Set Description:
My high grade Crisis set, one of the best DC limited series ever. Another 'life shaper' for me, I remember eagerly awaiting the the next issue every month, and admiring the detailed artwork of George Perez. This also prompted me to buy the Marv Wolfman 'Crisis on Infinite Earths' hardcover novel years later, which had a number of nice 'easter eggs' enhancing the overall reading experience of the earlier series. As well as the collected hardcover and Absolute editions which came out later.
Aiming to complete someday with 9.8's or higher slabs. Wish me luck!
Synopsis (Wikipedia):
Crisis on Infinite Earths is a 12-issue American comic book limited series (identified as a "12-part maxi-series") and crossover event, produced by DC Comics in 1985 to simplify its then 50-year-old continuity. The series was written by Marv Wolfman and illustrated by George Pérez (pencils/layouts), along with Mike DeCarlo, Dick Giordano, and Jerry Ordway (who shared inking/embellishing chores). The series removed the concept of the Multiverse in the fictional DC Universe, and depicted the deaths of such long-standing superheroes as Supergirl and the Barry Allen incarnation of the Flash. As such, it is one of the most important events in the DC Universe, and continuity in the DCU is typically divided into pre-Crisis and post-Crisis periods.
The title of the series was inspired by earlier crossover stories involving the multiple parallel Earths of the Multiverse, such as "Crisis on Earth-Two" and "Crisis on Earth-Three", but instead of lasting two to five issues and involving members from many superhero teams from many parallel worlds, it involved virtually every significant character from every parallel universe in DC's history. It in turn inspired the titles of four subsequent DC crossover series: Zero Hour: Crisis in Time (1994), Identity Crisis (2004), Infinite Crisis (2005–2006), and Final Crisis (2008).
The story introduces readers to two near-omnipotent beings, the good Monitor and the evil Anti-Monitor, who had been created as a result of the same experiment that created the Multiverse. The Monitor made cameo appearances in various DC comic book series for two years preceding the publication of the series. At first, he appeared to be a new supervillain, but with the onset of the Crisis, he was revealed to be working on a desperate plan to save the entire Multiverse from destruction at the hands of the Anti-Monitor. The Crisis series highlighted the efforts of DC Comics' superheroes to stop the Anti-Monitor's plan. Under the initial guidance of the Monitor, a select group of heroes was assigned to protect massive "tuning forks" designed to merge the surviving Earths into one that could be protected from the antimatter that had already annihilated untold numbers of alternate Earths. Eventually, the conflict grew and nearly every DC hero became involved in the battle.
The Monitor was murdered by his own assistant, Harbinger, while one of her duplicates was temporarily possessed by one of the Anti-Monitor's "shadow demons." However, he expected the attack and allowed it to happen so that his death would release enough energy to protect the last five parallel Earths (the homes of the known DC Universe) long enough for the heroes to lead an assault on the Anti-Monitor under the guidance of the Monitor's assistants, Harbinger, Alexander Luthor, Jr., and Pariah. The villain is forced to retreat, but at the cost of Supergirl's life.
This lull in the war provides some breathing room for the heroes, but the various supervillains join forces under Brainiac (who murders Alexi Luthor of Earth-Two for trying to take leadership) and Lex Luthor to conquer the Earths, while the Anti-Monitor causes chaos on the Earths by forcing the Psycho-Pirate to manipulate the emotions of their inhabitants. The Flash (Barry Allen) apparently dies stopping the Anti-Monitor's backup scheme of destruction—to use an antimatter cannon to penetrate the protective aura. The Spectre halts the hero/villain conflict, warning that the Anti-Monitor is traveling to the beginning of time to prevent the Multiverse's creation. Heroes and villains join forces in response, with the heroes traveling to stop the Anti-Monitor, and the villains traveling to the planet Oa in antiquity to prevent the renegade scientist Krona from performing a historic experiment that would allow the Anti-Monitor to succeed in his efforts.
The villains fail, and Krona proceeds with his experiment; while the heroes support the Spectre, whose battle with the Anti-Monitor creates an energy overload that shatters space and time. A single universe is created and all the superheroes return to a present-day reality where the various elements of the five Earths were fused into one, with no one except the people present at the battle at the dawn of time remembering the original reality.
The Anti-Monitor attacks one last time, transporting Earth to the Anti-Matter universe, and summons a massive horde of shadow demons. However, he falls to a carefully planned counter-attack, culminating in a battle with Kal-L (the Earth-Two Superman), Alexander Luthor of Earth-Three, and Superboy of Earth-Prime, with some unexpected last-second help from the New Gods' adversary, Darkseid. As the Anti-Monitor crashes into a star and dies, Alex sends himself, Earth-Two Superman, Earth-Two Lois Lane, and Earth-Prime Superboy into a paradise reality.
The aftermath of the Crisis plays out a few pages later, including Wally West becoming the new Flash. The final page shows the Psycho-Pirate, who was now imprisoned in Arkham Asylum, talking to himself in a monologue:
“ I'm the only one left who remembers the Infinite Earths. You see, I know the truth. I remember all that happened, and I'm not going to forget. Worlds lived, worlds died. Nothing will ever be the same. But those were great days for me... I had a good friend in the good old days, really. He was the Anti-Monitor. He was going to give me a world to rule. Now he's gone, too. But that's okay with me. You see, I like to remember the past because those were better times than now. I mean, I'd rather live in the past than today, wouldn't you? I mean, nothing's ever certain anymore. Nothing's ever predictable like it used to be. These days... y-you just never know who's going to die... and who's going to live. ”
—Psycho Pirate, Crisis on Infinite Earths #12. p. 42.
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