Hawkman's immortality has been something he's dealt with his entire continuity - but how will he deal with losing it? In the upcoming issue of HAWKMAN #28 out October 13th, the hero's reincarnation cycle will break. Spoilers ahead for everything that has been leading up to this happening.
Robert Venditti's run of Hawkman is one fans should not miss out on. From start to finish, it has been packed full of fun surprises and shocking reveals. Early on, we learn that there is more to Hawkman's past lives and begin a crazy journey that unlocks a lot of new information, also giving a reason to why the hero keeps having dreams of things called Deathbringers. New information such as being a Kryptonian once who was actually a teacher to Supergirl. Or that he was a hero of the Microverse named Avion, which leads to a funny interaction between Hawkman and The Atom about how that technically means Carter found the Microverse, not The Atom. The series is filled with other fun things like that but also answeres some important questions regarding Hawkman's past and the reasoning of him reincarnating.
Hawkman finds out the origins of his reincarnation cycle was when he was known as Ktar. Ktar was a general of a murderous army called the Deathbringers. The Deathbringers killed countless innocent people, and when Ktar tries to right the wrong, he's killed. A mysterious red-haired woman we come to find out is none other than Hawkwoman makes it to where Ktar will keep living until he has saved as many as he has killed. Hawkwoman also unknowingly linked herself to this curse, not being able to die herself until Hawkman fulfills it.
Currently, in this series, Hawkman and Hawkwoman are fighting the very reason Ktar killed for, The Lord Beyond The Void, a God that the Deathbringer's worshiped and gave their kills to as offerings. The last issue out was #25 with #26 coming August 12th and #27 out September 8th, so we'll have to wait to see how DC's description in their preview for #28 pans out.
"What was once a gift now becomes a curse! With the reincarnation cycle finally broken, Hawkman finds himself fearful that every fight could be his last—and Hawkwoman's patience for his caution wears thin. But they'll need all their wits and courage about them, because their age-old enemy Hath-Set is out for blood!"
Venditti has been leading up to this point from the beginning of this series. The whole arc of the story is about why the reincarnation is happening in the first place, so it ultimately coming to an end shouldn't be a complete shock to readers of the series. In fact, it makes the whole series far more interesting as Carter gripes about the struggles of his reincarnating repeatedly, but now that it is coming to an end, it seems he is going to have a hard time with that too. As the quoted preview of the issue suggests, Carter is going to become what paranoid with the idea of a final death and. It is also not surprising that good ol' Vandal Savage ( Hath-Set ) is going to show up to take advantage of this after all these years.
This entire run from Venditti has brought a new attitude to the Hawkman title, and it seems like it is only going to get more interesting moving forward.