Discover the official location of Gotham City, the mythical city home to the most devious super-villains in the DC Comics universe.
Where is Gotham City, the fictional birthplace of Bruce Wayne aka Batman? The question has caused a lot of ink to flow!
From a comic strip published in 1978 under the title World’s Greatest Super Heroeswe learn for the first time the American state in which the city is located: New Jersey, on the east coast of the United States.
DC Comics
Also shown is official information that is not to all fans’ liking in terms of consistency, namely that Metropolis, home of Clark Kent/Superman would be located simply on the shore opposite Gotham, and that the two towns are only separated by a bridge. Lots of superheroes in a pocket square.
A more precise vision is offered to us a few years later in the n°22 of the comics The New Adventures of Superboypublished in 1981, which also tells us the location of Smallville:
DC Comics
In reality, this could for example place Gotham City at the level of Greenwich, with the Cohansey River (the Gotham River of the comics) flowing into Delaware Bay.
Google Maps
For the record, there is a real city called Gotham in the south-east of England. This name comes from the extreme contraction of “Goat’s Town”.
But back to the fictional town. It’s obviously easier for comic book writers to have some leeway as to the exact location of Gotham City, in order to retain some creative freedom and be able to overcome the limitations posed by clearly locating the city on a map.
Wherever it is located, fictional Gotham attracts the worst criminals Batman has ever had to fight. But why here and not elsewhere? Is this all just the Dark Knight’s fault? Your keyboards !