Best DC Comic Crisis/Event?

  • Crisis on Infinite Earths
  • Zero Hour Crisis in Time
  • Final Crisis
  • Final Night
  • Blackest Night & Brightest Day
  • Infinite Crisis
  • Convergence
  • Futures End
  • Forever Evil
  • Darkseid War
  • Invasion!
  • Legends
  • Flashpoint
  • DC One Million
  • 52
  • Multiversity
  • Dark Knights Metal
  • Doomsday Clock
  • Heroes In Crisis
  • Other

0 voters

4 Likes

COIE is still the gold standard. Nothing of its scale had been done before or has been done since. Realigning 45 years worth of comics and bringing Fawcett & Charlton into the fold and killing such a vast array of characters. Killing Supergirl and the hero that literally started the Silver Age of comics, turning the page from the Silver and Bronze Ages to the modern era of comics.

And most importantly, it had never been done before. Wolfman & PĂ©rez were literally breaking new ground for the entire industry that a major publisher could even try It, let alone pull it off. COIE May be the granddaddy of them, but as the bard said: Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale.

6 Likes

It’s impressive how despite being the first of its kind, COIE compares favorably to the vast majority of its imitators.

52 and Legends would probably be my runners-up.

4 Likes

I most definitely agree, COIE is the most impressive feat for any comic book company to achieve and I’m happy it was DC to create the milestone. However I hope you don’t hate me for saying that Infinite Crisis has to be my favorite, for me it was the first real DC event that I read, and going back and re-reading it time after time I find it to be such a fulfilling read and I believe it was a phenomenal sequel to COIE, with a lot of payoff from the events of COIE. Not to mention the fact that 52 came right after and was another mind-blowing series. Not often these events play off each other so well!

3 Likes

Im conflicted. I have reasons to both like and dislike all of these events… :thinking: COIE should get my vote, but I can’t help but dissent.

3 Likes

Comics are often, I think about the time and place you are at in your life. IC is good, don’t get me wrong. And for you that was your bond to the comics crisis concept. I can relate.
I was buying comics weekly when COIE came out. I couldn’t believe it. The depth, the spectacle, the sheer power of what Wolfman & Pérez we’re doing. Each issue had me brimming with excitement and dread wondering who was gonna get killed next issue. They say “you never forget your first”, I think that holds true for crisis events.

But, at some point put yourself into that time and place in 85-86 when COIE happened and think this has never been done before. You’ll get the real experience of COIE. Not saying it will change your mind on ic being your favorite. But it will give a glimpse into what the comic book world was.

4 Likes

I don’t know… it’s kind of hard to beat the impact that COIE had, but that doesn’t make it good. The plot is kind of a mess, and it’s got good moments, but good moments does not a good story make. Otherwise Mark Millar’s The Ultimates would be hailed as a masterpiece. And, like The Ultimates, the art on COIE (by George Perez) is excellent, but (again like Ultimates) the script, pacing, and storytelling has not aged well. My pick is Multiversity. Honestly, I could go for Final Crisis, but Multiversity has all those one-shots, some of which are better than most anything else DC’s published since 2010. So, that’s my pick. Unconventional, admittedly, but deserving.

5 Likes

But I’d disagree. Age has only done COIE harm. Better event comics have come and gone, and the whole “killing beloved characters ostensibly for shock value” (in no way does it move forward the story, with the exception of Flash) trend marks the story as very much of its time. Also, it kind of put DC in an awkward editorial mess for awhile trying to figure out what to keep and what to throw away. In effect, trying to clean up the DC house ended up making it more cluttered by eliminating the “alternate universe” excuse.

Let’s put it this way: it says quite a bit that almost everything COIE did for the DC Universe has been entirely or partially undone.

5 Likes

52 is what made me committed to DC for life. I’ll always be chasing that high.

9 Likes

52 is also very, very good. It’s been said, but it’s a genuine miracle that none of those issues ever came out late.

6 Likes

But I also wanna say this: while it’s not my favorite event on this list, The Final Night is SEVERELY underrated.

5 Likes

As an editor myself, I stand in awe of it.

5 Likes

The Stuart Immonen art on that book was absolutely beautiful.

4 Likes

COIE was definitely the most ambitious comic event of all time, and we may never see its like again. But on the other hand, I’d say it does at times feel TOO busy. That’s always the struggle with event comics, balancing the cosmic stakes without losing sight of the characters involved.

7 Likes

Agree. The time in your life and “your first” go a long way to explain a persons preferences and opinions… which can make it difficult to be objective.
They all have their merits and their flaws. Don’t agree first is always best tho. It’s just a blueprint—an experiment to be improved upon.

5 Likes

I think that as far as the major players went, it did good for Superman (Man of Steel), Batman (Year One), and Wonder Woman (the George Perez run), but the smaller characters became a weird case. They had to work out what to do with the many characters of Hawkman (a problem that plagues the character to this day), Supergirl (probably the second biggest thing DC went back on from COIE), and a number of other smaller characters from the Silver Age. Plus, as I mentioned, they did get rid of any alternative universes, which is kind of an oddity of the time, I’d wager. Either way, the ensuing comics were largely good, and the reboot was significantly cleaner than The New 52, but COIE isn’t really fun to read, it has a lot of problems, and it really didn’t solve every issue it clearly set out to. I don’t know. I’m in the minority, I recognize that.

5 Likes

Definitely agree! You go from Emerald Twilight to Final Night, then to Day of Judgement and finally Green Lantern Rebirth, it’s such an amazing journey for Hal Jordan, and a fulfilling adventure! Also I forgot to put it on the list and I know it take a lot of gripe, but I am a huge fan of Identity Crisis.

3 Likes

I proudly wave the Final Crisis flag! 52 is a close second.

4 Likes

Forever Evil was my first crisis, so that’s become my favorite for nostalgic reasons.

4 Likes

I think that’s one of the things I love and truly respect about COIE. It was ambitious and cut a swath through the darkness where no light had ever been before. Crisis has its problems, I will admit that. Deed they need to kill supergirl, probably not, but it has given us one of the most iconic moments in DC history.

I suppose I always wonder when reading other crisis books, could they actually include 238 named DC characters (thanks again @HubCityQuestion ) , and actually pull that off? Could they have done this crisis event if they were flying blindly into the abyss? I’m not sure any of them could. Sure, COIE, has its problems but no other crisis book has dealt with sheer enormity of COIE. Something DC realized was immensely problematic. Nobody has had to try and align that mass of characters.

I love Pérez’s style, he’s one of my 3 favorite artists ever. So I love that some of the panels are “overpacked”. To me, that’s how they should be in a crisis event. When so many people are involved. And let us not forget, COIE was not printed in Baxter paper. There were physical limitations they had to deal with that the others have not.

So a few of the events, like IC and 52 may have been better executed. But, I have my doubts on if they would have been, had they been dealing with the mass of characters, the technological limitations of print, and flying blind through the darkness. I worked in tech and when technologies we take for granted today were literally coming new into the world. What that taught me was things are a hell of a lot easier with fewer potholes and blind allies the second or more time around. So, I’ll stick with my pick.

5 Likes