History Comicbook / CrisisOnInfiniteEarths

The series climaxes with (almost) ''all'' of the characters who ever got their own series, [[MyFriendsAndZoidberg plus their team-mates, their {{Sidekick}}s, and their kitchen sink]], ganging up to kick the crap out of the Anti-Monitor. There is (as you'd expect) an EarthShatteringKaboom...

And the heroes wake up the next morning on Earth. It's apparently Earth-1, and some of the heroes from other universes landed here. And the Multiverse no longer exists. And everyone remembers the heroes, even the ones that were from other Earths, being here all along. [[TimeyWimeyBall And the heroes remember the Multiverse, but no one else does, except for Psycho Pirate.]] It appears that it was AllJustADream - but then the Anti-Monitor tries to destroy reality one last time. So the Comicbook/{{Superman}} from Earth-2 [[TookALevelInBadass takes a level in Badass]], [[SuddenlyShouting screams "I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!"]] [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu and punches the Anti-Monitor so hard that the Anti-Monitor]] [[YourHeadAsplode ceases to exist]]. Cue ''another'' EarthShatteringKaboom. Now ''nobody'' remembers the Multiverse, except for poor Psycho Pirate, who ended up locked in Arkham Asylum, raving about "how worlds lived, worlds died... nothing will ever be the same"... The End.

The series climaxes with (almost) ''all'' of the characters who ever got their own series, [[MyFriendsAndZoidberg plus their team-mates]], their {{Sidekick}}s, and their kitchen sink, ganging up to kick the crap out of the Anti-Monitor. There is (as you'd expect) an EarthShatteringKaboom...

And the heroes wake up the next morning on Earth. It's apparently Earth-1, and some of the heroes from other universes landed here. And the Multiverse no longer exists. And everyone remembers the heroes, even the ones that were from other Earths, being here all along. [[TimeyWimeyBall And the heroes remember the Multiverse, but no one else does, except for Psycho Pirate.]] It appears that it was AllJustADream - but then the Anti-Monitor tries to destroy reality one last time. So the Comicbook/{{Superman}} from Earth-2 [[TookALevelInBadass takes a level in Badass]], screams "I HAVE HAD ENOUGH!" [[DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu and punches the Anti-Monitor so hard that the Anti-Monitor]] [[YourHeadAsplode ceases to exist]]. Cue ''another'' EarthShatteringKaboom. Now ''nobody'' remembers the Multiverse, except for poor Psycho Pirate, who ended up locked in Arkham Asylum, raving about "how worlds lived, worlds died... nothing will ever be the same"... The End.

Because of the holes in continuity it left behind, ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' has spawned several CrisisCrossover sequels that have attempted, with varying success, to make sense of the mess. These include 1994's ''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'', 2006's ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis'', 2007's ''ComicBook/FiftyTwo'', 2008's ''ComicBook/FinalCrisis'', 2009's ''ComicBook/BlackestNight'', and 2022's ''ComicBook/DarkCrisisOnInfiniteEarths''. ''ComicBook/{{Legends|DCComics}}'' can be seen as an epilogue, as it allowed the new DCU to introduce themselves to each other; for example, it was the introduction of a young adult ComicBook/WonderWoman to the other DC heroes. Much of the Creator/GeoffJohns era as head creative mind for ComicBook/GreenLantern also ties in directly with Crisis (specifically the Anti-Monitor). The in-universe ramifications of the Crisis were also a recurring theme of the late-'80s MindScrew series ''Comicbook/AnimalMan''. Much of its imagery and backstory was referenced in ''ComicBook/JLAAvengers''.

The DC Universe would later pull another ContinuityReboot in 2011 with ''ComicBook/{{Flashpoint}}'', followed by 2015’s ''ComicBook/{{Convergence}}'' effectively undoing the Crisis.

Compare ''ComicBook/SecretWars2015'', another high stakes multiverse-spanning crossover that has dramatic consequences for a superhero universe.

!!Tropes codified or invented by this crossover include:

An [[Series/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths2019 adaptation of the story]], set within Creator/TheCW's Series/{{Arrowverse}}, was revealed to be in development at the end of the 2018 crossover ''Series/{{Elseworlds|2018}}''. It aired in December 2019 and January 2020 as a five-episode series. An animated film adaptation is set to release in 2024 as part of the WesternAnimation/{{Tomorrowverse}}.

An [[Series/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths2019 adaptation of the story]], set within Creator/TheCW's Series/{{Arrowverse}}, was revealed to be in development at the end of the 2018 crossover ''Series/{{Elseworlds|2018}}''. It aired in December 2019 and January 2020 as a five-episode series.

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/crisis_on_infinite_earths_vol_1_1.png]]
[[caption-width-right:350:An event so vast that it can barely be contained in this space!]]

->''"Worlds will live. Worlds will die. And nothing will ever be the same."''

[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/crisis_on_infinite_earths_small.png]]

** Huntress is slain instantly by a shadow-demon.

* AscendedFanfic: The series is based on a story Marv Wolfman envisioned as a child. After he was hired as a writer by DC, he pitched the project, though it obviously has numerous differences from his original fan fiction.

* AdvancingWallOfDoom: A big white one consuming the entire [[TheMultiverse Multiverse]].

* AscendedFanfic: Essentially. See the top of the page.

* AttackOfThe50FootWhatever: The Anti-Monitor grows to giant-size in the latter half of the story and stays at that size while the heroes (and Darkseid) whittle him down to nothing more than a flaming head coming out of a star.
* TheAtoner: Pariah, for having destroyed his parallel universe by attempting to explore the origin of the universe, and believing himself to be responsible for the destruction of countless other parallel universes before the Anti-Monitor reveals he himself is responsible for the latter.
* BadGuysDoTheDirtyWork: Subverted. While Darkseid probably gave the Anti-Monitor a fatal blow (the Anti-Monitor is only a decaying, exploding ball of energy after Darkseid uses Alex Luthor to fire Omega beams at him), it's ultimately Superman of Earth-Two that fittingly delivers the killing blow, punching the ball into a star.

** Likewise, Supergirl is so enraged by the Anti-Monitor's deeds she declares she's seriously considering waving her "do not kill" rule.
* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: The Psycho-Pirate wanted a world he could control with his powers. The Anti-Monitor gave him ''three whole universes'' to control, and it was too much for him.
* BetweenMyLegs:
** The cover of issue #8 (Barry Allen and a beaten-up Psycho-Pirate between the Anti-Monitor's legs).
** Half of the panels with Harbinger in them have this.

* BittersweetEnding: Our heroes have saved reality! ...Or at least, a tiny fragment of it. Almost everything and everyone that ever existed is not just dead but erased from all memory. [[note]][[AdvancingWallOfDoom And they got to see their end coming inescapably toward them]], so googolplexes of people died in sheer terror.[[/note]] And the coming months will show that even the survivors have been drastically altered by the experience, mostly becoming more [[UsefulNotes/TheDarkAgeOfComicBooks violent and depressed]], and have no memory of ever having been otherwise, let alone of what caused it. So, um... Yay?

* UsefulNotes/TheDarkAgeOfComicBooks: The {{Retcon}} at the end of this series is the official end of UsefulNotes/TheBronzeAgeOfComicBooks and the start of UsefulNotes/TheDarkAgeOfComicBooks for the DCU.
** Well, for some books. Other books (like the retooled ''Green Lantern'' series) remained more or less Bronze Age in tone for some years. Others (like the retooled ''Justice League'') were considerably brighter in tone. A serious Dark Age treatment wouldn't set in for a few more years.
* DefiantToTheEnd: Oh man, pretty much everyone. ''No one'' surrenders in the face of the multiverse's annihilation, but a few deserve special mention.

** Supergirl has probably the most epic last stand in all of comics. Facing down the ''Anti-Monitor itself'', she just starts wailing on him, hitting him with everything she's got. And she almost wins, destroying the Anti-Monitor's body completely, and forcing him to retreat, though he gets in a lucky shot on her, killing her.

** Also a somewhat more literal and temporary example is Killer Frost, Firestorm's archenemy, who was emotionally altered by Psycho Pirate to fall in love with Firestorm so that they could actually work together. It was temporary as was intended.

* TheDragon: The Psycho-Pirate, though he's more like the SycophanticServant or TheIgor to the Anti-Monitor.
* DrivenToSuicide: Ultraman, realizing how powerless he was and how hopeless it was for him and his Crime Syndicate partners to try saving Earth-3 from annihilation by the anti-matter energy wave, flies straight headlong into the energy wave and dies, with Power Ring watching before he too dies.
* DroppedABridgeOnHim: Not everyone gets to go out in a blaze of glory. Aquagirl is killed off-screen by Chemo when the supervillains attack every Earth. Huntress is slain instantly by a shadow-demon. Golden Age Alexei Luthor is vaporized by Brainiac for being surplus to requirements. Huntress is struck by some rubble, it cuts away for one panel and then boom, dead and gone. Wonder Woman is killed by a glancing blow from the Anti-Monitor.

* DyingMomentOfAwesome: Supergirl's fight with Anti-Monitor. She manages to do him some serious injuries, bad enough to make him retreat, at the cost of her life. In fact, had she not been distracted by telling Dr. Light to get to safety, she might well have ''won''.

* ExpendableAlternateUniverse: By the end of the story, all save one of the eponymous Infinite Earths are destroyed, and it just happens to ([[CosmicRetcon more or less]]) be the "real" one where most of DC's stories are set. And, therefore, the good guys are considered to have won.
** If you were from Earth-Two with an exact counterpart on Earth-One, you were screwed. In some cases the Earth-Two version was retconned out of existence, in some cases they merged into a composite with some of the traits of the Earth-Two version and some of the traits of the Earth-One version. For cases where the Earth-Two and Earth-One versions of the heroes were different people (such as Green Lantern and Flash), since the Earth-Two heroes were significantly older (many of them fought in World War Two), the ones that made it through mostly became advisors/mentors to their modern counterparts (who ''should'' "only" be old enough to have fought in Vietnam or Korea, but ComicBookTime).

* FlingALightIntoTheFuture: Alexander Luthor, Jr.'s origin.

* HarbingerOfImpendingDoom: Harbinger, sent by the Monitor across the Multiverse to gather heroes and to warn them of the coming destruction of their universes. Also Pariah, though usually he comes when the universe is already in the process of being destroyed, serving more as a doomed witness.
* HarmlessFreezing: During the big battle between the villains and the heroes, Aquaman and Mera are frozen solid by the many ice-themed villains. They're fine.
* HeroicSacrifice: Memorably, ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} and Comicbook/TheFlash (Barry Allen). However, following the ''Man of Steel'' reboot, Supergirl [[{{RetGone}} did not exist]] due to the "Superman was the only Kryptonian survivor" edict. Both have since been [[DeathIsCheap brought back]], although it took 18 years for Supergirl to return and 23 for Barry, which is ''really'' impressive for a comic book death[[note]]Primarily because Wally West, who took up the mantle, was a popular, well-written character who was distinct from Barry[[/note]]. So these stuck pretty good, considering the medium.
** Oddly played with in the very beginning with Ultraman of Earth-Three. Despite being a super-villain, he smiles at Power Ring, tells him he'll fight until the very end, and charges into the anti-matter wall to his death. Goes to show, heroic and brave aren't the same thing.

* LastKiss: Alexander Luthor and Lois Lane of Earth-3, as they are being swallowed by the anti-matter wave.

* MadnessMantra:
-->'''Psycho Pirate:''' I'm the only one left who remembers the infinite Earths. You see, I know the truth. I remember all that happened, and I'm not going to forget. Worlds lived, worlds died. Nothing will ever be the same. But those were great days for me... I had a good friend in the good old days, really. He was the Anti-Monitor. He was going to give me a world to rule. Now he's gone, too. But that's okay with me. You see, I like to remember the past because those were better times than now. I mean, I'd rather live in the past than today, wouldn't you? I mean, nothing's ever certain anymore. Nothing's ever predictable like it used to be. These days... y-you just never know who's going to die... and who's going to live.
* MassiveMultiplayerCrossover: With one major exception, EVERY character who had their own series, ''ever''. The Franchise/JusticeLeagueOfAmerica, ComicBook/LegionOfSuperHeroes, ComicBook/JusticeSocietyOfAmerica, and ComicBook/TeenTitans of course, but also DC's UsefulNotes/WorldWarII army heroes, the magic heroes, the legacy heroes, the Knights of the Round Table, ComicBook/AmbushBug. Most epitomized by one scene where the Gotham heroes go to meet in Wayne Manor... and a glitch in time drops Anthro the Caveman and his supporting cast in the parlor. Long awkward silence, then the Gotham heroes decide to decamp to the kitchen for the duration.
** The exception of course, is the fact that Hal Jordan does not appear AT ALL in the main mini-series, because, at that point, he resigned from the Green Lantern Corps, and was succeeded by John Stewart. He does contribute heavily to the plot in the main ''ComicBook/GreenLantern'' book, but he's nowhere to be found in the twelve issue mini-series.
*** Hal not appearing in the book was a blessing in disguise. When DC was first compiling their "death list" for characters they would kill off, Hal was on the list due to DC wanting to kill him off so they could counter claims that having John Stewart as Green Lantern was them ripping off James Rhodes as Iron Man, by killing Hal off so that no future writers could restore Hal as Green Lantern.
** Comicbook/CaptainCarrotAndHisAmazingZooCrew don't appear either; their world, Earth-C (a funny-animal counterpart to our Earth), and its sister planet Earth-C-Minus (with funny-animal counterparts to the DCU heroes), were grandfathered into Post-Crisis reality as "alternate dimensions" rather than "parallel Earths" (causing some head-scratching among readers of a genre where the two phrases were usually used interchangeably).
** Also, with the exception of ComicBook/{{Darkseid}}, almost all of the ComicBook/NewGods are not involved in the series because they live outside of the multiverse.

* MultiversalConqueror: The Anti-Monitor.

** You'd think that at the very least, somebody like Batman would have thought to say, "Wait. If he's already traveled to the dawn of time, how come we still exist?"
*** Actually addressed in story; the Spectre basically tells everyone the Anti-Monitor's scheme to wipe out existence at the dawn of time had not yet occurred, due to the Anti-Monitor waiting for the heroes to come stop him so he could destroy them at his moment of triumph.
** This was lampshaded and mocked in one of the last issues of ''ComicBook/{{Quasar}}'', a title published by DC's rival, Creator/MarvelComics. A powerful alien being known as The Geometer wants to fix what it sees as "imperfections" in the multiverse. Quasar reasons with it that the multiverse is too big to fix one problem at a time, and tells it that it should go back before the dawn of time and fix all the imperfections before they can even begin. After it goes, Quasar mentions that either it'll be powerless to change anything and be stranded there, or the Big Bang will destroy it.
* NighInvulnerability: The Anti-Monitor. Even ''killing'' him just inconvenienced him for an extended period.
* NightmareFace: What we could see on the Anti-Monitor's face looks like someone melted some wax and ''kind of, sort of'' molded it into a bloated, bone white human face.

* OriginalGeneration: The Monitor and Anti-Monitor, Harbinger, Pariah, Alex Luthor, Superboy-Prime, Lady Quark, and the second Doctor Light.
* OtherMeAnnoysMe: Alexei Luthor takes umbrage at the thought of having to take orders from his Earth-One counterpart, and starts angrily ranting about it. Unfortunately for him, Braniac agrees. They ''don't'' need two Luthors. ZAP!

* PietaPlagiarism, for issue 7. Possible TropeCodifier for comics.

* PlotRelevantAgeUp: Alexander Luthor grows from infancy to adulthood in a ''very'' short amount of time.
* PopularityPower: Averted with Batman who openly admits he can't do a thing against the Anti-Monitor.

* PyrrhicVictory: Uncountable googol plexes worth of people die in meaningless terror and agony, and the sole remaining universe gets {{Retcon}}ned into a DarkerAndEdgier, BloodierAndGorier universe for many years afterward. As Jonathan Woodward's ''[[https://www.prismnet.com/~woodward/chroma/crisis.html The Annotated Crisis on Infinite Earths]]'' memorably put it, "The current DC Universe is built on a foundation of corpses."
** This was the plot point in ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis''.
* RasputinianDeath: The Anti-Monitor takes the cake. After being weakened by his failed attempt to rewrite the Big Bang, he's attacked by the heroes in his home dimension. His powers are weakened further when a large portion of his anti-matter is drained out by Alexander Luthor and the energy of the star he's feeding on is absorbed by Dr. Light. After Negative Woman binds the Anti-Monitor with her burning radioactive body, everybody aside from the aforementioned three heroes starts blasting him. Upon reaching full charge, Dr. Light unleashes all of the energy she has collected into a beam. The attack sends the Anti-Monitor flying into a nearby planet, breaking his armor and ''burning all of his internal organs''. [[YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle This only knocks him out for a few minutes]]. When he wakes up, he absorbed a large mass of his Shadow Demons to power up, shattering the planet with his energy. With a mouth blast, he kills the Earth-1 version of Wonder Woman. Unfortunately for him, the Demons, which had been poisoned by the magicians, begin fighting against him. While he's suffering from the effects, Kal-L chucks ''a moon'' at the Anti-Monitor. Superboy-Prime shows up to help, but is blasted away. Seeing that his friend wasn't killed instantly by the attack, Kal-L takes it as a sign that the Anti-Monitor is weakening and smashes him with two continent-sized asteroids before picking up a third equally large one and ramming him with it. This attack buries the Anti-Monitor alive on another planet and actually ''stops the monster's heart'', but only manages to take him down for a few seconds. He suddenly bursts through the rocks, out of his armor and in his energy form, and starts crushing both Kal-L and Superboy-Prime with his hands. [[VillainousRescue Darkseid saves the two]] by channeling a beam through Alexander Luthor, knocking the Anti-Monitor into the star that Dr. Light had drained power from. This didn't even do the job, as [[TakingYouWithMe the Anti-Monitor rushes out of the star in the form of a screaming fireball]], [[TheDeterminator still determined to kill Kal-L]]. Unfortunately for him, his essence is shattered by one final punch from the man he was trying to murder. Immediately afterwards, the pieces of his essence fall into the star, [[EarthShatteringKaboom making it implode]]. The explosion utterly obliterates the Anti-Monitor. Of course, he returned later on.

* RetGone: Happens to almost ''the entirety of existence!''
* ResetButton: This series was one for the entire DCU.

* ShootTheShaggyDog: All of pre-Crisis continuity.

* SpacetimeEater: The Anti-Monitor, who ate an infinite amount of universes apparently.

** The Psycho-Pirate ''thinks'' of pulling this on the Anti-Monitor after Supergirl's HeroicSacrifice, if only because he's afraid of what might happen to him, as he discusses to the Flash. He's only spared because the Anti-Monitor believes in PragmaticVillainy.
** Psimon does this in Luthor and Brainiac's cadre of villains. [[spoiler:Fortunately for Luthor, Psimon underestimates Brainiac, who completely obliterates Psimon's brain.]]
* AStormIsComing: [[CosmicRetcon "Why the]] [[RedSkiesCrossover red skies?"]]
* TheseAreThingsManWasNotMeantToKnow:
** Everyone's problems started with the Maltusian scientist Krona, who was told not to look at the beginning of time, and went "pssh, whatever." He created the Monitor and Anti-Monitor, and broke the ''universe''.
** Pariah was warned not to do the exact same thing. He ignored them and looked anyway. He came to ''really'' regret that.
* TimeTravel: In issue #10, both the heroes and the villains use this in their attempt to prevent the Anti-Monitor from destroying all creation and replacing it with only his own universe. The heroes go back all the way to the Dawn of Time while the villains go to the point where Krona is about to make his discovery of the origin of the universe that set the whole Multiverse into motion.
* TimeyWimeyBall: Try not to think too hard about how all the time-fluxes work, or you'll see plotholes so big a Mack truck can drive through them. In particular, don't give too much thought to this line by ComicBook/MartianManhunter: "Time must be interchanging earlier on this Earth!"
** It's even lampshaded in the story. After all the Earths merge, it's noted that people know Supergirl died but can't remember ''how.''

* VillainTeamUp: The ultimate one as Lex Luthor and Brainiac gather together ''every single super-villain'' from the five Earths into a massive army. They actually manage to conquer ''THREE'' entire worlds before the heroes even know what's going on, showing just how strong these guys are when they stop bickering long enough to work together.

* WhamEpisode
* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: Skeletal, Bronze-Age Brainiac leads a group of heroes to Darkseid for help, and this is his last appearance. We know that anyone who survived the Crisis remained relatively unchanged, so this Brainiac could not have become the Milton Fine Brainiac. Is this version of Brainiac still out there?
** ''History of the DC Universe'' #2 stated that this version of Brainiac was destroyed by the Omega Men during a failed attempt to conquer the Vegan system, possibly at some point after the Crisis. Then, it vaguely mentioned a new Brainiac was created on Earth two years of the original's death.
** If you want to accept ''ComicBook/WhateverHappenedToTheManOfTomorrow'' as the final chapter in Earth-One Superman's history, Brainiac is destroyed for good there.
** Pre-Crisis Brainiac's fate was ultimately revealed in Convergence and Futures End. He became a universal singularity, connected to every subsequent incarnation that came to be in the DC Universe (and several which were tangibly related, such as Pulsar Stargrave and Vril Dox). He also managed to capture/clone countless pre-Crisis Earths into dome cities (including Earth 3) and additional cities circa Zero Hour and pre-Flashpoint DC Universe and had them on an alien world; from which he planned an invasion on Earth during the Future's End timeline that the Authority/Stormwatch of the New 52 was created to stop. He also wasn't in his terminator body by this point, though that was due to Geoff Johns hating the Terminator look as he restored Brainiac back to a modified version of his green form.

* WritersCannotDoMath: An infinite number of universes is destroyed... one at a time.
** WordOfGod is that there was "only" 3000 universes or so.

* YouHaveOutlivedYourUsefulness: Brainiac to Alexei Luthor, with Brainiac saying there's no need for two Luthors in their supervillain superteam.

As a child, little Marvin Wolfman wanted to do a big series where every hero in DC Comics, ever, would team up to fight a cosmic villain called "The Librarian". Then Marvin grew up and became Marv Wolfman, the man who managed to make the ''ComicBook/TeenTitans'' successful.

* BittersweetEnding: Our heroes have saved reality!... or at least, a tiny fragment of it... Almost everything and everyone that ever existed is not just dead but erased from all memory. [[note]] ([[AdvancingWallOfDoom and they got to see their end coming inescapably toward them,]] so all those googol plexes worth of people died in sheer terror).[[/note]] And the coming months will show that even the survivors have been drastically altered by the experience, mostly becoming more [[UsefulNotes/TheDarkAgeOfComicBooks violent and depressed]], and have no memory of ever having been otherwise, let alone of what caused it. So... yay?

* KillThemAll: The Anti-Monitor's goal for the entire Multiverse, so only his universe can exist. Pretty much everyone in the entire Multiverse is erased except for the survivors of some universes and the five universes that the Anti-Monitor couldn't destroy. And even when the Multiverse merges and becomes one single universe, the copies of people from the surviving universes other than Earth-1 (except for those that survived the merging at the Dawn of Time or through certain other means -- it all depended on who DC Comics wanted to keep alive or not) are also erased.

* OmnicidalManiac: The Anti-Monitor, though his ultimate goal is to still rule the Anti-Matter universe after all other universes have been destroyed.

Because of the holes in continuity it left behind, ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' has spawned several CrisisCrossover sequels that have attempted, with varying success, to make sense of the mess. These include 1994's ''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'', 2006's ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis'', 2007's ''ComicBook/FiftyTwo'', 2008's ''ComicBook/FinalCrisis'', 2009's ''ComicBook/BlackestNight'', and 2022’s ''ComicBook/DarkCrisis''. ''ComicBook/{{Legends|DCComics}}'' can be seen as an epilogue, as it allowed the new DCU to introduce themselves to each other; for example, it was the introduction of a young adult ComicBook/WonderWoman to the other DC heroes. Much of the Creator/GeoffJohns era as head creative mind for ComicBook/GreenLantern also ties in directly with Crisis (specifically the Anti-Monitor). The in-universe ramifications of the Crisis were also a recurring theme of the late-'80s MindScrew series ''Comicbook/AnimalMan''. Much of its imagery and backstory was referenced in ''ComicBook/JLAAvengers''.

Because of the holes in continuity it left behind, ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' has spawned several CrisisCrossover sequels that have attempted, with varying success, to make sense of the mess. These include 1994's ''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'', 2006's ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis'', 2007's ''ComicBook/FiftyTwo'', 2008's ''ComicBook/FinalCrisis'', and 2009's ''ComicBook/BlackestNight''. ''ComicBook/{{Legends|DCComics}}'' can be seen as an epilogue, as it allowed the new DCU to introduce themselves to each other; for example, it was the introduction of a young adult ComicBook/WonderWoman to the other DC heroes. Much of the Creator/GeoffJohns era as head creative mind for ComicBook/GreenLantern also ties in directly with Crisis (specifically the Anti-Monitor). The in-universe ramifications of the Crisis were also a recurring theme of the late-'80s MindScrew series ''Comicbook/AnimalMan''. Much of its imagery and backstory was referenced in ''ComicBook/JLAAvengers''.

* DidYouJustPunchOutCthulhu?: Supergirl nearly kills the Anti-Monitor all on her own halfway through the Crisis, he even admits it an issue later that she nearly got him.

* TheDragon: The Psycho-Pirate, though he's more of like the SycophanticServant or TheIgor to the Anti-Monitor.

* EarlyInstallmentWeirdness: John Constantine makes a cameo appearance in the main series, but if he wasn't addressed as such you might be hard pressed to know it. He's clean-shaven, well-dressed and doesn't even have his typical accent.

* EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: The real names of the Monitor and the Anti-Monitor weren't given for decades. It won't be until the [=2010s=] when their names were established respectively as Mar Novu and Mobius.

* GratuitousSpanish: When Yolanda Montez was introduced as the second Wildcat during the series, she has a habit of letting Spanish phrases slip into her internal monologue followed immediately by the English translation as though she were trying to teach Spanish to any listening telepaths.

The series climaxes with (almost) ''[[LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters all]]'' of the characters who ever got their own series, [[MyFriendsAndZoidberg plus their team-mates]], their {{Sidekick}}s, and their kitchen sink, ganging up to kick the crap out of the Anti-Monitor. There is (as you'd expect) an EarthShatteringKaboom...

Because of the holes in continuity it left behind, ''Crisis on Infinite Earths'' has spawned several CrisisCrossover sequels that have attempted, with varying success, to make sense of the mess. These include 1994's ''ComicBook/ZeroHourCrisisInTime'', 2006's ''ComicBook/InfiniteCrisis'', 2007's ''ComicBook/FiftyTwo'', 2008's ''ComicBook/FinalCrisis'', and 2009's ''ComicBook/BlackestNight''. ''ComicBook/{{Legends|DC}}'' can be seen as an epilogue, as it allowed the new DCU to introduce themselves to each other; for example, it was the introduction of a young adult ComicBook/WonderWoman to the other DC heroes. Much of the Creator/GeoffJohns era as head creative mind for ComicBook/GreenLantern also ties in directly with Crisis (specifically the Anti-Monitor). The in-universe ramifications of the Crisis were also a recurring theme of the late-'80s MindScrew series ''Comicbook/AnimalMan''. Much of its imagery and backstory was referenced in ''ComicBook/JLAAvengers''.

''Crisis'' is notable for being one of the first comic "events" (''ComicBook/ContestOfChampions'' actually came first, as well as ''ComicBook/SecretWars1984'', which was more of a merchandising promotion like DC's ''Super Powers''), but also for promising "Everything you know will change! [[Franchise/TheDCU The DC Universe]] will never be the same!" and actually ''delivering''. Unfortunately, for every continuity problem it fixed, three more sprang up in its place, leading Franchise/TheDCU to become even more convoluted and cluttered than it was before as writers scrambled to fill in the gaps left by characters and universes that no longer ever existed. Indeed, the changes wrought throughout the DC Universe by ''Crisis'' were so profound that, according to some, its publication marked the end of UsefulNotes/TheBronzeAgeOfComicBooks.

* BatmanGrabsAGun: The situation is so dire that even the Supermen of Earths 1 and 2 are willing to kill the Anti-Monitor in the name of saving all existence. Indeed, Earth-2 Superman is ultimately the one to slay the Anti-Monitor and bring the Crisis to an end.

* ColorCodedSpeech: The comic voiced the Anti-Monitor with black dialogue balloons and white lettering. Ink bleed often made it nearly impossible to make out the words.

* DroppedABridgeOnHim: Not everyone gets to go out in a blaze of glory. Aquagirl is killed off-screen by Chemo when the supervillains attack every Earth. Huntress is slain instantly by a shadow-demon. Golden Age Alexei Luthor is vaporized by Brainiac for being surplus to requirements.

* DyingMomentOfAwesome: Supergirl's fight with Anti-Monitor. She manages to do him some serious injuries, bad enough to make him retreat, at the cost of her life.

* EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: The real names of the Monitor and the Anti-Monitor were not given for decades. It won't be until 2010's when their names are established respectively as Mar Novu and Mobius.

* RasputinianDeath: The Anti-Monitor takes the cake. After being weakened by his failed attempt to rewrite the Big Bang, he got attacked by the heroes in his home dimension. His powers were weakened further when a large portion of his anti-matter was drained out by Alexander Luthor and the energy of the star he was feeding on was absorbed by Dr. Light. After Negative Woman bound the Anti-Monitor with her burning radioactive body, everybody aside from the aforementioned three heroes started blasting him. Upon reaching full charge, Dr. Light unleashed all of the energy she had collected into a beam. The attack sent the Anti-Monitor flying right into a nearby planet, breaking his armor and ''burning all of his internal organs''. [[YourPrincessIsInAnotherCastle This only knocked him out for a few minutes]]. When he woke up, he absorbed a large mass of his Shadow Demons to power up, shattering the planet with his energy. With a mouth blast, he ''seemingly'' killed the Earth-1 version of Wonder Woman. Unfortunately for him, the Demons, which had been poisoned by the magicians, began fighting against him. While he was suffering from the effects, Kal-L chucked ''a moon'' at the Anti-Monitor, which worked. Superboy-Prime showed up to help, but was blasted away. Seeing that his friend wasn't killed instantly by the attack, Kal-L took it as a sign that the Anti-Monitor was weakening and smashed him with two continent-sized asteroids before picking up a third equally large one and ramming him with it. This attack buried the Anti-Monitor alive on another planet and actually ''stopped the monster's heart'', but only managed to take him down for a few seconds. He suddenly burst through the rocks, out of his armor and in his energy form, and started crushing both Kal-L and Superboy-Prime with his hands. [[VillainousRescue Darkseid saved the two]] by channeling a beam through Alexander Luthor and knocking the Anti-Monitor into the star that Dr. Light had drained power from. That didn't even do the job, as [[TakingYouWithMe the Anti-Monitor rushed out of the star in the form of a screaming fireball]], [[TheDeterminator still determined to kill Kal-L]]. Unfortunately for him, his essence was shattered by one final punch from the man he was trying to murder. Immediately afterwards, the pieces of his essence fell into the star, [[EarthShatteringKaboom making it implode]]. The explosion utterly obliterated the Anti-Monitor. Of course, he returned later on.

* TheStarscream: The Psycho-Pirate ''thinks'' of pulling this on the Anti-Monitor after Supergirl's HeroicSacrifice, if only because he's afraid of what might happen to him, as he discusses to the Flash. He's only spared because the Anti-Monitor believes in PragmaticVillainy.
** Psimon does this in Luthor and Brainiac's cadre of villains. [[spoiler:Fortunately for Luthor, Psimon underestimates Brainiac who completely obliterates Psimon's brain.]]

** Pre-Crisis Brainiac's fate was ultimately revealed in Convergence and Futures End. He became a universal singularity, connected to every subsequent incarnation that came to be in the DC Universe (and several which were tangibly related, such as Pulsar Stargrave and Vril Dox). He also managed to capture/clone countless pre-Crisis Earths into dome cities (including Earth 3) and additional cities circa Zero Hour and pre-Flashpoint DC Universe and had them on an alien world; from which he planned an invasion on Earth during the Future State timeline that the Authority/Stormwatch of the New 52 was created to stop. He also wasn't in his terminator body by this point, though that was due to Geoff Johns hating the Terminator look as he restored Brainiac back to a modified version of his green form.

* AdultFear: Lady Quark is introduced watching her daughter get erased by something she can't fight off.

* [[YouGottaHaveBlueHair You Gotta Have Purple Hair]]: Pariah. In a story shortly following the ''Crisis'', a punk rocker on the street comments that he likes the shade.

* AdvancingWallOfDoom: A big white one consuming the entire {{Multiverse}}.
* AllOfTimeAtOnce: During the chaos made in the {{Multiverse}} there are multiple different Earths fighting to not disappear at the hands of Anti-Monitor. In Earth-1, time is also collapsing, prompting different time periods to happen at the same time but also, it seems, different continuities of different times as there are multiple unthinkable alliances. This is how there are heroes from the present fighting alongside the post-apocalyptic WildMan ComicBook/{{Kamandi}}, the WildWest AntiHero ComicBook/JonahHex and the WWII Comicbook/SgtRock against the Anti-Monitor's Shadow Demons.

* CListFodder: Dozens of minor characters, from the Crime Syndicate to the Ten-Eyed Man, died. Also, averted by a lot of A List Fodder: [[spoiler: Supergirl, Barry Allen (Flash), the original Dick Grayson (Robin), and the original Green Arrow are all among the fallen.]]

* AndIMustScream: For the crime of [[spoiler: (apparently) awakening the Anti-Monitor]], Pariah has spent uncounted ''millennia'' dragged from universe to universe, forced to watch their destruction and unable to die himself. As he puts it on his first appearance, when blamed for the incoming doom:

* EpicMovie: Well, an Epic ''Comic'' actually, but contains many of the same elements of the genre of film. It features the ''entire'' Creator/DCComics Superhero library and even those from [[Creator/CharltonComics Charlton]] and Creator/FawcettComics (whom were bought out by DC and now are part of their lineup) battling a foe that threatens existence itself on a cosmic level in a story that spans all of space and all of time. Every hero is pushed to their limits; Some will live while others will die, [[spoiler: most notably Supergirl and Barry Allen]]. And indeed, [[ArcWords "Nothing will ever be the same"]]. One Hell of a way to celebrate 50 Years, DC.

* PlanetaryRelocation: Around the end of the story, [[spoiler:[[OmnicidalManiac the Anti-Monitor]] drags the Earth into the Antimatter Universe in order to finish it off. Thanks to Alexander Luthor Jr acting as a portal the heroes are able to pull Earth back to its normal orbit and universe.[[/spoiler]]

** Psimon does this in Luthor and Brainiac's cadre of villains. [[spoiler: Fortunately for Luthor, Psimon underestimates Brainiac who completely obliterates Psimon's brain.]]

So, there's a [[TheMultiverse Multiverse]], which is just the unified set of all the different universes. The Multiverse is guarded by a CosmicEntity called the Monitor, whose powers are related to positive matter. But his EvilTwin, the ComicBook/AntiMonitor, who guards (naturally) the Anti-Matter Universe, has discovered that his powers can increase if he destroys positive-matter universes, and proceeds to destroy the entire Multiverse. Trying to stop him, the Monitor is pushed back and knocked into a coma. Awakening, the Monitor sees that the multiverse has been cut down to just the universes we've seen before. Panicking, he gathers a group of heroes from the Earths of the remaining universes, and sends them to hold back the Anti-Monitor's minions.