Most of the time, comic book heroes have the luxury of avoiding the ravages of time. However, both DC and Marvel have taken journeys into dark, alternative realities that exam what would happen if superheroes ever got old. Each publisher took one of the more staple heroes and pushed them to areas not explored in the main titles. DC's Batman and Marvel's Spider-Man became old men who had stopped being the superheroes that defined them. In their absences, their respective worlds kind of fell apart.
First published in 1987, DC's Batman: Dark Knight Returns was a four-issue mini-series. Created by Frank Miller, Klaus Janson, Lynn Varley and John Costanza, the miniseries famously shows an older Bruce Wayne who has given up being Batman. Though he is still the wealthy and single Bruce Wayne, Batman has been missing in action for a decade following the death of Jason Todd -- the second sidekick to be named Robin. Bruce goes through the motions of life, chatting with people who knew that he was once the caped crusader. All the while, he feels the bat creature stirring inside of him to be free as a new crimewave calls him back into action.
Marvel's Spider-Man: Reign, also a four-issue miniseries, was published in 2006 and has a similar feel to The Dark Knight Returns. Created by Kaare Andrews and Jose Villarrubia, the story finds a sad and elderly Peter Parker who has buried Spider-Man in the past. Peter Parker's New York has become ruled by an authoritarian government and police force that has removed freedoms from its citizens for the supposed sake of safety. The police, called Reign, are as brutal and violent as any of Spider-Man's former foes.
Peter Parker is a broken man, riddled with feelings of guilt. He lost his beloved Mary Jane and when she died, he put his Spider-Man costume in the grave with her because he felt he always picked being a hero over being there for her. Though Peter is bothered by the violence and abuses of power he sees on a daily basis, he keeps his instinct to fight muffled.
An elderly J. Jonah Jameson, Parker's old boss and editor of the newspaper The Daily Bugle, finds Peter and gives him one of his old Spider-Man masks. The call to action becomes too great then. Putting on the Spider-Man mask makes Peter feel alive and himself again. He jokes like the old Spidey while taking on the bad guys. It is as if the weight of age is suddenly lifted from him.
Peter comes face to face with literal and figurative demons from his past. Including fighting old enemies like an aged Kraven the Hunter and Dr. Octopus. During the fight he sees Mary Jane again, giving him a chance to confront his guilt and move past it. Though the various battles injure him and people see he is just an old man behind the mask, he is a hero again and doing what he should have been doing for years.
Both series drive home the fact that both heroes are human. They make mistakes, they age, and they have similar limitations to regular people. It is only when they stop doing good that their heroic efforts are really seen. New York City and Gotham fall apart without a guiding force of good. The cities fall under the sway of bad people who want to exploit for their personal gain.
After the aged heroes start to act again, more people follow suit. People are no longer afraid to fight against their abusers. It shows that the acts of one person can drastically make a difference. Even though both cities seemed to be at their darkest points, Batman and Spider-Man were able to bring a wave of light back into their worlds.
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