First dead superhero?

Cafe Society
1

News reports are trickling in that identify the member of the Fantastic Four who dies tomorrow (Hint: It’s exactly who you would have guessed).

Who was the first superhero to die, on panel, in an American comic book?

It seems to me this was asked here fairly recently, but I couldn’t find any previous threads on the subject. I’m not talking about retcons after the fact; I mean, how long ago did a kid open a comic book that showed a superhero die and not get promptly resurrected?

Here are some contenders:
[ul]
[li]Gary Concord, the Ultra-Man died in his first appearance in All-American Comics #9 (1939); his son carried on the name and costume for ten more issues. He lived in the far future and wasn’t part of any “Marvel Universe”-type continuum, so the emotional impact was debatable.[/li][/ul]

[ul]
[li]The Phantom, 1936. Kit Walker is the 21st in a line of Phantoms, who date back to the Tudor dynasty; as part of his backstory, Phantoms 1-20 died, presumably violently. None of the predecessors was actually the central character, though, and the character was more from the newspaper strips than comic books )although he has been in plenty of comic books over the years.[/li][/ul]

[ul]
[li]Several members of the Blackhawks, named Boris, Zeg and Baker, appeared in the earliest issues of Military Comics before the group line-up gelled, and were never heard from again. If they died, it was off-panel. Stanislaus apparently died in one issue, but came back before too long.[/li][/ul]

[ul]
[li]Meatball, one of Daredevil’s Little Wise Guys, got killed in a gang fight in Daredevil #13 (1942). An uncostumed kid sidekick, it’s a stretch to call him a superhero.[/li][/ul]

I’m ignoring ghost characters like the Spectre and the Gay Ghost, since being dead is their whole shtick.

2

Bucky died fairly early on in comic book lore, did he not?

3

I think his “death” was retconned in the 60’s.
And, as it turns out, he didn’t really die.

4

No, the first reference to his death was in 1964. When they re-launched Captain America in the 50s–briefly–Bucky was along for the ride. His 1945 death was one of comics’ first major retcons.

5

Lightning Lad was killed in 1963. Like most superhero deaths, he was revived, by the sacrifice of Proty I. AFAIK, Proty I was never brought back tro life (they introduced Proty II to take his place). You could argue that Proty I wasn’t a superhero, but I think getting killed gives him an appendage up.

6

People die in comics all the time. The problem is, as long as their comics still sell, they can’t die permanently, and somebody will come up with a lame excuse for bringing them back. This makes their deaths meaningless.

BTW, the first superhero to die was Enkidu, from the Gilgamesh epic. 12th century BC.

The Comet died in 1941 (http://www.toonopedia.com/comet.htm).

If we count people who come back: Jim Corrigan died in 1940 to become the Spectre.

7

Boston Brand died in 1967 and was never brought back to life. :wink:

Ferro Lad of the Legion of Superheroes died in 1967, too. DC did not try to bring him back for a very long time.

8

The OP said “no ghost characters.” Anyway, although that Wiki is very badly written and unclear, it seems to say he has been indeed recently been brought back to life by a “white lantern.”

9

This story got retconned too, towards the end of the original LSH continuity. Saturn Girl discovered that Lightning Lad had not actually been ressurected, but that Proty (a shapeshifter after all) had merely replaced him. Why Saturn Girl (a telepath) never caught on to the imposter until years after she’d married and had kids with “Lightning Lad”, I don’t know. But it’s the only incident I know of in which a superhero died, and the story was retconned so that he stayed dead.
Toonopedia opines that the Comet was the first guy from the longjohn brigade to bite the bullet.

10

Proty did not replace him by shape-shifting. Proty replaced him by transferring his mind into Lightning Lad’s dead body.

It’s made pretty clear in that story that Saturn Girl knew on some level, but was in denial because she liked Garth’s “new personality” better.

11

That story has, itself, been retconned - there’s no indication, now, that Garth is not Garth. The rest of that era of stories has also been retconned, though at least one element (the Shrinking Violet/Lightning Lass relationship), seems, happily, to be making its way back in.

12

That version of Saturn Girl never even realized that she’d given birth to twins, so she wasn’t always terribly perceptive.

13

Actually, Saturn Girl DOES mention that she thought she sensed another baby’s mind for a moment. But hey, if Darkseid wants to hide something, he’s got the power to do it.

14

They should rename that group “The Legion Of Continuously Retconned Heroes”.

15

Comet meets all the criteria, I guess he’s the winner!

16

And who is the latest major superhero to bite the dust? It happens tomorrow.

17

Didn’t they kill off both Ultimate and Regular Wasp within a few months of each other? I know Cable died and came back recently, but as future cyborg Jesus, that shouldn’t be surprising.

18

Yes, but she’s not the latest.

The two most recent are Magog at DC (‘major’ is arguable, but he was positioned to be made major), killed in the last couple months, and Johnny Storm at Marvel, killed this week, and the one Czarcasm was referring to.

19

[lennybruce]…Man, poor Chris Evans.[/lennybruce]

20

P.S. Are they going to change their name to the Fantastic Three? Will they need to redesign their logo?

Does this count as a hijack?