10 More Comic Characters Who are Still Dead After 20 Plus Years

With so many characters returning from the dead in comics I thought it would be interesting to look at who has remained dead over the last couple of decades. This is the first in a series off such posts.

Rules I’m playing by in this post and any time I revisit this post:

A death still counts if:

·        They returned briefly but returned to the grave in such a way that their original cause of death applies, even if they died again in their return;

·        A character time travels to the present from a time period before their death, as long as this does not interfere with their death;

·        A character appears because they were actually visited in the afterlife;

·        In the case of DC’s changing timeline, their status in the current timeline is unconfirmed.

·        A clone is distinct from the original.

A death does not count if:

·        A character’s adventures take place in the future (and therefore are alive/not yet born in the present);

·        A character continues to have an active or semi-active present due to being a vampire, ghost, zombie, or other member of the undead, or due to being “one with the universe”;

·        In the case of DC’s changing timeline, a new version of the character who is more or less the modern continuity version of the deceased character has appeared.

·        A clone is likely to have the soul of the original.

Finally, in the event that a dead character is revealed to be an imposter, the death still counts for the imposter (barring other circumstances) but not the original.

For now I’m skipping characters who died in their first appearance, even major ones such as Ben Parker, though I may cover such characters in later posts. 

1.      Blue Beetle (Dan Garrett; archaeologist with mystical scarab; seemingly killed fighting Jarvis Kord and encouraging Jarvis’ nephew Ted to take over as the Beetle, he was revived by the scarab; half-mad, he died for real after the scarab shattered in battle with the Ted Kord Blue Beetle). First appearance: Blue Beetle #1 June 1964. Death: Blue Beetle #18 November 1987.

2.      Blue Eagle (James Dore Jr., aka American Eagle and Cap’n Hawk; inherited pair of wings from father that gave him flight; during the battle between his team, the Squadron Supreme and the Redeemers, Lamprey drained the power from his wings; he tried landing on Pinball to break his fall, but only ended up killing them both). First appearance: Avengers #85 February 1971. Death: Squadron Supreme #12 August 1986.

3.      Alex DeWitt (girlfriend of Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner); strangled by Major Force and stuffed in a fridge; this led to the term “fridging” being coined to refer to cases where a female character is killed to advance a male hero’s story). First appearance: Green Lantern #48 January 1994. Death:  Green Lantern #54 August 1994.

4.      Fritz the Cat (anthropomorphic cat who has sex and drugs adventures; killed by ice pick; death was creator Robert Crumb’s protest of the movie). First appareance: Help! #22 January 1965. Death: The People’s Comics 1972.

5.      Lady Liberty (member of a shady government group called the Force of July; killed battling Kobra). First appearance: Batman and the Outsiders Annual #1 1994. Death: Suicide Squad #30 Late June 1989.

6.      Melter (Bruno Horgan; Iron Man foe with a melting device; shot to death by the Scourge of the Underworld, who was disguised as his assistant). First appearance: Tales of Suspense #47 November 1963. Death: Avengers #263 January 1986.

7.      Nite Owl (Hollis Mason; policeman active as a costumed crime fighter during World War II; killed by thugs erroneously believing he had come out of retirement) First appearance: Watchmen #1 September 1986. Death: Watchmen #9 May 1987.

8.      Dorothy Parker (head of the criminal Parker Girls, who forced Katchoo, one of the lead characters of Strangers in Paradise, to work for them; shot in the face by her agent Tambi, who felt Parker was becoming too erratic; Tambi made the death look like a suicide). First appearance: Strangers in Paradise #1 September 1994. Death:  Strangers in Paradise #12 January 1998.

9.      Scourge of the Underworld (original; one of a number of people hired by Thomas Holloway to murder super-villains; this version killed the most of any, starting with the Enforcer and cumulating with a massacre at the Bar with No Name; after being captured by Captain America, he was killed by another Scourge). First appearance: Iron Man #194 May 1985. Death: Captain America #320 August 1986.

10.   Gwen Stacy (Peter Parker’s girlfriend; Green Goblin tossed her off a bridge, the Spider-Man shot a web-line to break her fall, but that apparently broke her neck). First appearance: Amazing Spider-Man #31 December 1965. Death:  Amazing Spider-Man #144 May 1975.