10 Comic Book Deaths That Angered The World
2. Damian Wayne (AKA Robin MK IV)
Not content with the massacre of millions of mutants on the island of Genosha, the death of Magneto and the (apparent) death of Batman during Final Crisis, Grant Morrison is also responsible for the death of Damian Wayne, the fourth (unless you count the blink-and-you'll-miss-it tenure of Stephanie Brown) incarnation of Robin. The character of Damian Wayne first appeared in 1987's Batman: Son of the Demon graphic novel.
The story was considered non-canonical, but that didn't stop the son of Batman showing up in numerous other stories. He appeared as Ibn al Xuffasch in the epic adventure Kingdom Come, amongst a fair few other appearances, but hed never been considered official until Morrison introduced him during his 2006 story Batman & Son. Fans initially hated the bratty, over-privileged Damian, not least because he entered Batmans life by beating up Alfred, critically wounding Robin (Tim Drake) and outright murdering Silver Age villain The Spook. Apparently, Morrison's original concept was to kill the character at the culmination of Batman & Son, but instead he decided to really make the character popular...And then kill him. Comics, they are a grisly business indeed.
So it came to pass that, upon the disappearance of Batman, Damian Wayne inherited the mantle of Robin from Tim Drake (who became Red Robin) and paired up with new Batman Dick Grayson against an army of brightly coloured sadists in Morrison's gleeful Batman: Reborn storyline. During this period, fans grew to genuinely love Damian for his bravery and tactless honesty, as well as for his pomposity and arrogance. The character revealed a fondness for animals and a genuine desire to help the less fortunate. In addition, the big brother/little brother pairing of Dick and Damian was, arguably, the best odd couple pairing DC had published since the famous O'Neil/Adams Green Lantern/Arrow run in the 1970s. For a little while there, Damian was everywhere in the Batman books and the fans (for the most part) loved him. Then, all of a sudden, he was gone. Getting murdered by your own clone is a pretty nasty way to go in anybody's book (even Wally West winced from beyond the fringes of existence. Probably), but it's especially bad when it's your own mother that tells him to kill you.
So, as Batman, Incorporated came to a close, 10-year-old Damian was repeatedly shot with arrows and badly beaten before being skewered on his foes massive broadsword. Morrison, himself a child of divorce, stated that he had intended the character's death to be a rumination on divorce and what it does to children. However, that could probably have been better achieved by showing Damian crying in his room for a page before he zipped up his Robin suit and went out bashing the bad guys... The truth is that Grant Morrison was simply too good at making the fans love Damian and they took to the Internet in their droves in order to complain about it. One poster even wrote (without a trace of irony) that Morrison should be beheaded for his crimes and that his head should be paraded through the streets. Ouch.