When Does "The Kents" #2 (1997) Take Place?
"The Kents" #2 "Bleeding Kansas" Part 2 is a western comic-book written by John Ostrander that released July 2nd, 1997. So when is "The Kents" #2 set?
It takes place on the fictional DC Comics Universe timeline in the year:
We know this because about a quarter into the issue a textbox clearly declares it presents excerpts from “the journal of Nathaniel Kent -- December 12(?) 1855--”. (The question mark is meant to add verisimilitude to the faux found document nature of the papers in the diegesis of the comic.) Later, another textbox reads: "Thus 1855 ended and I hoped 1856 would be better. But the winter was harsh, worse than anyone could remember, and the spring was bitter, for the Kents especially." Wintertime crosses over to the next year from around November to around March so "the spring" means at least March of 1856 AD.
1855 AD - 1856 AD
We know this because about a quarter into the issue a textbox clearly declares it presents excerpts from “the journal of Nathaniel Kent -- December 12(?) 1855--”. (The question mark is meant to add verisimilitude to the faux found document nature of the papers in the diegesis of the comic.) Later, another textbox reads: "Thus 1855 ended and I hoped 1856 would be better. But the winter was harsh, worse than anyone could remember, and the spring was bitter, for the Kents especially." Wintertime crosses over to the next year from around November to around March so "the spring" means at least March of 1856 AD.
(HOWEVER, a textbox near the middle of the book opens: "March 8, 1857. Dearest brothers--"... making the end of the narrative in 1857 AD but this date is essentially contradicted by a later 1856 AD journal date and the entire following issue, which includes the phrase "the spring of 1856" when referring to the story’s main action. The two "1857" textboxes therefore must be seen as a production mistake.)
Additionally, the issue opens with a frame prologue and a later interlude merely labeled with a textbox telling us it’s "Metropolis. Today." So the frame story and the interjected scenes with Kal-El/Clark Kent/Superman are set in ‘the present’ of the DC Universe.
It is a chronologically early comic in the DC Comics Universe multiverse timeline and can be read at its timeline point after the previous issue, "The Kents" #1 (1997).
