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comics - Who has been dead (and gotten better) the longest?



In super hero comics it's not unknown for a someone to die, then a few issues later get better.


But who holds the record for being dead for the longest time (real world time) and coming back?



Answer



There may be a longer one, especially amongst the golden age heroes (specifically DC's, as I'm not as up to speed on them). I would say it is probably


James "Bucky" Barnes, 40 years, 10 months: revealed as dead in Avengers #4 (March 1964); revealed as alive in Captain America v5 #1 (January 2005)


Granted, it was retconned so that he never actually died in the first place, but I don't think that should discredit this. For all intents and purposes, he was dead as dead and intended to stay dead until Ed Brubaker had a story idea. His death was considered so permanent that he was one of three characters included in a popular phrase about comic book death:



A common expression regarding comic book death was once "The only people who stay dead in comics, are Bucky, Jason Todd, and Uncle Ben." referring to the seminal importance of those character's deaths to Captain America, Batman, and Spider-Man respectively. However, after the former two were brought back in 2005, the phrase was changed to only recognize Uncle Ben.



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