PopSyndicate.com

Is there less value in a hero who comes back versus those who stay dead? If a hero comes back does that minimize their own death or the actions they took? Plus some other questions as well.

Booster Gold, Jason Todd, Bucky, Jean Grey; what do these people have in common? They were all thought to be dead at least once in their careers. There is a generality in comics: people who die don’t stay dead. I read somewhere that only three characters in the history of comics were not allowed to come back from the dead; Uncle Ben from Spiderman, Bucky from Captain America, and Jason Todd from Batman. Of late, two of those three characters have made a return to the living and that came as surprise to many. Is no death sacred anymore? Can anyone just come back at the will of some writer or editorial decree?

The return of these, and others characters, from the dead have gotten a lot of different reactions and have made the occurrence cliché. There is always some loophole to bring someone back, some unforeseen event or background dealings. Fans have voiced concerns that character deaths don’t mean anything anymore if a character can be brought back from the dead.

Coming back from the dead isn’t unique to comics. It has appeared in other literature and other various forms of story-telling and has been happening to a lot of characters throughout history. Hercules and Gilgamesh lost their lives and came back to fight another day. Why shouldn’t our modern day Heroes follow suit? Are our heroes worse for coming back from the dead while Gilgamesh and Hercules aren’t? Are our heroes less worthy of coming back?

If we accept that our modern day heroes are on par with many ancient heroes, then why do we find their defeat of death so cliché? One concern is that their return from death makes their sacrifices less valuable or less “worth it”? In the case of Booster Gold, here is a character who lost his life containing an explosion that would have taken hundreds of lives. He gave his life to save others. A few issues after his death, we find that Booster Gold is not dead and merely faked his death. Does that make his sacrifice in vain? Is his death - as we perceived it at one point in time - less heroic because he survived the blast and saved the people? Did Booster Gold know he was going to survive the blast, is that why he saved those people? Do heroes know they will conquer death, and therefore, are not afraid of it? If we look at Superman, who we generally consider indestructible, is death ever an issue? He can take a lot of damage and still not die. As far as I know he has only died once. Is his sacrifice of less value because he came back? Is he less heroic because he can fly into battle and not worry about dying?

Of all the heroes who have come back from the dead, how many knew they weren’t going to stay dead forever? How many stepped out and said “I’m going to give my life now ‘cause I’ll get it back later?” I personally can’t recall any hero at the moment. I keep posing questions with no answers to them. I guess I’m really not as sure about this as I should be and maybe Booster Gold isn’t the best example to use either. I do know that when a hero dies I want it to mean something; I want it to have some sort of value as a story and not as a gimmick. I hope I’m not the only one who wants that as well. Watch out for those bent corners.