With the huge announcement from DC last week regarding Grant Morrison's Batman: The Return of Bruce Wayne, I thought it might be high time to take a look back at some of the best examples of one of the most well known comic cliches: resurrection of deceased characters. With Blackest Night and the revolving door of death front and center right now in the DCU, what better time is there to count of the company's best death and return stories?
While there are oodles of superheroes and villains that have been slain only to return from beyond, be it literally or through a clever retcon that alters continuity, it would be too easy for such a talented list-maker like myself to construct a "worst resurrections" article. Hell, if any Joe Citizen on the street randomly hollered at me to name those names, I'd spout them off rapid fire (Jason Todd, Steve Rogers, Aunt May, Wally West, Connor Kent, Bart Allen...). Instead, I wanted to look at the more carefully constructed and clever resurrections to hit our beloved superhero comics.
5. Barry Allen
Death: Barry ran faster than he ever had in order to stop the Anti Monitor from firing his weapon in Crisis on Infinite Earths, and became one with the Speed Force. Ouch.
Death: Barry ran faster than he ever had in order to stop the Anti Monitor from firing his weapon in Crisis on Infinite Earths, and became one with the Speed Force. Ouch.
Return: Making his reemergence in Final Crisis #2, Barry Allen came back with a vengeance in one of the best moments of that series, barreling through time chasing the bullet that was headed to kill Orion. Though his return was teased months earlier with the 50 cent special DC Universe #0 (in conjunction with those assholes at the New York Daily News that like to print spoilers), that didn't make his debut any less exciting, especially considering that he was one of comics' longest dead characters.
Unfortunately for him, as idle as he's been for the last quarter of a century, Barry was thrust right out of one DC-line event into the next, dying in Crisis and returning dead center in Final Crisis, rocketing straight into Blackest Night.
4. Oliver Queen
Death: Oliver Queen died saving Metropolis from a terrorist organization attempting to detonate a massive bomb.
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Return: Courtesy of clever retconning, Kevin Smith brought Ollie back to life in the relaunch of Green Arrow back in 2001, by having The Spectre Hal Jordan revive Ollie's body, albeit soulless, a few years prior to the beginning of the "Quiver" storyline. Ollie has no memories of his life after (and including) Mike Grell's The Longbow Hunters, and is left searching for his place in the world he's found himself in.
Ollie's return is awesome because Smith somehow weaved in the magical elements of the DCU, such as Etrigan, who attempted to use Ollie's soulless body as a vessel to return to Earth. In response, Hal Jordan's Spectre sends Ollie to heaven in an effort to convince his soul to return with him to Earth. Along the way of course, there is father/son drama and black arts worshipping cultists.
3. Crispus Allen
Death: Allen was murdered by dirty GCPD crime scene technician Jim Corrigan upon his discovery of Corrigan's dirty dealings.
Return: Okay, so this one is a little cheap, but Crispus' return as the newest vessel for The Spectre back in Infinite Crisis was an epic turn of events for a character that was firmly rooted in one of DC's most gritty (and best) series, Gotham Central. Allen was always a character that had issues with faith, so watching him rise from the dead to become, unwillingly, the hand of judgement for God was both cruelly ironic and utterly awesome.
Case in point, when Allen's own son Marcus attempts to avenge his father's death by killing Corrigan, Allen is forced to pass judgment on him as The Spectre, killing him. The pleasure of seeing a tough cop character in such an out-there role in the greater DCU tickles my nerd bone, but also makes me question my own morality from finding so much joy in such a terrible string of events.
2. Kal-El
Death: Superman died in the bout to save his beloved Metropolis from the Kryptonian steroid king Doomsday in an epic battle of fisticuffs.
Return: While the media picked up the story as though it was the second coming of Jesus, comic fans knew that "The Death of Superman" was simply the next evolution of the Clark Kent saga. Being the iconic figurehead that he is, brining Superman back from the dead couldn't be a half-assed affair. Enter "Reign of the Supermen". While keeping Supes on the slab, the architects of the epic storyline introduced four different characters that were potentially Kal-El's permanent replacement, or perhaps even the hero himself.
Steel, Kon-El, The Eradicator and Cyborg Superman all have their roots in this story, and though none of them turned out to be the one true Superman, they wound up being very important new characters in the DCU and a strong addition to the Superman mythos. Plus, Clark returned from the dead with a mullet, and that's just awesome.
1. Hal Jordan
Death: In the battle against the Sun-Eater in The Final Night, Hal Jordan, as Parallax, sacrifices his life in order to reignite the sun.
Return: Jordan suffered one of the most epic falls from grace that any comic hero has ever seen, descending from being the iconic Silver Age Green Lantern to becoming Parallax, a selfish being crushed by the destruction of his city, looking to remake time the way he saw fit. However, after his death, Jordan's soul was bonded with DC's resident omnipresent being The Spectre, which he used as a path to redemption. Along with some crafty retconning, making Parallax a living alien entity that inhabited Jordan's body, Jordan was on the road to becoming DC's poster boy in the 2000's.
Finally, in Green Lantern: Rebirth, Jordan's successor to the Lantern mantle, Kyle Rayner, took a day trip into the sun to retrieve Jordan's body. After doing so, the Guardian Ganthet was able to guide Jordan's soul back into his mortal body as it becomes untethered from The Spectre, thus resulting in all of the Geoff Johns GL goodness we are still enjoying today, right up to the most recent issue of Blackest Night. Once again, Johns proves he is a master of making conflicting pieces of continuity fit perfectly in line.
