Yes, Booster Gold Was Behind DC's Mass Shooting

Warning: SPOILERS for DC's Heroes in Crisis

There was no way for DC fans to prepare for Heroes in Crisis, delivering a crushing blow to their favorite comic book heroes with an attack much smaller, and much more common than the end of the world: a mass shooting.

With the first page of Heroes in Crisis #1 beginning after the attack, too late for even Superman to stop, only two survivors are left in a daze at what they've just witnessed. Wally West is dead, joined by at least a dozen other heroes. And it was Booster Gold who killed them. But knowing that Booster Gold was behind the shooting at Sanctuary is just the beginning of this story. Now, the question is why he did it. And just as important, why doesn't he seem to remember it?

This Page: Yes, Booster Gold Was The Killer
Page 2: Why Booster Gold is Losing His Sanity

Yes, Booster Gold Was Behind The Mass Shooting

Before any skeptical readers unfamiliar with Tom King's writing, or Clay Mann's artwork let their outrage or anger turn to attacks against the storytellers, Heroes in Crisis is not a story being lightly, or disrespectfully told. The stunned, numb, and half-dazed tone with which most of the first issue is told fits the shock of the event itself, and it starts with Booster and a cup of coffee in an unassuming roadside diner - blissfully unaware of how close they are to one of the most tragic crimes in recent DC memory.

It's hard to know if the storytellers intended this first page to end the mystery, with Booster calmly accepting that when Harley comes shuffling in - clothes torn, skin cut, blood dripping - "there's gonna be a fight." Whether the reader views Harley as survivor or stalking killer, that assumption likely holds as she consumes a piece of pie in the wake of a horror (a meal she finds "tastes like America" in a new way), and begins stabbing Booster with her typical brand of tenacity.

Their continued fight, Booster seemingly surprised that she hasn't "done enough" already, Harley seeming to have already decided neither she nor Booster is going to live through the day, plays out even as Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman enter Sanctuary to discover who, and what has been lost. As Bruce decides the promise of Sanctuary is dead, Harley plants her knife squarely into Booster's chest - revealing that he's been broken more than he knows.

The end of the issue doesn't leave a sense of ambiguity as to the killer's identity, as much as it might seem to be a case of Harley's word against Booster's. Her regret over responding to Booster's sudden attack by fleeing for her life rings true, and the final page revealing Booster's video testimonial - dropping his confident persona to admit that he needs help - is as final a note as they come. Telling as Harley's earlier testimonial, ending with "Bang, Bang. Bang. God..." may have seemed at the time.

The most tragic part of this story is that fans who begin searching for an explanation out of habit may not find one at all. Booster Gold was taken to Sanctuary out of concern for his mental health, like many of the other heroes being treated. And it may be his recent trauma, horrible enough to break any hero, that simply led to his violent break.

If comic book fans don't already know about Booster's recent nightmare trip through time, they should, before deciding what the future should hold for Booster Gold.

Page 2: Why Booster Gold is Losing His Sanity

Booster Lost His Mind Ruining Batman's Life

There's no real easy way to explain the mental trauma that Booster went through over the past year than to just state it, in all its science-fiction, time travel-y goodness. Back when Batman and Catwoman's wedding was approaching - before it all went sideways, and Catwoman left Batman at the altar - Booster decided that he should show his appreciation for the hero in the best way he knew how: warping reality.

Remembering the old Superman story-- err, memory of when he was shown the fantasy of what his life on Krypton could have been, but somehow knew his destiny was to become Superman, Booster had a brain wave. He would do the same for Batman, whose path to heroism was even more painful... but whose destiny in the cowl was even more important. To do it, he would need to keep Bruce Wayne's parents from being killed in his childhood. And in Batman #45, the mission went wrong immediately.

Going back in time and preventing their murder, Booster traveled forward along that resulting timeline to when Bruce Wayne was an adult. Unfortunately, the entire world was basically tearing itself apart, after the world's heroes - without their greatest hero, Batman - were wiped out, leaving villains to take over. After seeing Green Lantern get Joker toxin-ed and blow his brains out with his own power ring, things got worse when he informed this Bruce Wayne of how his life, and the world, should have turned out.

Bruce loved his parents more than the world, so he destroyed Booster's time travel technology. When Booster recruited Catwoman to help, she snapped and killed the Waynes anyway, leading Bruce to keep Booster a tortured prisoner for a full year.

Bruce Wayne's Suicide Finally Broke Booster

The year spent as a prisoner of Bruce Wayne's left Booster malnourished and on the edge of his sanity, proudly proclaiming to his A.I. sidekick Skeets that he had "almost lost his mind," but wasn't sure he had gotten it back. The mission only went back to normal when he agreed to take the future Bruce back to the night of his parents' death. The night of their first death.

But when the pair got into a fistfight on a Gotham rooftop (which led the Waynes to head down Crime Alley), Bruce missed his chance, lost himself in a hopeless rage, and shot himself in the head before Booster's already damaged eyes. Oh. immediately after killing the Booster Gold who originally time traveled to that very night to set the whole mission in motion, just for good measure. Booster made it back to the present... but sought out Batman and Catwoman to explain how it had all gone horribly wrong.

The closing panels left Booster unable to clear away Bruce's blood, even after it had been washed clean - and both Bruce and Selina realizing that the trauma had left Booster in serious distress. Escorted to Sanctuary off the page, fans had hoped Booster would get treatment to help him deal with his harrowing guilt, torture, isolation, imprisonment, and witnessing more than one suicide. Fans hoped too much, but Heroes in Crisis picked a fitting patient as its poster boy.

Heroes in Crisis #1 is available now from DC Comics.