Infinite Crisis
Infinite Crisis is the title of a seven-issue comic book limited series published by DC Comics beginning in October 2005. It is written by Geoff Johns, with art by Phil Jimenez and George Perez. Each issue features two different covers, one drawn by George Pérez (who also guest-pencilled on the series itself, in particular in pages that featured the Flash), and another by Jim Lee and Sandra Hope.
Infinite Crisis is the sequel to Marv Wolfman and George Perez's successful 1985 12-issue limited series Crisis on Infinite Earths. In addition to the similar name, it reintroduces or revisits characters and concepts last seen in the earlier series, including the existence of a multiverse with alternate versions of iconic characters (such as the Golden Age Superman, Kal-L). One of the major themes is the nature of heroism, contrasting the "darker" and conflicted heroes of recent years with memories of "lighter," more noble, collegial heroes of the past.
Although the first issue of Infinite Crisis was released on October 12 2005, the plot threads, and various precursors, had been explored for a long time in many major events, such as the 2004 seven-issue limited series Identity Crisis. DC officially began leading up with Countdown to Infinite Crisis, a one-shot issue written by Geoff Johns, Greg Rucka, and Judd Winick. Afterwards, four distinct six-issue limited series intended solely to tie-in to Infinite Crisis were launched. A trade paperback entitled Prelude to Infinite Crisis, released in late June 2005, collects a number of earlier story references to Infinite Crisis.
DC has announced that after the fifth issue of Infinite Crisis, in March 2006, nearly all ongoing series set in the DC Universe will jump forward a year. Referred to by the company as "One Year Later," it was designed to give the writers of these series an opportunity to make substantial changes in the situations of their ongoing stories. A weekly series titled 52 is scheduled to begin publication in May 2006, to fill in that missing year in "real time."
Synopses
Infinite Crisis #1
The series begins in the aftermath of the leadup mini-series and several stories in other titles. The Justice League Watchtower has been destroyed, Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman are feuding, the OMACs are hunting down heroes and villains alike, a space-time rift opens in the center of the universe where Oa used to be as the Guardians of the Universe lay down their duty, the Spectre is hunting and destroying magic, and the villains of the DC world have banded together into the Secret Society of Supervillains, killing prominent heroes like several of the Freedom Fighters.
In response to this, Kal-L, the Superman of Earth-Two breaks out of the "paradise" dimension in which he departed at the end of Crisis on Infinite Earths, accompanied by Lois Lane of Earth-Two, Superboy of Earth-Prime, and Alexander Luthor, Jr. of Earth-Three.
Infinite Crisis #2
The Secret Society of Super-Villains attempts to capture Power Girl, but are defeated by Kal-L, who takes Power Girl to his companions, and her memories of Earth-Two are restored.
Meanwhile, the Joker apparently kills the Royal Flush Gang when he learns he is not invited to join the Secret Society.
Kal-L declares his intentions to Power Girl: to reverse the action made during the Crisis on Infinite Earths which saved Earth-One, and bring about the return of Earth-Two, so that his Lois can recover and the world can return to, from his point of view, its previous heroic and ideal state.
Infinite Crisis #3
As the OMAC attack on Themyscira intensifies, the Amazons make use of a new weapon, the Purple Ray of Death. Diana orders the weapon shut down when she realizes that Brother Eye is broadcasting the assault across the world in order to discredit her and her nation further. Quickly diverting the OMACs away from the Amazon armies, Diana orders her sisters to retreat. As they gather on the shoreline of Themyscira, Diana calls on Athena to send Paradise Island into another dimension. Diana, however, remains behind to battle the OMACs, never able to return to her home.
Power Girl struggles with whether to support the returned heroes, knowing that Earth-Two must be restored for Earth-Two's Lois Lane to live.
Kal-L visits Batman to enlist his support, stating that the mistrust and hostility Batman has developed — leading him to create the Brother Eye satellite — was because of the inherent "darker" nature of Earth-One. Upon learning the full genocidal implications of this Superman's plan, Batman refuses to cooperate and attacks Kal-L with a kryptonite ring. As Kal-L came from a Krypton of another dimension, this attack proves ineffective. Kal-L, dissapointed, incinerates the ring and leaves.
After the encounter, Batman learns that it was Earth-Prime's Superboy who intercepted the Martian Manhunter when the JLA Watchtower exploded. Meanwhile, the two Luthors confront each other, only to have the blue-eyed Luthor reveal himself as Earth-Three's Alexander Luthor. Power Girl learns that Alex and Superboy have created a machine, using kidnapped heroes and villains—including Breach, Lady Quark, The Ray II, Martian Manhunter, Black Adam, Nightshade, as well as the remains of the Anti-Monitor (this would seem to be a plothole, as Crisis On Infinite Earths #12 shows clearly there are no remains)—presumably to restore Earth-Two. However, Alexander and Superboy may very well have another agenda in mind as well since Alexander states that Earth-Two is just a step along the way.
Infinite Crisis #4
Meanwhile, another survivor of the multiverse, Donna Troy, gathers a group of heroes (including but not limited to Alan Scott, Animal Man, Air Wave (Harold Jordan), Jade, Starfire, Herald, Firestorm (Jason Rusch), Supergirl and Cyborg) to New Cronus for a mission into space to fight an unknown menace to the cosmos in the location of the rift. A major conflict breaks out in the vicinity of the rift, and Jason Rusch's partner Mick apparently overexerts himself and dies, causing Firestorm to be divided into both individuals, but the Elemental Firestorm, Martin Stein, saves Jason Rusch from death and bonds with him to become a new Firestorm. On Earth, a young man discovers the blue scarab formerly owned by the Blue Beetle and thrown from the Rock of Eternity when it exploded over Gotham City. Beetle's best friend, Booster Gold, returns from the 25th Century, searching for the Scarab, which is revealed to have attached itself to the young man.
Chemo is dropped on Blüdhaven by the Brotherhood of Evil, killing more than 100,000 people. Batman shows Nightwing the recordings of Superboy-Prime attacking the Martian Manhunter, and enlists his help. In a Gotham City morgue, the Spectre is drawn under extreme duress into his new host, Crispus Allen, in punishment for his rampage against magic, including the destruction of the Rock of Eternity, Atlantis, and the Lords of Chaos and Order.
Superboy-Prime confronts Conner Kent, in seclusion at the Kent farm, and attacks and ridicules him. The Doom Patrol, JSA, and Teen Titans arrive to defend Conner, but suffer casualties at the hands of the powerful and out-of-control Superboy Prime, who accidentally beheads Pantha, kills Baby Wildebeest and Bushido, freezes Red Star solid, and severely injures Risk. He is ultimately contained or killed by the "three Flashes" (Jay Garrick, Wally West, and Bart Allen), who force him into the "Speed Force", with the apparent assistance of three deceased speedsters: Flash II (Barry Allen), Max Mercury, and Johnny Quick. Jay Garrick (the original Flash) is seemingly the only speedster left alive after the Superboy-Prime encounter, and he claims that he no longer feels any trace of the Speed Force. Having run out of our reality and to a realm perhaps even past the Speed Force, the fates of Superboy-Prime, Bart Allen, and Wally West (along with his wife and twin children) are unknown.
Alexander reveals to Power Girl that he and Superboy-Prime had been operating from outside their heaven and orchestrating recent events since before Kal-L destroyed it. While Alex posed as Lex Luthor to gather the combined forces of the Society, Superboy Prime collected the corpse of the Anti-Monitor and rearranged planets to precipitate intergalactic war. This was done while the Golden Age Superman (Kal-L) was distracted by the dying Lois. Superboy Prime's planet-moving shifted the center of the universe, from Oa to where Earth-Two's center used to be, creating an 'access point' in space (the rift). Alex then created the tuning fork using both the matter and antimatter remains of the Anti-Monitor and certain select individuals who had the unique vibrational frequencies of the former multiverse hidden in their genetic code.
However, fuel and programming were still required to activate the tower. For the programming part, Alex gave Brother Eye sentience to redirect the tower's energy and remap the universe. For fuel, Alex enlisted the Psycho-Pirate, as one of the only people in the Post-Crisis universe to remember the multiverse, to bring back Eclipso in order to seduce the Spectre to attack magic-based beings, and leave magic in the world in a raw form. With the death of Shazam, Alex obtained access to that raw magic to fuel the tower, and uses it by coercing Black Adam to speak Shazam's name, bringing about the return of Earth-Two separate from the current Earth, with any heroes formerly tied to it being transported there.
Leadups to Infinite Crisis
Infinite Crisis was announced at the end of March 2005, with the release of Countdown to Infinite Crisis (which had previously simply been solicited as "DC Countdown" to keep the title and nature of the upcoming miniseries a secret) followed by four six-issue miniseries, plus an additional one-shot special for each miniseries.
Countdown to Infinite Crisis
In Countdown to Infinite Crisis, Ted Kord (the Blue Beetle) discovers his former Justice League associate Maxwell Lord has been using Justice League files and Batman's Brother Eye satellite to spy on the metahuman community, which he considers a threat to the human race. Lord shoots Kord in the head, killing him.
The OMAC Project
The OMAC Project is the most direct follow-up from the Countdown to Infinite Crisis special, picking up the story where it left off. The OMACs are modified humans who work as sleeper agents, a product of the Checkmate organization now led by Maxwell Lord, and rise to destroy metahumans. They possess the Brother Eye spy satellite built by Batman. The OMAC Project ended with an autonomous Brother Eye having command of over 200,000 OMACs and seemingly planning war on the superheroes, starting with the worldwide broadcast of Maxwell Lord's death at the hands of Wonder Woman.
Rann-Thanagar War
Rann-Thanagar War follows the war between Rann and Thanagar. At the end of the series the war has not ended, but Hawkwoman is dead and a rip in the space-time fabric emerges. The rip resembles similar rips seen in the original Crisis on Infinite Earths.
Villains United
Villains United is a six-issue miniseries written by Gail Simone with art by Dale Eaglesham and Wade von Grawbadger. The series focuses on the new "Secret Society of Supervillains", organized by Lex Luthor in the wake of the revelation that the DC heroes had altered the memories of several supervillains. The Society is resisted by the Secret Six, a group brought together by a mysterious figure known as Mockingbird.
The Six fail to destroy the Society , although they do come to a standstill. The central revelation is that Mockingbird is actually Lex Luthor, and that the Luthor organizing the Secret Society is actually an alternate-universe version of Luthor. Also notable is the alternate Luthor's apparent murder of Pariah, a prominent character from Crisis on Infinite Earths
Day of Vengeance
Day of Vengeance follows a ragtag bunch of magical heroes called the Shadowpact and magic-based superhero Captain Marvel in their attempts to stop The Spectre as he tries to destroy all magic. They fail. The Spectre attacking and kills the Wizard Shazam, leading to the scattering of many magical artifacts, including the old Blue Beetle Scarab, throughout the world. The Rock of Eternity splits into many pieces, freeing many magical forces and threats, most notably the Seven Deadly Sins.
Other key tie-in issues
Though this article is by no means a complete checklist of Infinite Crisis, below is a list of key issues of other titles that have crossed into the story.
- DC Special: The Return of Donna Troy #1-4. Donna is resurrected by the Titans of Myth as the Goddess of the Moon. With the help of the Teen Titans and the Outsiders, her true memories are restored. Donna has a crucial role in the upcoming events and it is revealed that she is a living embodiment of all the Donna Troys that have ever existed in the multiverse and possessed all of their memories.
- Hawkman #47-49 "Coalition in Crisis". A 3-part story chronicling the immediate aftermath of The Rann-Thanagar War that features Hawkman and Hawkgirl joining forces with Adam Strange to battle alien invaders seeking to destroy the planet Rann.
- JLA #115-119 "Crisis of Conscience". This story covers the breakdown of relationships within the Justice League of America over events that occurred in Identity Crisis, and ends with the destruction of the lunar Watchtower, which leads directly into Infinite Crisis.
- JSA Classified #1-4 "Power Trip". This story deals with Power Girl and her post-Crisis origin, establishing that she "survived" the original Crisis, and that her origins somehow are re-established as being from the Krypton of Earth-Two.
- Superman/Wonder Woman: "Sacrifice". Max Lord repeatedly takes mental control of Superman, forcing him to attack first Batman, critically injuring him, and then Wonder Woman. Wonder Woman eventually captures Lord and, seeing no other way to permanently end the threat he poses, kills him in cold blood.
Editorial planning and Infinite Crisis
Dan DiDio has stated that Infinite Crisis was being planned in some form for two years prior to its launch, starting with the "death" of Donna Troy.[1] The leadup was mostly understated until the release of the Adam Strange limited series in 2004, at which point industry press began to report that DC was planning a very large event, mentioning the titles Teen Titans, The Flash, and JSA, all written by Geoff Johns. [citation needed] Comic Book Resources gossip columnist Rich Johnston announced in August of 2004 that DC planned a sequel to Crisis on Infinite Earths with work by Johns and Jiminez.
With Countdown to Infinite Crisis, Infinite Crisis began to visibly affect DC's editorial policy. Geoff Johns and Grant Morrison were both given editorial positions in addition to their writing duties, with Johns in charge of coordinating the coherence of the DC Universe and Morrison in charge of handling reimaginings of several characters. In July 2005, Mark Waid signed exclusively with DC and was given a similar editorial role. The leadup to also saw DC change its decades-old logo with a new one that debuted on the first issue of DC Special: The Return of Donna Troy.
Crossover events
Aside from marking a major editorial shift within DC Comics, Infinite Crisis was a return to large company-wide crossovers of a sort that had been uncommon since the downturn of the comics industry in the 1990s. Although DC had done crossovers within its individual lines — the Batman event "Bruce Wayne: Fugitive", for example — it had not done a line-wide crossover spanning more than a month since 2001's Our Worlds at War, and arguably hadn't done something of the year-long scale of Infinite Crisis since the original Crisis on Infinite Earths.
This return to large crossover events was reflected in the larger comics industry. At the same time DC began to revive the Wildstorm line, bringing a DC character, Captain Atom, into it, Marvel Comics began the substantial crossover called "House of M", which extended into a storyline called "Decimation" that in turn spawned events planned for Summer 2006. Both companies launching large-scale events concurrently renewed sniping between the two industry leaders that spilled into the mainstream press. DiDio launched the first volley in the preface to Prelude to Infinite Crisis, asking pointedly, "Why settle for a House when you can have [the DC] Universe," a shot at Marvel's "House of M". Marvel editor-in-chief Joe Quesada fired back in an interview that DC's comics were "corporate"-driven, whereas Marvel's were "creator"-driven. [2]
Consequences of Infinite Crisis
Deaths
Although it has been suggested that cover art presented for pre-order solicitations confirms some deaths, it should be noted that, in an interview accesible at Newsarama.com, Executive Editor Dan DiDio would not confirm whether that was how the cover art would actually appear.
Leadup to Infinite Crisis
The following characters died in the six-month leadup:
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+ Which of two known Hyenas died is unknown. The other later appeared in Batman.
Infinite Crisis
The following characters died during the events of Infinite Crisis:
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Missing or presumed dead but unconfirmed
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Returns
Prior to and during the Infinite Crisis, the following characters and planet returned from death or long absence:
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See also
- 52: Weekly storyline post-Crisis, and related events.