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Revolving Door of Death 15 - The Rules of Death (Oct 2001)
While death in superhero comics gleefully ignores the rules of the real world, certain principles of storytelling, marketing, and caprice do shape how it works.

Columns from 2001

Revolving Door of Death 14 - The Confusing Return of Hawkman (Jun 2001)
The return of Hawkman in Johns' JSA represents a gamble that talent and dedication can overcome the burdens of mangled continuity and inept retconning.

Revolving Door of Death 13 - The Peculiar Resurrection of Nighthawk (Feb 2001)
The ease with which Nighthawk returned from the dead - though by no means as trivial as the circumstances of the return of his Defenders teammate Hellcat - nonetheless helps dumb down the notion of death in comics to a transient, disposible inconvenience.

Revolving Door of Death 12 - Fat Freddy (Feb 2001)
Though superhero comics make the most frequent use of death as a dismissible gimmick, the dying-and-resurrected character evel appears occasionally in unexpected places, such as underground comics.

Revolving Door of Death 11 - Professor X (Sep 2000)
Different standards, including a much less casual attitude toward the deaths of heroes, defined the death and return of Professor X of the X-Men at the dawn of the 1970s.

Columns from 2000

Revolving Door of Death 10 - Punisher (Aug 2000)
Though the character concept actually allows a scenario where he comes back from the dead exactly as he has for the recent Punisher series, Frank Castle seems disinclined to remind anyone of the impossibility of his return in his own book.

Revolving Door of Death 09 - Hellcat (Aug 2000)
The triteness of the superhero resurrection tale becomes more clear with the recent return of Hellcat, which demonstrates that superheroes can simply fight their way into hell and bring back their fallen.

Revolving Door of Death 08 - Green Arrow (Dec 1999)
Amid over-hyped superhero deaths and resurrections, Green Arrow may have returned with only a whisper.

Columns from 1999

Revolving Door of Death 07 - Superman: Doing it Right, for Once (Nov 1999)
DC Comics, in the early nineties, showed that even the trite and overused theme of the dying and reborn superhero can work, if talent cares to make it work.

Revolving Door of Death 06 - Elektra (Nov 1999)
Frank Miller's character Elektra shocked Daredevil readers with her death, but surprised readers with her return only by how long it took.

Revolving Door of Death 05 - Lightning Lad (Mar 1999)
Lightning Lad served as one of the first characters in mainstream comics to suffer, then overcome, death.

Revolving Door of Death 04 - Adam Warlock (Mar 1999)
Like a bad penny, Adam Warlock turns up again after each successive death.

Revolving Door of Death 03 - Jean Grey (Feb 1999)
The resurrection of Jean Grey involved such an obnoxious tangle of retcons and complications that the character's history became something best left unmentioned.

Columns from 1998

Revolving Door of Death 02 - Wonder Man (Jan 1998)
One superhero has crossed between life and death more than any of his peers: Marvel Comics' Wonder Man.

Revolving Door of Death 01 - The Human Torch (Jan 1998)
Marvel Comics' first superhero couldn't stay dead, even after another superhero had recycled his name.

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