Blackest Night (Recent Comics)

The brainchild of Geoff Johns, the Blackest Night crossover series is a tie-in to the Green Lantern series (also by Johns) that ran throughout the various DC Universe books during 2009 and 2010. The premise is that dead heroes and villains are returning to a semblance of life (they're not quite zombies nor are their bodies reanimated by the actual consciousness of the deceased) as members of a Black Lantern Corps in an attempt to destroy the Entity, the creator of all life in the multiverse.

The idea of the series is interesting (though a full-scale zombie apocalypse might have been a more powerful story), and there were a number of engaging tie-ins (some collected as Blackest Night: The Black Lantern Corps). In terms of impact, Blackest Night is important for killing off a number of major characters (including Tempest) and, also, for reviving a select group of dead heroes (Aquaman, Deadman, Firestorm [Ronnie Raymond], Hawk, Hawkgirl, Hawkman, Jade, the Martian Manhunter,and Osiris) and villains (Captain Boomerang, Maxwell Lord, and Professor Zoom, the Reverse Flash) to feature in Brightest Day, an ultimately rather lackluster follow-up series (more on this eventually). Moreover, Blackest Night is of supreme importance for the Green Lantern series in its introduction and incorporation of additional Lantern Corps powered by other aspects of the emotional spectrum, and these revelations have continuing impact on the Green Lantern franchise in the comics, as well as on film and television in the ongoing Green Lantern: The Animated Series.