The Heroes in Crisis Murder Mystery *SPOILERS AHOY*

[Bored at 3:00AM]

I posted a collection of observations here, but it seems like the site logged me out during the long edit time. So I've re-entered them here instead:

http://rikdad.blogspot.com/2018/11/h...signs-and.html

Oooo, Christmas has come early! Thanks Rikdad. Your thoughts are always eagerly anticipated.

[Rikdad]

Thanks. Many good ideas in this thread already, following paths such as Nemesis that are really intriguing, and ought to go somewhere. I'm significantly more excited about the series after issue #3 and reading people's thoughts here.

[numberthirty]

I posted a collection of observations here, but it seems like the site logged me out during the long edit time. So I've re-entered them here instead:

http://rikdad.blogspot.com/2018/11/h...signs-and.html

All I have to add are some observations from lining up, side-by-side, events where the three issues have given us at least two accounts. There are numerous inconsistencies. (That's not to say that they are all contradictory: There are various ways to explain these.) The location of Roy and Wally has been mentioned, but there are also these:

1) The trio of greeter androids inside the house is an older couple (who resemble the Kents) and a younger woman. In HIC #1, the younger woman is black. In HIC #3, she is white with red hair in a ponytail.

2) The cluster of dead heroes outside the house is considerably different in HIC #1 and HIC #3. Lagoon Boy and Hotspot are feet-together in #1 but heads-together in #3. Those around them include Commander Steel in #1 and Red Devil in #3. Basically none of the details match.

3) Wally's costume leg is ripped in #1. In #3, he's killed with a single blow to the head. There'd be no reason for his costume leg to become ripped.

4) Obviously, Booster and Harley contradict one another, each saying that the other did it.

5) Booster's memory and recordings are inconsistent. At the time he apparently sees Harley kill Wally, he says that it's his first day there. The session recordings are not the same, and in one, he says that it's his first day. If all of these scenes are real and on the level, then he must have made two recordings introducing himself on the same day. (There are many other explanations.) Harley says that she didn't know he was there and his explanation is that it's his first day.

6) Booster and Harley have scratches/cuts, and costume tears in #1, but none when they meet in #3. Perhaps we missed a fight between them, but it would seem odd for any of Booster's weapons or tactics to give Harley scratches.

7) The shadows fall in almost opposite directions when Booster arrives at the house in #3 and when Superman arrives in #1. This is probably just an error, but it could indicate sunrise vs. sunset.

8) Ivy's testimony in #3 involves a direct and immediate contradiction/correction/refinement of how long she's been there when she says "A week. Nine days." We don't know if that recording and the one seen in #2 are from the same session or not. It seems that the one in #2, coinciding with Harley's arrival, must likely be shortly before the murders. This makes it odd that she is still explaining her justification for being there, nine or more days after her arrival. There's no direct contradiction here, but it calls into question the soundness of Ivy's thoughts.

9) Booster's costume is intact after Skeets wakes him up, despite the tears and injuries earlier. Perhaps Skeets' technology includes costume repair.

10) Booster's memory of the session where he's talking to a virtual copy of himself indicates that the attack began when he was not present, another contradiction of Harley's assertion that Booster committed the murders.

Obviously, this is a lot of contradiction, and it's got to be resolved. A lot could be resolved in one tidy package if we simply find out that Booster is delusional. More could be resolved if we find out that someone rearranged the crime scene.

I think we're a long way away from answers here. Neither Booster nor Harley is the killer in the simplest sense: The solicits for #5 and #6 indicate that someone or something corrupted the Sanctuary AI and the Sanctuary AI, by giving the heroes counterproductive "therapy" made their problems worse rather than better, until one or more of them snapped. The villain stands a good chance of being someone we haven't even seen on-panel yet. A bug in the software owing to Batman's paranoia (see the kryptonite in the belt) would be a plausible explanation except that's just what the Brother Eye plot was.

I'm glad we've got six issues to go. There's a long way to go for the mystery, and we haven't gotten very deep into the psychology yet.

..........

[Jody Garland]

Referencing Power Boy and Little Barda from that old titans issue from years ago that barely anyone remembers was weird and out of nowhere

Like what was the point?

I took it as a deconstruction of the 'massacre' issue type, like what happens in Titans East Special #1 or Stormwatch/Aliens, a serious look at the sort of survivor guilt would ensue.

This issue was mostly to flesh out the various victims, particularly poor Wally West, who was just so, so sad. I'm not sure how that stuff plays for anyone who doesn't know what his backstory is, but it is just heartbreaking. His death seems to a mallet to the back of the head by Harley Quinn, but then King lets the real shoe drop in the final panel...

Nemesis. The master of disguise.

I see what you did there Tom King, you sneaky bastard...

I'm sticking with my Skeets/AI causing everyone to go crazy and kill each other in VR theory for now, but Nemesis is a nice monkey wrench to throw in there.

His positioning on the last page really cements it. He's the wham panel, the moment it all fits together, even if imperfectly at the moment.

[Buried Alien]

Anyone suspect that the dead heroes are actually on some kind of VERY deep cover mission that requires them to fake their deaths, even to their closest loved ones? Maybe the whole thing is a shell game to draw out and capture a dangerous enemy, requiring the specific skills and experiences of the chosen heroes and that their friends and allies must NOT interfere with, lest they mess up carefully laid plans that do not include them.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Jody Garland]

I hadn't thought of that particular scenario, though with Nemesis being included, it makes some sense. Remember, he was an important member of the early John Ostrander Suicide Squad...

[Arsenal]

If it was somewhere else than maybe, but I don’t think faking a massacre at a secret hero mental health facility is the best place to launch a deep covert operation.

[Buried Alien]

If it was somewhere else than maybe, but I don’t think faking a massacre at a secret hero mental health facility is the best place to launch a deep covert operation.

It might in this specific circumstance: EVERYBODY, friend and foe alike, might need to believe that those heroes are actually dead until the operation is successfully executed. This is especially difficult to pull off because they need to be able to fool Batman, among others.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[BatmanJones]

Referencing Power Boy and Little Barda from that old titans issue from years ago that barely anyone remembers was weird and out of nowhere

Like what was the point?

I believe the point was to show the trauma that plagues him every moment of his life. That's what he said anyway.

[BatmanJones]

I don't think Nemesis is the big bad, but he's definitely going to playing a role in whatever bad joojoo went down at Sanctuary.

The last time Nemesis was around was when he was Wonder Woman's love interest because DC was still saddled with Perez's shortsighted idea that Steve Trevor shouldn't be with Diana (who must forever remain viginal and pure), so he aged Steve up to his 40s/50s, then married him off to Etta Candy. Gail Simone followed through with that notion until JMS was brought on board to shake things up, but ended up simply driving away absolutely everyone. As far as I know, Tom Tresser hasn't been seen since.

So, thanks to time shenanigans of the DCU that so tragically destroyed Wally West's life and led him to Sanctuary, Nemesis got Wonder Woman snatched away from him. If I am correct, the parallels between Wally & Tom's tragedies of having their loved ones torn from their lives due to the ever-shifting timestream would dovetail nicely with Booster & Skeets, as well as Harley's own tragic actions related to love.

It's still early yet, and Tom King is playing this mystery close to the vest, but the clues are definitely there.

Great work! Same to Rikdad! Thanks, guys.

[numberthirty]

Anyone suspect that the dead heroes are actually on some kind of VERY deep cover mission that requires them to fake their deaths, even to their closest loved ones? Maybe the whole thing is a shell game to draw out and capture a dangerous enemy, requiring the specific skills and experiences of the chosen heroes and that their friends and allies must NOT interfere with, lest they mess up carefully laid plans that do not include them.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

I hadn't thought of that particular scenario, though with Nemesis being included, it makes some sense. Remember, he was an important member of the early John Ostrander Suicide Squad...

Let alone that there was a rumor that a certain someone from this series will wind up in a relaunch of Suicide Squad.

It feels like it's either something like what Buried Alien mentioned, or that character might have in accidentally killed everyone here.

Might even explain Harley having to be a part of the title.

[Naked Bat]

I knew someone would have beaten me to the punch on this one and I'm totally unsurprised it was @Bored at 3:00AM.

May be a red herring but that felt to me like we were being told to suspect him.

Very little commentary about that final panel. I speculate it's because the character has been in limbo for so long. But Nemesis can look like anyone. Could easily have been him when we thought we saw Harley hitting Wally with a hammer and he could have easily been any of the characters we've seen. He's like Clayface that way.

Skeets has been my prime suspect until this issue. But that Nemesis panel did indeed feel like the big reveal of the issue.

As for the rest of the issue, I have never in my life identified with so many different kinds of trauma in a comic book. This issue made me cry several times, not for the loss of beloved heroes (though that's hard to take) but for how personally I took the situations of Lagoon Boy, Booster, not to mention the Trinity's or Blue Jay's testimonials, which I also identified with. I feel like I've essentially described each of their arcs as shown in HiC while talking about myself over many years of therapy.

To each his own but Tom King is writing superhero comics that hit home with me much more strongly than any prior comic book writer. Not saying he's the best ever or anything, only that I've never before taken comic books quite this personally.

It does feel true, it's written with care and respect. I hope the outcome of the story gives closure, not only to the characters, but to the reader as well.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Yeah, I think that Suicide rumor is looking more and more plausible by the moment...

[Denirac]

Yeah, I think that Suicide rumor is looking more and more plausible by the moment...

“This Deal is getting worse all the time”

[failo.legendkiller]

I knew someone would have beaten me to the punch on this one and I'm totally unsurprised it was @Bored at 3:00AM.

May be a red herring but that felt to me like we were being told to suspect him.

Very little commentary about that final panel. I speculate it's because the character has been in limbo for so long. But Nemesis can look like anyone. Could easily have been him when we thought we saw Harley hitting Wally with a hammer and he could have easily been any of the characters we've seen. He's like Clayface that way.

Skeets has been my prime suspect until this issue. But that Nemesis panel did indeed feel like the big reveal of the issue.

As for the rest of the issue, I have never in my life identified with so many different kinds of trauma in a comic book. This issue made me cry several times, not for the loss of beloved heroes (though that's hard to take) but for how personally I took the situations of Lagoon Boy, Booster, not to mention the Trinity's or Blue Jay's testimonials, which I also identified with. I feel like I've essentially described each of their arcs as shown in HiC while talking about myself over many years of therapy.

To each his own but Tom King is writing superhero comics that hit home with me much more strongly than any prior comic book writer. Not saying he's the best ever or anything, only that I've never before taken comic books quite this personally.

I always love the positivity you have torwards the comics you're reading. Sometimes, often i would say, I'm not in the same mood as you, but reading your posts push me to try not to abandon me to easy complaints and look forward with renewed enthusiasm. So thank you BatmanJones