10 Most Ridiculous Ways Superheroes Have Come Back From The Dead

The circle of life is a lot more literal in the world of comics. Heroes are born, they live, they die and then they pop back up again a while later.

Ever since Superman revealed that Doomsday only beat him into a special Kryptonian healing coma, the floodgates have been open for dead superheroes to reappear. We've had so many magical resurrections and complex plots involving faking someone's death that it's now a well-worn joke that the afterlife in both the DC and Marvel Universe is just a revolving door.

And yet, we're still supposed to be surprised when a character comes back. Obviously, it wouldn't be very shocking at all if Doctor Strange could just say a spell and bring everyone back to life and so writers are often pushed to find new and creative ways to bring bring heroes back to life. Sometimes the results are absolutely flat-out insane stories that no reader could ever see coming (mainly because they'd have to be completely insane to predict them).

From literally getting stitched back together to simply deciding they didn't want to be dead anymore, here are ten of the most insane ways superheroes have found to cheat death.

The kind and friendly Nightcrawler is often considered the heart of the X-Men. Unfortunately, that also made him a prime target to be killed off for maximum emotional damage.

In the storyline Second Coming, a group of the X-Men's villains banded together to try and kill Hope Summers, the first mutant born since Scarlet Witch depowered 90% of them. Nightcrawler was able to save Hope from an attack and teleport her to safety, but in the process he contracted a nasty case of robot fist through the chest and died.

Nightcrawler then hung around in Heaven for a few years. However, despite it being a complete affirmation of his Christian beliefs, Kurt struggled to enjoy the afterlife as he constantly felt he had unfinished business.

It turned out Kurt was right in Amazing X-Men. His father Azazel, who is red, pointy-eared, a lord of Hell but absolutely definitely not a demon, led an army of demon pirates (comics are often as silly as they are awesome) to take over Heaven. Nightcrawler recruited the X-Men to help him, but was ultimately forced to stop Azazel himself by teleporting them both to Earth.

And that was pretty much that. Kurt Wagner decided to leave Heaven and just stopped being dead.