Tuesday 10: Comic Book Deaths

Death in comic books means nothing. We all know that. Beyond the fact that "death" rarely sticks (even the "characters what never ever came back!" are starting to come back now), c'mon... let's not forget that these are fictional characters, most of whom aren't known by anyone who doesn't read comics (meaning: most everyone). But while the deaths of these particular characters might indeed be meaningless in an existential sense, they still had an effect on me and, I'd wager, many others. Presenting Ten Comic Book Deaths Which Touched Me In Some Small But Signficant Way:

Phoenix (Uncanny X-Men #137, 1980). (The first time only, please.) I was pretty new to the X-verse when Jean sacrificed herself to save the universe: I had only started reading UXM with issue 135, the tail end of the Dark Phoenix Saga, and the tragic, confused, supremely-powerful Jean Grey was already one of my favorite characters. UXM #136's cliffhanger, with most of the X-Men disappearing into space, gripped me in such a way I was sure I would die before #137 came out. Little did I realize, however, that Uncanny X-Men #137 was a double-sized issue, meaning that the local 7-11 where I bought my comics wouldn't carry it; I didn't catch on to that fact until #138 came out. And when I opened that issue and saw all those somber X-faces standing over Jean's tombstone... well, nine-year-old me took that hit pretty hard, I've gotta tell you.

Captain America (Captain America v3 #25, 2007). By no means do I believe Cap's death is going to last long-term, but I have to give Ed Brubaker and Steve Epting credit for pulling off such a high-profile event with such skill. The stories being told in Cap's series after his death have been just as riveting, if not moreso, than those being told when he was alive.

Guardian (Alpha Flight v1 #12, 1983). Ah, the glorious spoiler-free advance-solicitation-free pre-Internet days. The cover of Alpha Flight #12 told us straight up that one of the Alphans would be biting it in that issue, and knowing that death was coming for one of the team had me almost in terror while reading this issue. As I got closer and closer to the end and it seemed more and more obvious that John Byrne had pegged Jim Hudson to die, I couldn't believe it: "No way can he kill Guardian!" thought I. "He's the team leader! The star of the book!" But kill him Byrne did, and in a way that I'm sure must have impressed on the mind of young Joss Whedon, too: Jim knows he's only got seconds left to keep his cybernetic suit from self-destructing -- and then his wife, Heather, comes in and distracts his attention, causing the suit to explode and consume Jim in front of her. Meaning that Heather had to watch her husband die and know that she effectively killed him. Powerful stuff, both for Heather Hudson... and for me.

Blue Devil/Amazing Man/Crimson Fox (Starman #38, 1998). OK, sure, Blue Devil didn't stay dead for long, and yeah, I might be the only person on the planet who actually misses Amazing Man... but still, the brtual efficiency with which Jack Knight's nemesis The Mist dispatched this newly-formed Justice League Europe -- just to prove she could -- was almost sickening to behold. [1]

Robin (Jason Todd) (Batman #428, 1988). I didn't particularly care that the Joker murdered Jason Todd -- I'd never really much cared for the second Robin, apparently much like the many, many people who called DC's special 900-number voting for him to die. But I was pretty shocked that DC actually went through with his death, not only because the character of Robin is so iconic (the mainstream press surely wouldn't have recognized that the Robin who died wasn't the one from the old Batman TV show, the only touchstone they seem to have for the Batman characters) but because they were murdering a kid. In a way it would've been less shocking had the Joker offed Batman... though they would've found a way to bring Bats back within months, instead of the nearly twenty years it took to bring back Jason Todd.

Alex DeWitt (Green Lantern v3 #54, 1994). When Ron Marz took over the book and introduced Kyle Rayner as the new Green Lantern, he also introduced Alex, Kyle's good-hearted, funny, beautiful, very likable girlfriend... and then three issues later had her killed by uber-baddie Major Force and had her corpse shoved into a refrigerator. Alex's death was shocking, yes, giving Kyle the "Uncle Ben" motivation to become a great hero -- but there was a bigger positive to come from her death: the birth several years later of the Women In Refrigerators site, which both pointed out how poorly female characters in comics are treated... and gave the comics industry the vastly talented Gail Simone.

The Flash II (Crisis on Infinite Earths #8, 1985). Barry Allen was my first-ever favorite superhero (and only partially because of that wonderful last name), and his death in the first Crisis really upset me. I read this issue standing in a drugstore in Brookhaven, Mississippi -- I had no idea his death was coming, and I spent the bike ride back to my dad's apartment all kinds of bummed out at the loss of the Flash. (Note to DC: please please don't ever bring Barry back.)

Maxwell Lord (Wonder Woman v2 #219, 2005). This one's actually less for the murdered than the murderer -- Wonder Woman demonstrated exactly how dedicated to The Greater Good she really is by giving the retconned-into-pure-evil Lord a nice view of his own posterior, a move which truly was significant from both a character standpoint and a plot standpoint. Part of DC head honcho Dan Didio's campaign to eliminate most of the Giffen/DeMatteis Justice League, as was the event which precipitated it:

Blue Beetle II (Countdown to Infinite Crisis, 2004). It's not often that a well-liked, if second-string, superhero gets his brains blown out by a former teammate who's been retconned into being pure evil. I'd say that losing Ted Kord was a waste of a perfectly good character... if it weren't for the fact that his replacement's an interesting, entertaining character in his own right, probably the best new character to come out of Infinite Crisis.

Cypher (New Mutants #60, 1987). Doug Ramsey held an "everyman" place within the New Mutants since his powers (the ability to instantly understand all languages, human and computer) were entirely intellectual. Unfortunately for Doug, "entirely intellectual" superpowers don't do a whole lot to stop bullets. But Doug's sacrifice (he died to save teammate/girlfriend Wolfsbane) isn't the reason for his inclusion on this list: the incredibly creepy "Warlock takes possession of Doug's corpse and tries to reanimate it" storyline which followed is. I mean, c'mon... what the hell, Claremont?!

[1] During research for this post, I read that James Robinson hadn't intended to off three heroes in one issue, but editor Dan Raspler encouraged him to get rid of some unused characters. If the characters aren't being used, couldn't you just leave them in limbo for when someone inevitably thinks of something interesting to do with them later on? Hell, shouldn't Amazing Man be in the Justice Society at this point?