Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, despite all of its flaws, is the superhero version of an easter egg basket. Many articles have touched upon the various hidden references to not only the larger DC Universe but other films as well. However, the movie still has some surprises left and pretty big ones.
Last month I discovered a Harvey Dent easter egg that opened new possibilities for future DC films. Now, a recently discovered detail from the film may give us a clue into the larger connective tissue of the DC Universe: In Batman v Superman, it's revealed the exact date when the US government got a hold of the Mother Box that turned Victor Stone into Cyborg.
This easter egg comes during the infamous scene in which Diana Prince, a.k.a. Wonder Woman, is going through clips sent to her by Bruce Wayne, showcasing superheroes like Aquaman, Flash and Cyborg, with the latter having the lengthiest footage. Throughout the clips, we see Silas Stone through different stages as he tries to save his son, Victor Stone, and, after all else fails, Silas takes out a Mother Box to heal the young man. The interesting part comes when the scientist says:
"Dr. Silas Stone suspending all critical protocol. US gov Object 6/19/82 is... successfully activated."
Something that went unnoticed before is that those numbers are actually a date: June 19, 1982. It's then reasonable to assume that the Mother Box is labeled with the date it was found. Why is this interesting?
Back when the Justice League set visit occurred, several juicy details about the film were revealed, including the central conflict: Three Mother Boxes scattered around Earth, which were teased in the Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice Extended Edition when Steppenwolf was showing them to Lex Luthor. Charles Roven, producer of the movie, said this:
"These Mother Boxes are best used and work in threes, and back before there was a history, these Mother Boxes – this is an Amazonian Mother Box, this is Atlantean, and this is mankind. So when –again, let me just set this over here. So sort of back before history, mankind, the Atlanteans, before they were underwater, the Amazons, and actually the old gods, teamed together and decided that, based on an event that happened, these Mother Boxes were going to be placed in the care of as I said, the Amazons, mankind, and the Atlanteans. So that allowed us to get into some of those environments in our story."
So one of the Mother Boxes was entrusted to mankind. Could this 1982 date give us a clue as to what happened? The Mother Boxes were divided many, many years ago but, why did the US government got a hold of it thousands of years later? Something that I like in the DC Extended Universe and that might give us a clue for this question is the fact that many of the characters from the comics already exist.
For example, Batman had been around for 20 years when Superman first appeared; we can be sure that Oa (home of the Green Lantern Corps) is somewhere in the universe or that Black Adam existed thousands of years ago. The universe's timeline leads me to believe that someone important in the DCEU - whether they've appeared on screen or not - knows about the Mother Boxes and the bigger universe above them.
From who could have obtained this Mother Box theory, I'm excluding Amanda Waller. Viola Davis - the actress that plays her - is only 51 years old. If Waller was around the same age in Suicide Squad, that means that when the US Government got the Mother Box in 1982, Waller was only 17 years old, so she wasn't yet involved in the world of intrigue she's known for.
Suicide Squad introduced Rick Flag Jr. an important character from DC comics, played by Joel Kinnaman. With him comes the implication that his father, Rick Flag Sr. already exists. In the comic books, Flag Sr. led an early version of the Suicide Squad, called Suicide Squadron during World War II. After this, he was given the leadership of Task Force X by Mr. Harry Truman himself (33rd President of the United States).
Rick Flag Sr. is a very politically-involved character. While not a lot is known about him in the comics, he's the type of character whose backstory the DC Extended Universe could benefit from. What if he got the Mother Box for the Government? What if one of the original Task Force X's missions is retrieving the Mother Box from wherever it was? When Silas takes out the Mother Box, he calls it "US Gov.", so the government has at least some notion of what the device can do, and without a doubt, Silas was one of the scientists who examined it.
Using this angle in Justice League or a future sequel would give a more connected and balanced feel to the universe, and would also give us a pretty sweet origin for the Suicide Squad's concept.
Another theory could be that the Mother Box has been in possession of different countries. But that doesn't hold up as well, as so many people having their hands on it would open the questioning of why it was never used in its years of existence in a more civilized world. I say this because in Batman v Superman, it's shown how the Mother Box merges with Victor Stone.
Well, there you have it: We know when the US Government got a hold of a Mother Box. I'm hoping this gets explained as the easter egg does open the door for a lot of questions; the main one being: Why did the Mother Box take so long to be in the hands of the government? Where has it been? What do you think?
Do you think the Mother Box's date of recovery will be explained at all or will it be left as a cool detail to spot? What do you think it means?