Elseworlds (Season 9)

***Elseworlds* (Season 9)** was going to be an additional season to the 8 season run of the anthology series *Elseworlds*, had it not ended.

## Overview

When Bryan Fuller was in the middle of pre-production of season 8, it was announced that season 8 would be the final season. This was mainly due to the last few seasons of the series being over budget and not garnering the projected viewership they wanted. As well as the last couple seasons having mixed reception. With this, Bryan Fuller wanted to change his original plan of having all original stories for season 8, to doing well known stories like DC: The New Frontier and The Dark Knight Returns. The higher ups begrudgingly agreed to his request.

When season 8 eventually premiered, it received very positive feedback and garnered a lot of praise for all 3 of its adaptations. With this, the higher ups had a meeting with Fuller about doing another season, and despite Fuller wanting to do his original idea for season 8, he eventually passed on doing it, deciding to end it on a high note. They ultimately stayed the course and kept it cancelled.

## Plot

When it was revealed a couple years after the series ended that there was plans for a season 9, Fuller was then asked about it in subsequent interviews when he was doing press for another project.

> "Well, there was and there wasn't. When I was planning out season 8, they were like "show's done, this is the last of it". I was like "alright, instead of my original plan, can I end it on some great adaptations that people have wanted for years?" and they were like "ugh I GUESS". They pretty much left me alone after that, I got some great talent to helm the stories and write them, and whatnot. Then, when season 8 got really really good reviews, and high viewership, they were all of a sudden interested again. I had no intention of doing season 9. At all. Even though I was kind of interested before, I felt that since season 8 did really well, that was my omen to leave. Plus, I was getting a bit tired of it at that point. 8 seasons is a long ass time y'know? So they were like "hey wanna do season 9?" and I said "hell no" and that was pretty much how we left it. But if I did do season 9, I would've done my ideas for season 8, definitely."
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When further asked about what his ideas were, he had this to say:

> "It was all original stories. We went nuts on so many, we must've had like 100 ideas. One was *Star Trek* themed, another took place in the *Doctor Who* universe, I think there was one that was like this cerebral Doctor Fate story. All of it was insane. [...] We ultimately went with something similar to season 1, but it all took place in the same universe. I called it 'Alternate Origins', kinda like what Stan Lee did. Green Lantern was a criminal, The Flash was this speed demon from an alternate dimension, Batman was poor instead of rich, that kind of thing. Then they meet up for the Justice League episode. If season 10 was an option, I probably would've done the same thing. I was getting sick of adaptations at that point, and I felt a lot of the good Elseworld stories were kind of used or just couldn't do y'know? I think it would've been fun. Get some amateur directors to put something on their resume.
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## List of Episodes

Episode 1: ***Experiment***

Superman would've been a military experiment with amnesia who has to learn of the world again.

Episode 2: ***Poor***

Batman would've been poor and had only his father killed in front of him and would swear vengeance on the upper class.

Episode 3: ***Visions***

Wonder Woman would've been a schizophrenic martial artist who receives visions of the future.

Episode 4: ***Chaos***

Flash would've been a speed demon from an alternate dimension who finds the value in human life.

Episode 5: ***Amphibian***

Aquaman would've been a deformed creature akin to the *Creature from the Black Lagoon*.

Episode 6: ***Criminal***

Green Lantern would've been an ex-con trying to find his place in the world.

Episode 7: ***Hitman***

Martian Manhunter would've been a hitman doused with experimental chemicals.

Episode 8: ***League***

Wonder Woman's visions would've brought the team together to fight an all-powerful entity (revealed to be the character Entropy).

## Cast

While Fuller never officially got to casting before he changed his ideas/left, he did consider some names.

* Bo Burnham as CK-938/Superman
* Kodi Smit-McPhee as Bruce Wayne/Batman
* Karen Fukuhara as Dina/Wonder Woman
* Unknown as Flash
* Unknown as The Amphibian/Aquaman
* Aaron Paul as Michael Corringer/Green Lantern
* Jeffrey Wright as John/Manhunter

## Reception

When Fuller posted his ideas, it was received with mixed to positive reception from fans. Some thought that it was too weird and took away from the core of the characters, while many thought they were interesting ways to evolve the characters and make them something new.

## Legacy

While Bryan Fuller never ultimately did season 9, he did publish a short story collection that featured the characters entitled Alternate Origins. He eventually went on to adapt the very similar Stan Lee's Just Imagine... series (which he mentioned in his original interview). It received mixed to negative reception. Many fans unofficially call it "The Lost Elseworlds season".