Obscusion B-Side: The DC Hero Who Refused to Die! A Resurrection Man Retrospective

During the early 90s, Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning were two British employees of Marvel Comics. Abnett was known mainly as an inker, though he had written every now & then, while Lanning had previously written for 2000 AD magazine. The two considered teaming up to revive the Great Lakes Avengers, a comedic off-shoot of the iconic team, but there was one main problem they had: Mr. Immortal, the leader, was just too boring. In particular, they felt that the simple power of immortality gave them nothing to really work with, so they dropped the idea. However, Lanning did think that it'd be interesting if they had a character that would gain a new superpower every time he resurrected, and when the duo moved over to DC in the second half of the decade they pitched it to editor Eddie Berganza, who absolutely loved the idea. Teaming up with artist Jackson "Butch" Guice, a last-minute addition who was one of the lead pencillers for the entire Death & Rebirth of Superman storyline a few years earlier, the end result was Resurrection Man #1, which debuted in May of 1997; no relation to the 1998 British film directed by Marc Evans, or the two novels written in 1994 & 1995. I first heard of this series just a couple of years ago, but only recently gave it a chance, and now I would like to go over the story of one Mitch Shelley, the wild ride he had during the twilight years of the 90s, and how he resurrected one more time over a decade later.

It all starts with our lead, unsure of anything about him other than his first name, coming across some gangbangers about to commit a drive-by on some hapless teenagers outside the town of Crucible who walked into their territory. Mitch, wanting to do the right thing, jumps in front of the teens... Only to start flying, which he never knew he could do. Unfortunately, while the gangbangers were distracted by this, it also made Mitch into a giant target, so he gets shot down, with his only consolation being a rough flashback of whatever memories he has, as scattershot as they are. However, Mitch then wakes up, confused as to how he survived getting shot down in a hail of gunfire, finding out that he now has the power to harden the air around him. Using the jumbled memories he gained, he enters Crucible & heads to the library to look up any info he can, getting the help of a librarian named Irma, who helps him search & realize that his name is Mitch Shelley, a lawyer who was reported dead two days ago after a gas explosion in the nearby town of Viceroy.

Irma takes Mitch to a nearby mission for the homeless to feed him & cut his long hair, only for the mission to be attacked by Bonny Hoffman & Carmen Leno, two assassins calling themselves the Body Doubles. They're hunting after Mitch, who only manages to escape because of Irma sacrificing herself, & later Mitch comes across a gas station diner shortly before an out-of-control truck risks everyone's life. Mitch manages to stop it with his hardened air power, & save the unconscious driver, before dying in an explosion created by the gas the truck had started leaking. Three days later, the Body Doubles come across the diner, only for everyone to find out that Mitch's body, which was dumped in the freezer room while waiting for the police to slowly arrive, had gone missing. Yes, Mitch resurrected once again, this time with pyrokinetic powers, and wanders off, deciding to consider himself a "Resurrection Man", after hearing someone at the diner talk about a rumor of such a man, one who hails for free rides, only to leave the good Samaritans dead. Unbeknownst to Mitch, though, this rumor is real... And it's on the hunt for him. Issue #1 does a great job introducing Mitch Shelley, his interesting power (which is like a more randomized take on Dial H for Hero, though activated by dying), some ongoing villains, & the general storyline for the time being, i.e. finding out who Mitch really is, why he was in a gas explosion, & how he gained these powers. We also get a good feel for Mitch's character, showing that he values human life & wants nothing more than to help those in need, and since he can't die he's more than willing to risk his life in ways others simply can't.

It doesn't take long to get some answers, as after an issue where Mitch comes across the Justice League fighting Amazo (complete with Blue Superman... which was a thing), during which Mitch helps save innocents, Mitch returns to Viceroy in order to find out some truths. This starts the three-part Scorpion Memories story, where Mitch reunites with his wife Paula & best friend Richard Bessly, only to eventually remember that the gas explosion was all their plan in the first place. Turns out Mitch Shelley was a dirty lawyer that allowed the mob to slowly take over Viceroy, while he earned big bucks to protect the crooks. Eventually, Mitch wanted out & had a plan to enter witness protection, while spilling the dirt to the FBI, only for Paula & Rich to hire a crooked cop named Keach, who created the explosion meant to kill Mitch. Paula, Rich, & Keach kill Mitch again, all while a private insurance claims investigator named Kim Rebecki follows Mitch in secret, after seeing him walk the street earlier; she thinks Mitch committed insurance fraud, & now wants his share of the money. It all comes to a head when Mitch artificially causes a Mexican standoff between the mob, his ex-friends (along with Keach & his fellow bad cops), & himself, all in an attempt to wipe the slate clean & finally put an end to the crime his old self allowed to spread. He also comes face to face with Hooker, the rumored "Resurrection Man" he heard about, with the main difference between them being that Hooker doesn't gain new powers every time he resurrects... And he doesn't recover any of the damage he took from his previous deaths, either, leading to him being more or less insane.

Scorpion Memories is a strong three-parter, giving Mitch tons of backstory that helps flesh out his character, both who he used to be & who he is now, while also introducing some recurring cast that will feature throughout the series, namely Kim Rebecki & Hooker. By the end of this arc, Mitch has been captured by the Body Doubles, who tracked him down & laid in wait for him to become vulnerable. They drive him to a rendezvous point... But not before getting accidentally Boom Tubed to Apokolips, the domain of the villainous New God Darkseid. This is due to Issue #6 being a tie-in to Genesis, a crossover event happening at the time involving Darkseid trying to gain control of the "Godwave" that threatens the safety of the universe. Luckily, this only amounts to a 4-page gag where the Body Doubles are shown to have had a wild journey off-panel to get back to Earth & back to their rendezvous point; Mitch, being tied up in the trunk, has no idea what happened. Anyway, Mitch is given to The Lab, an organization run by man known only as "Mr. Fancy" that seems to be the cause for Mitch's resurrection-related powers. After a test, though, he comes up as negative, so the Body Doubles kill him, only for Mitch to then resurrect, knock out the Doubles, & steal their car. Following that are two issues where Mitch is mainly wandering, meeting Batman in Gotham & helping a young boy make his cryptozoologist father finally settle down in a small town, followed by a two-issue story where Mitch encounters Tommy Monaghan, a superpowered contract killer known as the Hitman.

Tommy is hired by the Viceroy mob to kill Mitch (again), who came back to town to ask for Kim's help, only to wind up helping Mitch out, as his mind-reading abilities made him realize that Mitch is nothing more than a nice guy who only wants to find out what happened to him. In the end, the main things from this story are giving Mitch a supporting cast of Kim, her partner Claude Peck (a former Gotham SWAT Team member), & her sister Brenda (who's a talented hacker), while Tommy eventually tells the gang that The Lab is located outside Washington D.C., since he's been hired by the organization in the past. As for the hit on Mitch, Tommy simply extorts more money from the mob, since he was told to provide photographic proof of him killing Mitch... And after killing Mitch a bunch of times, so that he has an appropriate power to take on The Lab with, Tommy feels he should get paid for each & every one; at $300,000 per kill, it adds up. This leads us to the two-part Origin of Species story, where Mitch & Kim infiltrate The Lab to finally get some answers from Mr. Fancy. They not only get their answers regarding Mitch's power (nanotechnology based on tektites), but Hooker crashes the party, revealing his relation to the The Lab, kills Fancy, & destabilizes the nuclear reactor that powers the entire facility. After sharing a kiss, Kim escapes The Lab, with help from Claude (who pushes past his severe heart condition to infiltrate The Lab himself), while Mitch hangs on to Hooker as the facility is destroyed in a giant nuclear explosion.

At this point, after twelve issues, it kind of feels like the story has come to an end, doesn't it? After all, Mitch found out who he really was, put a stop to what his old life had done, found out where he got his power from, & sacrificed himself to take down the insane semi-mirror image of himself, while also destroying the place that made him into the Resurrection Man; plus, there's a good chance Mitch will just resurrect anyway, so he & Kim can give life together a try. However, Issue #12 ends with the introduction of Cliff DeWitt, a young & rich mogul who not only disguises The Lab's destruction as the result of an airplane crash, but also hires the Body Doubles to recover something from the irradiated area: Hooker, who survived the explosion, though now he's nothing more than a skull with two eyeballs. After a standalone issue of Mitch helping a small town Sheriff find out the identity of a serial killer, though told in flashback so as to disguise when this actually happened, the story picks back up in Issue #14. DeWitt hires the Body Doubles to search for Mitch, using Hooker to act as a sort of radar, since that's how Hooker kept finding Mitch in the first place; they're also given "Mr. Skism", who has reality-warping abilities. Meanwhile, Keach is in jail, after Mitch managed to get some of his dirt to Kim following Scorpion Memories, only to wind up getting forcibly possessed by a female entity called "The Rider", which can take control of his body & force him to do murderous deeds. Using Keach's memories, The Rider hunts after Mitch, as she wants a body that she doesn't have to worry will die on her.

As for Mitch, he resurrected as a shadow-like being, making it tough to communicate with anyone. After encountering (& killing) Keach, The Rider possesses Mitch, leading into Issues #16 & 17, which sadly creates a problem with my reading of this series. You see, these two issues are parts one & three of Avenging Angels, in which the Rider-possessing Mitch winds up in Leesburg, home of Supergirl (the "Earth-born angel" Linda Danvers version). Turns out that The Rider is actually Wanda Lee, the founder of the town who bonded with The Rider after drinking from the "Chaos Stream" that runs under Leesburg... And all of this explained in Supergirl (Vol. 4) #24, which is part two of the story. Yes, after being completely standalone for over a year, Resurrection Man became slightly fragmented due to requiring another series for a issue, and while you can just read Mitch's series & understand the story fine, it still weakens it. Anyway, the story ends with the "help" of an alleged angel wanting to claim Mitch's soul, but winds up taking The Rider's. A new wrinkle is also added to Mitch's backstory, as it's indicated that his resurrection ability may not have even been due to the tektites, but rather has always been with him, as he starts seeing glimpses of previous lives upon dying, though the whole "gain a new superpower" thing is likely due to the tektites. Unfortunately, this is never really followed up on in any major way by the end of the series, instead becoming an unnecessary plot hole.

Still, Avenging Angels marks the start in a change of execution for Resurrection Man, one in which half of the remaining issues of this run involve Mitch interacting with previously-established DC characters. Issue #18 sees Mitch meet Deadman & the Phantom Stranger in "The Dreaming" while put on life support, keeping him from dying, with the Stranger revealing that Mitch is one of his "oldest friends" (which, coming from the Stranger, means an unfathomably long time), ending with the reveal that, eventually, Mitch will have to come face to face with the immortal villain Vandal Savage. This was meant to help lead into a tie-in with the event DC One Million, in which the JLA teams with its 853rd Century equivalent, Justice Legion Alpha, to put a stop to Vandal Savage & original villain Solaris in the year 85,271 (a.k.a. one million months into the future). As for Mitch Shelley, he becomes the tactician for JL Alpha, after Martian Manhunter merged with his home planer of Mars; just roll with it. To tie in, a bunch of DC series received a #1,000,000 issue, including Resurrection Man, with Mitch's issue seeing him take on Vandal Savage one last time... Only to be left in an state of infinite death. Honestly, I have no interest in ever reading DC One Million, and this issue does nothing to make me interested; it's honestly just a pointless detour. Issues #19 to 21 tell the three-part Cape Fear story, which I have mixed feelings on. It starts with a complete reboot, turning Mitch into a Superman/Batman proxy, making Kim into a Lois Lane equivalent, & re-imagining old villains into new supervillains... But at the end of Issue #19 it's thankfully all revealed to be a lie, as the Body Doubles & Hooker have finally caught up with Mitch, with Mr. Skism creating this false reality to trap Mitch.

As for the good, it is amusing (& kind of trippy) to see such a wild shift in tone for the comic, & you can tell the creative team just wanted to do something silly. Plus, it's a clever way to actually use Mr. Skism, who up to this point simply acted like a sick pervert to the Body Doubles. Unfortunately, there's literally no real explanation as to how Mitch & Kim got caught, aside from a throwaway line that still doesn't explain enough, Mr. Skism simply dies after using his power too much (so he's pretty much a wasted villain), & Mitch still has the silly superhero outfit after getting free (because reality got warped), which then leads to him being recruited by the JLA, because of Superman's knowledge from DC One Million, & fighting against Major Force in Issue #21; at the very least, Mitch & Kim finally admit their feelings for each other. Thankfully, the JLA recruitment is simply a one-off, though Batman does give Mitch info Oracle found out about The Lab & the man who was behind it: Cliff DeWitt. Not just that, but after getting captured by DeWitt & escaping imprisonment inside his complex (alongside the Body Doubles, who were imprisoned for constantly failing), Mitch finds out where the tektite technology that gives him superpowers came from in the first place... Cells of Vandal Savage, who just happens to be DeWitt's father.

Also, Mitch becomes a woman after being put through torturous testing by DeWitt, because women have a higher threshold of pain. After some initial surprise, Mitch takes the new body well, even adapting rather quickly to being considered a "she"; it's likely also why the Body Doubles become willing to be Mitch's new friends. Granted, he's killed at the start of the next issue so as to take on DeWitt in a final confrontation with better powers, but it was a well done change of pace for an issue.

Anyway, Mitch deals with DeWitt & a final encounter with Hooker, all of which kind of feels a bit rushed, as the Doubles get away, never to be seen again, while Hooker is literally just shoved aside, but never actually seen to be killed once & for all. DeWitt himself really only factored into the story for about four issues total, with seven straight issues in between that either didn't involve him at all or simply involved his hiring of the Body Doubles, Skism & Hooker, and he honestly got irritating immediately, especially due to this hipster geek demeanor & constant use of "kewl"; as a "true" finale to The Lab, it's pretty disappointing. This brings us to the final three issues of the original run, where Mitch teams with the Forgotten Heroes to take on Vandal Savage, with all of this stemming from the idea that Mitch might actually be the long-missing Immortal Man, Savage's original arch-rival since the dawn of humanity. Despite his name, Immortal Man actually can die, though he'd simply reincarnate in a new body, though unlike Mitch his additional powers stayed consistent. Turns out the "Millennium Meteor" that gave Savage & Immortal Man their respective powers is on course to approach Earth again, landing in Antarctica via a time warp, but with it comes a bio-mechanial creature called the Warp Child, one that can alter all reality around it, a victim of experimentation by the ancient beings that sent the meteor in the first place. With not even the JLA, Titans, & Young Justice able to do anything, Mitch has to team up with Vandal Savage & the real Immortal Man, who Savage had held hostage for years, to stop the Warp Child. They do, with Immortal Man sacrificing his very existence to negate the Warp Child's existence. After 27 issues, plus one that technically didn't happen yet, Mitch feels he deserves a "normal" life, so he heads back to Viceroy to finally be together with Kim; to be fair, he more than deserves it.

In the end, the original 1997-1999 run of Resurrection Man is a case of a series seemingly running for longer than originally intended, & it's obvious to see. The first 12 issues are simply outstanding, focusing on telling a story that, though taking place in the larger DC universe, does not require any previous knowledge of comics to simply start reading, and is filled with memorable characters, clever stories, & a smart usage of characters from other DC series; I may not be interested in reading Hitman, but I loved the use of Tommy Monaghan. If the series had ended there, it would have been perfect, because all questions had been answered, & the reader could tell where Mitch was going to wind up. The comic must have done better than expected, though, which led to the reveal of DeWitt at the end of Issue #12 & an extension, and while the comic never became "bad", it started getting roped into the usual pratfalls of "Big Two" comic book storytelling. The Supergirl crossover required reading an issue from that series, so you couldn't simply stick to just one series. The stuff with DeWitt was nowhere near as interesting as what came before, and its "true" end of The Lab's involvement feels like a case of the comic being cancelled, so the creative team had to finish it off so that they could get to the "real" finale; to be fair, those last three issues are pretty good, if lacking any real epilogue. Finally, Mitch's origin became overly complicated &, in the end, never fully explained; I would have accepted him being the the new reincarnation of Immortal Man, honestly. Still, Resurrection Man's original run is an outstanding series overall, and well worth a read for anyone who wants something different from the DC universe, even to this day.
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After the original run came to an end, Mitch Shelley only made a handful of appearances. In October 1999, Abnett & Lanning wrote The Superman Monster, an Elseworlds story where Mitch essentially played an actual "resurrection man", a.k.a. a body-snatcher/grave robber. Mitch & Killer Croc then shared a short story, "Sometimes They Come Back", in 2007's Infinite Halloween Special #1 (also written by Abnett & Lanning), followed by a supporting role for Mitch in the "Way of the World" three-parter in Supergirl (Vol. 5) in mid-2008, & he made one last appearance in Issue #13 of the Brightest Day crossover storyline at the start of 2011. Four months later, however, Flashpoint happened, with the end result being a complete restart of DC continuity, the first one since Crisis on Infinite Earths in the mid-80s. DC hyped this reboot as "The New 52", with the name coming from the fact that 52 comic series were (re-)starting from #1, which was controversial due to the legacies of series like Action Comics & Detective Comics coming to a sudden halt (these would be returned to normal, eventually, though). These 52 series were split across seven categories, one of which was "The Dark", focusing on supernatural, fantasy, & horror stories, & it was decided that Resurrection Man would be one of the "First Wave" of The New 52, complete with Abnett & Lanning returning to write the story, though now artwork would be done by Fernando Dagnino, a newer talent who had previously worked on Justice League: Generation Lost. With a new continuity to establish, did this second chance for Mitch Shelley work for the better, or did the eventual flaws of The New 52 drag this series down to hell?

The series starts with Mitch Shelley being declared dead at a local hospital, but when the nurse leaves the room Mitch gets right back up, realizing he has magnetism powers. Yes, Mitch already knows about his "resurrection = new powers" gimmick, & he has an urge to head to Portland. While on a plane heading to the city, he meets a woman with a teardrop tattoo on her face... Only for her to reveal herself to be a four-armed, winged creature, crashing the plane while losing track of Mitch, who dies by getting sucked into the engine rotor of the plane; he revives with the ability to turn into water. Turns out the woman is actually Suriel, a shapeshifting angel who wants to claim Mitch's soul, which has become super valuable since he can't actually die. Mitch arrives to his location in Portland, a home for the elderly where he left his father... Who has since passed away. With the help of Darryl Roth, his father's neighbor (& former supervillain the Transhuman, a New 52 original), they start to search for info about Mitch, only to be interrupted by the Body Doubles (Carmen Leno & Bonnie Hoffman), who have been hired to retrieve Mitch & seem to have a past with him. They kill Mitch, who takes longer to resurrect then usual, because he's stuck in a Limbo-like realm (i.e. it's pretty much Hell) by a mysterious figure who considers himself Suriel's "opposite number". Mitch forces his way back to reality & fights against the Doubles, who reveal to have super "repair factors", making them nigh-invincible, since they'll just immediately recover any damage done to them, no matter the attack. They incapacitate Mitch, only to then have to deal with Darryl, who managed to find the "gene-bonded, symborg" Transhuman armor & weaponry he hid away in the home.

All that right there? That's the first three issues of this new series, and it perfectly encapsulates the change in how comics are made today, compared to even back in the 90s: Writing for a single issue vs. writing for a trade paperback. Due to various factors, like the success of Watchmen & the Speculator Boom, the American comic book industry eventually switched from telling self-contained stories in a single issue as the norm to instead making each issue part of a longer overall story, with the intent of selling the collected trade paperback release to a larger audience than who were still buying single issues. Let me cut straight the chase here & mention that Resurrection Man's second series didn't last long, being cancelled only after a year, lasting 13 issues. That means we're already about a quarter into the overall story, yet it feels like barely anything has really happened. Now don't get me wrong, because I'm not already putting down the storytelling at this point (I like the concept of multiple, conflicting parties hunting after Mitch), but it definitely shows how much things changed in only the 12 years between the end of Mitch's first run & the beginning of his second.

Moving back to the actual plot, Darryl gets into a particularly brutal fight with Carmen (& since the two are nigh indestructible, neither stands down), but eventually Mitch comes to & willingly agrees to come with the Doubles, after Bonnie realizes that Mitch truly doesn't remember anything & offers to do things peacefully. Of course, Suriel then arrives & promptly reduces Mitch to nothing more than dust & a skull; she worries she might have overdone it, but reasons that Mitch will just finally go to Heaven. Naturally, things don't work out that way, as Mitch is instead revealed to be in an ambulance & being transported to Arkham Asylum... Somehow. It's during these next three issues I just covered that we also learn some things, like that the Doubles work for the same man Mitch used to work for, Director Hooker (whose face is horribly scarred & burned), & that Darryl isn't actually an old man, but rather is just 19 years old, with his accelerated aging being the effect of the symborg armor he created; he came to the elderly home to seek the help of Mitch's father. Also, via flashback to three years prior, Mitch's past is revealed, showing that he was the former Director of "The Lab", with Hooker being his subordinate, Bonnie being under his command, & Carmen a soldier on death's door from the Iraq War who becomes an unwilling lab rat for a new tektite-based regeneration experiment. Not only that, but Mitch was a ruthless, heartless, & downright horrible person, even hiring Deathstroke the Terminator as the head of his security, & when his base is attacked by a mysterious force (which never gets identified), he easily chose to let Hooker die & took a syringe of the tektites with him for his own greed... Only for his own arm to get blown off & have the tektites injected directly into him by the mysterious attackers. As for Mitch, the flashback was all a dream to him, so he's not fully sure if he once was that horrible person, and if his sudden urge to help others is just his way to atone for his sins.

At this point, starting with Issue #6 (the stuff in Arkham Asylum), the series feels like it suddenly got a soft reboot, as Mitch is now all by himself once again. It's honestly not all that dissimilar to Jaime Reyes' second Blue Beetle run, which saw him being tossed all over the place constantly, preventing him from getting a consistent story. Anyway, after getting out of Arkham & a story in Metropolis, Mitch runs into Kim Rebecki, a psychometric detective who's been hired by a "mysterious benefactor" to find Mitch... And The Butcher, a necromancer who's been hired by "Hell" to get him. After The Butcher essentially deals with himself (never to be seen again in this series...), Kim apologizes to Mitch because her research made her think he was a horrible person, but her psychometry made her realize he's a changed man & is willing to tell him about his past... Until a Deadshot-lead Suicide Squad suddenly burst in. This brings us to Suicide Squad (Vol. 4) #9, which also brings about a change in staff, as Dagnino moves over to drawing this series, while Jesus Saiz (& later Javier Pina) comes in to draw for the rest of Resurrection Man. Luckily, I'm reading the second series from a trade, which includes this issue of Suicide Squad, but it's still annoying to see that, after only eight issues, the story is already requiring reading other comics to get the full picture. Regardless, the Suicide Squad issue & Issue # 9 of our focus end up with Mitch being hunted by both the Suicide Squad & a returning Body Doubles, and Kim getting captured by Amanda Waller, only to make a deal with Waller to allow the two of them to go free, as long as Waller gets a sample of Mitch, like one of his hands, as he'll just regenerate what's lost, anyway. Also, unbeknownst to them, Waller put a Suicide Squad nanobomb into Kim's neck... Which will absolutely play no factor whatsoever, because we're already nearing the end!

The brings us to the final four issues, which deal with Kim helping Mitch find The Lab, and the final confrontation with Director Hooker. Also, Mitch somehow knows that Darryl had been taken by The Lab back in Portland, even though he (or the reader) never actually saw that happen; the last time Darryl was seen, he & the Body Doubles were beaten up by Suriel. Speaking of said angel, she & her unnamed Hell equivalent come upon Mitch & Kim while they find a way to track Darryl's (& The Lab's) location, & Mitch makes a deal: Give him one week to find out the truth, & he'll quietly go with whichever side gives him a better deal. Issue #11 starts as they head to Viceroy, South Carolina, Mitch's home town & the secret base for The Lab, & find Darryl... Who sided with The Lab to act as bait for Mitch, who then gets captured. While being tortured via intense VR to find out how to copy his power, Darryl realizes that he was an idiot & frees Kim to save Mitch. They succeed... Only for Darryl to be summarily killed by head eradication; *siiiiiiiiiiiiiigh*. Finally, Issue #12 ends with the revelation of who's really behind all of this, the man Hooker was taking orders from, which you can highlight yourself if you don't mind reading the biggest spoiler of this entire retrospective: Mitchell Shelley, the man we saw in the flashback, with the Mitch the story has revolved around being nothing more than a clone that regenerated from a discarded arm of the original Shelley, who is actually dying, as he lost his ability to regenerate. The second half of this reveal happens in Issue #0, which is part of a larger "0 Month" campaign from late 2012 to help give backstories to the various New 52 series. While 0th issues were meant to be standalone, though, Resurrection Man's is actually the finale, revealing how Mitch came to be the way he is, defeating his final enemy, & even finding a way out of being hunted by Heaven, though the never-named representative of Hell, after taking Mitch & Kim back to her office, reveals that he'll let Mitch continue to live... Until he has need of him in the future.

To this day, this remains the last time Mitch Shelley has ever appeared in the DC Universe... Because of course that's how things end: Teasing something that will likely never happen! Also, some revelations regarding Mitch in Issue #0 results in me wondering what'll happen with the arm that Amanda Waller took from Mitch; I bet it never got addressed at all in Suicide Squad.

Overall, Resurrection Man's run in The New 52 is a somewhat perfect encapsulation of a number of the problems comic fans had with this entire DC reboot, as a whole. Things start off really promising, but after only four issues it seems like editorial mandates threw things into disarray by effectively discarding everything that had been set up so that the story can go into a different direction, one that involves crossing over with other currently-running series, in a poor attempt to cross-promote. Mitch suddenly has to be seen in well known locales like Arkham Asylum or Metropolis for no real reason other than that they're well known locales that readers will identify. Sure, Mitch went to Gotham in the original series, but that issue had fun with the idea, putting Batman into the narrative role; the Arkham Asylum issue here contributed nothing & supplied no reason for it to happen. As for the Suicide Squad, they were handled poorly, and overall contribute nothing of importance, as their involvement could have simply been replaced with the forces of Heaven or Hell. In fact, Mitch's hand being in Amanda Waller's possession is nothing more than plot for the Suicide Squad comic, and I can't find any indication that it actually amounted to anything later on. Compare that to Tommy Monaghan's appearance in the original series, which not only did well to advertise Hitman (without setting anything up for that series), but also played a relevant role in Mitch's story.

Similarly, while I liked making Kim Rebecki into a psychometric detective, her inclusion is not handled well, as her power is used as a way to (pretty much) make her instantly infatuated with Mitch literally upon first touch; I get her wanting to help him, but their romance is nowhere near as natural as it was in the 90s. Finally, everything is all done with a penchant for being more violent & untrusting than necessary, in an attempt to come off as appealing to "mature" audiences; to be fair, though, this series wasn't that bad with it as other New 52 comics were. As for the finale, while I do appreciate that Mitch's existence was given a proper explanation, and I was happy that Issue #0 addressed the final twist, it was also just way too rushed, with Kim feeling pretty much useless, Hooker being killed off way too easily for a guy who's revealed to be immortal, Darryl's death being a horrible waste of an original character for nothing more than shock factor, & the fact that it just couldn't finish with an definitive ending is just the cherry on top; as rushed as the original series' ending did feel, it at least was definitive.

All that being said, though, I don't exactly hate this second series (I'm just very disappointed in it), because I can still tell that Abnett & Lanning tried their best to keep the moment-to-moment storytelling & writing as good as possible, and the artwork lead by both Dagnino & Saiz is generally excellent; the change in pencillers doesn't even result in a massive style switch, which is nice. It's also easier to get a hold of physically, as the entire run, plus that issue of Suicide Squad, is collected across two trades. Meanwhile, the first 14 issues of the original series were collected in a "Vol. 1" trade in an attempt to play off of the new series' debut, but after that series got cancelled the remaining 14 issues (15, if you count that issue of Supergirl) never were collected, requiring one to buy back issues to own the entire original series; Issue #1,000,000 was also collected in DC One Million's various trade paperbacks, though. If you're fine with digital, though, then you're in luck, because DC has released the entirety of both Resurrection Man series that way; you can even buy the first 14 issues as either back issues or the "Vol. 1" trade.

Personally, I absolutely recommend the first 12 issues of the original Resurrection Man, which are simply outstanding from start to finish; not a single issue is anything other than great. After you've read that, & still want more, then go ahead & read the rest of the original series; it's not quite as excellent as the first 12, but still really good & fun, on the whole. As for the New 52 run, I say only check it out if you're really curious, because it does try & has its moments, but don't expect anything near the level of what came before. As for the chances of Mitch Shelley resurrecting once again... Once can certainly hope it'll happen, because it's certainly an excellent concept that can deliver outstanding stories, as long as the creative team is allowed to flourish.

Comics © DC Comics, Inc.