WARNING: The following contains spoilers for DCeased: Dead Planet #1 by Tom Taylor, Trevor Hairsine, Gigi Baldassini, Stefano Gaudiano, Rain Beredo and Saida Temofonte, on sale now.
The world of DCeased has already had to deal with world-ending situations, including the corruption of some very powerful figures into the Blighted-Ones. While that saw much of the human race and many of the DC Universe's most powerful heroes turned into ravenous Anti-Life virus zombies, the most horrifying prospect for the entire universe may only be growing.
As DCeased: Dead Planet #1 reaffirms, the corrupted DCeased version of Superman might be trying to achieve his Golden Superman form by absorbing the power of the sun, which could spell doom for his entire reality.
While heroes like Green Lantern, Nightwing, and Robin were turned in the initial wave of the Anti-Life Equation, Superman remained one of the most powerful and consistent heroes throughout the early days of the crisis. His speed, strength, and durability made him ideal for rounding up the infected Blighted-Ones and escorting them away from survivors without risking infection himself. He was a beacon, a genuine leader among the survivors. But when Flash was infected with the virus and soon started using his super-speed to spread it around the world at an accelerated rate, Superman was forced to kill his old friend. By standing in his way as he moved across the Earth, Superman ensured that Flash exploded in a cloud of gore and bone upon collision.
However, the impact was enough to break Superman's skin and infect him. Upon turning, Superman became the most dangerous entity on the planet in Taylor and Hairsine's DCeased #6. It took the combined might of the remaining heroes to contend with him. Even while wielding a giant sword, Superman was only wounded while infecting Wonder Woman. But he was prevented from wiping out the fleeing remnants of humanity -- first by his son, Jon and then an armada of Green Lanterns. Rather than risk losing its greatest asset, the Anti-Life Virus controlling the Blighted-Ones sent Superman into the heart of the Sun. There, the corrupted Kryptonian began absorbing the energy out of the star. Even five years later in DCeased: Dead Planet, Superman is still absorbing the energy. The Green Lanterns keep watch over him and have noticed that the sun grows colder every day.
The full potential of Superman in the core-DC Universe makes this plan by the Blighted-Superman a genuinely fearsome one. As revealed in Grant Morrison and Val Semieks's DC One Million, legends in the 853rd century reveal that Superman departed the Earth to explore the galaxy as the twenty-first century ended and the majority of his loved ones died. Eventually returning to Earth, he constructed a Fortress of Solitude in the center of the Sun. He spent 15,000 years within the star, absorbing its solar energy at an increased rate. His body turned gold and burned with excess energy, and his powers reached the point of being impossible to fully gauge. Reunited with his long-dead wife Lois Lane thanks to a new silver body, Golden Superman is hinted to be the ultimate form of the hero, where his powers know no limit.
That's what makes the possibility of Golden Superman becoming a Blighted-One so terrifying. All that power in the hands of a fully destructive and unleashed Superman would spell doom for the galaxy. It's unlikely that even the full might of the Green Lantern Corps wouldn't be enough to contend with a corrupted Golden Superman, even if he only spent a fraction of that time in the Sun. A corrupted Golden Superman couldn't be stopped and could easily spread the Anti-Life Virus across the entire rest of the galaxy. The remaining heroes of the DC Universe need to discover a plan to contend with this Blighted-Superman before he becomes a true threat to everything that has ever existed in that reality.