, but Batman's comics were "lackluster" in comparison to his earlier "atmospheric adventures" of the 1940s, and Wonder Woman, having lost her original writer and artist, was no longer "idiosyncratic" or "interesting".<ref name="Jacobs34"/> [[Aquaman]] and [[Green Arrow]] (with his sidekick, [[Speedy (DC Comics)|Speedy]]) were also still appearing as back-up features in ''[[Adventure Comics]]'', "the only other two superheroes" known to have remained continuously in print from the [[Golden Age of Comic Books|Golden Age]] as the Silver Age began,<ref>Wallace "1940s" in Dolan, p. 51: "Following ''More Fun Comics'' change in focus the previous month, the displaced super-heroes Superboy, Green Arrow, Johnny Quick, Aquaman, and the Shining Knight were welcomed by ''Adventure Comics''".</ref> largely due to [[Mort Weisinger|their creator's]] ongoing affection for them. Jacobs describes the arrival of ''Showcase'' #4 on the newsstands as "begging to be bought", the cover featured an undulating [[film stock|film strip]] depicting the Flash running so fast that he had escaped from the frame.<ref name="Jacobs34">{{cite book |title=The Comic Book Heroes: From the Silver Age to the Present |last=Jacobs |first=Will |author2=Gerard Jones |year=1985 |publisher=[[Crown Publishing Group]] |location=New York, New York |isbn=0-517-55440-2|page =34}}</ref> Editor [[Julius Schwartz]], writer [[Gardner Fox]], and artist [[Carmine Infantino]] were some of the people behind the Flash's revitalization.<ref name="Schwartz">{{cite web |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0DE2DC133AF931A25751C0A9629C8B63 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20121209125727/http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E0DE2DC133AF931A25751C0A9629C8B63 |url-status=dead |archive-date=December 9, 2012 |title=Julius Schwartz, 88, Editor Who Revived Superhero Genre in Comic Books |access-date=2008-09-23 |last=Nash |first=Eric |date=February 12, 2004 |work=[[The New York Times]] }}</ref> [[Robert Kanigher]] wrote the first stories of the revived Flash, and [[John Broome (writer)|John Broome]] was the writer of many of the earliest stories.<ref>{{cite book | author = Kanigher| title = The Flash Chronicles, Volume One | publisher = [[DC Comics]] | year = 2009 | isbn = 978-1-4012-2471-4|display-authors=etal}}</ref><ref>[http://www.comics.org/series/1194/ ''Showcase''] at the [[Grand Comics Database]]</ref>

[[File:Julius Schwartz in 2002.jpg|thumb|right|upright|[[Julius Schwartz]], an instrumental figure at DC during the Silver Age]]
With the success of ''Showcase'' #4, several other 1940s superheroes were reworked during Schwartz' tenure, including [[Green Lantern]], [[Aquaman]], the [[Atom (character)|Atom]], and [[Hawkman]],<ref name="US"/> and the [[Justice Society of America]] was reimagined as the [[Justice League|Justice League of America]].<ref name="Schwartz"/> The DC artists responsible included [[Murphy Anderson]], [[Gil Kane]], [[Ramona Fradon]], [[Mike Sekowsky]], and [[Joe Kubert]].<ref name="Schwartz"/> Only the characters' names remained the same; their costumes, locales, and identities were altered, and imaginative scientific explanations for their superpowers generally took the place of magic as a [[modus operandi]] in their stories.<ref name="US">{{cite web |url=https://www.usnews.com/usnews/tech/nextnews/archive/next040226.htm |title=Flash Facts |access-date=2008-06-27 |last=Pethokoukis |first=James |date= February 26, 2004 |work=[[U.S. News & World Report]]|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110525005552/http://www.usnews.com/usnews/tech/nextnews/archive/next040226.htm|archive-date=May 25, 2011|url-status=live}}</ref> Schwartz, a lifelong science-fiction fan, was the inspiration for the re-imagined Green Lantern<ref name="Space">{{cite web|last= Janulewicz| first=Tom | url= http://www.space.com/sciencefiction/gil_kane_000201.html | title=Gil Kane, Space-Age Comic Book Artist, Dies|publisher= Space.com|date=February 1, 2000|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20090207181003/http://www.space.com/sciencefiction/gil_kane_000201.html | archive-date= February 7, 2009}}</ref>—the Golden Age character, railroad engineer [[Alan Scott]], possessed a ring powered by a magical lantern,<ref name="Space"/> but his Silver Age replacement, test pilot [[Hal Jordan]], had a ring powered by an alien battery and created by an intergalactic police force.<ref name="Space"/>

In the mid-1960s, [[Flash of Two Worlds|DC established]] that characters appearing in comics published prior to the Silver Age lived on a [[Parallel universes in fiction|parallel Earth]] the company dubbed [[Earth-Two]]. Characters introduced in the Silver Age and onward lived on [[Multiverse (DC Comics)|Earth-One]].<ref name="VV"/> The two realities were separated by a vibrational field that could be crossed, should a storyline involve superheroes from different worlds teaming up.<ref name="VV">{{cite web |url=http://www.villagevoice.com/2006-06-27/books/superfan-returns/ |title=Superfan Returns |access-date=2008-09-23 |last=Singer |first=Matt |date=June 27, 2006 |work=[[The Village Voice]]|archive-date= May 24, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110524165151/http://www.villagevoice.com/2006-06-27/books/superfan-returns/|url-status=live}}</ref>

Although the Flash is generally regarded as the first superhero of the Silver Age, the introduction of the [[Martian Manhunter]] in ''[[Detective Comics]]'' #225 predates ''Showcase'' #4 by almost a year, and at least one historian considers this character the first Silver Age superhero.<ref>{{cite web |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20031020180208/http://www.comicbookresources.com/columns/oddball/index.cgi?date=2003-09-22 |archive-date=2003-10-20 |url= http://www.comicbookresources.com/columns/oddball/index.cgi?date=2003-09-22 |title=Oddball Comics |access-date=2008-09-04 |last=Shaw |first=Scott |date=September 22, 2003 |website=Comic Book Resources}}</ref> However, comics historian Craig Shutt, author of the ''[[Comics Buyer's Guide]]'' column "Ask Mister Silver Age", disagrees, noting that the [[Martian Manhunter]] debuted as a detective who used his alien abilities to solve crimes, in the "quirky detective" vein of contemporaneous DC characters who were "TV detectives, Indian detectives, supernatural detectives, [and] animal detectives".<ref name=Shuttp21>Shutt, p. 21</ref> Shutt feels the Martian Manhunter only became a superhero in ''Detective Comics'' #273 (November 1959) when he received a secret identity and other superhero accoutrements, saying, "Had Flash not come along, I doubt that the Martian Manhunter would've led the charge from his backup position in ''Detective'' to a new super-hero age."<ref name=Shuttp21/> Unsuccessful attempts to revive the superhero archetype's popularity include [[Captain Comet]], who debuted in ''[[Strange Adventures]]'' #9 (June 1951);<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=14633|title=Permanent Damage: Issue #127|last=Grant|first=Steven|date=February 18, 2004|publisher=(Column) Comic Book Resources|access-date=2009-02-20|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120410160905/http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=14633|archive-date=April 10, 2012|url-status=live}} (Archive requires scrolling down.)</ref> St. John Publishing Company's 1953 revival of Rocket Man under the title Zip-Jet; [[Fighting American]], created in 1954 by the [[Captain America]] team of [[Joe Simon]] and [[Jack Kirby]]; Sterling Comics' Captain Flash and its backup feature Tomboy that same year;<ref>[http://www.toonopedia.com/capflash.htm Captain Flash] at [[Don Markstein's Toonopedia]]. [https://archive.today/20120912170737/http://www.toonopedia.com/capflash.htm Archived] from the original on April 9, 2012.</ref> Ajax/Farrell Publishing's 1954–55 revival of the [[Phantom Lady]]; Strong Man, published by [[Magazine Enterprises]] in 1955; [[Charlton Comics]]' [[Nature Boy (comics)|Nature Boy]], introduced in March 1956, and its revival of the Blue Beetle the previous year; and [[Atlas Comics (1950s)|Atlas Comics']] short-lived revivals of Captain America, the [[Human Torch (android)|Human Torch]], and the [[Namor|Sub-Mariner]], beginning in ''Young Men Comics'' #24 (December 1953). In the United Kingdom, the [[Marvelman]] series was published from 1954 to 1963, substituting for the British reprints of the [[Captain Marvel (DC Comics)|Captain Marvel]] stories after [[Fawcett Comics|Fawcett]] stopped publishing the character's adventures.

The [[talking animals in fiction|talking animal]] superheroes Supermouse and [[Mighty Mouse]] were published continuously in their own titles from the end of the [[Golden Age of Comic Books|Golden Age]] through the beginning of the Silver Age. [[Atomic Mouse]] was given his own title in 1953, lasting ten years. Atomic Rabbit, later named Atomic Bunny, was published from 1955 to 1959.