And now for an even more sci-fi (but familiar to some people who've read a particular graphic novel
The year is 1956. A scientist named Yuri Tchaikovsky is disintegrated in a top-secret physics department in experiments to prove the prospect of contacting other dimensions. A sequence of bizarre, otherwordly phenomena involving unintentional anatomy lessons and screaming muscled skeletons follow for several months until a reconstructed, glowing version of Dr. Tchaikovskys body reappears. The Superman now exists, and he's a devoted follower of Soviet communism and dedicated to truth, justice, and the international expansion of the Warsaw Pact. How does the work adjust to Comrade Atom and the presence of a superman who can transcend ordinary reality as we know it, when the guy's a Soviet and not an American?
Does he accelerate and deform Cold War tensions? Does the presence of a real-life superman render the superhero genre obsolete? Do a great many Americans die trying to duplicate the accident and create a Dr. Manhattan to show the benefits of Truth, Justice, and the American Way? Does the simple invalidation of everything we used to know about physics and biology cause either a massive crash of the existing sciences, a more limited retooling of those sciences, or lead to a great wave of religious hysteria that makes the Crusades and the Jihads of medieval times look like a junior sibling?
Or alternately does he just grow bored with humanity after sleeping around and go to Mars when he finally has enough?
Personally I think that if a real superhuman existed that this would throw our entire premise of reality out of whack and we'd find out very quickly that the Superman works best in fiction, not in real life. No matter which state, which ideology, or which society these supermen came from. I think, however, that if one showed up as a Soviet around the time of the Sputnik launch that this would have also put US culture of the time into a Red-Baiting Frenzy to end all frenzies and that from a detached popcorn-on-couch approach this would make great TV on both sides. I also think that one superhuman ain't anywhere near enough to fix the rotten Soviet system or to save it, but that's my own cynicism.
TL;DR: What if the Watchmen universe happened but Dr. Manhattan was a Soviet? Things would go much the same but from the opposite POV.
Does he accelerate and deform Cold War tensions? Does the presence of a real-life superman render the superhero genre obsolete? Do a great many Americans die trying to duplicate the accident and create a Dr. Manhattan to show the benefits of Truth, Justice, and the American Way? Does the simple invalidation of everything we used to know about physics and biology cause either a massive crash of the existing sciences, a more limited retooling of those sciences, or lead to a great wave of religious hysteria that makes the Crusades and the Jihads of medieval times look like a junior sibling?
Or alternately does he just grow bored with humanity after sleeping around and go to Mars when he finally has enough?
Personally I think that if a real superhuman existed that this would throw our entire premise of reality out of whack and we'd find out very quickly that the Superman works best in fiction, not in real life. No matter which state, which ideology, or which society these supermen came from. I think, however, that if one showed up as a Soviet around the time of the Sputnik launch that this would have also put US culture of the time into a Red-Baiting Frenzy to end all frenzies and that from a detached popcorn-on-couch approach this would make great TV on both sides. I also think that one superhuman ain't anywhere near enough to fix the rotten Soviet system or to save it, but that's my own cynicism.
TL;DR: What if the Watchmen universe happened but Dr. Manhattan was a Soviet? Things would go much the same but from the opposite POV.