DC Comics has published its fair share of dark stories since the company kicked off the Golden Age. Many of its most evergreen comics with the highest mainstream appeal are actually incredibly dark stories which changed the company forever. These stories often have some especially shocking twists that make them memorable, some spurring on sequels and homages.
DC has been more open to darker stories than their competitor, Marvel Comics, and that openness has consistently paid off for them. With a bigger appetite for deconstruction and themes of horror, the DCU and its fans love to go as dark as possible. Hal Jordan’s descent into Parallax, Barbara Gordon’s lasting injury in The Killing Joke and more have defined some of DC’s greatest stories.
10 Green Lantern: Emerald Twilight
Green Lantern arc “Emerald Twilight” followed Hal Jordan’s descent into villainy following the destruction of Coast City. Hal killed a group of Green Lanterns and stole their power rings in the hopes of resurrecting his city, with the Guardians dispatching Sinestro to fight him.
Geoff Johns later retconned the “Emerald Twilight” story as Hal having been possessed by Parallax, but for readers at the time, seeing their favorite Green Lantern become a murderer was jarring. For many years, fans wondered if Hal would ever return at all and if he could be redeemed.
9 Tales From The Dark Multiverse: Knightfall
The Tales From the Dark Multiverse series followed pivotal moments in DC’s history as they’d played out across the Dark Multiverse. The Knightfall story’s main shocking twist came early on, with the revelation that Bruce Wayne was injured but alive in a dismembered state.
Bruce Wayne’s new existence came following his defeat at the hands of Azrael, who turned Gotham into a mini-theocracy. When Bruce eventually escaped and became a cyborg, he killed Azrael as well as his savior, and became the new ruler of the city.
8 DCeased
DCeased (by Tom Taylor, Trevor Hairsine and Stefano Guadiano) brought the zombie apocalypse to the DCU, delivered through computer screens. After Darkseid finally discovered the Anti-Life Equation, it spread throughout Earth, delivered by Cyborg, and caused mass death.
DCeased’s most heartbreaking and darkest moment comes when Nightwing and Robin bite Batman, slowly turning into a zombie himself. In the end, Alfred had no choice but to kill Bruce and leave behind the bodies of the boys he’d dedicated his life to caring for.
7 Injustice
DC’s comic book adaptation of the Injustice games has led to what is arguably the most successful Elseworlds universe since Watchmen. Injustice: Gods Among Us (by Tom Taylor, Jheremy Raapack & Tom Derenick) gave fans the definitive story of what would happen if Superman used his powers to kill.
Injustice actually had two incredibly harsh twists. Not only did Superman become an authoritarian murderer, he was driven to evil by Joker’s illusion that caused him to murder his own wife and unborn child. When he confronted Joker, Superman murdered the killer clown in front of Batman.
6 Green Lantern #54
Ron Marz’s Green Lantern run is memorable for many reasons, but the death of Kyle Rayner’s girlfriend, Alex DeWitt was incredibly shocking. While at odds with Major Force, Kyle Rayner came home to find that the villain had murdered his girlfriend… and put her in the fridge.
Major Force’s murder kicked off the meme of “fridging,” the term used to describe expendable female characters who die to further the hero’s story. The gruesome nature of the murder remains topical among DC fans even today, almost 30 years after the issue.
5 Watchmen
In Watchmen (by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons), fans saw a world where heroes were more grounded, flawed and darker people. The story focuses on a murder mystery, following the death of Comedian, the team’s old loose canon.
Watchmen’s famous twist revolves around Ozymandias releasing a monstrous alien onto the world in the hopes that it would unite humanity. The cost of this was the death of Rorschach at the hands of Dr Manhattan, so they could cover up the plot – only for Rorschach’s diary to keep the truth alive.
4 Identity Crisis
Identity Crisis (by Brad Meltzer, Rags Morales & Mike Bair) had one of the most crushing twists in DC history. The story revealed that the villain Doctor Light had sexually assaulted Sue Dibny (Elongated Man’s wife), and the Justice League erased everyone’s memory of the event.
Identity Crisis‘ ending reveal has remained a topic of discussion among fans, with many still debating if the Justice League’s choice was ethical. Many view the story as the beginning of a trend of DC’s canon getting progressively darker, especially in Crisis stories.
3 Death In The Family
One of the most famous twists in DC, Death in the Family is most notable because it allowed readers to decide the twist. DC let customers call in and pick whether Jason Todd would live or die. Given the choice, fans voted to let the latest Robin die.
The Joker brutally murdered Jason Todd with a crowbar. Though Todd later returned as Red Hood, Batman had to live with his death as his greatest failure, and considered murdering Joker because of it.
2 The Killing Joke
Alan Moore and Brian Bolland’s Batman: The Killing Joke is one of the most popular Batman stories ever told, due to sparking a new, darker era of Batman books. Killing Joke gave Joker an origin story, but is best known for its jarring and shocking twist with Batgirl.
The Killing Joke’s darkest moment is also one of the most controversial in Moore’s history, with Joker shooting Barbara Gordon and leaving her disabled. The story has also been interpreted as implying a sexual assault on Batgirl by Joker, and is often believed to end with Batman killing Joker as they share a laugh.
1 Heroes In Crisis
Heroes in Crisis (by Tom King and Clay Mann) is best known for almost single-handedly destroying the reputation of Wally West. The story focused on The Sanctuary, a place where DC’s heroes could open up about the traumas and stress of being a superhero.
Heroes in Crisis followed a murder mystery, which eventually revealed Wally West to be the mass-murdering culprit. The outright destruction of who had been many fans’ definitive Flash was only made worse by reading pages of other heroes venting about depression and trauma. Heroes in Crisis may have looked nice on paper, but it failed in execution.