Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Lois & Clark Where is Metropolis?

There is an online Atlas of the DC world based on the Atlas from the DC Heros role-playing game. Doesn't add a new state of New Troy instead puts Metropolis in DE.


NorthEast

It is right about where Lewes, DE is in RL. Unfortunately, Lewes is in Sussex County, not in the more appropriately named Kent County.

cheers,
Lynn

And Gotham is somewhere around Ocean City-Atlantic City NJ. Which does make them close enough to get between fairly quickly at fast driving times.

I was re-watching "Stop the Presses" and I saw that Bernie's phone number at Star Labs has a 201 area code. In RL, that area code covers Jersey City and Hackensack in northern New Jersey, pretty close to NYC. That would add further support to Metropolis being on the east coast.

I guess Lois has a looooong commute to work. ;-)

cheers,
Lynn

I found an intriguing hint about the locations of Metropolis and Gotham in Superman 354 (published in 1980). The first panel of the second page reads as follows:
The real life cities are all mentioned in northeast-to-southwest order. If the two fictional cities were to follow that pattern, it would put Metropolis right about where I live! Philly is northeast of me; Baltimore is to my southwest. One can almost draw a straight line to connect the three locations.

I realize that this passage is only suggestive at best, but I must admit to being amused by the thought that I might have been living in Metropolis all along and never even known it.

Maybe I should be looking up in the sky more often...

Joy,
Lynn

Lynn

What a cool thought! Look up in the sky ... and see if the Lexor Hotel is anywhere around while you are doing that.

They show a map in the Pilot when Clark (he is not Superman yet, he doesn't have the suit) flies to Shanghai, and that makes it look like Metropolis is somewhere in North-east Pennsylvania, maybe not far from Scranton.

However in "Return of the Prankster" there is a map at the poor company that Griffin is messing with, and that really looks like it is a section of New York City.

Then there is the "Night Before Mxmas" where the bar tender is shocked to learn the 5th dimension is worse than Jersey. This establishes that Metropolis is not in New Jersey.

Also in I think it was "Ordinary People" Clark goes to deal with a nuclear problem in Philadelphia and the bad guys try to kill Lois while he is away. I am not sure that tells us much beyond that Metropolis is not Philly.

On the other hand at least in the script for "Man of Steal Bars" Lois mentions that it is much colder in New York. They did change a lot between the script we have an actual publication, moving it from December to November and from over 100 degrees to in the 90s, but I think they did keep the mention of New York.

Actually I went and watched through that point, and Lois does say "its 12 degrees in New York, they have 8 inches of snow in Chicago and were having a run on sun block."

So it does appear at some level New York is elsewhere. That does not mean that Metropolis is not in other ways a New York equivalent.

In sum: Metropolis: The wandering city!

Joy,
Lynn