Resurrection Ambivalence

[ducklord]

In super-hero comics, just about everyone who dies eventually gets resurrected, particularly if they're one of the spandex-wearing characters. Whether by retcon, reboot, or good ol' fashioned editorial incompetence, deaths just don't stick.

In the vast majority of these cases, these resurrections are welcome events. Often times comic book deaths aren't written well, done for shock value, or just plain suck. By and large, fans don't really complain when a badly-written story is unwound to undo a dumb death, or a redemption/resurrection arc culminates after several long years.

And yet, there are those resurrections that give pause. And while I would never be the kind of fan who would say "that character should never have come back" ('cause EVERY character is someone's favorite), there are a few DC resurrections that, to this day, I'm somewhat ambivalent about...

Vic Sage
I love Vic Sage. Full stop. From the trench coat to Hub City, from Myra to Tot, from O'Neil to the JLU. Everything about him rocks.

And yet, everything about the transition from Vic Sage to Renee Montoya also rocked. Vic really and truly seemed to reach the organic end of his story, as he finally ascended to his rightful place as a master passing along knowledge to his student, before imparting one more lesson with his death. It worked. And sure, he died just outside Nanda Parabat, where magical stuff happens, but his death seemed final and appropriate.

And now he's just... alive (and fairly inexplicably, at that). And while I enjoy the fact that he's around again, and that there are two Questions bouncing around the DCU, Renee's story is so tied up in Vic's death that it just kind of feels... off. So, I'm ambivalent.

Jason Todd
On the one hand Jason Todd's death was horrible. Done in by fan-polling (with possible ballot-stuffing on DC's part), he's a darned good example of a "bad" death that inevitably would get reversed.

And yet... as a corpse Jason became a darned good symbol for Batman's fallibility over the years. He was a persistent ache in Bruce's bones, a reminder that things could always go wrong. And it gave the Joker some additional street cred.

Jason's been back for a number of years now. His resurrection was not handled well (teased in Hush, eventually made real via a Superboy-Prime bunch, then much later given a "this is how it actually happened" explanation), but since then he's stood on his own two feet and regained a solid fan base. But I still wonder if he was better for the Bat-family as a corpse. Again, I'm ambivalent.

Barry Allen
The Flash was one of the first comics I subscribed to back in the late 70's, right around the time that Iris was killed. To say that I'm a Barry Allen fan is an understatement... I'm more of a freak.

And yet... Barry died well, smeared across the length and breadth of the Crisis on Infinite Earths. His successor was the first DC sidekick to completely and successfully take over for his mentor, holding the job for over two decades. Barry's stature as the Patron Saint of the DCU became legendary during his absence. When he returned in Final Crisis, it did not appear that fans were exactly clamoring for his resurrection. Unlike Hal Jordan's resurrection, which was arguably necessitated by How He Had Been Done Wrong, Barry's return felt like more of an "okay, I guess?"

Worse, Barry's return arguably messed up the Flash franchise for almost a decade. Wally West got shoved to the side, forgotten, and subjected to Heroes in Crisis. Various other speedsters in the Flash family were killed or forgotten. Barry's retconned mama-death directly led into Flashpoint, about which the less said the better. We've finally gotten to a point where the Wally/Barry situation is *finally* in a state in which fans are generally pleased (although Barry seems to have been sidelined in a pocket universe until the next Crisis), but I often wonder whether it was worth it. Big time ambivalence.

How about the rest of y'all? Are there any DC resurrections that YOU feel kind of "meh" about?

[Timothy Hunter]

Jason's return as Red Hood would have been far more powerful if he died at the end of Under the Red Hood. A reminder how the world of superheroes could scar someone irreparably. There also should have been a degree of ambiguity of whether or not it was the real Jason.

This is just my personal taste, most fans seem to like Jason as the anti hero Red Hood.

[D.Z]

I rather they rarely use deaths and rebirths again. Marvel does them so much I'm surprised characters on pages act like someone is dead forever, when you know they will be back.

[ducklord]

I rather they rarely use deaths and rebirths again. Marvel does them so much I'm surprised characters on pages act like someone is dead forever, when you know they will be back.

That would be ideal, yes.

I think the resurrections that bother me the most are the ones where the deaths were dramatically well-earned, long-lasting, and impactful. That's kind of the problem with Barry Allen's return, in my opinion.

I'd probably feel the same about Tara Markov coming back. She's not back, is she?

[Buried Alien]

Only universally unpopular characters stay dead. If they have any kind of fan base, they're coming back.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[CaptCleghorn]

Barry Allen
The Flash was one of the first comics I subscribed to back in the late 70's, right around the time that Iris was killed. To say that I'm a Barry Allen fan is an understatement... I'm more of a freak.

And yet... Barry died well, smeared across the length and breadth of the Crisis on Infinite Earths. His successor was the first DC sidekick to completely and successfully take over for his mentor, holding the job for over two decades. Barry's stature as the Patron Saint of the DCU became legendary during his absence. When he returned in Final Crisis, it did not appear that fans were exactly clamoring for his resurrection. Unlike Hal Jordan's resurrection, which was arguably necessitated by How He Had Been Done Wrong, Barry's return felt like more of an "okay, I guess?"

Worse, Barry's return arguably messed up the Flash franchise for almost a decade. Wally West got shoved to the side, forgotten, and subjected to Heroes in Crisis. Various other speedsters in the Flash family were killed or forgotten. Barry's retconned mama-death directly led into Flashpoint, about which the less said the better. We've finally gotten to a point where the Wally/Barry situation is *finally* in a state in which fans are generally pleased (although Barry seems to have been sidelined in a pocket universe until the next Crisis), but I often wonder whether it was worth it. Big time ambivalence.

Barry's death and Wally taking over the mantle was for me, the defining moment of Crisis. Jay was the Golden Age, Barry was the Silver, and now the new age for DC was Wally. It was a powerful meta moment telling fans that this really was a new age and things weren't the same, not by a long shot. I read Wally's book for a few years and was impressed with his growth in that time.

[D.Z]

That would be ideal, yes.

I think the resurrections that bother me the most are the ones where the deaths were dramatically well-earned, long-lasting, and impactful. That's kind of the problem with Barry Allen's return, in my opinion.

I'd probably feel the same about Tara Markov coming back. She's not back, is she?

Tara's death was erased in Nu52. Post rebirth nobody knows what her status quo is.

[king81992]

That would be ideal, yes.

I think the resurrections that bother me the most are the ones where the deaths were dramatically well-earned, long-lasting, and impactful. That's kind of the problem with Barry Allen's return, in my opinion.

I'd probably feel the same about Tara Markov coming back. She's not back, is she?

Terra is alive, but she hasn't shown up since Death Metal.