10 Jaw-Dropping Comics Cancelled Before They Were Published

10. Twilight Of The Superheroes

In 1987, Alan Moore was thinking a lot about endings. He had written what could have easily been the last issue ever of Swamp Thing, was working on the end of a superhero society in Watchmen, had written an ending for Superman in "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" and had written a foreword to The Dark Knight Returns, which was then regarded as Frank Miller's ending for Batman. What was left to end? Soon enough, the answer would be "his working relationship with DC Comics," but before that relationship had soured completely, Moore had one more big idea: an ending to the DC Universe. Moore's idea is refreshingly different, though bits and pieces of it would inspire later works like Kingdom Come, Identity Crisis and the animated Justice League series' Justice Lords. As society crumbled, the world's superheroes organized, purged the world of most supervillains, and found themselves the only remaining forces for social order. An aristocracy developed, with superheroes organizing into "houses" and, bit by bit, slouching toward tyranny. Now, an arranged marriage between Superman and Wonder Woman's House of Steel and the Marvel Family's House of Thunder could spell the end of liberty on Earth, and eventually, the end of liberty in the galaxy. But John Constantine has a plan. How Regrettable Is Its Loss? Severely. Even in pitch form, Twilight of the Superheroes is breathlessly exciting once you get into it (if you're pressed for time, WhatCulture summarized it here). Of course, it does have your standard bloody, perverse darkness from early Alan Moore, but that flavor still felt revolutionary in 1987, before twenty years of trying to imitate it ensued.