All-Out War

Our Worlds at War rages on as heroes start to die off at an alarming rate, including a devastating loss to Wonder Woman this month.

Superman #172

Superman lands in the devastated city of Topeka, Kansas, where the damaged population sign now reads zero.  There he finds a drone of Imperiex smoldering in a crater.  Superman fights the Imperiex probe, shattering its armor with heat vision and cold breath.  It blows up in a flash of light so blinding even the Man of Steel loses his sight.  Supergirl, who was already at the scene in her own series, finds Superman and accompanies him to the remains of the Kent farm in Smallville.  Supergirl tries to reassure him that his parents could still be alive, but they're presumed dead for now.  Superman gets a telepathic distress call from the Martian Manhunter that the JLA needs him, and he flies off to his next battle.

This issue is accompanied by Lincoln's Gettysburg Address as the narration.

In JLA: Our Words at War #1, Imperiex probes are attacking all over the world.  Superman rescues an injured Wonder Woman and takes the unconscious Diana in her armor back to her mother.  An Imperiex probe impales Guy Gardner, perhaps putting the ill-conceived "Warrior" version of this character out of his misery.  Saving Atlantis from Imperiex, Aquaman vanishes in a flash that leaves a hole in the ocean like DeMille's The Ten Commandments!  This issue is accompanied by FDR's Pearl Harbor speech as narration.

In Young Justice #35, the teenage heroes (including a de-aged Lobo) are assigned to the Paradocs unit to retrieve fallen heroes from the battlefield.

Adventures of Superman #594

In an eerie partially silent issue, Superman arrives at the JLA Watchtower on the moon to find that Luthor's secret weapon is Doomsday!  Manchester Black manipulated Doomsday to focus his hatred of Superman towards Imperiex instead, but he couldn't control the killing machine, and Doomsday wipes out the new Suicide Squad.  We learn that since Steel disappeared, he was coerced into the new Squad, where he was fatally wounded by Doomsday.  Superman fights alongside Doomsday, and they encounter the real Imperiex in space.  With one blast, Imperiex disintegrates Doomsday to bones, and sends Superman flying into space, where he falls at the feet of Darkseid on Apokolips.

In Nightwing: Our Worlds at War #1, Oracle discovered a futuristic virus started attacking the world at the same time that Imperiex invaded, and now she's on the run from mysterious assassins.  With help from S.T.A.R. Labs, Nightwing and Oracle have a time-travelling adventure on the run in a classic 40's getaway car. 

Superman: The Man of Steel #116

Superman pleads with the Black Racer not to take Steel's soul, but death is inevitable.  At the JLA Watchtower, a dying Steel tries to contact Superman to warn him about something he just discovered in space, but an unseen woman teleports into the headquarters and blasts him with a killing blow.

Darkseid reveals he brought Superman to Apokolips for a purpose, and presents Superman with the Entropy Aegis, a new suit of armor forged from the shell of an Imperiex probe and enhanced by Apokoliptian technology.  In a cosmic saga, this is analogous to the Ultimate Nullifier, the only weapon in the galaxy that could defeat Galactus.  Superman battle tests the armor in a fight against Darkseid, but he refuses to wear it or work with the despot.  Superman races back to the JLA Watchtower, but Steel is already dead when he arrives.

The narration for this issue is "the Black Racer's Death Song", which seems like a cheat compared to the narrative devices in the previous issues, which had to carefully craft stories to coincide with existing speeches.

In JSA: Our Worlds at War #1, the Justice Society of America leads an attack on Imperiex's ship and amazingly suffers no losses.  Somehow Superboy also has his own separate adventure in Superboy #90, and Supergirl fights more Imperiex drones along with the Blackhawks in Supergirl #60.

In Wonder Woman #172, Diana's mother Queen Hippolyta takes her injured daughter's place in her armor and saves the planet from a world-destroying weapon falling to Earth, but she is tragically killed.  When she lands on the ground, Superman at first thinks Diana has fallen until Diana rushes to the scene, and her mother dies in her arms.  Hippolyta's death was so big, it happened in two issues in the same week.  This was frustrating for collectors who argued over which book was her "real" death.

Far from the war, the Amazons on Themyscira reminisce about the convoluted life and legacy of their queen before they receive word of her passing in Wonder Woman: Our Worlds at War #1.  In this period, Hippolyta had been retconned as the Golden Age Wonder Woman.

Action Comics #781

While Queen Hippolyta was saving the world in the sky, President Luthor's cabinet defends the White House on the ground.  Lois watches at Luthor's side while her father Major Lane fights against Imperiex in a tank.  Lois begs Superman to help, desperately hoping he can hear her like a prayer.  A shocked Lois watches her father die in battle and Lex consoles her while she wonders why Superman didn't come in time.  With no time to recover from Hippolyta's horrific death, Superman rushes to Washington and apologizes for not being able to save Lois' father.  Superman volunteers to do whatever it takes to help President Luthor win the war.

Far from the chaos of the war, an alien refugee crashes and finds himself in Gotham City in Batman #593.  This story line is really only a few pages of the issue, and you would barely know it was a tie-in.

Several more sacrificial deaths are still ahead in the concluding month, but a major death from this controversial crossover would already be un-done next month, followed by even more reversals in the coming months.