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The Final Crisis Primer

In a few short weeks, DC Comics along with the manic mind of Grant Morrison launches Final Crisis. The crossover Morrison claims is the “Lord of the Rings of the comic world”. (This makes me wonder if Mr. Myxlplyx and Batmite are the Merrin and Pippin of the DC Universe, but I digress). Thus, as your friendly neighborhood Geek, I shall endeavor to help all my DC newcomers and get you ready for this epic event to end all events! (At least until summer 2009 or a new Editor-in-Chief takes over).

Better sit down, this is going to take a while and probably frighten off the all but rabid comic fan.

1930 - 1986 : DC Comics has dozens of parallel worlds. All the writers ran willy-nilly in their books. You need another evil Superman, but the first evil Superman is busy over in Action Comics. Simple, there is a blonde evil Superman from Earth 7 that gets power from Kryptonite or, something. Wonder what would have happened had Bruce Wayne’s parents not been killed at the hands of Joe Chill? You can have that answer provided by Robin II from Earth X, he’s Thomas and Martha Wayne’s grandson. What I’m trying to say is this, DC had a full on grip of Earths. Each one has some random version of the characters you know and love. This doesn’t even count the Earth’s DC had to create whenever they bought the rights to a fallen comic book company. See Captain Marvel, the Question, and Blue Beetle.

Some writers had the mad love for war books, sadly, we weren’t at war during the Golden Age of Comics. That wasn’t going to stop the pool of writers at DC! They went ahead and created alternate timelines that allowed their WWII characters to stay "in fashion". (Hence, we get Sgt. Rock and The Losers fighting Nazis on American shores). Basically, it created the single most confusing friggen comic setting of all time. Nothing made any sense. Characters could hop from world to world. It was crazy and only dudes in their 50s and comic editors could make sense of it. (Even then, some editors didn’t have a clue).

Dang, we aren’t even to the confusing section yet…

During this heyday of writers running with any ‘ol story they wanted, a young comics fan named Marv Wolfman began drawing characters instead of paying attention in school. During one of these daydreams, he created a character named The Librarian. He would collect all the heroes and file them away. When you’re 12, the idea kicks ass. (Trust me, it does). Anyway, Marv comes of age and finds himself under the employ at DC Comics. (A goal I will also ascend someday).

1986 - 1987: Enter Marv Wolfman and George Perez. Taking a character, he wrote about as a kid, "The Librarian" and created The Monitor. The Monitor had an anti version named, lamely enough "The Anti-Monitor". This set off the then unheard off "Maxi-Series"... Crisis on Infinite Earths. DC killed thousands of characters within their library. At the end, only "Earth 1" existed. After Crisis, only two characters flat-out remembered the events. The Harbinger (who vanished) and Psycho Pirate. (No one believed him and would spend the next 20 human years in Arkham Asylum, forgotten by the world.

Superman was back to being the lone survivor from the doomed planet of Krypton. Bruce Wayne never found the man that killed his parents. Jason Todd went from being a clone of Dick Grayson into a street hooligan that tried to steal the hubcaps from the Batmobile. The JSA were long since retired, heroes from the Second World War Wonder Woman knew nothing of the man called Trevor and was a fresh hero upon the Patriarch’s world.

1987: Marv Wolfman reveals that he left a loophole for a few characters to return / remember Crisis. He even left a loophole for the return of Barry Allen (The Silver Age Flash that sacrificed his life during issue 9 of Crisis on Infinite Earths). He also allowed a loophole for Earth 3 Superman , Lois Lane, Earth-Prime Superboy, and Alexander Luthor of Earth 2. (Okay, I might have the "earths" wrong, but just stick with me here).

Things move along fine for a few years. Then, ever so slowly, writers and editors allow past events to slip into stories. We DC fans call them Pre-Crisis Events, aka PCE. (It is like BC and AD, but with less religion). At first, fans meet this with cautious optimism. Then something interesting happens, the stories work. We fans didn’t mind so much that characters we thought gone forever were slowly coming back into our pulpy pages. It was okay that Supergirl, and an extended Flash family returned from the abyss of editorial execution.

Then did the world see the rise of Image Comics and their “edgy” characters. (Yes, that included Rob “who needs feet” Liefeld). Marvel Comics was able to make the transition fairly well. However, with the exception of the Batman Characters, most of DC crew consisted of “gee-whiz” heroes and were having their asses handed to them from readers that wanted more. It didn’t matter how many characters you turned into alcoholics or suffered from child rape, the other companies kept schooling DC. The editors decided they need a new “major event”. (Side note, the harsh books from the late 80s to early 90s inspired Mark Waid and Alex Ross to create Kingdom Come, a direct reaction to all the “edgy” books or the era).

1994: Zero Hero, with a couple VERY LOOSE connections to Crisis on Infinite Earths, Zero Hero quite literally reset the DC Universe all the way to the Big Bang! Some heroes became big ass villains. (Green “Hal Jordan” Lantern becomes the mad powerful villain called Parallax). More heroes die and every issue are re-set to Issue 0. (They keep the numerical run though, so as not to generate the ire Marvel did when it reset all their books for no reasons, thus resulting in dual-numbered books). A new edict comes down from high in DC land: “No more multiple Earths. There is only 1 Earth. 1 Galaxy. 1 Anti-Matter Galaxy (allowing for a potential Earth 2, but mainly allows for the Qward and Sinestro’s Yellow Ring). DC begins to announce their setting as the “The Original Universe” and everything went back to normal for darn near a decade.

Then. Something. Happened.

Great writers missed the Golden Age Heroes. Heroes like the entire JSA! All of a sudden, all the “rules” set by Crisis and Zero Hour fell aside. Mark Waid sidestepped the entire mo multiple Earth rule by creating Hypertime. No more infinite Earths, now we had infinite timelines. The stories were good but new readers were getting confused all over again. It didn’t help that books published under the “Elseworlds” banner, DC’s answer to Marvel’s What If, were starting to ooze into DC coveted “Original Universe”.

2004: Identity Crisis – We open with a flashback to the happy days of the Justice League International. Happy times when a Green Lantern got his kicks by addicting Martian Manhunter to Oreos. IT turns out, things weren’t roses and satellite clubhouses. It turns out there was a nasty old case of Elongated Man wife rape. (Thanks to New York Times Bestseller Writer Brad Metzger). The heroes find out and go Goodfellas on the poorly named Dr. Light. We learn the entire event along with said rapist gets “mind-wiped” by Zatana. Dr. Light gets turned into a bumbling idiot, the butt of jokes from the Teen Titans. Then, we learn a ton of villains got mind-whipped during this era. The Dark Knight finds out. For all his hatred of villains and crime, Batman has ethics and heroes acting as judge, jury, and lobotomizers aren’t one of them. Furious, Batman fights most of the JLI. It takes most of the team to subdue. Fearing the worst from one of the most influential (and potentially dangerous) members of the global hero community, Zatana mind-wipes Batman. Things go bad. Paranoid Batman creates robots that watch and can kill each hero on Earth. Robin’s father gets whacked. Poor raped wife is then killed. Killer turns out to be bat-shite crazy ex-wife of The Atom. No galactic shattering events, but heroes lost trust in each other. Villains know the heroes are willing to magically lobotomize them. Villains vow vengeance. End of Identity Crisis.

The DC Universe has become a dark and paranoid friggen place. Fans (and reviewers) begin to ask, “Where are all our heroes”?

2005 – 2006: Infinite Crisis – Those loophole characters I mentioned way back in Crisis on Infinite Earths. They are furious that all they sacrificed created a world where heroes kill. (Opps, almost forgot. Wonder Woman killed Maxwell Lord because he was mentally controlling Superman, who was about to Cheney Punch Batman through his heart…also, her killing went over the global news feeds). Heroes didn’t trust each other. The Villains however were getting along just fine and taking out heroes left and right. Superman-2, Alexander Luthor, and Superboy-Prime (so named so DC wouldn’t have to pay Schuster and Siegel characters rights) literally PUNCHED their way into the “Original Universe”. The boundaries get broken. All those hidden Earths roar back into existence. It turns out they didn’t actually die. It also turns out that Alexander Luthor, though a “good guy” on his Evil Planet has gone wacko and wants to rebuild a new and pure Earth. Superboy-Prime is a whiny teenage bitch with all the powers of about 100 Supermen. (See, on Earth Prime back in the 1960s, Superboy was the only hero, so they gave him a grip of power). Anyway, the “Big 3” (Superman, Wonder Woman, and Batman) are too busy hating each other to notice that all kinds of crap is going down.

In fact, Batman gives the most cold-hearted line of all time…

“Face it Superman, the last time you truly inspired people was when you were dead”. SNAP!

Superboy-Prime fights “Original Universe” Superboy (who is also a whiny bitch, but at least he is trying to be a man, and got to tap that fine ass blonde of a Wonder Girl). Anyway, he gets his ass handed to him, but all the Titans arrive to save the day. Sadly, Superboy-Prime is crazy, whiny, and has nigh limitless in power. So, he kills himself a whole grip of Titans and doubles the glove collection of a few others. Finally, The Flashes save the day by dragging him into The Speed Force (where all DC Speedsters, save Jay Garrick, gets their power). Guess who does the final “you coming with me boy”! Yup, good ‘ol long dead Barry Allen from Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Finally, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Superman pull their collective heads out. Sadly, only after many heroes die, including the above-mentioned “Original Universe” Superboy. The good guys put aside differences, they take on bad guys led by the now escaped Superbor-Prime. A Superboy-Prime made even more powerful by the Anti-Monitor’s suit from way back in Crisis on Infinate Earths. Big ass fight. Heroes and villains die like there is no tomorrow. Good triumphs, but at the cost of uber-noble Superman 2’s life. Also, Superboy-Prime survives the big showdown. Heroes trap him in a Red Sun, in which the Green Lantern Corp designed a box of infinite layers. He swears he’ll escape.

He does in the pages of the fantastic The Sinestro Corps War. (Easily DC’s best series in over 5 years and why Geoff Johns is a writing GOD)!

At the end, 52 worlds are created and we get the weekly series 52. Very ambitious. Considering it was a full book every week, a good story. Buy the trades, you’ll like it. (Especially you Booster Gold fans). Sadly, Dan Didio sees the money 52 generates and creates a new weekly series called Countdown. A series that is supposed to lead into Final Crisis. The series is crap, avoid at all costs. (This doesn’t make sense, since the very talented Paul Dini is the lead writer. Oh well, his work on Detective Comics is kicking butt).

Whew, almost finished.

2008 – 2009: Final Crisis – Darkseid, the big bad villain created by Jack “King” Kirby in the 1960s is the only survivor after his fellow “New Gods” of the “Forth World” die off. Ah screw it, I’m gonna’ rip-off Wikipedia for this stuff, since it is all conjecture for now:

With the Fifth World of Gods dawning and his longtime enemies the New Gods eliminated, Darkseid seeks to bring about a new order of evil towards the universe. Darkseid's ascension coincides with the return of a long-forgotten Justice League villain, the original founder of the Injustice Gang, Libra. As Libra begins organizing a new army of super-villains for an unknown purpose, while in the 31st Century, Superman has been summoned back to the 30th Century to lead the combined forces of three incarnations of the Legion of Super-Heroes against Superman-Prime, who has gathered his own army in the form of a new incarnation of the Legion of Super-Villains as part of his renewed vendetta against Superman.

References to Infinite Crisis as the "middle Crisis” gave the implication that there will be at least one additional major crisis, which was further indicated when DC Comics released a teaser poster for Final Crisis with the date May 2008 and the tagline: "Heroes die. Legends live forever

According to DC Comics' website, the first issue of Final Crisis will go on sale May 28, 2008.

Dan Didio announced that with issue #26, Countdown would be renamed Countdown to Final Crisis. In a later interview, he mentioned that Countdown to Final Crisis would end with issue #1, the next issue being titled Final Crisis #0. This title was later changed to DC Universe #0, and its relation to Final Crisis was de-emphasized.

Writer Grant Morrison has said that this is the last "Crisis", and that it will be "The Lord of the Rings of the DCU".

The main story of Final Crisis is planned for seven issues released over eight months starting in May 2008. Although there will be other projects alongside Final Crisis, the story will not crossover with any ongoing series.

That about covers it. Yes, this 5-page dissertation WAS the “10-cent” recap. I could write page after page if you wanted the full details.

My only worry? Grant Morrison. He is wicked talented. He is also out of his friggen mind! This is the guy that gave us an all-text comic. He wrote The Invisibles. He wrote Arkham Asylum. Then again, he also wrote the greatest (and truly heroic) run of Justice League of America.

Grant Morrison is creative chaos. We’ll see.