WARNING: This article contains major spoilers for Heroes In Crisis #1 by Tom King, Clay Mann, Tomeu Morey and Clayton Cowles, on sale now.


In the weeks and months ahead, there will be plenty of articles speculating about the identity of the Sanctuary killer, the unknown guest of a trauma facility for superheroes who murdered most of the other patients as well as the caretakers. This feature isn't that, and I won't be naming a suspect here (though I have a few ideas). Rather, it starts from two questions about Heroes In Crisis' story itself, and seeks to compile the main clues -- as well as several scenes that could be clues -- to take a different tack on who the killer might be.

The first question is, is Tom King the sort of writer who would structure a story such that, if a reader could piece together the clues in just the right way, it would be possible to solve the mystery after the first issue?

And then there's the second question: Is Heroes in Crisis even that kind of mystery?

The questions are interrelated. Heroes in Crisis has been described as a mass shooting in the superhero community, and the first issue is very much structured to reveal information in drips and drabs, with a lot of uncertainty, as is the case with news reports in an active shooter situation. Taken in this context, HiC is not properly a mystery at all, but rather something more like a procedural. The suspect will eventually be brought to justice, but his or her identity is beside the point.

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But as a piece of serialized narrative fiction, what everybody's asking is, Who killed Sanctuary's patients? And this question is foregrounded at the end of the issue, when Harley Quinn and Booster Gold accuse each other of the crime.

If this is a mystery, it seems possible that King put all the clues here in issue #1, if only we can see them from the right perspective.

So what do we have?

"Yeah, there's going to be a fight."

The first scene takes place in a diner in Gordon, Nebraska. Booster Gold sits down to have a cup of coffee, as the waitress remarks they "don't get too many super heroes here." Then, surprise! Along comes Harley Quinn, peering in the window before making her way inside.

There are a number of strange things about this scene. The first and most palpable is how slowly and casually it unfolds, both for the restaurant staff and the heroes. There is tension, but no urgency. If, as we learn later, Booster and Harley each believe the other has just committed mass murder, how do they feel comfortable enough to sit down next to each other for a bite to eat? And why are the folks in the restaurant utterly unconcerned about the fight that is now pretty much guaranteed to happen?

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The most likely explanation for Booster and Harley's truce, especially given their interactions later in the issue, is that they have formed some sort of close relationship at Sanctuary. Not necessarily romantic, but a bond deep enough where each might see themselves as a lifeline for the other.

And the restaurant? Despite the waitress's opening line, it seems to be part of Sanctuary. There's a "Robin-1" license plate above the bathroom door, the name of the town -- Gordon -- can be seen to once again reference Gotham's familiar faces. The man's newspaper headline is cut off, but it might say "Perry," which would be another nod to someone close to the trio of heroes responsible for establishing Sanctuary.

If the restaurant is part of Sanctuary, that provides another reason for Harley and Booster to be here -- each fears the other is going to finish the job by killing the restaurant staff, as well.

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Poor Blue Jay

Blue Jay is the first victim we see, his tiny body being eaten by crows. The diminutive hero's most recent appearances were in the latest Justice League of America series, where he had teamed up with Ray Palmer, the former Atom, in the microverse.

He is one of several characters -- including Booster, Harley, and several of the victims -- to receive a sort of "intake video" page, explaining his reasons for seeking Sanctuary. Blue Jay reveals that he's lost control of his shrinking powers, and will wake up "drowning in my own bed." Blue Jay views this as a reaction to the death of his teammate Silver Sorceress, killed by "that arrow," which in his telling happened about a month ago. Interestingly, the events referenced happened way back in Justice League Europe #35, in 1992. The disparity is most likely down to a Rebirth continuity reshuffle, but drawing readers' attention to the story may hold significance as its major players were Max Lord and Dreamslayer.

If shrinking is a post-traumatic stress reaction, it makes sense that Blue Jay died small. But what does this have to say about how he was killed? Presumably the birds didn't get to him until after.

"A Bit Scathed"

How close attention should we pay to the particular words Harley says to Booster? There isn't a lot that jumps out as a firm clue, but there are a few turns of phrase that have the potential to be significant -- especially if we're working on the premise that all the clues are here, however obscure.

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After quoting Freud, Harley paraphrases him, saying that she has "conjured the most evil demon" and is now "a bit scathed." This leads immediately to her attacking Booster with a knife. Harley can certainly be said to "have her demons" in the vague, cliched sense, but that's not exactly what she says here. She says she has conjured the most evil demon. "Conjured" suggests agency -- Harley did something. "Most evil" would be someone or something outstripping all the others, even the Joker; who could that be?

Also, if Harley believes that Booster committed the attack, why does she talk about being "a bit scathed?" What is her role in this, and what does she expect from Booster in telling him this? Telling him this right before attacking him?

Harley has all sorts of interesting things to say, and some/much of it may be nonsense. But not all. While fighting Booster, Harley sings a few modified nursery rhymes, any one of which could reveal something about the assault on Sanctuary. First is "Old McBooster Had a Farm," where the farm is clearly Sanctuary. But what are we to make of "had?" Or that he also "had a Harley?" She could simply be saying they were both at Sanctuary, but now Harley's giving him a "stab stab here." But there's more!

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Next comes "Little Boy Gold, Come Blow Your Horn." Harley sings that "the goat's in the corn," then asks "but where is the boy who looks after the goat?" directly implicating Booster. If Booster is "the boy who looks after the goat," Harley seems to be saying that Booster had a responsibility to the guests at Sanctuary. There may be additional significance to "the goat" itself, as well. What was Booster's role at Sanctuary prior to the attack?

In her final song, Harley sings that Booster is about to die "all cause his friends said 'trust us.'"

If Harley is the Sanctuary killer -- as Booster believes -- this makes perfect sense. Booster thought he was safe because Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman said he would be; but Harley has betrayed them all, and now he will die. But Harley believes Booster is the killer, or at least that he's responsible. So what is she saying here? There's something missing. In what way was Booster's trust misplaced? How did it lead to the massacre? Were the circumstances (such as Harley perceives them) such that it could not have happened in any other environment?

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The Victims

In addition to Blue Jay, confirmed victims are Hot Spot, Lagoon Boy, Captain Steel, an unknown Green Lantern (possibly Arisia?), Arsenal (Roy Harper) and The Flash (Wally West), plus some Sanctuary caretaker robots. But there are 13 bodies seen in Superman's aerial view, so it's likely more deaths will be revealed next issue.

What do we know about these victims?

Hot Spot dies with a tear in his eye; the images of his death hold particular power.

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Hot Spot, Lagoon Boy, Roy and Wally are all most closely associated with the Titans. Arsenal, Wally and Steel are all "legacy" heroes; it's possible that the as yet unidentified Green Lantern might fit this definition as well. Notably, Booster and Harley fit into neither of these camps.

Wally and Roy die inside the house -- that's the big two deaths, and it seems to have started with them, with the others fleeing into the fields. Three Sanctuary robots also "die" inside the house; more on this in a bit.

Interviews are shown for Hot Spot and Arsenal. Not every confirmed victim in this issue gets an interview, but is it significant that Wally's is not shown? As one of the lynchpins of Rebirth, there is reason to doubt the finality of his demise (though, as a second Flash, from a certain narrative point of view he is expendable). Is there an assailant whom he could only escape by using his powers to fake death?

Roy is clutching a Sanctuary badge in his left hand, presumably taken from the killer -- that suggests he was in very close proximity to the murderer when the attack began. This, plus the selection of other victims, heavily points toward someone with ties to the Titans.

The Puddlers

Above the bodies of Sanctuary robots resembling Ma and Pa Kent as well as a third robotic woman, the phrase "The Puddlers are All Dead" is scrawled on the wall. Wonder Woman tells us the word puddler refers to "those who work in iron" making weapons, and that they "remove impurities so the iron can be strong."

Who, then, are the puddlers?

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If the attack started in the house before spreading to the field, and the killer did not return to write the message, then the most straightforward explanation is that the caretakers are the puddlers -- they are the ones who should have "removed the impurities," healing the heroes so they could once again be strong. But the "all" suggests something larger in scale, and blood-messages on walls are a bit dramatic for robots, however wholesome.

Are the puddlers, then, Wally and Roy? They've both recently been recognized as equals to or surpassing their mentors -- boiling down the essence of a speedster or archer to its purest form. Or, alternately, they and the other young and legacy heroes could be seen as providing a fresh, youthful optimism that kept their predecessors' darkness at bay -- but which traumatized them to the degree they sought peace at Sanctuary.

Or are the patients the "impurities?" Does the wall writer, then, believe those who should have removed them are dead, leaving the job to him, her, or them? Does the writer know who killed the residents of Sanctuary, and has already dealt with those responsible? Under that scenario, it's entirely conceivable Booster or Harley could have written the message -- Booster being the more likely -- while being innocent of the crime.

The reference to iron is particularly notable considering DC's recent fixation on metal, the mythology of which had seen Earth pulled into the Dark Multiverse and which continues to influence ongoing story arcs in the twenty or so Justice League books. At a glance, Heroes in Crisis does not seem to fit the pattern of those stories, which have turned a good deal of attention on fracturing of the Source Wall and its aftermath, but it's an unusual coincidence and can't be written off completely.

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Unreliable Narrators

It all wraps up in another quiet moment between Booster and Harley.

"I saw you," Booster says, "hurting us… killing us…"

"I saw you… with all.. with my…" With all my what, though? Booster trails off. Friends? None of the victims we've seen so far are people Booster was close with. What did Harley have, or what was she near, that is connected to Booster? Are the "all" and "my" part of the same sentence, or two different sentences? "With all that blood, with my time sphere" is one (very speculative) way to fill in the blanks.

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Booster then says he "stupidly ran" from Harley. Why "stupidly?" And more to the point, where was he coming from? Where did Booster enter the scene, from his perspective? It's easy enough to imagine him coming upon Harley, who, in her version of the story, is trying to help the victims, and mistaking her for the attacker -- this is something we've seen countless times both in fiction and real-life events. But what was he doing immediately prior?

Because, if both Booster and Harley are telling the truth -- I think we need to assume they are -- Harley's version is harder to reconcile. Booster comes upon a scene where Harley is doing something, he thinks she's killing the people of Sanctuary, and he runs away. But Harley says that Booster is the one who killed them -- which would have had to have happened first. So what did Harley see, and what was Booster doing before seeing Harley?

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There are a couple of deep-cut explanations -- a far-future Booster Gold turned heel in 1996's Justice League America annual, for example -- but a solution that relies on time travel hardly seems satisfying, especially since part of what landed Wally West at Sanctuary was the timestream closing off and making it impossible to rescue his kids. And there are a few scenarios in which Harley, too, could be mistaken about what she saw, or she may otherwise not have the full picture. Nevertheless, it is possible Harley holds Booster accountable for the deaths at Sanctuary without meaning he literally pulled the trigger -- which leaves us to wonder, in what other ways could Booster be directly responsible for the killings?

World's Greatest Detective

It's been a couple thousand words, so let's recall the starting point of this investigation. Is it possible, given only what we see in the first issue, to deduce the identity of the Sanctuary killer in Heroes in Crisis? Perhaps not. But many of the best mysteries frontload a ton of subtle clues, so that when the turn comes, there's that a-ha moment that sends a reader back to the beginning of the story to see how it all fits beautifully together. And Heroes in Crisis #1 is deceptively dense with information. It's possible that some of the clues above are nothing of the sort, and it's very likely there are items of grave import we've missed.

So what's your theory?