The Heroes in Crisis Murder Mystery *SPOILERS AHOY*

[Bored at 3:00AM]

This is a thread devoted to the armchair detectives who want to discuss and theorize about the murder mystery aspect of Heroes in Crisis without having to wade through the inevitable ocean of posts debating its merits as a story, character deaths, the depiction of PTSD in superhero comics, Harley Quinn's fighting ability, Tom King's writing or Dan Didio's editorial priorities.

If you aren't enjoying Heroes in Crisis, that's perfectly valid, but this thread isn't for you. You are free to complain about it on any of the other Heroes in Crisis-related threads. Thank you for your understanding.

For those of you who remain, here's the ground rules. Anything already released officially by DC comics is fair fame to discuss without the need for spoiler tags. If you are participating in this thread, you are agreeing to be spoiled on anything that's out there, including published comics, interviews and promotional materials. However, any unofficial leaks or rumors that aren't meant to be public yet are not allowed. This thread is not for those sad individuals who like to sneak a peak at the final page of a murder mystery before they've finished reading the book.

No theory is too crazy, no idea is silly to be considered. This is your chance to play Sue & Ralph (or Bobo) and decipher the mystery, dismiss the red herrings, and follow the clues that will point to our murderer. Please lay out your primary suspects, evidence and reasoning as best you can. Nose twitching is not only acceptable, but encouraged.

[Jabare]

Harley did it. You saw her moves against Booster and the Trinity. Mind control? super power upgrade? who knows, but good money says Harley


I don't by Wally being the muderer at all. If anything DC will probably keep him dead


I know Skeets working for Bane but I don't think either of them could pull this off, and why would they just to annoy Batman? They could do worse.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Here's how I see it. While we are only two issues in, it's very likely that the murderer has already appeared or been mentioned given Tom King's public anxiety over readers being able to figure out his mystery too easily.

The only legit suspects from the first two issues are the following:

Harley Quinn - On the surface, she's the most obvious suspect because of her past relationship with The Joker, who's no stranger to a little mass murder here or there. As a result, that would seem to disqualify Harley because that wouldn't be particularly satisfying for readers and burden one of DC's most popular characters with being a mass murderer from now on. From a publishing point of view, that would limit Harley's ability to be seen as a sympathetic character any longer.

Booster Gold - Next to Harley, Booster is the second most obvious suspect because he's been directly accused by Harley of being the killer and he's been acting nutty for the past year. With all the chaos going on in Booster's regular turf of the timestream, Booster going crazy would make for a plausible enough explanation for a heel turn, but, again, it seems too obvious for this to sustain a nine part murder mystery.

Poison Ivy - Yes, she's dead, but as King has also said in interviews "Nobody is really dead forever in superhero comics but Uncle Ben". Ivy's plant powers would allow her to resurrect herself in a new body, or transfer her consciousness into another person, so her being dead is by no means a dis-qualifier. Since she had just been shown taking mental control over the entire world prior to this, it's entirely possible she did so again to Booster, Harley and more, and caused the massacre at Sanctuary.

Skeets - Booster's trusty AI sidekick was nowhere to be seen in issue #1, but turned up in issue #2 encouraging Booster to turn himself in. This wouldn't be the first time Skeets would be revealed as the villain, although I don't think Mr.Mind will be the man behind the curtain this time. Booster's force field not working in the first issue was flat out stated by King as being a clue. Skeets would certainly have the ability to mess with Booster's tech.

Sanctuary - We currently know little about the AI program that ran Sanctuary aside from it being created by Kryptonian tech and infused with the will of Batman, the compassion of Wonder Woman and the honor of Superman. This seems like an unlikely recipe for a mass murderer, but given the Trinity's prominence in the story thus far (and presumably the rest of the story), I can see the appeal of having the killer be revealed to be a warped unnatural combination of the protagonists' own personalities. Again, Booster's malfunctioning force field makes sense here because the Sanctuary AI could have been messing with his suit.

My current guess:

My Spidey-Sense is telling me that King is pulling an Agatha Christie and it's all of the above, but primarily a combination of Skeets and the Sanctuary AI. I think maybe Skeets was trying to once again protect Booster and tried to interface with the Santuary AI, causing a massive malfunction that pitted all the patients against each other and caused the massacre. I think there's clearly something hinky going on with Wally West though that hasn't been revealed yet. I'm certain some time-travel shenanigans will come into play at some point in this mystery.

What do you think? Am I way off-base?

[LordUltimus]

King making Ivy the killer would be weird since he was the one who established that Ivy has never killed anyone in her career.

[Jabare]

King making Ivy the killer would be weird since he was the one who established that Ivy has never killed anyone in her career.

whoa whoa whoa whoa... What?!?!?!!?

[LordUltimus]

whoa whoa whoa whoa... What?!?!?!!?

The events referred to are the War of Jokes and Riddles, an event retconned into Batman's early history by King. Ivy thought that she had killed those men and had tormented herself for years, leading into the "take over the world" thing.

[Jabare]

The events referred to are the War of Jokes and Riddles, an event retconned into Batman's early history by King. Ivy thought that she had killed those men and had tormented herself for years, leading into the "take over the world" thing.

uh okay. I'll admit I'm not really reading King's gun I jus pop in here nd there when I hear people freaking out. Interesting.

[Jabare]

Ooooooo the Sanctuary one is a good theory. I hadn't thought about that. Seems kind of like a rehash for Batman with Brother Eye or the whole evil articifal intelligence trope, but I'm okay with that.


I'm going to be underwhelmed if its Skeets I'm gonna be honest. But Booster fans might be happy because that means he gets to be the hero.

[king81992]

There is some sort of mental manipulation going on here.Booster and Harley claim that they saw the other one kill everyone else. Even if we assume that one of them is the culprit, it would be impossible for Booster or Harley to kill everyone in Sanctuary without extra help.

Since King is writing this story, there is a high chance that whatever happens here is connected to the whatever Bane is scheming in the Batman comics. We don't know the full details of the plan, but Bane's team includes Skeets(who is supposed to be Booster's buddy)and Psycho Pirate(who manipulates emotions). Skeets could have hacked Sanctuary's AI and made it kill everyone or Psycho Pirate used his powers to make everyone at Sanctuary kill each other.

The AI might also be responsible. AIs have a tendency to go rogue in comics. Assuming the AI did go rogue, did it do so on its own or was there outside interference?

I find it unusual that none of the Titans seem aware that Wally is dead. Either the JL decided to keep them out of the loop or Wally is actually alive. Depending on what the writers do, Wally being alive might be a good thing or a bad thing.

We should also consider the possibility of fake bodies coming into play. Ivy can regenerate and create new bodies via plant shenanigans and Wally has access to the Speed Force(speed clones,time shenanigans).

The fake teeth in Commander Steel's throat makes me think that the Joker is involved somehow. It just seems like something he would do, especially if his endgame is trolling Harley.

[Franny6422]

I am done 'whining'. The thread is yours. Enjoy yourselves. It's a place to discuss stuff with fellow fans. If this one isn't fun anymore, I or anyone else can just start another one. No worries.

Agreed jetengine. Sorry Bored l did have the most utmost respect for you, but you have turned this into a debacle. I jumped on the bandwagon as you were extremely rude to 'married guy.' People are discussing on this thread, and they are fellow fans. Maybe ones who have slightly different views, that's all. That last post brings the words 'rattle' & 'pram' to mind. What happens if someone posts something you don't like on any new thread? I am pleased to read that I'm not the only one concerned about your attitude. Would like to think we can all agree to disagree, and enjoy the debate. I apologise again to you 'Bored' but that was a harsh and unnecessary response to 'married guy's post in my opinion. And 'no' I don't know him. As for 'Heroes in Crisis' it has Is followers and detractors. That's good. Married guy's original post was discussing the 'murder mystery' aspect in the fact that he thought it wasn't handled well, some reason' you took exception to this and practically dismissed him. His views are just as valid as your own. May I ask, are you a moderator? If so, I'm not sure you represented yourself accordingly in your last few posts. I started a thread 'Pick & choose' when I last looked' two folk seen to be having a 'go' at one & other? Their prerogative, rather they didn't. They were way off topic, but I just read around them and enjoy. I stepped out of line recently and was reprimanded. Rightfully so. I apologised and am more mindful of other folk now. I do think you should stop being so narky (for want of a better word) and 'married guy deserves an apology. However that's up to yourself. I wish you the best and remember the words of Nolan' s Joker "Why' so serious?"

[Stingo]

I'm curious to see how King wraps it all up and I'll wait until then before I post my full review on the series. I will say there have been more "highs" on this series for me than "lows."

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Agreed jetengine. Sorry Bored l did have the most utmost respect for you, but you have turned this into a debacle. I jumped on the bandwagon as you were extremely rude to 'married guy.' People are discussing on this thread, and they are fellow fans. Maybe ones who have slightly different views, that's all. That last post brings the words 'rattle' & 'pram' to mind. What happens if someone posts something you don't like on any new thread? I am pleased to read that I'm not the only one concerned about your attitude. Would like to think we can all agree to disagree, and enjoy the debate. I apologise again to you 'Bored' but that was a harsh and unnecessary response to 'married guy's post in my opinion. And 'no' I don't know him. As for 'Heroes in Crisis' it has Is followers and detractors. That's good. Married guy's original post was discussing the 'murder mystery' aspect in the fact that he thought it wasn't handled well, some reason' you took exception to this and practically dismissed him. His views are just as valid as your own. May I ask, are you a moderator? If so, I'm not sure you represented yourself accordingly in your last few posts. I started a thread 'Pick & choose' when I last looked' two folk seen to be having a 'go' at one & other? Their prerogative, rather they didn't. They were way off topic, but I just read around them and enjoy. I stepped out of line recently and was reprimanded. Rightfully so. I apologised and am more mindful of other folk now. I do think you should stop being so narky (for want of a better word) and 'married guy deserves an apology. However that's up to yourself. I wish you the best and remember the words of Nolan' s Joker "Why' so serious?"

Totally understand why you would feel that way, but it was much ado about nothing. I wasn't replying to married guy and already apologised to anyone who felt they were being treated harshly.

For the record, this was my response to married guy's perfectly reasonable post:

"When the story is done, we can judge how good or bad of a murder mystery it was until we see how King sticks the landing."

And this was in my later reply that was not in response to married guy's post:

This isn't directed at anyone specifically. Just a general request for the hard-core HiC haters out there who keep chiming in with the exact same comments over and over again. We've heard you. You don't like Heroes in Crisis for the same reasons. Got it. Thanks.

My subsequent replies to married guy after people incorrectly assumed that post was specifically directed at married guy appear to have been deleted, but I did indeed apologize for any confusion that was caused, which was entirely my fault because I shouldn't have assumed that people would read the first post laying out the intent of the thread.

You're right that I used to be a mod, so I spent many, many years trying to keep flame wars from erupting on the old Green Lantern Forum, the Superman Forum, and the DCU Forum. Life got in the way and stepped down from CBR's mod community almost a decade ago. If it seems like I act like one at times, that would be the reason. Old habits die hard.

For the record, this thread is for anyone to do with as you will and I apologize again for any problems or offence my weird "This is a thread for people enjoying Heroes in Crisis to talk about the Murder Mystery elements" guidelines caused. When I have something more to say about Heroes in Crisis, I will start up a new thread that's less confused in its intent.

[kjn]

I myself has appreciated this thread and your efforts to keep it civil and constructive, Bored. It has served not only as a place to discuss the mystery, but also as a spot of high signal-to-noise for civil discussion on the series. Both the good parts and the bad parts of the story, because it was always kept grounded and constructive. It's only in the last week or so it broke down.

[BatmanJones]

I myself has appreciated this thread and your efforts to keep it civil and constructive, Bored. It has served not only as a place to discuss the mystery, but also as a spot of high signal-to-noise for civil discussion on the series. Both the good parts and the bad parts of the story, because it was always kept grounded and constructive. It's only in the last week or so it broke down.

Hear, hear.

[Franny6422]

Bored, could you possibly start HiC review/overview thread, for its detractors and followers. Let the debate begin. Take Care.