How Did Ice Come Back From the Dead?

In Death is not the End, we spotlight the outlandish explanations for comic book characters (mostly super-villains) surviving seeming certain death. Today, we see how Ice from the Justice League came out of the cold, as it were.

While there had been an Icemaiden in the Global Guardians in an issue of Infinity, Inc., Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis did not know that she had been given a name already, so when they came up with their own name for Icemaiden, they inadvertently created a brand-new character instead.

Paired with her best friend, Green Flame, Ice Maiden joined the Justice League after the Global Guardians went under. Soon, the two began referring to themselves as Fire and Ice and they got new costumes and became stalwart members of the Justice League...

After the death of Superman, she left the team and went back home, where she had grown up as an ice goddess. Her brother went evil, though, and the Justice League had to help Ice in Justice League America #84 (by Dan Vado, Kevin West and Ken Branch). She got a new costume at that point...

The best thing about Ice was just how SWEET she was. Mark Waid wrote an excellent story in Justice League Quarterly #5 (art by Mike McKone and Andrew Pepoy) where Ice feels that she just isn't cut out for this superheroing business and plans to quit. Martian Manhunter tries to convince her to stay since she was the "heart" of the team, but she seems determined to leave...

However, the League then got caught up in a plot involving the evil Professor Ivo, who is sick of being disformed, so he kidnaps the most powerful superheroes in the world and steals their powers to try to kill himself. It doesn't work (as he is immortal as well as disformed). Ice, though, happened to have Guy Gardner's Green Lantern ring at the time and she wished that Ivo could be cured of his immmortality/deformity and it WORKED! Being the "heart" of the Justice League was enough...

Super sweet story, right? The problem was that Waid realized that if she was the heart of the team, one the biggest disruptions to the team, then, would be to remove the heart of the team!

In the crossover "Judgement Day," the evil alien known as the Overmaster tries to take over the Earth. He gives some of his powers to Ice, turning her evil in the process, as seen in this bit from Justice League America #90 (by Dan Vado, Marc Campos and Ken Branch)...

In Justice League Task Force #14 (by Mark Waid, Sal Velluto and Jeff Albrecht), though, the Martian Manhunter is able to break her free from the Overmaster's control...

She then heroically leads the heroes against the Overmaster..

Only for him to then kill her...

Years later, on Gail Simone's Women in Refrigerators site, Mark Waid admitted, “I’m responsible for the death of Ice. My call, my worst mistake in comics, my biggest regret. I remember hearing myself ask the editor, ‘Who’s the JLA-er whose death would evoke the most fierce gut reaction from readers?’ What a dope. Mea culpa.”

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She remained dead for over a decade. Her return was a true shock, as it happened at the end of an issue of Birds of Prey.

Birds of Prey #104 (by Gail Simone, Nicola Scott and Doug Hazlewood) saw the team agree to go on a mission for the new Spy-Smasher. They interrupt this old Russian general, who has plans for some sort of grand future involving a Rocket Red suit...

The Birds of Prey steal the suit. They are being pursued by the Secret Six, who had been hired by the general for protection. While on the run, the Birds of Prey open the suit and discover a living Ice inside of it!

It turns out that the general had used sorcery (using the blood of descendants of Rasputin) to resurrect Ice. He then kept her in the Rocket Red suit as a sort of life support because she came back essentially in a coma...