Off with His Head!: Swamp Thing literally pops Maxwell Lord's head off by crushing his body with vines. Tom Taylor made sure to recognize this isn’t where the story of DCeased: War Of The Undead Gods needed to end. We already got this ending in DCeased: Dead Planet and that did not put an end to the Anti-Life Equation crisis. For this to be a true ending our heroes needed to go to the source of the DC Universe problems, which was the embodiment of the Anti-Life Equation in Erebos. Green Thumb: Poison Ivy, as usual. She eventually turns all of Gotham City into a forested haven from the infected. Played straight when the first child sees Grundy and understandably mistakes him for an infected undead. Sapient All Along: Cyborg manages to compel the infected Wonder Woman to answers his questions via the Lasso of Truth, showing that the virus itself has an intelligence, albeit an incredibly omnicidal one.

Break the Badass: Superman is really put through the wringer in the story, having friends, colleagues, and his father get infected and turn on him throughout, and it all culminates in his own death and monstrous transformation at the end of the fifth issue. The arks with the survivors arrive at a new planet they name "Earth 2". The Earth 2 comics had the deaths of the DC Trinity and the death of planet Earth against Apokolips, and survivors evacuated on ships to settle on a new Earth, but played more as heroic Space Opera adventure. Earth 2 shared the same writer of DCeased and Injustice. Things go From Bad to Worse in the fifth issue with the deaths of Martian Manhunter, Lex Luthor, The Flash, and Superman. Captain Atom is considered to be this to the United States government. As the Equation spreads, Amanda Waller sends him out to destroy as many of the infected as he can with his atomic powers. When he detonates after becoming infected, the destruction is incomprehensible: the unleashed energy destroys Washington, D.C. and Baltimore, and even reaches Metropolis.

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Batman remains protected from the Equation in the Batcave due to both the Bat Computer's firewall systems isolating the virus and a network of analog cameras placed around Gotham City that allow him to view the outside chaos without worrying about witnessing digital signals carrying the Equation. In addition, he has an electromagnetic pulse ready to go to disable any and all electronics inside Wayne Manor. Unfortunately, these safeguards don't protect Nightwing and Red Robin from becoming infected. However, he has the foresight to provide Damian with equipment to counter and defeat the members of the Justice League. Like a Son to Me: It's clear that Alfred feels this way about the entire Bat Family. He explicitly calls Batman his son before killing him once he's taken over by the infection. Before leaving Wayne Manor, he refers to Batman, Nightwing, and Red Robin as "[his] boys."

Talking Is a Free Action: Subverted in Issue #5 when the narrator suggests that Superman's Heroic Sacrifice might have succeeded if he hadn’t taken the time to say goodbye to his family. Brown Note: The virus can be transmitted visually via the internet; millions are infected instantly while engaging in mundane electronics usage, including Green Lantern, Nightwing, Red Robin, and Joker.

This series contains examples of:

Why don't you use all that power and channel it into a bit of insight? What do you think I'm motivated by?" Covers Always Lie: Some issues feature covers with characters who either don't actually appear in the specific issue or don't appear at all, or are shown as being infected but this does not happen in-story if at all. There are even covers showing heroes fighting the infected after previous issues already had that hero turned. Cruel Twist Ending: For one character in particular: after staying behind on Earth out of guilt for unintentionally bringing the virus there in the first place, Cyborg discovers that the cure for the infection has been inside of him the whole time. Sadly, he's killed by the infected Wonder Woman before he can communicate with the evacuation arks. The new Justice League make short work of the alien invaders moving in on Earth-2. Jon makes a point that they could have really flattened them, but they wanted peace, not to kill the aliens. Go Out with a Smile: In issue five, Jason Todd sadly dies with his family saddened. However before he died he tells Rose he's glad he met her in his second chance and goes out smiling.

When Harley goes to break up with Joker, he's hunched over a wall of monitors in his lair. At the end of Harley's speech, a close-up of his face reveals that he's been infected. The main story of DCeased is made up of three comic book miniseries, which act as a trilogy. These are: According to the narrator Superman's attempted Heroic Sacrifice after he became infected failed because he stopped to say good bye to his family. As a result of him succumbing to the infection the sun was destroyed.

Success!

Even zombified Badass Normals can still use some of their skills. For example, the infected Nightwing and Red Robin can still use their agility to out-maneuver Batman, who is quite agile himself, and the zombified Birds of Prey can still use enough agility to swoop down from Gotham buildings like they used to do when they were alive. Man Hug: Much to Gordon's surprise, Damian has no problem embracing him out of happiness towards his survival. Driven by Envy: Jimmy calls out Luthor and states that one of the reasons he hates Superman so much is because deep down a part of him is envious how someone who isn't human can be more human than him. While Luthor moves on from the topic, it's noted he doesn't deny the words either.