Rules of this very trainspotter-y game

I’m going to explain aspects of my methodology here— which is to say, what guidelines are employed to assign kounterparts…

Kounterparts must come from a similar place of origin
Mainly, this comes into play when two characters both come from elsewhere, shall we say: extraterrestrials will be paired with extraterrestrials, visitors from mystic realms are paired with same, characters from a particular country are assigned together (two very similar countries will suffice). This guideline, like all guidelines, will only occasionally be ignored.

Notions of ethnicity and of class are fluid; age less so; but gender is inviolable
An African-American can be paired with a non African-American. A character with roots in the WWII era, for instance, can paired with a character originating in later decades. But a female cannot be paired with a male.

There are too many mutants in the MU for that particular distinction to be obstructive
In the 1980s, Marvel went bananas with the mutants. So many characters are now assigned as such that it’d be counterproductive to be observed across the board (in any case, DC PTB established that tons of their characters are “meta-humans,” i.e. humans born with a extra-normal gene that could result in extraordinary abilities, i.e. “mutants").

There are too many sidekicks/”legacy” characters in the DCU for that particular distinction to be obstructive
Dick Grayson, Wally West, Roy Harper and Donna Troy were all conceived as junior versions of their mentors. But they’ve each existed long enough as distinct characters that to observe “creator intent” in this case would be again counterproductive across the board.

There are too many rich guys and scientists taking on super-heroic guises in the DCU for that particular distinction to be obstructive
Although there is one particular rich scientist in the MU who is not paired with an equivalent along those lines in the DCU: that one is imperfect, and may be subject to change eventually.

Family ties are much too prevalent in both diasporas to be obstructive
Sometimes family relations will be observed, but most often will not.

Characters are paired based on similarity and significance “in universe”
Spider-Man and Superman are the premiere brands, if you will, of Marvel and DC. But (beside the fact that both work for major metropolitan newspapers), they have almost nothing else in common.

Similarly, superhuman abilities are not the be all and end all of how characters are paired together
I find myself more interested in equivalent characterizations than, for instance, whether a shape-shifter is paired another shape-shifter, or a "brick" is paired with another "brick," etc etc…

The parallel universes conceit will not be obstructive
Nuff said, pilgrim…

More to come…