5 Nostalgic DC Events That Aren’t As Great As You Remember

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DC Comics has been creating superhero comics longer than anyone, bringing beloved stories to readers for generations. A highlight of DC’s history is its tradition of large-scale, interconnected storylines – often called “event” comics. In fact, DC pioneered this format with its “Crisis” stories during the Silver Age, regularly uniting the Justice League with versions of themselves from alternate universes. Since then, the publisher has created many memorable event comics, some of which are considered classics. These are the stories fans often remember fondly, even if they haven’t revisited them recently.

Fans often remember these DC storylines fondly, but revisiting them reveals they haven’t aged well. While nostalgia might make us think they were amazing, a fresh look shows they don’t quite live up to our memories. These five events, in particular, don’t hold up to scrutiny.

5) Blackest Night

Blackest Night is well-regarded, successfully concluding the storyline started in “The Sinestro Corps War.” It’s a thrilling story with exciting action and some of artist Ivan Reis’s best work. While it’s a good comic, it doesn’t quite live up to the hype for many readers. The story relies heavily on surprising deaths and resurrections, but once those twists are known, it feels like a fairly typical, albeit more violent, event comic – a style Geoff Johns often favored.

4) The Flash: Rebirth

Barry Allen’s return in Final Crisis saw him outpace the Black Racer alongside Wally West, and ultimately use the power of death against Darkseid. This led to The Flash: Rebirth, a story by Geoff Johns and Ethan Van Sciver, which re-established Barry as a central figure in the Flash legacy and reintroduced Reverse Flash as his main enemy. However, the comic isn’t very good. Its main goal seemed to be elevating Barry Allen’s importance over Wally West, and it achieved this in a strange and contradictory way. Barry was made the source of the Speed Force, the Negative Speed Force was created but rarely used, and the book largely followed the structure of Green Lantern: Rebirth. Adding to the problems, Ethan Van Sciver’s artwork is often poorly executed, with excessive detail and inconsistent proportions. While some fans enjoy it, it’s generally considered a weak story.

3) “Knightfall”

While “Knightfall” is often remembered as a landmark event for DC Comics in the ’90s, it doesn’t quite live up to the hype. It’s actually a fairly typical Batman story. Bane’s plan to break Batman by emptying Arkham Asylum is clever, but revisiting the series reveals a lot of repetition. You can essentially understand the whole story by reading just the first issue – where Bane breaks Bruce Wayne’s back – and the issue where Azrael takes on the Batman mantle. Despite its reputation, this era of Batman often relied on predictable storylines, and “Knightfall” is a prime example of that.

2) “Death of Superman”

Many fans enjoy “Death of Superman,” but I believe that’s more about the concept than the actual story. It shares similar issues with “Knightfall” – it becomes repetitive. Each issue follows the same pattern: Superman and his friends battle Doomsday, Doomsday gains the upper hand, and Superman vows to keep fighting as the monster approaches Metropolis. It’s essentially a drawn-out fight, repeated across multiple issues, and lacks the depth to truly be considered a compelling narrative.

1) Infinite Crisis

While Infinite Crisis is often considered the best event series of the 2000s from either DC or Marvel, a closer look reveals it’s not quite as perfect as people remember. The main issue isn’t necessarily the story itself, but rather its impact and how it was executed. It marked the beginning of writer Geoff Johns’ signature style – attempting to restore hope to a grim universe, ironically using incredibly violent scenes to do so. Despite its flaws, Infinite Crisis deserves praise for many reasons, but it’s easy to overestimate its quality when viewed through the lens of nostalgia, with contributions from artists Phil Jimenez, George Perez, Jerry Ordway, and Ivan Reis.

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2025-11-27 03:42