YMMV / Dark Crisis

• Anti-Climax Boss: The assembled team of Darkseid, Nekron, Neron, Doomsday and various other heavy hitters would seem like a monumental threat to deal with for the heroes even if Pariah is dealt with. However, once the Darkness-infections of Pariah and then Deathstroke are dealt with, the assembled villains just seemingly leave without further incident with the exception of Doomsday being beaten by the two reunited Supermen. It's even stated in narration that, after the battle Darkseid in particular just went home.
• Author's Saving Throw: After some fans criticized an early preview for depicting Connor Hawke with pale skin (which historically has been a problem for the character), subsequent issues had him colored with a darker skin tone.
• Character Rerailment: It's eventually revealed in Justice League Incarnate that Pariah was The Man in Front of the Man, fixing the Broken Aesop from The Great Darkness' original story that we all need darkness to help us appreciate the light.
• Critical Dissonance: Professional reviewers gave the core series fairly positive reviews, with particular praise for the artwork and the fact it allowed the Legacy Characters to have some much needed spotlight. However, the majority of fans had a mixed-to-negative response to the event, as the general consensus is that there were severe pacing problems that led to the plot being rather dull and uneventful, especially when compared to DC's previous Crisis Crossovers.
• Don't Shoot the Message: Dark Crisis: Young Justice makes a big point about how fans shouldn't let nostalgia blind them to negative aspects about older works, and that they should embrace more diverse characters when they're introduced. Nobody would disagree with that, however what undermines this point is using Young Justice as an example, as the book is generally considered to have been very ahead of its time and still holds up today when it comes to progressive issues, and that the Young Justice fandom as a whole tends to lean left and be in favour of progressive comics. Combined with the miniseries itself being met with criticism for how it writes Cassie and Cissie coming off as deeply sexist, and the handling of Tim's bisexuality being seen as problematic by bisexual readers, it greatly undermines the message it's claiming to push. It's not helped either by using a toxic Straw Fan as the Big Bad, which is seen as mean-spirited at best and is generally not a popular way to preach messages like this even when they do have a point.
• Fanon Discontinuity: Dark Crisis: Young Justice has been getting a lot of this from Young Justice fans for various reasons, one of which being that it portrays a lot of people out of character for the sake of plot convenience. Notably, when it became clear that the boys were trapped in a Pocket Dimension that was an artificial recreation of their old adventures, many assumed that Cassie was trapped in one too, because of just how out-of-character Cissie, Wally, and everyone she interacted with was, as well as the inconsistency with recent canon. When it became clear this was not the case, going this route became the solution.
• Fanfic Fuel: What are the numerical designations of modern DC Elseworlds, animated properties, live-action properties, and video games in the newly-restored infinite multiverse?
• Fashion-Victim Villain: Slade's mohawk has inspired much snickering from fans, due to how incredibly out of place it seems, both for a character intended as part of the Big Bad Ensemble, and Slade as a character.
• Funny Moments: When Mr. Mxyzptlk's son Mickey reveals himself to Young Justice, Conner says in his caption box, "Great. Now I'm thinking of Mr. Mxyzptlk having sex".
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • Issue 1 features a variant cover by Jim Lee, which is a recreation of Crisis on Infinite Earths #1's cover, but with various DC live-action properties, including The Batman, The Suicide Squad, The Flash (2023), Black Adam (2022), Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, Titans, Stargirl, Peacemaker, Doom Patrol, Naomi, and various Arrowverse productions like The Flash (2014), Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman, and Superman & Lois. The same week the cover was unveiled, it was announced that Legends of Tomorrow, Batwoman, and Naomi were all being cancelled, which came on the heels of a report that the new owners of Warner Bros. were possibly seeking to phase out the Arrowverse in favor of a stronger emphasis on the DC Extended Universe. Subsequently, not only were more shows cancelled (including Stargirl, Titans, Doom Patrol and the remaining Arrowverse series), but it was later announced that the DCEU itself would be undergoing a Continuity Reboot under James Gunn and the newly established DC Studios, meaning that even some of the cinematic characters like Supergirl and the Michael Keaton version of Batman featured on the cover would also most likely be phased out after the release of the Flash movie.
  • Similarly, the event was clearly part of the company-wide push for Black Adam ahead of his movie debut, with the character being the only member of the Justice League to "survive" the initial onslaught and subsequently playing a key role in the finale. With the subsequent failure of Black Adam (2022), some fans and critics have commented that Adam's bizarre prominence in Dark Crisis makes the series an Unintentional Period Piece.
• Heartwarming Moments: Hal using a constrict of the Batfamily to break Bruce out of his Lotus-Eater Machine.
• I Knew It!:
  • A number of fans called Black Adam being the Sole Survivor of the Justice League's Total Party Kill, thanks in part due to the character having a film adaptation later that year and because he had only recently joined the team.
  • After it was confirmed that a major hero would be the Sacrificial Lion for the events opening, many guessed to it being Beast Boy, as Deathstroke was targeting Teen Titans Academy, and Gar had long being the most expendable member of the original Wolfman/Perez team. Come Issue 1, this was proven to be correct.
• It's the Same, Now It Sucks!:
  • When it was revealed that, part of the event involved the restoration of the Worlds destroyed by Crisis on Infinite Earths, many decried the plot as this has already happened multiple times across multiple events, including the still-recent Dark Nights: Death Metal.
  • A somewhat lesser point of criticism about Dark Crisis: Young Justice is how, despite ostensibly being presented as the opposite, it continues the trend since 2003 of the characters being put through angst and melodrama, depicting them as toxic and messy, which has long been a point of sourness for fans as it's the exact opposite of how the characters were in the 1998 Young Justice run that popularised them. Their fans just want to see the characters grow up and have fun again.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Just about everyone agrees that the biggest draw of the event is the simple fact that it more or less tosses out the Justice League in favor of focusing on lesser-known heroes, legacy characters, sidekicks, and allies, a decision met with near-universal acclaim.
• Like You Would Really Do It: Nobody reading this series actually expects the Justice League to stay dead, including the writers. However, this contributes to a degree of interest in the series in the sense that it's a Crisis Crossover focused on other characters for once, and indeed the fact that the story gives a spotlight to lesser-used characters is seen as its biggest boon. A not-insignificant number of fans actually hope (against all odds) that the League do stay dead or out-of-action, simply because it would force DC to actually refocus on and develop its larger world and stable of characters instead of using the Trinity (especially Batman) as a crutch as they've become infamous for.
• Obvious Judas: Black Adam joining the Legion of Doom is a borderline Captain Obvious Reveal. Did anybody really expect Black Adam to play by the League's rules for long?
• Tainted by the Preview:
  • The event wasn't very looked forward to when it was announced due to its lack of setup beyond the mini-series Infinite Frontier and Justice League Incarnate, making the apparent deaths of the Justice League have less of an emotional impact. That the series is explicitly set in a Flash Forward after all the current runs leaves Dark Crisis without having any bearing on the current storylines also caused some uneasiness about the story (though others have seen it as a positive since it prevents books from being derailed and gives writers breathing room to actually properly plan for the aftermath of Dark Crisis).
  • When the preview for the third issue was released, fans of Roy Harper were livid at him treating Jason Todd like an old friend with Jason promising they would find his daughter Lian. This comes off of how massively unpopular Roy's friendship with Jason Todd during the New 52 was and the fact that the storyline to have Roy reunite with Lian has been stalled for over a year. The sheer implication of Jason having any reason to help Roy find Lian was galling to multiple fans because of how it once again ignores all of Roy's longstanding friendships with the Titans and the connection to the Arrow Family, and the fact that Jason shouldn't have any idea who Lian is because she didn't exist during Red Hood and the Outlaws. Even if it was a single panel out of the entire comic, the vitriol against it goes to show how much Roy's fans do not want him associating with Jason anymore.
  • When the tie-ins were first solicited, a lot of Flash fans were angered to see that Bart Allen, AKA Impulse, was being left out of the Flash tie-in despite it being a Flash Family story, because he was tied up with the Young Justice tie-in instead. This got even more heated when it became clear the two tie-ins are set during separate times of the event's timeline, meaning there wasn't any reason in-universe Bart couldn't have been part of both adventures. Upon release, the negative reception of Dark Crisis : Young Justice in comparison to The Search For Barry Allen just further inflamed this issue.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • By issue 2 of Dark Crisis: Young Justice, many fans have expressed this sentiment over various things done in the title, including implying that people who prefer Tim's relationship with Stephanie Brown over Tim's relationship with Bernard are homophobic (which was seen as an unnecessary and overly expansive Take That!) and retconning Cissie King-Jones' reasoning for leaving heroics (from accidentally murdering a man and wanting to leave her mother's shadow to claiming that she didn't want to be in the shadow of young male heroes who had everything given to them).
  • In regards to Cissie, the idea that she quit being a hero because she didn't want to be defined by Tim, Kon, and Bart like Cassie supposedly was only serves to actually define her by them if they are now the reason she quit, compared to her actual motives being the combined trauma of her Stage Mom making her be Arrowette and the death of the counselor who looked out for Cissie's well being. Issue #5 makes it clear that the entire thing was an excuse and she was still scared of everything, but now she realizes how dumb it was to just take it up on herself. She just won't let Cassie have the win.
• The Scrappy: The main Big Bad of the Young Justice tie-in miniseries, Mickey Mxyzptlk. Many Young Justice fans are unhappy that Mickey, a Manchild toxic Straw Fan of the original Young Justice series, is clearly intended as a representation of the fan base of the original series. It comes across mean spirited, as most fans just want their favorite characters to have some role in the comics and have character development after having been Exiled from Continuity for several years. It's particularly questionable as, while many would agree that toxicity exists in the DCU fanbase, Young Justice's pocket of fandom isn't really known for engaging in sexist, racist, and homophobic attitudes, in fact one of the main points of criticism the Young Justice fandom is known for making about the use of their favourites since 2003 is how sexist the treatment of Cassie Sandsmark has been since.
• Spiritual Antithesis: To Heroes in Crisis in terms of how they treat C-List DC characters.
• Win Back the Crowd: While initially responses to the event's announcement were mixed, upon release the reception has generally been very good, with many praising the crossover's focus and reparation for characters that have spent years being mistreated and shunted aside, solid Character Development, unintrusiveness towards other books, and a good story that finally repairs DC's tangled continuity. Initially feared as yet another unwanted Crisis Crossover, fans have generally instead seen the story as proof that Infinite Frontier has well and truly saved DC from its decades-long string of being in-and-out of dork ages under Dan DiDio.

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