Death Star Outer Hull Section Schematic

Blue Area of the Moon

Creators: Stan Lee & Jack Kirby
First Appearance: Fantastic Four #13 (April, 1963)

History: The Blue Area of the Moon was an artificial, Earth-like environment in the Luther Crater. The Blue area was first discovered by the Fantastic Four. They discovered the area contained the ruins of an alien city and the Citadel of Uatu the Watcher.

The Blue Area was created by the Skrulls one million years ago as a testing site for the Cotati and Kree. An equal number of Kree and Cotati were left in the Blue Area to see what they could accomplish. The Kree built the Blue City that fills most of the Blue Area, while the Cotati created a complex but subtle ecosystem. When the Skrulls judged the Cotati’s achievement greater, the Kree rebelled and killed the Skrulls and Cotati. They took the Skrulls’ starship and abandoned the area.

The Blue Area was rarely visited over the millennia that followed. Then a decade ago, the Fantastic Four and the Red Ghost both landed there. In the years since, the Blue Area saw increasing traffic. The area was used as the site for the trial by combat of Phoenix and the X-Men against the Shi'ar Imperial Guard. When the pollution on Earth became too deadly to the Inhumans, they sought the aid of the Fantastic Four to help relocate their home of Attilan. With the assistance of Mister Fantastic, the entire city was transported to the Blue Area where it remained for quite some time. During a period in which the Watcher was absent from his home, Nathaniel Richards attempted to plunder the technology stored there. Instead he triggered a trap that sucked the citadel into a vortex and threatened to destroy Attilan in the process. It was saved by the Fantastic Four, who reduced the city down to size and took it aboard their ship the Stealth-Hawk. Attilan was later returned to Earth and restored to its natural size on the risen continent of Atlantis. SHIELD later constructed an outpost on the Blue Area where they kept the Supreme Intelligence a prisoner. The Blue area was also where the opening salvo of the Destiny War between Kang and Immortus began. After a turbulent time on Earth, the Inhumans eventually returned to the moon, moving Attilan there once again. After the Secret Invasion of Earth, the Inhumans left the moon for the stars where they took control of the Kree empire.

In more recent times, the Blue Area was the resting place when the Living Tribunal after he was defeated in battle. Later the Watcher was murdered on the moon by an unseen assassin, leading to an investigation by the Avengers and other heroes to learn the identity of his killer. Ultimately, Nick Fury was exposed as Uatu's killer and as punishment the Watchers forced him to take Uatu's place, trapping him on the moon and dubbing him the Unseen.

Alternate Realities: Earth-90816 (What If? Vol 2 #16)
As Empress Lilandra teleported the X-Men to the Blue Area of the Moon and sentenced Phoenix to death, the mutants challenged the Shi'ar Imperial Guard to trial by combat. Suddenly appearing from the Hyborian Age, Conan mistook the Phoenix for his beloved Red Sonja and took out Cyclops with a large rock, sufficiently shattering the psychic rapport shared with Phoenix. Without that rapport, and without Wolverine to hurl Colossus at her, nothing prevented Jean Grey from transforming utterly and completely into her dark persona before she could destroy herself, unleashing the full fury of Phoenix.

Hyborian Age of Conan

The Hyborian Age was devised by author Robert E. Howard as the post-Atlantean setting of his Conan the Cimmerian stories, designed to fit in with Howard's previous and lesser known tales of Kull, which were set in the Thurian Age at the time of Atlantis. The name "Hyborian" is a contraction of the Greek concept of the land of "Hyperborea", literally "Beyond the North Wind". This was a mythical place far to the north that was not cold and where things did not age.

Howard's Hyborian epoch, described in his essay The Hyborian Age, is a mythical time before any civilization known to anthropologists. Its setting is prehistoric Europe and North Africa (with occasional references to Asia and other continents).

On a map Howard drew conceptualizing the Hyborian Age, his vision of the Mediterranean Sea is dry. The Nile, which he renamed the River Styx, takes a westward turn at right angles just beyond the Nile Delta, plowing through the mountains so as to be able to reach the Straits of Gibraltar. Although his Black Sea is also dry, his Caspian Sea, which he renames the Vilayet Sea, extends northward to reach the Arctic Ocean, so as to provide a barrier to encapsulate the settings of his stories. Not only are his Baltic Sea and English Channel dry, but most of the North Sea and a vast region to the west, easily including Ireland, are, too. Meanwhile, the west coast of Africa on his map lies beneath the sea.

Keystone City

Comic Book Info: Keystone City is a fictional city in the DC Comics Universe. Specifically, it is the home of both the original Flash, Jay Garrick, and the third Flash, Wally West. Keystone City first appeared in the 1940s in the original Flash Comics series - Flash Comics #1 (January 1940) Within the comics, Keystone has been described as being "the blue collar capital of the United States" and a center of industry. Keystone City's location over the years has been treated as vague, much like DC's other fictional cities such as Gotham City and Metropolis, though most writers have shown it as being located in Pennsylvania (likely due to Pennsylvania being nicknamed "the Keystone State"). Starting in the 1990s, however, Keystone has been treated as being located in Kansas, near the Kansas/Missouri border, adjacent to Central City. JSA #16 (November 2000) explicitly states that Keystone City is in Ohio, but Flash (vol. 2) #188 (September 2002) states that it is in Kansas. In the latter, the Flash constructs a bridge that connects Keystone City and Central City. (His internal monologue reads, "Keystone City, Kansas. Central City, Missouri. Forever united, and under my protection.") Under DC's Multiverse system between the early 1960s and 1985–1986's Crisis on Infinite Earths miniseries, Keystone City is located on Earth-Two (home of the Justice Society and DC's Golden Age characters), in the same space as Earth-One's Central City (Earth-One being the home of the Silver Age superheroes, and Central City being the home of the Silver Age Flash, Barry Allen). With the changes rendered to DC's fictional reality due to Crisis, Keystone and Central become twin cities.

Location: Across the Missouri River from Central City, Missouri, Keystone City, Kansas first became home to settlers in 1806, shortly after the Louisiana Purchase. It began to grow rapidly after the Civil War, attracting farmers and becoming a common starting point for those who were moving to the West. After the completion of the Transcontinental Railroad, it became an important depot, attracting the livestock and meat-packing industries. Although the stockyards closed in the 1950s, the area has been revitalized and the old warehouses transformed into a fashionable retail destination. Keystone remains a center of industry, home to aircraft and automobile manufacturers, including Keystone Motors.

Three miles from Keystone is Iron Heights Penitentiary, the security prison that holds the supervillains when captured. Besides heavy industry, Keystone is also the home of WKEY-TV, a television station where Wally's girlfriend/wife Linda Park works. Jakeem Williams (also known as Jakeem Thunder of the JSA) attends Wilson High School in Keystone.

History: Originally, the city is defended in the 1940s by the original Flash, Jay Garrick, against such villains as the Fiddler, the Thinker, Shade, and Turtle; coinciding with the real-world cancellation of All Star Comics, the last venue in which Garrick's adventures were seen as part of the Justice Society of America. Garrick goes into retirement in the early 1950s after the forced breakup of the original Justice Society due to McCarthyism. In the early 1960s, Garrick is shown coming out of retirement in the classic story "Flash of Two Worlds", published in The Flash #123 (September 1961), and resumes his duties as the protector of Keystone City. Keystone City was located on Earth-Two in the same geographical area as Central City was on Earth-One, separated by a dimensional barrier. In the penultimate issue of Crisis on Infinite Earths, when all parallel Earths have been merged into one, Keystone City and Central City become located beside one another and are named the "Twin Cities".

Starting in the late 1980s, Keystone City becomes the home of Wally West, the third Flash. Most of Barry Allen's "rogues gallery", including the Weather Wizard, Mirror Master, Captain Boomerang, and Gorilla Grodd, also begin to plague Keystone instead of Central City. Over the years, many of these rogues have fluctuated between criminal acts and crimefighting. With the events of the Identity Crisis crossover, it has become apparent that this is due to the actions of the brainwashed supervillain known as the Top. With the return of Barry Allen as the primary Flash during Final Crisis, Keystone City once again gave place to Central City as the main setting.

Future-Verse: In the Teen Titans story arc, "Titans Tomorrow", set ten years in the future, the whole of Keystone City is converted into a giant Flash Museum.

TV-Verse: In the pilot of The Flash, Barry mentions that Eddie Thawne is a transfer from Keystone City. Later in the season in the episode "The Flash is Born", Barry and Eddie visit the city while looking for Tony Woodward. In the episode "Potential Energy", it was revealed Wally West lived his whole life there when his mother left Central City while she was pregnant with him. In the third season's episode "Magenta" Frankie is sent to a new foster home in Keystone City. In the Arrow (S05E05), Oliver speaks of the apprehension of the heads of organized crime enterprises in Bludhaven, Hub City, Keystone and Whiteholland.

Video Game-Verse: Batman: Arkham Asylum, Keystone City is referred to as a place where Amadeus Arkham went to college. In the sequel Batman: Arkham City it is mentioned that prisons similar to the titular Arkham City will soon be opening in Keystone City and Metropolis. In the final game of the series Batman: Arkham Knight, there are various posters depicting Keystone City, with the phrase "Run to Keystone City.", and shows a red blur in the poster, supposedly depicting The Flash. The various militia forces around Gotham also mention Keystone, describing how Gotham is better because "You can see Batman coming", referring again to The Flash.

Cool Map: Opal City

Comic Book Info: Opal City is a fictional city set in the DC Universe. Created by James Robinson and Tony Harris, Opal City first appeared in Starman vol. 2 #0 (October 1994). "The Opal" has been established as the home of several DC Comics characters, most notably several super-heroes who have operated under the name of Starman. Other, non-Starman related heroes who have come to call Opal City their home are the second Black Condor and the Phantom Lady, as mentioned in Teen Titans vol. 3 #20, as well as the Elongated Man. The city itself is first mentioned in Action Comics #251, April 1959 as the name of a ship, the S.S. Opal City which Superman rescues from a modern-day pirate crew. It can be inferred[weasel words] that Robinson named the city due to his vast knowledge of obscure comics continuity from both the Golden Age and the Silver Age. 

Location: Depictions of Opal City in the Starman series showed it as a generally Eastern-US city with a port (though not necessarily a seacoast) and being surrounded by generally flat terrain. Mid-2000s (decade) issues of the JLA series, specifically 2005's "Crisis of Conscience" arc, have explicitly established Opal City as being located in Maryland,per Robinson's longstanding opinions on the subject in various interviews with fans.
 
History: Opal City is particularly notable for several aspects of its depiction in the second Starman series. The original settlement, "Port o' Souls", was established by Puritan settlers in the early 18th century. In 1884, the town elected Brian "Scalphunter" Savage as sheriff. About the same time the morally ambiguous Shade made Opal City his home.

The modern Opal City had its greatest expansion in the 1910s to 1930s, as evidenced by its many Art Deco buildings. An interesting detail is that the city, from its foundations, was heavily tainted with dark magic, first due to the activities of an unholy cult calling themselves the Tuesday Club, which was composed of Opal City's most influential and powerful citizens, from its beginnings as Port O'Souls in the Elizabethan era until Savage killed almost the entire cult the final night of 1899. Savage was killed by the last surviving member, but this man was killed seconds later by Savage's assistant, Carny O'Dare. Little after the foundation of Port O'Souls came the curse of the Black Pirate, binding all souls that ever died in Opal City to the earthly plane. The pinnacle of this was Hawksmoor St. John, the architect who planned Opal City's great expansion, also a fervent Satanist, who christened several buildings in blood so the lines drawn between them formed a perfect five-pointed star. In the World War II years, a group of Nazi occultists planned to drown Opal City into a void dimension, but the ritual was partly stopped by Etrigan and the then-Starman Theodore Knight. However, the aftermath of all of this was an atmosphere tremendously saturated in magical power, which the villain Simon Culp sought to use in conjunction with his own augmented power to create an impenetrable dome of shadow matter over the city, blocking all outer interference. He wished to allow the Nazi ritual to be completed, to destroy what his archenemy Richard Swift, the Shade, loved most. However, Culp was defeated and the souls liberated from the Pirate's curse.

It was in 1939 that the first Starman Ted Knight began his career as a superhero. Opal City itself at one point in its history suffered very heavy damage, first by explosions leveling several large stores, courtesy of the Infernal Doctor Pip, and later, due to the same man, demolition bombs designed to destroy much larger sections of the city during Culp's attempted destruction of Opal City. Additionally, the Post Office/Government building was torn out of its foundations and taken into space by Ted Knight, to protect the city from a nuclear bomb planted deep within it by the Mist. The bomb safely exploded in outer space, and the reconstruction of Opal City started.

Cool Maps: Battle Royale Island Okishima

Eternia & the Tri-Solar System

The Tri-Solar System is the general setting of The New Adventures of He-Man. It includes planet Primus, home of the Galactic Guardians, and Denebria, where the Evil Mutants come from. To better link the several aspects of the Masters of the Universe franchise, Catra was revealed to come from the Tri-Solar System in her Masters of the Universe Classics bio.

Cool Map: Gemworld Map

History: Gemworld is a world located in a dimension which was originally owned by the Lords of Chaos. However, thousands of years ago, when magic began to drop in its levels on Earth due to a change in the alignment of the stars (caused by a star going nova) the Homo magi sorceress Citrina went there and struck a deal with the Lords of Chaos so she would be allowed to create a realm there for those Homo magi and Faerie who wanted to emigrate from Earth. This deal was kept a secret from most of Gemworld's inhabitants.

Gemworld was rule by 12 royal Houses of Gemworld. Always, one ruled all others. Lord Ruby was the first, followed by Lord Emerald and then the house of Amethyst. They were the natural rulers until Dark Opal arose and slew Amethyst's parents. For the next 20 years Dark Opal ruled Gemworld until finally being overthrown by an alliance of the other 11 Houses, led by Amethyst.

Aquamarine Archipelago: A group of islands off the west coast of mostly fishermen, ruled with an irion fist by Lord Aquamarine. The forces of Quaar deposed him and instituted a democracy.
Castle Amethyst: The castle of the House of Amethyst. It was eventually destroyed in battle.
Castle Moonstone: Residence of Lord Moonstone and his wife.
Castle Sapphire: The home of Lady Sapphire, noted for its xenophobia and tough immigration laws.
Castle Turuoise: Realm of Lady Turquoise.
Emerald Domain: Luscious garden realm, home of the House of Emerald. Eventually fell under the protectorate of Lady Sapphire when no heir was found.
Fortress Opal: The stronghold of the supreme ruler Dark Opal. The fortress was destroyed when the usurper was defeated
Garnet Stormy Peaks: Mountain peaks, noted for their bad weather. Lord Garnet made his wealth with heavy machinery.
House of Diamond: The temple of the Diamond Priests. Destoryed by the Emissaries of Varn, but later rebuilt. It is the spiritual center of Gemworld.
Ruby Ruins: Formerly a beautiful realm, the buildings had fallen into decay after relentless battle.
Sardonyx Kingdom: Desert kingdom of Sardonyx.
Topaz Keep: Lofty towers of the House of Topaz.

Cool Map: Smurf Village

Cool Map: Goonies!!!

Cool Map: Thundercats Third Earth

Third Earth is the home planet of a wide variety of sentient and non-sentient beings of both native and alien origins. It became the home of the ThunderCats after Thundera was destroyed. At one point in its past, Third Earth was known as First Earth.

Cool Map: The Princess Bride

The World of the Dark Crystal - Maps!

The Savage Land

 

 

First Appearance: X-MEN #10 

Origin: The Savage Land is a hidden fictional prehistoric land within the Marvel Comics Universe. It is a tropical preserve hidden in Antarctica. It was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby in X-Men #10 (March 1965). Throughout time it has served as a basis for many story arcs in Uncanny X-Men as well as in related books.

 

History: Savage Land is an artificially created tropical forest region nestled amidst a ring of volcanic mountains on the icy continent of Antarctica. Ages ago, the enigmatic other dimensional entities known as the Beyonders contacted an alien race called the Nuwali, offering to pay the Nuwali to create a game preserve on Earth stocked with the fauna and flora of various geological periods. Hence, the Nuwali created the Savage Land as a wildlife preserve where Earth's life forms could be studied under relatively controlled conditions. The Nuwali constructed advanced technological devices within caverns beneath the Savage Land that helped to give it a tropical climate. But the main means of heating the Savage Land was the ring of active volcanoes surrounding it. Presumably the Nuwali chose the site of the Savage Land knowing that the volcanic heat would enable them to create a tropical environment best suited to the life of the Mesozoic Era (the "age of dinosaurs") once the climate of that era changed over the rest of the planet. Into the Savage Land the Nuwali also brought the Man-Apes, an evolutionary forebear of Homo Sapiens, as well as early examples of Homo Sapiens itself. Finally, however, the Beyonders apparently lost interest in the Savage Land and the similar habitats on other worlds, and the Nuwali abandoned them. Apparently all of the habitats collapsed except the Savage Land.

In the centuries before the worldwide disaster known as the Great Cataclysm, in which the continent of Atlantis sank, the people of Atlantis built a great worldwide empire and achieved scientific and technological heights still unsurpassed in many areas of research today. Several small tribes of nomadic Atlanteans sailed to Antarctica and settled within the great caverns lying beneath the frozen wastelands bordering the Savage Land. Eventually, these Atlanteans discovered an immense cavern containing the machinery that helped to regulate climate conditions in the Savage Land. Atlantean scientists made considerable improvements in the machinery and extended its range to cover certain areas of the surface beyond the Savage Land. The scientists used other technological devices left behind by the Nuwali to create incredible means of amusement for their people. The Atlanteans soon named their Antarctic colony "Pangea" after their word for "paradise." The Savage Land served as stock lands for various forms of wildlife, many examples of which wore imported into Pangea. The Atlantean scientists in Pangea turned there attention to genetic engineering, experimenting upon Man-Apes they had brought from the Savage Land and using equipment left behind by the Nuwali. Thus, the Atlantean scientists genetically altered the bodies of the beast-men into bird-people (the Aerians), monkey-people (the Tree People), fish-people (theTubanti), and other animal-like races, all of which had human-like intelligence. The Atlanteans initially used these animal-people as laborers in the Pangean amusement center. The animal-people grew increasingly restive at being treated as slaves, and eventually the Atlanteans of Pangea built fully automated, self-repairing maintenance machinery, eliminating the need for the animal-people to work as laborers. The Atlanteans then confined the animal-people to a section of Pangea far removed from their own. The animal-people finally rose in rebellion and, after weeks of warfare, defeated the Pangean Atlanteans. The animal-people demanded equal rights as sentient beings, and so the Atlanteans further extended the range of the climate control machinery so that it turned all of the frozen wasteland above the underground Pangea colony into a tropical environment. The animal-people then settled in unpopulated areas of the surface of Pangea. When the Great Cataclysm struck, the continent of Atlantis sank and the Atlantean Empire came to an end. The Cataclysm caused the Savage Land and Pangea to sink below sea level, but thanks to the surrounding mountains, neither area was submerged beneath the sea. The climate-control mechanisms were so well built that they survived the sinking, of the landmass and continued to be operational. However, three forths of the population of the Savage Land and Pangea were killed in the upheaval, The rest sank swiftly into barbarism, and soon, as a result of widespread violence, only a tenth of the human population that existed before the Cataclysm was still alive. Peace eventually returned, and the human beings of Pangea and the Savage Land struggled back upward toward civilization, forming tribes such as the Fall People.

Recently, the alien marauder Terminus (or, possibly a pawn of his acting on his behalf) wreaked extraordinary destruction within the Savage Land and Pangea, destroying the climate-control machinery and snuffing the volcanoes surrounding the Savage Land. Terminus slaughtered great numbers of the sentient beings living in Pangea through the vast destructive energies he wielded, and, with the volcanoes extinct and the climate-control machinery wrecked, virtually all the other inhabitants of these two regions were slain by the Antarctic cold, which swiftly spread over both the Savage Land and Pangea. A considerable number of the sentient inhabitants of the Savage Land and Pangea, including Zaladane and the other Savage Land Mutates, escaped the disaster by seeing through a dimensional warp into an other dimensional world. The sentient beings who thus escaped returned to the Savage Land at the time that the god-like High Evolutionary set about his preparations to restore it to its previous state. The anonymous human being who was transformed into the living image of Garokk voluntarily sacrificed his life energies to power the devices that the High Evolutionary used to return the Savage Land to its tropical state. (Whether or not Garokk is indeed dead is as yet unrevealed.) Apparently, the High Evolutionary has returned the Savage Land's climate control machinery to working order and has reactivated the surrounding volcanoes; he has also repopulated the Savage Land with its animal and plant life from different ages, possibly through cloning previously obtained cell samples. As far as if yet known, however, the High Evolutionary restored only the Savage Land. Pangea's fate remains unrevealed.

The United Nations of the Marvel Universe considers the Savage Land an international wildlife preserve, and forbids any commercial exploitation of its resources.

Fun Fact: In the Transformers Marvel comics continuity, shortly after the Ark's crash on earth, the computer aboard the spaceship detected Shockwave landing on the prehistory Savage Land. The Ark used the last of its capabilities to revive the five Autobot warriors by scanning the Savage Land's dominant lifeform: dinosaurs, and rebuild them into the Dinobots. The Dinobots fought Shockwave, a battle that ended in permanent stalemate when Snarl brought down the mountain that Shockwave stood upon, knocking all of them into a tar pit. They remain deactivated until the year 1984.

Tarzan's Pal-ul-don The Lost Land

 

Clipped from Wikipedia and other fan sites.

Lost worlds : remote or near-inaccessible corners of our modern Earth where races and lifeforms still survive from prehistoric times have been a staple of fantastic literature since popular culture embraced the existence of dinosaurs. The term “dinosaur” was coined in 1842, by paleontologist Richard Owen, following the official recognition of the first discovered species, Iguanodon and megalosaurus, in the 1820s. As more of the remains of more incredible species were unearthed, it is hardly surprising that, along with the public’s fascination with prehistoric beasts, there was more than a little speculation that the living animals might still be alive somewhere. After all, there was still enough virgin territory at the close of the 19th century to make the possibility of fantastic monsters roaming the vastness of remote wilderness regions seem viable. 

Edgar Rice Burroughs: had the distinction of being the creator of three separate lost worlds, Pellucidar, Pal-ul-don, and Caspak. Though Pellucidar and Caspak had their own separate series, Burroughs confined Pal-ul-don to a single novel, Tarzan the Terrible. Burroughs describes Pal-ul-don as a region “where every known species of bird and beast appeared to have sought refuge from the encroaching numbers of men since the first ape shed its hair and ceased to walk on its knuckles."

Unfortunately, Burroughs single novel did not allow him to develop Pal-ul-don further. Tarzan never returned to the lost land in any of the original novels, although he did revisit Pal-ul-don in many of the stories concocted by many of the comics writers over the years. The most notable of these writers seems to be Russ Manning, who took Burroughs’ hero to the lost land a number of times in the Sunday strips. Manning did indeed allow Tarzan to explore Pal-ul-don further, adding his own embellishments as to how the strange world worked. He also invented a Weiroo-like race of winged humanoids, who, like their Caspakian counterparts, were a race entirely of males, and who constituted an even greater threat to the women of Pal-ul-don than rampaging Tor-o-don bulls. It was Manning’s concept of Pal-ul-don existing in its own separate time-frame which is most notable, however. This invention may have been in part due to the fact that the existence of a hidden valley full of prehistoric beasts and races, remaining undiscovered in modern Africa, seemed less feasible in the later 1960s than when Burroughs wrote. 

History of Pal-ul-don: When  Jan goes missing Tarzan tracks her to a hidden valley of Pal-ul-don (Land of Men). Pal-ul-don is filled with dinosaurs, notably the savage Triceratops-like Gryfs, which unlike their prehistoric counterparts are predatory. The lost valley is also home to two different races of tailed human-looking creatures, the Ho-don (hairless and white skinned) and the Waz-don (hairy and black-skinned). Tarzan befriends Ta-den, a Ho-don warrior, and Om-at, the Waz-don chief of the tribe of Kor-ul-ja. In this new world he becomes a captive but so impresses his captors with his accomplishments and skills that they name him Tarzan-Jad-Guru (Tarzan the Terrible)!

Gorilla City

Gorilla City: is a fictional city in the DC Comics Universe. The city, hidden in the jungles of Africa, is home to a race of super-intelligent gorillas, that gained their powers from a meteorite. The supervillain Gorilla Grodd is also from the city. Gorilla City first appears in The Flash vol. 1 #106, (April 1959) and was created by John Broome and Carmine Infantino.
 
Publication History: While the current version of Gorilla City debuted in The Flash vol. 1 #106, the very first appearance of a location identified as Gorilla City occurred four years earlier in Congo Bill vol. 1 #6 (July 1955), by George Kashdan and Nick Cardy. The intelligent Gorillas in this story came from a "two mooned world" that Congo Bill assumed to be Mars.
 
Fictional History: After an alien spacecraft crashes into the jungles of Africa, local gorillas become hyper-intelligent and acquire telepathic abilities. These gorillas form Gorilla City. The city led by Solovar quickly creates technology far surpassing that of humanity and cloaks itself from human society. Flash first finds out about the city due to Gorilla Grodd, who probed Solovar's mind to find how to control minds, before trying to take over Gorilla City, then the world. However Flash defeated him. Gorilla Grodd took over the city briefly using neo-magnetic radiation. The radiation caused the rest of the gorillas to adore him, and they made him their king. During JLA Annual #3 (the JLApes storyline), Gorilla City reveals itself to the world and joins the United Nations. However Solovar was killed by a bomb apparently set off by human terrorists.

TV Appearances: Gorilla City appeared in the Challenge of the Super Friends episode "Revenge on Gorilla City," where Grodd tries to take it over. Gorilla City appeared in the Justice League episode "The Brave and the Bold." It was seen again in the Justice League Unlimited episode "Dead Reckoning."

Fun Fact: A song called "Gorilla City" appears on nerd rock band Ookla the Mok's space monkey rock opera "Smell No Evil."

Continent of Myrra home of the Nightmaster!

First Appearance: Showcase #82 - 1969

Clipped from Fanzig by John wells : The circumstances that would transform Jim Rook into the Nightmaster began nearly a millennium before his birth in the other-dimensional land of Myrra. The world was full of strange sights, from the benevolent Zelks (grasshopper-like steeds that the natives rode: SHOWCASE # 82) to Hackies (animated suits of armor "filled with vile souls of dead Warlocks": # 83) to Smoke Spiders (giant arachnids that materialized in unlimited numbers from magic vapors: # 84) to Arivegs (monstrous flying plants that "devour anything that falls within their grasp: # 84).

In a kingdom of Myrra, a monarch had once commanded the court magician, the blue-skinned Farben, to provide two renowned warriors with weapons that they would use in defense of the realm. The blue-fleshed barbarian Brom was given the enchanted Mace of Mists. The pink-skinned Nacht, a goateed man clad in a blue hood, blue body suit and a red cape, was bequeathed with the Sword of Night. Corrupted by power, Brom and Farben conspired to murder their sovereign and the loyal Nacht. The two warriors fought "for a full day" but ultimately the Sword of Night was victorious. Before Nacht could react, Farben cast a spell to exile the hero to "a separate spiritual plane" that overlapped with Myrra -- Earth. The Sword of Night was stuck fast, Excalibur-like, in a stone column in the royal chamber. With the disappearance of Nacht, the balance of power shifted in the favor of Brom and his descendants. The faction known as the Warlocks reserved a special fate for the kingdom that their patriarch had coveted. Its "magnificent buildings crumbled" and its "people shriveled under the mystic onslaught," reduced to short, withered blue-skinned creatures.On Earth, Nacht, using his family name of Roke (inferred from SHOWCASE # 83 & 84), had no choice but to adapt to the strange new world of 10th Century Earth. He took a mate and began a family that would extend for centuries to come. His legacy would ultimately fall on the shoulders of a child born in 1942, a kid from the slums of New York City named Jim Rook.

After beating three hecklers into semi-consciousness ("You think because I don't look like a bank manager I'm weak -- because, I favor peace, I'm a coward … fair prey for bullies?"), Jim was pulled away by Janet. Walking through the streets of lower Manhattan, Jim spotted a store called Oblivion, Inc. and, convinced that a vacant lot was supposed to be on the spot, felt compelled to try the door. He and Janet immediately realized that they'd made a mistake. The door locked behind them, the temperature began to plummet, and a spiral of golden energy tore them away to the land of Myrra. With Janet nowhere in sight, Jim was brought before the wizened King Zolto. The monarch admitted that he'd taken advantage of a fracture in the barrier that had long separated Earth and Myrra and summoned a descendant of Nacht before the opportunity passed. Jim kept his cool but insisted that he and the missing Janet be sent home at once. The conversation was disrupted by the humming of the Sword of Night, still sheathed in the pillar. The song of the sword was a warning of approaching Warlocks and Zolto pleaded with Jim to release the blade. Despite Rook's insistence that "from swords I know zero," Zolto assured him that "the weapon will guide your arm." As predicted, the heir to Nacht could draw the weapon and he instantly felt "some sort of weird strength surging through my arm -- through my whole body. The blade seems ALIVE … to KNOW what it wants to do. I didn't even see that Warlock bolt coming. The sword pulled my hand to parry. Since this obviously isn't my show -- I'll follow the sword's lead -- and hope for the best!" It was a strange scene, the Earthman with the turtleneck, Nehru jacket, and striped pants fighting otherworldly magicians in green robes. Though Zolto had to bail out his young defender in the end, he pronounced Jim Rook's first battle a success. 

"I feel like a character from Howard or Tolkein. Pretty soon, though, I'm gonna wake up and find this is a spaced-out dream. And I'm gonna swear off reading sword-and-sorcery sagas!" -- Jim Rook, 1969 (SHOWCASE # 82).

A Map of Hyboria and The Hyborian Age of Conan

A 1932 illustration of The Hyborian Age based upon a hand-drawn map by Robert E. Howard.

Version drawn by David Kyle for the 1950 Gnome Press edition of Conan the Conqueror.

Marvel Comics Version

A larger map of Robert E. Howard's Hyborian Age.

First Appearance: The Hyborian Age is a fictional period within the artificial mythology created by Robert E. Howard, in which the sword and sorcery tales of Conan the Barbarian and Red Sonja are set. It was an essay written in the 1930s but not published during Howard's lifetime. Its purpose was to maintain consistency within his fictional setting. The reasons behind the invention of the Hyborian Age were perhaps commercial: Howard had an intense love for history and historical dramas; however, at the same time, he recognized the difficulties and the time-consuming research needed in maintaining historical accuracy. By conceiving a timeless setting – a vanished age – and by carefully choosing names that resembled our history, Howard avoided the problem of historical anachronisms and the need for lengthy exposition.

Word Origin: The word "Hyborian" is derived from the legendary northern land of the ancient Greeks, Hyperborea, literally "Beyond the North Wind"." 

Time Period: Howard described the Hyborian Age taking place sometime after the sinking of Atlantis and before the beginning of recorded history. Most later editors and adaptors such as L. Sprague de Camp and Roy Thomas placed The Hyborian Age around 10,000 B.C. More recently, Dale Rippke proposed that the Hyborian Age should be placed further in the past, around 32,500 B.C., prior to the beginning of the last ice age. Rippke's date, however, has since been disputed by Jeffrey Shanks who argues for the more traditional placement at the end of the ice age

On the Map: Howard drew conceptualizing the Hyborian Age, his vision of the Mediterranean Sea is also dry. The Nile, which he renamed the River Styx, takes a westward turn at right angles just beyond the Nile Delta, plowing through the mountains so as to be able to reach the Straits of Gibraltar. Although his Black Sea is also dry, his Caspian Sea, which he renames the Vilayet Sea, extends northward to reach the Arctic Ocean, so as to provide a barrier to encapsulate the settings of his stories. Not only are his Baltic Sea and English Channel dry, but most of the North Sea and a vast region to the west, easily including Ireland, are, too. Meanwhile, the west coast of Africa on his map lies beneath the sea.

The Inhumans Attilan

First appearance: Fantastic Four #47 (February, 1966)

History: Attilan is the ancestral home of the Inhumans.Originally Attilan was located in the North Atlantic Ocean. It was at one point relocated to the South American Andes and became known as, "The Great Refuge". The Great Refuge was ruled by Maximus, the mad brother of the rightful leader of the Inhumans, Black Bolt. After living in exile for many years, Black Bolt and the Royal Family returned to the Great Refuge, and forced Maximus to relinquish the throne. In an insane attempt to strike back against humanity, Maximus activated a device called the Atmo-Gun. By reversing the Atmo-Gun's polarity, he generated a null barrier that completely surrounded the Great Refuge, cutting them off from the rest of the humanity forever. With humanity's technological advancement, the Inhumans began to worry their city may be found and used anti-gravity generators to move it to a valley in the Himalayas. The Great Refuge (as it came to be known) came to the attention of world leaders after being discovered by the Fantastic Four. With the Inhumans growing ill from pollution caused by humanity, the city was moved again. This time to the Blue Area of the Moon, with permission of Uatu the Watcher.

Following Black Bolt's capture and an attack on Attilan by Skrulls, a machine developed by Maximus was utilized to send Attilan into space, powered by Black Bolt's words. Once in space, the Inhumans destroyed numerous fleeing Skrull ships before arriving at Hala. There, an assault was launched, leading to Black Bolt being declared ruler of the Kree. Attilan then settled on Hala, hovering above the Kree capitol city.

Attilan was moved over New York City and was destroyed during Thanos' invasion on Earth in the search of his secret Inhuman-descendant son, when Black Bolt unleashed a powerful attack on the Mad Titan and destroyed his home in the process. The ruins were re-purposed into New Attilan which sits in the New York Harbor.

X-Men: Age of Apocalypse Map

Author of the below write up is unknown.

NORTH AMERICA: North America is ground zero of Apocalypse's Empire. Manhattan has been conquered by his forces and lies in ruin. The skyline resembles charred matchsticks starkly jutting from a mist of billowing smoke and choking ash. Familiar landmarks such as the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building are horribly damaged. Rubble, trash, abandoned taxis, and smoldering buses clutter the streets, while vermin run unchecked. Towering above all, symbolizing Apocalypse's complete domination, stands the imposing citadel that is the mad immortal's stronghold. The eastern half of the continent, from Florida to the upper reaches of Canada, is under Apocalypse's direct control. The countryside, like New York City, has been devastated. Shopping malls are home to wild packs of dogs, the super highways are clogged with burned-out cars, and smoking human death camps known as "breeding pens" pockmark the obliterated landscape. Delegating his authority, Apocalypse has divided the western half of North America, now called "The Badlands," and assigned it to the Four Horsemen, his chosen cadre. The northwest portion of the United States and a southern section of Canada are ruled by Holocaust, Apocalypse's most powerful henchman. Mikhail Rasputin, brother of Generation Next's Colossus, controls an equal portion of land ad- joining to the east. The Great Plains and an area of southern Canada -- where many breeding pens are found -- are held by the conniving Mr. Sinister. The southwest region of the U.S. and a large portion of Mexico have fallen to the mysterious Abyss. The once proud nation known as The United States, now scarred and bleeding under the ruthless power of Apocalypse and his Four Horsemen, has been butchered. The land of the free and the home of the brave is now the land of the hunted and the home of the scared. The majority of Canada is not as heavily patrolled and is dotted with human hideouts. But the region has been heavily damaged, snow piles up unchecked, and packs of wolves roam the deserted cities. Across the northwest tip of North America, severing Canada from Alaska, snakes the monstrous Wall of Apocalypse. Cutting across thousands of miles, this fence of death blocks the "back door" human escape route which runs across the Bering Straight into Asia.

CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICA: Central America has been flooded, covered by leagues of churning sea. South America was targeted by Apocalypse-- as a measure of "genetic cleansing" -- and much of it has been pummeled by limited nuclear warheads, creating a Chernobyl-like wasteland of scorched earth, with mutated life forms and horrific radiation contamination.

ANTARCTICA: On an Antarctic peninsula somewhere below the southern tip of South America lies Avalon, the mutant haven. This hidden jungle land is the focus of much whispered speculation, yet has not been detected by Apocalypse. A small and primitive town has been constructed by those mutants in hiding here. Home to prehistoric animals and vegetation, this pocket tropic is a true savage land.

ATLANTlC AND PAClFlC OCEANS: Ringing North and South America, bisecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, stand the feared Perimeter Securify Plafforms. Spaced approximately 200 miles apart, these plat forms resemble oil rigs from hell. Their purpose: destroy anything attempting to enter or escape Apocalypse's empire.
 

The continents of Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe are held by free humans. Compared to the Americas, they appear relatively untouched, but even these faraway lands have felt the cauterizing touch of Apocalypse.

EUROPE: France, once a receiving site for humans who were lucky enough to have escaped Apocalypse's empire, is no more. The country has been bombed ruthlessly, and even Paris, the City of Lights, has been extinguished and is under hundreds of feet of water. London has been fortified as the capital of the Human Council, Big Ben now overlooks a militarized zone whose crowded streets hum with rumors and paranoia. Muir Island, off the northern tip of Scotland, is now home to the monolithic Sentinel Processing Plants. Moira MacTaggert, the island's previous occupant, constructed the plants there after she married the robots' creator, Bolivar Trask. Wundagore Mountain, once rising out of the Slavic region, is no more. The site of Apocalypse and Magneto's second monumental battle, the mysterious mountain was completely obliterated. As a result of the massive explosion for which the Master of Magnetism was in part responsible, the Earth's electromagnetic field has been severely traumatized. The resulting chain reaction caused worldwide, global natural disasters: floods, earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, and wildfires that struck simultaneously. The world's weather patterns have been subsequently disrupted, triggering unprecedented occurences of blizzards, heat waves, snowstorms, and monsoons.

AFRICA: The southwest region of Africa has been transformed into the humans' military defense region. Sentinels patrol Africa's southwest coast; behind the Sentinel region are defense lines cut into the earth by the free humans. While these precautions are necessary, the activity unfortunately has further eroded the already sparse landscape.

ASIA: Japan has also been bombed by Apocalypse into a radiated slag pile. Apocalypse targeted this island nation due to its developing economic system and growing population. Horrors like those that once befell Hiroshima and Nagasaki have now ravaged the entire country. Taken as a whole, the planet Earth physically reflects the grim mood of despair, loss, and fear which has consumed its population.